S2E26: Seattle Colleges Conversations with! International Student Lindokuhle Ngobese of Eswatini

In this our twenty-sixth (26th) episode of Season 2, Seattle Colleges host Evan Franulovich interviews international student Lindokuhle Ngobese of Eswatini (Swaziland) about his experience here at Seattle Colleges and about life in the United States. 

1:19 - Meet Lindo

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Transcript

Evan Franulovich  0:05  
Welcome to Seattle Colleges International Programs and our show 'Conversations with!', where we talk to people that help you understand how you too, can be an international student in the United States and why Seattle Colleges should be your first choice. We'll talk to students and staff and agents and government folks, all kinds of people about what you can expect when you're getting ready to apply or travel here, what you'll experience while you're with us, and how it can all lead to an amazing life. Don't forget to check out the Seattle Colleges International Programs website at intl.seattlecolleges.edu where you can find a treasure trove of information about the school, the programs here and best of all, fill out and submit your application. Again, that's intl.seattlecolleges.edu.

Evan Franulovich  1:04  
Hey everybody! It's Evan Franulovich here with 'Conversations with!' Welcome back. Today we are at the South Seattle campus and I gotta tell you, I'm really excited about this interview because I've... this is the first person I've ever met from the country that he's from, so... Lindo, welcome to the show. I want you to... his name, I want you to introduce yourself because it's such a unique name and tell everybody what country you're from.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  1:35  
My name is Lindokuhle, I'm from Swaziland. Yeah, people call me Lindo over here because of the clicks.

Evan Franulovich  1:46  
Right. Now Swaziland, my understanding is that's old school. Now it's Eswatini, isn't it?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  1:52  
Oh, yeah. The king woke up and decided to change to Eswatini. So yeah, we are now called Eswatini. Last time it was Swaziland.

Evan Franulovich  2:02  
Okay. Do you personally have a preference or do you not care?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:07  
I don't really care.

Evan Franulovich  2:07  
It doesn't matter. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:08  
Doesn't matter.

Evan Franulovich  2:09  
All right. Well, you are a South student. It's nice to be able to speak to some students that are out here on this campus because, it's a little bit further away from the city. Do you live near the campus?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:22  
Not really. When I applied, I lived in the south. So when I applied, it's said South Seattle College. 

Evan Franulovich  2:30  
Right.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:33  
By default, I thought, 'Oh, well, my it might be near where I stay.' It's not. 

Evan Franulovich  2:39  
Yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:39  
I have to go downtown and then take the bus there, and it takes me about an hour and 15 minutes...

Evan Franulovich  2:48  
Okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:49  
... at most right. 

Evan Franulovich  2:52  
Do you live in a different city like Auburn or Kent? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:56  
No, I live in Seattle. 

Evan Franulovich  2:57  
You do live in Seattle. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  2:58  
South Seward Park. 

Evan Franulovich  3:00  
Right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:01  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  3:02  
Yeah. So the listeners you should know, even though the name of the school is South Seattle... 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:06  
It's Southwest.

Evan Franulovich  3:07  
its really kind of West. Southwest. So when you're looking for a place to stay, you look at the map pretty carefully.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:15  
Yeah, yeah. Definitely.

Evan Franulovich  3:17  
So you have an apartment. What do you got? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:19  
Oh, I live with family. 

Evan Franulovich  3:20  
Oh, you do? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:21  
Yeah. I live in family. My brother has a place over there. 

Evan Franulovich  3:25  
Okay.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:25  
So I stay with family.

Evan Franulovich  3:28  
Is your brother a student as well or? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:30  
He works over here. Married. 

Evan Franulovich  3:37  
Did he come and emigrate to the United States? Or is he just you're working or what's his status? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:42  
Oh, he's an American. 

Evan Franulovich  3:44  
Oh, he is. Okay.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:45  
He's a citizen. He officially became an American. 

Evan Franulovich  3:52  
Okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:52  
I think it was the fourth of July. 

Evan Franulovich  3:54  
Really? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:55  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  3:55  
That's pretty cool. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  3:56  
I think that's when they do like, the processing and stuff. They swear you're in and everything. 

Evan Franulovich  4:02  
Yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  4:03  
But he's been here for a while now. He came here for school, I think it was back in 2009-2010. Yeah, I think it was 2010. 

Evan Franulovich  4:16  
Right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  4:17  
And then he started here. Yeah, I think in 2010, and then he was in Minnesota. He went there for four years and then worked for probably two or three years and now he's now working at different jobs. 

Evan Franulovich  4:32  
Okay.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  4:32  
So he was, he went from that. The F1 visa to the green card process. Now American citizen.

Evan Franulovich  4:40  
So he went to University of Minnesota?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  4:43  
McAllister.

Evan Franulovich  4:44  
McAllister. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  4:49  
Decent school.

Evan Franulovich  4:50  
So it's interesting. He went to Minnesota. You're here in Seattle with him now. These are very northern areas, you know, Eswatini is pretty far south but it's pretty warm, right? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  5:02  
Yeah, It is.

Evan Franulovich  5:03  
So this must be kind of a change for you. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  5:06  
Huge change. 

Evan Franulovich  5:06  
Yeah. How's it going?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  5:10  
It's okay. Like I'm getting used to the place. 

Evan Franulovich  5:12  
Yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  5:12  
It's taken me longer than I expected. But yeah, definitely like getting used to the place. I kind of sort of went through the seasonal depression kind of thing. And it was new to me. 

Evan Franulovich  5:24  
That's good to know. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  5:25  
Yeah, it was new. You don't see the sun. I think it was around February or something. You only see the sunlight for a number of hours. So when you come out, it's dark. And when you go to classes, kind of dark. 

Evan Franulovich  5:40  
Sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  5:40  
So yeah, I went through that. And I was like, what's happening? I asked family around. They were like "We have supplements." It's normal for Africans, especially the southern part. 

Evan Franulovich  5:50  
Right, right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  5:51  
For you guys to go through this. 

Evan Franulovich  5:54  
Yeah. So there you go. Guys. If you come here, and you're from South Africa, or the southern part of Africa, maybe bring some supplements or get a happy light? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  6:04  
Yeah, I actually do have that.

Evan Franulovich  6:06  
Yeah, those are cool. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  6:07  
Yeah, I don't know. I kind of thought it wouldn't work, especially the happy lights.

Evan Franulovich  6:14  
Yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  6:15  
But then I used them. It helped me out. 

Evan Franulovich  6:17  
Right?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  6:18  
It got me through the season. 

Evan Franulovich  6:21  
I used to live in Alaska, which is way north. So imagine even more darkness. And January is pretty tough. But you know, you go outside as often as you can. And a lot of people have happy lights like you're talking about. Well, so you have the choice of a number of different places to go to school in the Seattle area. Why did you choose Seattle Colleges?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  6:45  
Ah, community college was kind of like the right thing for me to do. I kind of felt right, because it's definitely cheaper to go here than transferring to straight to the Udub. 

Evan Franulovich  7:02  
For sure.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:03  
And getting scholarships. It's kind of like hard if you haven't been in the country. So not unless you're going through those channels like, I don't know. 

Evan Franulovich  7:14  
Right, right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:15  
But then I already like went to school. And then I was trying to change my majors when I came here. 

Evan Franulovich  7:21  
Where did you go to school?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:24  
It's in *????* and I dont know if you know. Have you been to *????* in South Africa? 

Evan Franulovich  7:30  
I've only been over in the West. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:32  
You should go to Devon. 

Evan Franulovich  7:33  
I would like to yeah, yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:35  
So I'm assuming you've been to Cape Town. 

Evan Franulovich  7:38  
I've been to Cape Town. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:38  
Everyone goes there. 

Evan Franulovich  7:39  
Everyone's goes to Cape Town. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:41  
As interesting about Cape Town. 

Evan Franulovich  7:43  
Yeah.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:43  
Should I deviate? 

Evan Franulovich  7:44  
Sure. It's your Interview and do whatever you want. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  7:47  
Interesting fact about Cape Town. And I didn't see it. But my sister in law, an American. She went there and she didn't like Cape Town. Yeah, there's a huge gap between...

Evan Franulovich  8:05  
It's true. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:06  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  8:06  
Township people. People live in the nice neighborhoods. Is that what we're talking about?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:13  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  8:13  
Okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:13  
Yeah. If you go to the stores, like management, it's... 

Evan Franulovich  8:19  
Yeah.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:19  
And then...

Evan Franulovich  8:20  
It's not Johannesburg dangerous, though. It's a little bit more calm in Cape Town, I would say. Is that true? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:29  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  8:29  
Okay.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:30  
It's super chilled. Because the place isn't really South Africa. Like if you really want to have the experience of South Africa, and you also want to experience the beach and stuff. 

Evan Franulovich  8:43  
Right.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:43  
Go to Devon, where you have like a mix of like black people and white people, people of all races, like...

Evan Franulovich  8:49  
Sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  8:49  
Living all together with no like, real differences in the economic status, whatever. But yeah, you should go to Devon, I went to school there. 

Evan Franulovich  9:01  
Oh, you did? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:01  
Yeah. I went to school in Devon. I lived five years in South Africa. 

Evan Franulovich  9:05  
Okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:06  
Yeah, it's right there. 

Evan Franulovich  9:07  
Yeah, yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:08  
So I was doing chemical engineering then *?????*. I first I went to a state in Newcastle for two years. And then I moved to *?????* I did my diploma there and then, yeah.

Evan Franulovich  9:21  
So did most of your credits transfer? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:25  
No.

Evan Franulovich  9:26  
Really? I'm kind of interested. Nothing?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:29  
Which was the depressing part of it. I had to redo math, I had redo physics.

Evan Franulovich  9:38  
I'm guessing and this may be a dumb question, but you must have provided transcripts to them and they?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:44  
No, we don't recognize this. 

Evan Franulovich  9:46  
That's so sad. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:47  
Yeah, it is. And the fact that certain countries if you come from certain countries, irregardless of how good your English is, I'm not saying my English is that good.

Evan Franulovich  9:57  
It's pretty good. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  9:57  
Yeah, I still had to pay for that test, which they didn't really grade because they only graded the multiple choice questions they didn't really like to comprehend.

Evan Franulovich  10:07  
Which tests did you take the IELTS, TOEFL, the Duolingo?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  10:19  
I did the one here. 

Evan Franulovich  10:21  
When you arrived they did a...

Lindokuhle Ngobese  10:23  
Yeah, and I had to do a math test.

Evan Franulovich  10:29  
Yeah. Everybody does a math placement, I think. Even the domestic students have to do math placement tests. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  10:37  
Why do we have to do that? Why does the system require us to pay? Why are we paying for everything?

Evan Franulovich  10:42  
I don't know.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  10:43  
It's not okay.

Evan Franulovich  10:43  
Good question, guys. Listen to this. We can give some feedback to our administration about that. Yeah, I don't know. I wish I could tell you. The language part makes sense to me. What doesn't make sense, like South Africa is exempt. But I don't think Eswatini is, which doesn't make any sense to me. Since English is one of your official languages.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  11:04  
I think the only country that's exempt is Kenya, if I'm not mistaken. 

Evan Franulovich  11:10  
Well, South Africa also. So if you went to like a high school in South Africa, you should be able to show, you know which classes you took in your high school... 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  11:19  
Really?

Evan Franulovich  11:20  
... and it should get you out of that English.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  11:21  
But then I, but then I did my college in South Africa.

Evan Franulovich  11:28  
Yeah, you did college in South Africa. Where do you do High School?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  11:31  
in Swaziland? 

Evan Franulovich  11:32  
Yeah, I think that might be the problem. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  11:34  
We better than... and I think South Africa when it comes to English. 

Evan Franulovich  11:37  
Right? Yeah, I know. I was in Ghana recently and Nigeria. And they're like, Why do you have to take this test? Because we are an English speaking country? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  11:48  
Yeah, it's an official language. 

Evan Franulovich  11:50  
I don't make the rules. But I've encouraged. I sent an email after I got back from West Africa. And I was like "Hey, guys, come on, we had to reassess the languages or the countries." So we'll see what happens.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  12:02  
We don't have to pay for them. I feel like we still going to pay like a hefty fee for the like modules. We pay like, twice what locals pay for them. Anyways. It's not a political interview.

Evan Franulovich  12:16  
Well, it's good. It's really good information. I do this show, so we can talk about coming to the United States doing education here. Obviously, we'd love it if people came to see Seattle Colleges. But we also want people to understand, what the landscapes really like, you know, what should you expect when you get here. And the fact of the matter is, you may think you know, you speak English well, and you may think you won't need to take a test. But guess what, guys, have your pocketbook ready. Because you may need to pay for a test. Same with math. So you'll need to do a math placement test. And do you knew what they charged you for that?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  12:52  
$50, something like that, somewhere around that? I mean, it's not a lot of money. But why do I have to pay.

Evan Franulovich  12:58  
I'd rather spend that on a concert. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  13:02  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  13:03  
Or go out to dinner or something. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  13:04  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  13:05  
Well, all right. So that's good to know. Well, let's talk about when you first got here, so we talked about the weather but any other culture shock? I mean, did. Oh, yeah?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  13:17  
Funny, funny. I keep for like, remembering some things. I hope it relates to what we're talking about. 

Evan Franulovich  13:25  
Sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  13:26  
So when I got here, and kind of like, this was a good like... "UWC" do you know what UWC stands for? 

Evan Franulovich  13:37  
UWC, not sure.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  13:38  
United World Colleges. 

Evan Franulovich  13:40  
Oh, okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  13:41  
Oh, yeah, it's this program that gets like a lot of like, students from different countries to go into the I think it's the AA, and then the AAS and then they come here. 

Evan Franulovich  13:53  
Okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  13:53  
Yeah, like, final destination is usually like the US. So like, there's the network of that, like in Seattle was pretty good. So... and then like, I went and met with those guys, because my brother like kind of like, went through that process. So we're talking we're actually talking about the culture shock. It's crazy.

Evan Franulovich  14:14  
Really?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  14:15  
It's the same thing, like everyone experiences the same thing, yeah.

Evan Franulovich  14:22  
So for people that are listening, they'll be like, Okay, well, what does that mean? Like, what was your culture? Like? What did you find like just so different and hard to adjust to? Or? Or maybe you thought it was really great, but it's still an adjustment. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  14:37  
Food.

Evan Franulovich  14:38  
For sure. Yeah, yeah.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  14:39  
Food is...

Evan Franulovich  14:41  
Hey, speaking of food, sorry to get off on a tangent. But I was doing a little reading up on Eswatini. And pumpkin... you guys like have a pumpkin soup? Kind of a thing? Pumpkin seems to be like a real staple. Is that true? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  14:55  
No. 

Evan Franulovich  14:56  
No. All right.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  14:57  
I mean, we do like to mash like pumpkin.

Evan Franulovich  15:00  
Sounds great. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:02  
Yeah.

Evan Franulovich  15:02  
Because this, lot of pumpkins this time of year. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:04  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  15:05  
October, November. Be like, man, I would like to try that out if you can... 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:08  
Yeah, yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  15:11  
So what do you do for food? Do you just cook at home then? Or?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:14  
Yeah, we cook at home.

Evan Franulovich  15:14  
Yeah.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:15  
But then it's now mostly. My brother's lived here for like more than 10 years. So his tastes changed. 

Evan Franulovich  15:22  
What's eating? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:24  
I mean, he eats American food. And he enjoys American food.

Evan Franulovich  15:26  
For sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:26  
Yeah, but for us it's more different. Like we, I think we do a little bit more of the seasoning. Like yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  15:34  
Which is really good. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:35  
Yeah, you need to like, have your salt when you eating American food. But...

Evan Franulovich  15:42  
That is funny.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  15:44  
But I think, I think, I think Seattle is actually a good like place to be because like, down south, we have like, Kenyan food. East African with Gambian market so you, even if you are away from home, you kind of like, once you know the place you can get some of the even though we don't have the southern part...

Evan Franulovich  16:02  
Right.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  16:03  
Yeah, like we don't have a Southern African like market over here.

Evan Franulovich  16:09  
I just gotta think, you know, we have we have a pretty good size, Ethiopian community in the north part of the town where I live. And you know, there's grocery stores, but I can't imagine they carry much from the southern part of the region. They probably mostly focus on East African. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  16:26  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  16:27  
Oh, interesting. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  16:29  
Yeah, but yeah, culture shock was the food.

Evan Franulovich  16:32  
What about people? I mean, there must be interested in where you're from, or who you are, what you're up to? Or do they just assume you're an American? You know, the thing about Seattle is we're very, we have people from all over the world here. So it's hard to tell who's an international student and who's just a local. I mean, do people recognize you as a, someone from outside the country? Or?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  16:53  
I think they do. 

Evan Franulovich  16:54  
Yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  16:55  
The English kind of like, says, oh this is... 

Evan Franulovich  17:00  
Like where you from? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  17:01  
Yeah, it's good English, but it's not American English. It's different. Because we are colonized by the Brits. 

Evan Franulovich  17:07  
Of course. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  17:08  
Yeah. So it's different lingo. Like I remember when I was studying for the English Placement Test, like I was doing, like videos and everything in the way. They were like, explaining things. And then one YouTube video they were explaining like some other names, like, gas over here, like it's called gas. It's petrol. 

Evan Franulovich  17:27  
Petrol. yeah.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  17:27  
Yeah. So like those kinds of things. A truck. 

Evan Franulovich  17:31  
A lorry. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  17:32  
Yeah. You guys call a van, a truck. And then a van is that huge combee. Those kind of things. 

Evan Franulovich  17:38  
Yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  17:38  
So yeah. But then people. I think people are nice. 

Evan Franulovich  17:43  
Yeah?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  17:43  
We are... Even though someone mentioned this in the like, in the table, where we like having games and drinks and stuff. She was like, "I don't know, the people are nice, but they're too nice for my liking." 

Evan Franulovich  18:03  
To nice?!

Lindokuhle Ngobese  18:05  
No, in terms of, it's really hard when you're over here, I've gotten used to it. But when I got here, I was like, "This is weird." Like when you're meeting someone, they'll like smile at you. They don't even know you. "Hi!"

Evan Franulovich  18:25  
That's so funny. I mean, you're the first person that said this to me. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  18:28  
Really?

Evan Franulovich  18:29  
Yes, it's so funny. I love it, though. I interview so many students from all over the place. And everybody has their own experiences. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  18:35  
It's something, I didn't notice at first. But I was like, when I went like when I stay like for a bit longer here, I was like, actually she was right. Everyone smiles at you. Which is good. 

Evan Franulovich  18:48  
It's great. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  18:49  
It's a good thing. But then if you didn't smile, and then why, what's the point?

Evan Franulovich  18:56  
So it's actually even within the United States, it varies from place to place. For example, I used to live in Eastern Oregon. Very conservative out there, but really small towns like 3000 people in a town super small. So you know, you'll be driving down the road people be waving, smiling and waving. Hey, how's it going in the drive by? It's just, it took a little bit of getting used to for me. I mean, I grew up in a small town, but I was on the coasts, so it was a little different. Yeah, I know what you're talking about. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  19:25  
Yeah, it's, it's different *????????????* like almost everyone. 

Evan Franulovich  19:29  
Yeah?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  19:29  
But then it's more like a straight face kind of thing. Like you don't have to fake smile. If you're smiling, smiling, shouldn't just smile and then stop smiling immediately. I pass. 

Evan Franulovich  19:41  
Okay.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  19:41  
It's a bit different. I shouldn't say weird, but different. All right.

Evan Franulovich  19:45  
Very good. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  19:46  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  19:47  
Well, one of the things I hope you don't mind me calling attention to this for everybody but you are an older student. I've interviewed another student who's, who is older too. But most of our students that started community college are usually, you know, between 18 and 20, but you're a little bit older than that. Can you talk about that being an older student among younger people?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  20:07  
So I don't think it's common for this, for a foreign to come straight here and do community college. I don't know like, probably they probably like, that's just me happens a lot. But like, for me the reason why I had to like come to community college is because like, I went through school and finish that, I was even working 2021, I was, I was working. 

Evan Franulovich  20:31  
Yeah. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  20:31  
And I decided, you know what, this is actually not what I love to do for the rest of my life. So and I wanted to come to America. 

Evan Franulovich  20:39  
Cool. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  20:39  
Yeah, so being an old student, community college probably isn't the right place.

Evan Franulovich  20:46  
Actually it's the best place. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  20:48  
I don't know if it's the best place to meet like, to make friends or like, yeah, because we have a lot of runs, like Running Start students over, so I have to have a conversation with a 16 year old. 

Evan Franulovich  21:00  
Right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  21:02  
You know, it's... 

Evan Franulovich  21:03  
But cool for the 16 year old to hear. I mean, you have some experience on this kid. Right? You're also have a worldly point of view, because you've been around. That's such a great thing that you're here mixing with those people. I hope you see that. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  21:16  
I mean, if you put it that way. So yeah, I guess. 

Evan Franulovich  21:19  
Yeah, that's awesome. I was a non-tra... they call us non traditional students. So anyone above a certain age, like I had gone into the military. So after I got out, like we just didn't have enough money to send me to college as a very middle class family. So I ended up going into the military for a while. And then when I got out of the military, then I started, I had already even had a son, and I was already married. So by the time I started school, community college was perfect, because they usually have flexible schedules. So I mean, sometimes night classes, you know, so that was really appealing to me. And of course, affordability was a big deal. So yeah, I think it's cool that... I actually liked being in class as a non traditional student, with some other non traditional students. And with the younger people. I thought it was a cool mix.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  22:12  
That is actually like a good thing. But then I don't think, I don't think in my class, like we have a lot of those people, I think we...

Evan Franulovich  22:22  
You don't. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  22:22  
Yeah, I think we have like two to three, probably like a third things. Mostly they are Running Start students. 

Evan Franulovich  22:29  
Right, right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  22:30  
So because I'm coming, like, because I'm from like, I'm from a place far, far away from America. And usually school is where you actually like, make friends. 

Evan Franulovich  22:40  
Right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  22:41  
But then if I only have access to Running Start students, then it's really hard for me to have friends. So like, that's how I'm looking at it. 

Evan Franulovich  22:50  
Right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  22:51  
Yeah.

Evan Franulovich  22:51  
But at some point, you'll transfer. Right? Do you have plans to transfer to a four year? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  22:56  
Yeah, that's the plan. 

Evan Franulovich  22:57  
You want to what? Go to Udub? Where do you want to go?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  23:02  
Udub Tacoma, Bothell. Like I'm just looking at my options, seeing like, where to go, but I would really love to go to a different state probably like a warmer state. 

Evan Franulovich  23:14  
Right, right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  23:14  
It's a bit cold for me. I mean better than Minnesota, of course. 

Evan Franulovich  23:18  
Minnesota is chilly. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  23:20  
Minnesota is brutal, brutally cold.

Evan Franulovich  23:22  
Well, we have tag agreements with a number of schools. The two you mentioned Udub Tacoma and Udub Bothell, we have tag agreements with, which means your credits are going to transfer there shouldn't be a problem, as long as you are over a certain grade point average. But we also have agreements with some schools in California, Arizona. So if you want a warmer climate, that's no problem. And you're not required to go to a tech school at all. You could go anywhere you want. And there's some great schools down south. I went to the University of Arizona, which is down to Tucson beautiful city. It's 800,000 people so let's see almost as many people well, how big is Manzini? You are from Manzini? Right?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  24:04  
Yeah.

Evan Franulovich  24:04  
How many people about? Is it about... maybe a little smaller?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  24:08  
I have no idea.

Evan Franulovich  24:09  
It's like the biggest city right? in Eswatini? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  24:11  
Yes, it is, It is, like it's the most densely populated like city right in the country. So I don't even I don't even remember like the population of Swaziland.

Evan Franulovich  24:23  
That's 1.4 million people.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  24:24  
Then we should have above 700. 

Evan Franulovich  24:27  
Okay. Yeah, it's kind of interesting that the capital of your country is not the biggest city usually it's the biggest. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  24:35  
Oh, really? 

Evan Franulovich  24:35  
I mean, seems like that's how it works out.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  24:38  
So in Swaziland, what they did was, the capital cities weights, like it's a bit chilled and like it's more of a fancier place in Swaziland. Like when I go to a fancy place in Swaziland. You can go to Burbank, which is a capital city and then Manzini is where it's the hub of like everything like, if you like transporting things from other countries they usually come to. So I don't know that I think that was the reasoning behind not making that the capital city things. You can't have like, government offices and everything and everything official at the same place where it's super busy.

Evan Franulovich  25:18  
Okay, well, your brother lives here already. You were in. You're in southern Africa, you're in Eswatini. Let's talk about getting your visa. You know, one of the things I heard in South Africa from the students that I talked to there, was a lot of them have a hard time getting a visa, you know, they'll apply to be an international student, they'll go through the interview process, and they'll get denied. I'm wondering you about your experience? Did you have to do an interview in Eswatini? Or where did you do these interview?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  25:50  
So we have like an American Embassy in Swaziland? 

Evan Franulovich  25:53  
Okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  25:54  
Yeah, so we can do all those, type of visa stuff there. You also need to do the interview like, but it's in our country don't have to like go outside. 

Evan Franulovich  26:04  
Okay, cool. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  26:04  
But for Swaziland, I think it's not that difficult, because we don't have a lot of people have a lot of people in the country because I think, I think it's like, like visa things like are mostly correlated with how many people are in the country, like just... 

Evan Franulovich  26:25  
Right, right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  26:26  
Like countries like some other countries, like it's really, really hard for you to get a visa to the US. 

Evan Franulovich  26:31  
For sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  26:31  
Yeah. Because of how many people we have in the US. But for us, I think... 

Evan Franulovich  26:37  
I definitely never met anyone from Eswatini, so...

Lindokuhle Ngobese  26:40  
And we like a small country. So it makes sense for us not to have that much people in the country. 

Evan Franulovich  26:47  
Sure, sure. So it wasn't hard. You had to do an interview though. Someone asked you some questions. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  26:52  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  26:53  
How long did the interview take, do you remember?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  26:59  
I think it was 7 to 15 minutes. 

Evan Franulovich  27:00  
Oh, really? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  27:01  
Okay. It's, It's mostly like I don't, I don't even know why they do it. Because they know all... They know all the answers to the questions they ask you. I guess it has to do with, like trying to like, "Oh, this is what what's on file? This is what you say? Well, we might be lying. Okay."

Evan Franulovich  27:19  
Okay. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  27:20  
Yeah, I think it's mostly that, but they have everything they need. And then I don't know how Americans get the information. But in the embassy but they have all the information, so it was pretty quick.

Evan Franulovich  27:32  
Right. And from the time you got your I-20 from Seattle Colleges, until your visa interview, did you have to wait a long time? Because I know in South Africa, sometimes the wait time can be long. But in Eswatini, maybe it's much shorter, I don't know.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  27:48  
So, I think you need to get your I-20. For you to get a passport, for instance, because we have the traditional traveling document which like you can go in the set of countries, which is like Zimbabwe and South Africa, Mozambique. Zambia is also there. And then for you to get an international like passport, there has to be a reason why. 

Evan Franulovich  28:19  
Okay.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  28:19  
To enlist in a school. So I had to get an acceptance. I think an acceptance comes with the I-20 is actually the I-20. Yeah, so I guess I got that. And then I had to like do the whole process of getting the international passport. 

Evan Franulovich  28:32  
But the thing is, is one of our application requirements when you fill out your when you do the application is that you have to upload a copy of your passport. So how would you have done that? If that's the case? You must have already had your passport.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  28:49  
I might be getting those steps. 

Evan Franulovich  28:52  
I think they're a little bit backwards. Yeah. Because I think you might have had your passport first. Then you got accepted. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  28:58  
Oh, yeah, that's true. Is it? No, I can't remember pretty pretty well. But once you have your passport and your I-20 and then you can pretty much apply and then scheduled an interview. It's not it's not really like you don't have to really like wait, the reason why you have to wait is because probably like, because like they schedule like a certain number of interviews each day. And then they don't do it like every, every day. 

Evan Franulovich  29:25  
It's only like Thursday or something. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  29:27  
Yeah. So the reason why you'd have to wait is because they have like a bunch of like interviews scheduled for Monday. But then it's... 

Evan Franulovich  29:34  
But you didn't have to like wait three months?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  29:36  
Oh, no, I think I applied here in February, then got my acceptance and my I-20 in March and then I did my interview. I think in May.

Evan Franulovich  29:51  
That would make sense. That sounds about right. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  29:54  
Yeah, that's cool. 

Evan Franulovich  29:57  
Do you hear that? That means it's time for trivia hour. So we're going to ask you five questions basically, about this area. Let's see how you do. First question is, there is a body of water just off the shoreline from the city of Seattle. What do we call that body of water? Do you know what that's called? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:21  
No idea. 

Evan Franulovich  30:23  
Okay, it's the Puget Sound. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:25  
Oh!

Evan Franulovich  30:26  
Have you heard that? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:27  
No.

Evan Franulovich  30:27  
Okay, Puget Sound. Yeah, so we are on the Puget Sound. The Puget Sound connects to the Pacific Ocean. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:32  
Oh!

Evan Franulovich  30:33  
But it's cool. Go down and check out the water. There's some beautiful beaches. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:36  
Okay.

Evan Franulovich  30:36  
Alright, question number two: We have many professional sports teams within the city of Seattle. Can you name one of them?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:46  
Seattle Hawks.

Evan Franulovich  30:47  
Yeah, you're close. It's the Seattle... 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:51  
Seahawks. 

Evan Franulovich  30:51  
That's right. Good. What sport did they play? Do you know?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  30:55  
It's football.

Evan Franulovich  30:55  
American football. That's right. Hey, did you follow the World Cup rugby by the way.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:01  
I'm not really a fan. 

Evan Franulovich  31:02  
Okay, cool. Well, I saw South Africa won, right? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:05  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  31:06  
It was pretty big deal.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:06  
I didn't really watch it. But I was following it. Like I knew what was happening. 

Evan Franulovich  31:11  
Sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:12  
Yeah.

Evan Franulovich  31:12  
See, I thought, I was kind of thinking Ireland might go all the way but they didn't... I was surprised. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:17  
I thought New Zealand would win. 

Evan Franulovich  31:18  
New Zealand's always huge. Right? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:20  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  31:20  
So it was good for South Africa. Yeah, it's really cool. They must have gone crazy. All right. Cool. All right. Question number three: We have three national parks surrounding the city. Can you name one of those national parks? I'll give you a hint. There's a big mountain. Just to the south kind of out by in your direction where you live. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:51  
Mount Rainier. 

Evan Franulovich  31:52  
Yeah. Mount Rainier National Park. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  31:55  
I've been to the northern cascades is that a national park?

Evan Franulovich  31:57  
That is a national park. I love that place. Isn't it gorgeous? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  32:00  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  32:01  
You know, it's one of the least visited national parks in the United States. I mean, it's on the top 10 least visited. Crazy, right? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  32:08  
That place is beautiful. 

Evan Franulovich  32:09  
Because it's gorgeous. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  32:10  
Yeah.

Evan Franulovich  32:10  
And it's only what an hour and a half maybe? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  32:14  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  32:15  
That's really nice. And then the other national park. If you look across the water here, the Puget Sound, you'll see the Olympic National Park. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  32:24  
I've been to the Olympic. I don't know why, I haven't been to Rainier, though. It's something I'm planning on doing during the break. 

Evan Franulovich  32:32  
Right, right. Well, sometimes, the international program offers events for international students. One of the things we did last winter was we took students up to go up and play in the snow. Have you been to the snow yet? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  32:46  
I've been to the snow but I didn't go with, it comes in handy living with family because they kind of like know where to take you. So you like that's why I've been to the Olympic Park and then Cascades. 

Evan Franulovich  32:57  
Okay, that's true.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  32:58  
The reason why I didn't go to Mount Rainier was because I think I had a test scheduled on a Saturday or something. 

Evan Franulovich  33:07  
You got time. You can do it again. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  33:08  
Definitely, definitely.

Evan Franulovich  33:09  
Yeah, right. Now, this is a question, does it snow, like I had a good friend in China. I used to live in China, good friend of mines from South Africa, but she lived kind of in North East, South Africa. So not too far from where you're at. And they actually get snow where she lives. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  33:27  
Really?

Evan Franulovich  33:27  
Yeah, and I know that you guys have a lot of hills. And... 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  33:30  
We don't get snow. 

Evan Franulovich  33:31  
You don't get any snow. Kind of surprised. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  33:33  
I think only snowed once in South Africa as far as I know. Like during. I think there was a cold front. During the cold front. Yeah, that's when it snowed. Pretty rare though. Yeah. It's pretty rare. Yeah.

Evan Franulovich  33:45  
All right. Question number four. Now you go to South Seattle College, the South Campus. What is the mascot of this campus? What is the animal associated with South Seattle? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  33:58  
The Otters? 

Evan Franulovich  33:58  
It is the Otters! Good job. Nice. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:01  
Oh, no. It's the Otters. 

Evan Franulovich  34:02  
Yes. Sea otters. Have you seen a sea otter? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:07  
I don't know. 

Evan Franulovich  34:07  
You go down to the Puget Sound, sometimes you'll see them swimming. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:10  
Oh! 

Evan Franulovich  34:10  
They're really cool, actually. Alright, last question. What was the last film that you saw?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:21  
That's a movie? 

Evan Franulovich  34:21  
Yeah. Have you seen many movies in Seattle? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:25  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  34:29  
Did you see Barbie? 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:31  
Why are you laughing? 

Evan Franulovich  34:33  
I went and saw it. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:37  
It's been a while, because I was home during the summer so, so I can't really, I think it was a... I'm a Marvel fan by the way. 

Evan Franulovich  34:44  
Oh, yeah, yeah.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  34:44  
Yeah. So I went to watch quantum mania. And mania, I went like, that was the last time and I might actually go and watch the Marvel's tonight.

Evan Franulovich  34:54  
Yeah, I heard is, I just the interviewed a girl today who saw it. Girl from Cote D'ivoire . And she said that was great. She loved it.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  35:03  
Yeah. Yeah, it should be, I watched the tralier, and it's pretty interesting.

Evan Franulovich  35:07  
There's a lot of visual effects going on. That's all I can say about Marvel films. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  35:11  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  35:12  
Pretty crazy. Alright. Well, cool last... You know, I like to end the show with words of wisdom that you can offer to students back home in your region doesn't have to be Eswatini could be Mozambique. You know, Madagascar anywhere down in that part of the world. Kids that are thinking about coming to the United States, but they're not really sure. What kind of advice would you give them?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  35:38  
Actually, might be controversial, but what you see on, what you see in the movies is not what's really happening over here. I saw a TikTok video where someone was interviewing like a English British. 

Evan Franulovich  35:55  
British? Yeah. Cool. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  35:56  
British Lady. And they asked asked her, like, what does she miss? Like, has she been to Seattle? Does she miss Seattle? She was like, "I don't like that place. It's dirty. And there's a lot of unhoused people."

Evan Franulovich  36:14  
Well, that's true there. We do have some... 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  36:16  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  36:17  
... homelessness, for sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  36:18  
Yeah, and downtown is really messy. Anyways, coming back to, coming back to this. My advice, America is a bit different from Africa... 

Evan Franulovich  36:31  
For sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  36:32  
Most definitely. And Americans are more welcoming. We don't have to, you don't have to be afraid to ask. 

Evan Franulovich  36:43  
That's true. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  36:44  
Before I got here, some lady like gave me advice. And she was like, the worst thing that could happen is a no. So might as well just try. Ask see what happens. Yeah, and and I think Seattle is actually like, a better city to be in because of how diverse. 

Evan Franulovich  37:05  
Right.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  37:05  
This place is like everyone is welcome over here. And then... Oh, and advice to Africans. 

Evan Franulovich  37:12  
Oh, yeah. Good. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  37:13  
Yeah, it should, like you need to, you need to like be broad minded, like you need to, the ideas that you have about how things should be, you kind of like need to like unlearn a lot of things for you to like, be able to actually fit in here. We actually talking about this, I work in the diversity and inclusion department.

Evan Franulovich  37:40  
Oh, yeah. Sure.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  37:41  
So yeah, it's, it can be overwhelming. It can be overwhelming, like how, which is good, I guess. Like how much feeling, like how feelings are taken into factor in this country. Like, opinions, like so it's the inclusivity part is actually the great thing about America. And the fact that like, places like Seattle, like I haven't, I haven't really experienced racism or even the systematic racism like, it's, you have to go out, go out of your way and look for it for you to like, see, I'm not saying it's not here. It's not there. Definitely is here. But I haven't experienced I've been here for like a year...

Evan Franulovich  38:26  
Thank god. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  38:26  
.... so like, yeah, like, it's everyone is welcomed. That's the best thing about Seattle. Everyone is welcome. And if you like, if you love nature, it's a great place to be.

Evan Franulovich  38:37  
It is a great place to be, for sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  38:39  
People from Africa should come join us here. 

Evan Franulovich  38:41  
Yeah, yeah.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  38:42  
It's a good place.

Evan Franulovich  38:43  
I want to say that my time in Africa, It was awesome as well. People were really very friendly. Very welcoming. It was really cool experience. So going both directions. I want to encourage people from my country, take step out of their comfort zone.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  38:59  
You should go to Durban. Not Cape Town, not Cape Town, go to Durban.

Evan Franulovich  39:04  
I like Cape Town. But okay. Go to Durban. I will go to Durban. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  39:07  
It's like, it's really, it's really more diverse. Like it's diverse, like everyone living in the same kind of world. It's not like you, when you, the differences between the township and like the rich people's places like, It's like we have like a million people living in one township. And then we have like, maybe 50,000 living in a nice place. 

Evan Franulovich  39:34  
True. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  39:34  
Yeah, but Durban is fun. I like Durban.

Evan Franulovich  39:38  
They call South Africa, the rainbow nation. Does that apply to your country as well?

Lindokuhle Ngobese  39:44  
I don't even know why they call it rainbow nation.

Evan Franulovich  39:46  
I think there's people from all over the world. I mean, I saw a lot of people from South Asia there.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  39:50  
Oh!

Evan Franulovich  39:50  
Southeast Asia, a lot of people from Europe.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  39:55  
My country is definitely welcoming. We cool people. 

Evan Franulovich  40:00  
Well, hopefully I'll get there one of these days.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  40:02  
You should. You should, it's a great place to be. It's not as cold. It's not as hot. But yeah.

Evan Franulovich  40:09  
All right. Well, that's about oh, we were going to have you speak a little of your language. If you don't mind this second season. We're inviting our guests to speak a little bit of their language. And most of the people that listen to the show have probably never heard your language. So maybe tell them which language you're going to speak and maybe just say a few things and...

Lindokuhle Ngobese  40:31  
Siswati.

Evan Franulovich  40:32  
Okay, Siswati.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  40:33  
Yeah. Do you need me to translate it to you like afterwards? 

Evan Franulovich  40:38  
Ah, It's up to you. You can if you want, but you don't have to.

Lindokuhle Ngobese  40:44  
Oh, yeah. I've just addressed Africans to come over here. 

Evan Franulovich  40:47  
Sure. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  40:49  
Yeah. (Lindo's advice in Siswati)

Evan Franulovich  40:58  
All right. There you got it. Nice. Thanks so much. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  41:00  
Yeah. 

Evan Franulovich  41:01  
Appreciate your time. It was great to talk to you. I've got a 1000 more questions that I can drag this interview out for a long time. All right. Have a great day. Thanks. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  41:09  
You too. Thank you. 

Evan Franulovich  41:10  
Take care guys. 

Lindokuhle Ngobese  41:11  
Yeah.

Evan Franulovich  41:14  
'Conversations with!' is painstakingly crafted for you by the Seattle Colleges International Programs department and supported by the lovely folks here on our campus. This show is produced and edited by me Evan Franulovich. We welcome your emails and questions about coming to Seattle Colleges. Please reach out to us via our website or just give us a rating and a review on Apple podcasts as this helps others discover the show. Also, don't forget to follow us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok or YouTube at Seattle Colleges Intl, that's Seattle Colleges Intl. And be sure to check out all of the shows here on 'Conversations with!' Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next week.