High School Interview Essay

By interviewing Jian, I went to my high school. My friend who is also my participant, lives next to the high school. I took off at 79th St station, and saw a group of five boys, they were playing outside the bakery. I took a look at my watch, at this moment, they supposed to study in the classrooms, not play outside the bakery. And there were two students buying bread in the bakery. Students in this school were the “same” as the time when I went to this school. Cross the street, the high school is on my right side. There was a football team playing, actually they were trained by the teacher there. Again, there were three guys wearing hats were watching students playing football outside the playground. These styles of study are definitely not good for students. After one minute of walking, I still had a good view on students playing. There were cars all along the way on both sides. Behind that black car, my classmate was sitting on the long chair and smoking in front of his house. He seemed like he was looking, but

I didn’t see the point of what he was looking at. I thought he was thinking of something. He was wearing a black jacket with white shirt inside, blue jeans with a pair of slippers. There was no garbage can over there, he just put it on the floor when he finished that cigarette.
The interview was conducted in front of my friend’s house. He was born in a village, called Doushan, in China. Also, we came from the same village. Though we live not too far from each other, we didn’t meet each other for a long time. The interview gave me a good chance to meet with my old classmate. I stopped by his house, and met him for my interview.
“Hey!” This was the way we used to call each other. Though it was not a manner way to call people, it was what we did all the time. I called him out of thinking in his own “world”, and I sat down on the chair. I asked him how he was doing these days, and we had a conversation about things that passed by these days. A few minutes later, I turned our conversation to the interview. “In Grade 6, you can count it…About 9 years…” He answered my first question, his answer didn’t surprise me. I knew it already when we had the same elementary school. I still asked him this question based on my sample questions, though I thought it was a really stupid question. And I recalled my memory back to the elementary school, when we played together, and studied together.
Jian was a 19 years old teenager, who has smoked for almost 9 years. “It is that I feel afflictive if I don’t smoke.” From his answer, I knew that he was addicted to smoking. He also told me that he had tried to quit smoking for weeks, but he didn’t succeed. He felt painful and then smoked again.
“No one taught me. I used to hang out with my friend at night, we play very late, and I would be so sleepy. Then, my friend gave me a cigarette; they didn’t teach me how to smoke. I learned it by myself. Smoking can refresh myself.” He said. I remembered that many of my classmates used to hang out together for KTV, or play in the computer games store. At that time, games were very attractive things for them. I usually saw them falling asleep in the morning during the reading time.
I also asked what kind of people smoked around him. Though I thought it was a stupid question, I still asked him for my notes. “My grandpa, my papa, my uncle, all men in my family smoke.” He said. Too many people smoked around him, it was hard for him not to smoke.
“Second-hand smoking is the same, it is not good to people who don’t smoke.” He said. Then I got confused, his thought was different from my other participant’s. “Does that feel differently for people to smell second-hand smoke? Is that depend on people ?” I wanted to ask him these questions, but I didn’t think he could answer me specifically. I ask another question instead. Up until now, there was no signal of illness caused by smoking that has appeared in his body.
We had our conversation for almost one hour. I have known many of his things, because he was my really old classmate. We came from the same place, went to the same school in China and in America. Though he came to America two years ago, we didn’t lose our contact. He came here with his mother only. I knew he had a lot of pressure, and his English was poor. He told me that he was working in the Sushi Restaurant. I saw tired in his eyes. Smoking may be a way for him to release pressure.

Almost the same for my other participant. I conducted my interview in a park, called Milestone Park. On the way to the park, I saw a playground, right next to park.
It was a Garibaldi playground, the name was written on the sign along the way to the gate. When I got into the park, I saw a group of people were playing chess over there. Some of them were smoking. And there were some cigarette butts on the floor. Fewer minutes later, my classmate, Biao came.
Biao was born in a village, China.

Many people there had a little of education and knowledge. Under those circumstances, Biao didn’t continued having education after he graduated from junior high school. He worked for three years and then moved to America with his family. He just had half year of school here, and then quitted it. He went to work and only can work in Chinese place because of lack of knowledge and English. Those jobs were not easy, actually they were very hard.
Biao was a twenty years old teenager. “How long? I started smoking when I was in Grade 4 of Elementary School. Probably ten years.” He said. “That was really young.” I thought. I saw a pack of cigarettes inside his pocket. That may be one of the important stuff for him in his daily life. He took out one, and put it into his mouth, ignited it. Then he took a breath of it, again and again. The smoke came out of his mouth, it seemed very cool. But, it was really smelled not good for

me.
Before his first time of smoking, he saw smoke came out of his friends and families’ noses. He felt that was a cool thing. He wanted to learn it and do it as well. Then, he started smoking. “The first time I smoked, I felt giddy. I wanted to learn how to smoke quickly.” He said, “But now, I know that learning how to smoke is not a good thing, it is just waste, waste money.” People around you have a huge impact on you, they may give you advantages, but also give you disadvantages. These may depend on you, whether you choose to learn from them or not. This is one point I get from him.
He had a feeling that he really wanted to smoke before he smoked for every single time. When he felt bored, he wanted to smoke, especially during classes. He really enjoyed during smoking. After he smoked, he had a good spirit and felt relaxed. There were many friends smoking around him, as well as his father, all men in his family smoked. He used to smoke around people regardless whether they smoked or not, in China, but not in America. Because there was limitation in America for smoking. Now, he may smoked around people who were smoking.
He thought that second-hand smoke had a smell, was a not good smell for him. He seldom had a second-hand smoke. He knew some information about smoking, cigarettes, but not too much. Though he knew that smoking would harm his body, he still wanted to smoke. He had tried to quit smoking, but many of his friends were smokers, they smoked around him, they seduced him to smoke, gave cigarettes to him several times. He couldn’t afford the temptation, he smoked back. Up until now, there was no signal of illness caused by smoking appeared in his body.

Conclusion
After I am done these two interviews, I found out that both of them were influenced by their friends. “The company you keep in junior high school may have more Influence on your smoking behavior than your high school friends, according to newly published research from University on Southern California”. Sometimes, they were afraid to lose this group of friends, they chose to follow them and started doing things like them, such as smoking with them. From time to time, they became part of this culture. “It is possible that boys are adopting their friends’ risky behaviors, like smoking, as the groups grow together over time”. These behaviors made them feel they were part of that group.
I found agreement with Michelle Castillo, “Pre-teens and teens are more likely to smoke if their sibling or parents ever smoked”. Both participants’ family smoked in front of them. As samples for children, they gave wrong direction to them. “Both of my parents were heavy smokers, and I just picked up on it”, by Chris Woolston’ study. Also, it showed that “In families where the oldest child smoked, younger siblings were six times more likely to smoke as well.”
Smoking relates to social activity, is a time of chance to meet a new person, to have a small talk regardless of any cultural heritage, religion or race. Usually, teen has a cigarette for several teenagers. A relationship would be formed between the receivers and the givers.
Most teenagers are completely aware of the fact that smoking would harm their bodies. Even though they know the effects of smoking, they don’t care about it. They just care about whether they were accepted by that group or not. Once in that group, they feel proud to be inside.
Teenagers continue to smoke for various reasons. Smoking could help them escape from awkward gatherings, or even to have a moment of good old days. The functions of smoking have intrigued me. “Stress-relief and relaxation is one of the many benefits that a cigarette can provide by smokers. These claims have been directly disproven by research, showing that smoking actually raises our blood pressure and heart rate, thus doing exact opposite of relaxing our bodies”. This has surprised me. Up until I saw this research, I couldn’t image that my thoughts about smoking that could help people release pressure and make them relax were wrong for a long time.
For two interview, one thing that has disturbed me and I couldn’t figure it out until now is the way how it feel when they smoke, is that the same as I smoke the second-hand smoking? Though they told me how it felt, I couldn’t get that feeling.
By doing smoking subculture research, I dug out things I didn’t know about smoking, and it overturns some of my thoughts about smoking. Doing fieldsite for smoking was a good experience for education.