Speaking protfolio( entry3)

Context of the conversation
Last Saturday I went to a Chinese restaurant with my partner. I met a kiwi guy in the restaurant, and his wife is the owner of that restaurant. We talked about the Chinese food, his trip in China, and my home town. We talked about 10minutes.

Cultural aspects or cultural differences noticed
This gentleman is around 40-year-old, and he loves Chinese food and China. He is very kind to us and keen to talk with us. We have a relaxed and informed conversation. One cultural difference that I found is that this kiwi gentleman strongly expressed his love to his wife. However, in my country most of people are shy to express the feeling in public, and it is kind of tabu to express love in front of people. If someone did express the love, the others may consider this guy is boldness, and immature.

Beginning and ending of conversation
This conversation began when we got into the restaurant and after giving the order. This gentleman sit around the table beside us, and started with ”Hello, how are you? The Chinese food is fantastic, is it?” I replied back, “fine, thanks. Yes, it is, I really love to eat our food”.

Our conversation end when we begin to eat our dinner. I said ,” someday when you come to our home town, come to taste our hometown food. It is on my treat then.” He said to me,” thanks, that is lovely.”

Vocabulary features noticed
In this conversation he used the “um” “well” “I hope so”. He always nod and said “yes”, when he has the same opinion with me. Such as, we talked about our home town. We have a SHAOLIN temple which is famous for Kongfu. He knew that place and say “yes, yes, the Kongfu temple. He used “that’s pretty good.”” That’s great.” A lot in the conversation.

 
Strategy used

Because he lives with his wife which is Chinese, so he knows English is our second language, and he use the simple word for us to understand. if some words I did not understand, I said,” sorry, what that word mean?” he is nice and repeat and explain to us. Sometimes it is hard to describe our county food in English. I use body language to describe to him.

 Conversation Flow
He is very nice gay. When we are talking, he slows the speed down and makes me understand easily. We had eye contact when we were speaking, and he is exciting to talk about China. We use quiet a lot body language and gesture to encourage the conversation. Such as nodding. He used a lot words to encourage the conversation, such as “yes”, “that’s great.”.

I used some phrases to flow the conversation well , such as “is it?”. Also, I show a lot interest in what he talked about. He uses  “yes” to keep the conversation flow, and also encourage me to talk.

 

Vocabulary used
During the conversation, I used a lot adj to describe our country. Such as, fantastic taste. Otherwise, I keep the sentence simple. I used a lot “well” “um” to keep the conversation flow, and shows to others that I did not finish this sentence.  It is fillers and hesitation devices during the conversation. Also, I used the fillers such as “I mean” “you Know” “I guess” to help me to speak my opinion. Sometimes, when I unsure about the word, I used “you know” to make the conversation flow.

Linguistic Features
When I talked, it took me longer time to think about the grammar, so I speak slower. Sometimes, I still have the grammar mistake. When I was speaking, I searched the right word for the content, and sometimes I could not find the right word, so it might confuse the others. Also, my pronunciation is not good sometimes, and I could not pronounce very clearly.

In the further study, I need to extend my vocabulary and also I need to focus on my grammar and pronunciation.