Anyone from Ukraine willing to answer some interview questions?

[thelonster]

I am a Junior in college from Ohio and one of my assignments it to interview someone from Ukraine. I have attached the questions. If anyone would like to lend some help, it would be appreciated.

Please feel free to email me at lonni@hayslett.com.

Thanks!
Lonni Hayslett

[stepanstas]

Well in my opinion, you should have posted the questions istead of attaching them, so here they are for everybody

Cultural Interview
1. Not ment for questioning
2. How do people greet each other √ (shake hands, bow, embrace, other)?
3. As a visitor to the country, would you exchange gifts at the first meeting? What gifts are considered appropriate? If flowers, what kind? (Some have special meanings.)
4. How are children educated? At what age do they begin school? Do boys and girls generally go to separate schools, or are they separated by sex in the same school? Do they usually wear uniforms?
5. Not ment for questioning
6. How is garbage collection dealt with?
7. What is the normal dress for men and women?
8. What foods, if any, are generally not eaten or possibly considered taboo?
9. Are there gestures or movements that would not be acceptable in polite society?
10. Is it acceptable to bargain for goods at department stores or at markets?
11. How do people spend their leisure time? What kinds of leisure activities do they participate in?
12. What are normal work hours? Are most stores open on weekends? What days might they be closed?
13. What are the important holidays? Are there special observances of these holidays?
14. Where and how do people get married? What is the average marriage age? Is it acceptable not to get married? What is the attitude toward divorce?
15. What is the national language of the country? Are other languages spoken?
16. What is the principal religion(s) of the country? What are the basic beliefs or doctrines of these religions?
17. Who are (or were) the major artists and writers?
18. What kind of music is popular at this time? Who is the major pop star or movie star at the present time?


I would also like to say that you are looking for the easy way out. You have registered to only post one post and have not even taken the time to edit your question and/or post them. And i for one will only email you to tell you to check on this post, instead of chewing this site up, then spitting it out. I will reply with my answers.

Also, i suggest that all of you will do the same. Do not email him with answers.

[stepanstas]

2. Usually you say hello and shake hands. To women/girls you would ussually kiss there hand if you really want to act well raised, polite, etc, but of course you would not do that to any person you meet on the street. To female friends a kiss on the cheek is alright.
3. Well the visitor ussually brings something although not required. Flowers are given a lot. I think that a few sunflowers are popular.
4. In Europe education is ussually the same in all school in each country. I belive you start at age 5. Ussually nobody is seperated and uniforms are worn in sertain schools.
6. I havent been in Ukraine for a while, but when i was there, i would take my garbage up a small hill where large metal bin were located.
7. Havent been in Ukraine for a while, but causual pants are worn a lot by men. Dresses/skirts are worn by women a lot. People are usually dressed casually
8. Not sure
9. Other then common sence gestures, i dont know any.
10. Department stores, not really, no. Markets, definatly, also, food tasting is ussually done(at markets).
11. Once again, havent been there in a while, but people go out a lot if they are young. A lot of places to see there.
12. Havent been there in a while and never worked there, so i dont know.
13. Independace Day, Christmas, etc. (Sorry that i cant help more with this)
14. Dont know because i was too young when i was there and still kindof am, but divorse i know is not really appropriate that much.
15. Ukrainian is the national language. russian is spoken along with others. Seriously, this is not a question that you should ask people. This is a factual question.
16. I know that in the West is Greek-Orthadox people people there wanted to seperate from the other nations who were taking over their's a while ago.
17. Taras Shevchenko, and others. Another factual question. Research it.
18. Techno, Pop, i dont really know because all the song i heard tend to have their own catagory. Its mixed a lot. Ruslana is very popular. Listen to one of her songs. http://www.ruslana.com.ua/mp3/Ruslan...Znayu%20ya.mp3 and visit her site if you like it http://www.ruslana.com.ua
Watch her winning video in 2004 eurovison contest (half eng): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48XfMRxp6IM

Seriously. You are looking for an easy way out of homework. Research Ukraine. Its a great country. I hope you will mention that.

[thelonster]

Originally Posted by stepanstas

Seriously. You are looking for an easy way out of homework. Research Ukraine. Its a great country. I hope you will mention that.

The funny thing is, as I explained in my original post, the assignment is to interview someone from Ukraine. Believe me, it would be easier for me to research this information and just write a paper on it. It wasn't easy trying to find someone from Ukraine to talk to. I'm sorry you don't like my method, but I didn't make the assignment. I just trying to do the work to get the grade.

[stepanstas]

If those were interview questions in the sence that we answer them, why are numbers 1 and 5 not for us?

[thelonster]

1. Identify the culture and/or country of origin for the interviewee. Include how you met the person.

5. What is the literacy rate for the country? The interviewee may not know the answer to this question, but you can find this information by looking at CountryWatch.com database available at Franklin University’s library Web site.

BECAUSE I was NOT trying to take the easy way out, these are questions that I could answer so I was going to.

I think YOU should get your facts straight before you go accusing me of something that is so far from the truth.

[thelonster]

I do appreciate your help but to be honest you're not being fair. Yes I did come to the website to get questions answered for my assignment but you don't know what I would have done next. I have been reading through post but could not reply because I was waiting for my access to go through.

How do you think I feel now?? After the first thing I post I start getting yelled at and told that I'm lazy. Do you think anyone would want to spend their free time talking to someone that is going to stereotype them before they even find the truth?

Maybe I would put in my paper that Ukraine is a great place, but this is not one of the experiences that I will put as a positive one. As a matter of fact, I might say the oposite.

The class I'm taking is about culture. We spend a lot of time reading scenarios and analyze what went wrong. In most of them, there was a problem with communication or someone jumped the gun and said or did something that they shouldn't have. This could be because the culture they were in finds what was said or did offensive or it was not a socially acceptable thing.

I'm sorry you feel that way you do about me and how I went about getting my assignment done. I, unfortunately, do not know anyone from Ukraine and I did want to get the answers from a Ukrainian. As you can see the assignment below states to interview someone from that country or from that region. I sit next to someone from Austria and could have interview him.

My point is, I did not take the easy way out and as far as signing up for this forum just for this assignment, maybe you'll find out, maybe you wont. It depends on how I am treated in the future. I do not like to talk to people that go on the offinsive and say things as if they are trying to attack me for something I did or said that is unjustified.

Assignment 2-5
Cultural Interview
80 points

Purpose

To assess your ability to:

• Conduct an interview of a person who is not originally from the United States

• Formulate questions for a cultural interview

• Reflect on a cultural interview

• create a synopsis of an interview conducted with a person who emigrated to the U.S.

L3 Traits


Action Items

• Choose an Interviewee: Select a person from your assigned country or region of the world to interview. This person can be someone you know from your neighborhood, from class, or from your workplace. The person can be from your assigned country, or alternatively, can be from the region of the world where your assigned country is located. It is important that you get started early in finding a person to interview. Other resources you may employ could include: local hospitals, HR offices of large companies, ethnic organizations in your locale or at large universities, churches, genuine ethnic restaurants, i.e. not Taco Bell. Volunteers from Franklin's English as a Second Language class are also available by contacting the course manager of Global Cultures, but the listing may not include every region of the world. Please do not contact Franklin's international student office. Because of privacy issues, they are not permitted to give out student information.

• Prepare for the Interview: Use the list of questions for your interview. Note that two questions of your choice are to be added to the interview. Make sure that you have these questions defined before you conduct the interview.

• Conduct the Interview: Your first choice should be a face-to-face interview, but having a phone or e-mail conversation is also satisfactory. You may feel a bit nervous when approaching a person from another culture to ask them about doing the interview. You should explain about the school you are from and that the interview is part of an assignment you must complete for this course. Assure the prospective interviewee that you will be sharing cultural information with your professor and class, not their personal information. When you begin the interview, please introduce yourself and give a little information about yourself in order to find a comfort level of interaction with your interviewee. Using his or her correct name, pronouncing it as carefully as you can, is also important.

• Summarize the responses: Write responses to the questions based on the answers you received.

• Summarize the Interview: Then, write a synopsis of the information you gained.

• Reflect on the Interview: Append a paragraph to your synopsis in which you reflect on the interview. What did you think of the experience? What surprised you about any of the answers you received? Thinking back on the interview, what other questions would you have asked if you'd had more time? What preconceived ideas did you have about the interview or the responses from your interviewee? How were these ideas challenged by the interview itself?