QQ Instant Messenger...

I have a QQ IM and so does my friend. However since we both have different versions mine being South Africa's (couldn't find any Canadian/American one) and her's being a Chinese one it seems we're both having problems speaking to each other. I was just wondering do we both have to have the same version of QQ in order to speak to each other? What's the best solution to this situation?

I also tried downloading the same version as her's however I had problems opening it because it says the download didn't finish properly. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, thanks.