America is green. And wet.

Barely slept much on the 13 hour plane ride over from Aman to Chicago, and only got to sleep for a little on the bus up to Madison. I was amazed by how easy it was to get through customs. No questions about where I had specifically gone, no one asked to look in my luggage… It basically went: “What was the purpose of 6your trip? Oh, study abroad? Welcome back.”

When I got home, I had been awake for basically 24 hours, and I had hit that point of exhuastion where I wasn’t tired anymore, so I stayed up for a few more hours talking with Mom, Dad, and Whitney. However, now it’s 6:00 in the morning here, and I am wide awake. My body says “I don’t care if you went to bed at what felt like 6:00 am to you, it’s now lunch time, so get up!” So what am I doing? I made eggs the way my host family did, and am sitting eating them with hummus and bread (since I haven’t made my labneh yet). Inshah’allah I will be able to get back to bed in an hour or so. I’m gonna need the sleep.

It is so weird not having to constantly work to understand what people are saying around me. Traffic seems insanely tame and slow. It’s rainy here today, and I feel like I’m in another world. There’s no more call to prayer. The pita bread I’m eating is probably the closest thing I’ll get to real pita bread, but it’s still nowhere as good as what I’m used to. I’m no longer constantly on the verge of tears, but I am so sad to not be in Jordan anymore – I just don’t feel like I really fit here anymore. It’s like there’s still a cookie-cutter outline of the person I used to be when I left, just waiting for me to fill the void again, but I’ve grown and changed. I don’t fit the place I used to anymore. But yes, of course I am so happy to see my family again, and I cannot wait to see my friends. It’s just scary to see how they will react to how I’ve changed and the person I’ve become. And I’m wondering how long it will be before someone explodes at all of the Arabic I’ll be throwing into my conversations…

The Final Days

I officially have only ten days left in Jordan. I was completely freaking out about leaving about a month ago, but now, thankfully, I’m numb to that crazy hodgepodge of emotions and able to just try and enjoy the time I have left. Even though our finals are starting tomorrow, I don’t really feel the normal end-of-the-semester rush to finish studying. All I care about is seeing my friends and chatting with my host family. It’s probably a bad thing that I’m not more worried about my exams, but I make sure to get any work done that I have, and in the end, the friendships I keep are more important than a few grades that won’t transfer over anyway. The only exams that I really care about are my Arabic exams, but I’m not even that worried about those! It’s amazing how much Arabic I’ve learned over the past semester, mostly just by living in the language every day.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what it will be like to go back, however. Here’s just a sample of the thoughts that keep running through my head:

• I can’t wait to grind my own coffee! NO MORE NESCAFE!
• I must master the art of Turkish coffee.
• If plain yogurt in the States strained through a cheese cloth does not taste like labneh, I am going to be severely disappointed.
• Why are all of these women wearing so little clothing? Oh wait. That’s right. I’m no longer in a conservative culture.
• Stop kissing in front of me! Haram ‘alaykum! Stop it!
• Wait, what? I need to wait a full 20 minutes for the bus to come? It runs on a schedule?
• I’m either going to be an incredibly aggressive driver when I get back, or else the streets of Amman have scarred me forever and I will never drive above the speed limit again.
• What is this concept of “yielding” to another driver?
• I don’t have to throw my toilet paper in the garbage? Weird…
• I just met you, why aren’t you offering me any shai?
• I wonder if my self-esteem will completely tank when I don’t hear “Very nice, very very nice!” or “Beautiful!” called to my friends and me on the street all the time. Well, at least I won’t be asked if I’m Russian anymore.
• I think I’m going to miss all of the Turkish soap operas. I might have to watch them on YouTube like my host family does.
• Why aren’t all of the cars decorated with carpets and fringe hanging from the ceiling?

And so it continues…

Istanbul – Not Constantinople

I’m starting this week off in a weird mood – the anxiety of leaving this wonderful place, mixed with the anxiety of trying to adjust to life at home again, along with excitement at seeing friends and family I’ve missed and sadness at having to leave the amazing friends I’ve made here, along with the upsetting news I heard last night from my family – it’s not a fun combination. Sunday quickly turned into a sweatpants day at home writing my archaeology paper (aka, watching movies, doing laundry, and resting).

But on to the rest of my spring break.

Istanbul!

Let me first say that if I didn’t really want to learn Arabic, I might consider switching to learning the crazy language that is Turkish, because right now that is one of the only things keeping me from considering moving there after graduation. Istanbul was gorgeous and absolutely amazing – the blending of East and West that has been happening there for centuries has created an incredible culture. I wish there had been more time for me to travel around other parts of Turkey, but five days (with really only four full days to do things around the city) in Istanbul was just enough time to do everything that Claire and I wanted.

We stayed in a true hostel this time. I mentioned in my last post about Cairo that Sara Inn was technically a hostel, but was run more like a hotel – the Chillout Cengo hostel in Istanbul was much different, and, like the name implies, very chill – they were available to ask questions about the transportation system or the Bosphorus cruise times, anything fairly simple like that, but other than that they just let us do what we wanted and didn’t interfere. Claire and I stayed in a dorm room with 7 other people, and about 3 or 4 above us in the attic – it was fine for the amount of time we were there, but it got a little annoying never having a place of our own to go back to. Plus, Swedes and Spaniards don’t know how to be quiet at four in the morning. But other than that it was fine – the beds were clean, they had  multiple bathrooms, and they kept the doors locked at all times – nice. It was also in a really good location, just off of Istiklal Street (a long pedestrian-only street with a lot of stores, restaurants, bars, and cafes) near Taksim Square, a central stop for the public transport. We never had a hard time finding good places to eat dinner at night, and we discovered a fantastic little cafe just two blocks from our hostel that had the most amazing breakfast menu.

One more general point about Istanbul: the public transportation system is fantastic! Claire and I were really excited about having metered taxis again after our experience in Cairo, but we only took a taxi once the entire time we were there, and that was only because the metro from the airport only went halfway to Istiklal street and we hadn’t realized yet how easy the bus system was. A metro or tram ticket only costs 1.40 Turkish Lira and a bus ticket only costs 1.50 TL – sometimes we had to take a combo to get anywhere, but it was still so much cheaper than we thought we would be paying.

Our first full day in Istanbul, Claire and I ventured down to Sultanahmet to visit the Blue Mosque and see what other things we could accomplish. It was a great area, but I’m glad we stayed at a hostel in a different part of the city – it gave us a chance to explore a little bit more of Istanbul, especially since we were down in the Sultanahmet area most days anyway. The Blue Mosque was incredible – after five days of seeing it I still couldn’t get over it. Absolutely gorgeous. The best part is that it’s still active! They close it to visitors during prayer times, although it seems like they open it back up before the prayers are finished… Claire and I went in right after they opened it again and the prayer was still going on. I personally would find it really annoying to have talking tourists (who don’t understand the importance of the hijab in a mosque – I saw several women in the various mosques I visited taking off their scarves, exposing their hair, in order to fix them) wandering around while I was trying to pray, but I suppose it’s mostly visitors who pray in that mosque anyway.

After that, we wandered around the Aya Sofia (did not go in – we were sick of entrance fees and crowds of tourists… sad to have missed the beauty in there, but we just weren’t up for it) and unsuccessfully tried to see the Topkapi Palace (on the one day it is closed). It was so nice to just wander around the area – Istanbul is gorgeous in the spring! So many tulips everywhere you look! I really love tulips… and apparently so does Turkey. The last thing we did that day was hit up the Spice Bazaar – smaller than the Grand Bazaar, which we saw later on in the week, but just as fun! There, we tried Turkish delight and discovered that Turkish salesmen can be just as pushy as those in Cairo – sometimes they got extremely upset when we ignored their attempts at calling us into their shop with their fakely polite questions.

The next day we went to a hammam turkiyya (Turkish bath). I’m glad we allotted a full day for that experience, because wow – it was an experience. Claire has been to the Turkish bath here in Amman, so she knew vaguely what to expect. She was also fairly shocked. Apparently at the hammam in Amman, you are given pomegranate juice, you get to wash yourself in a shower, and there is a hot tub for you to relax in while you wait for the next phase of your bath. The hammam we went to in Istanbul (in a neighborhood just south of Istanbul University) was much more… authentic. We were the only two customers in the women’s section, so we thought that it would be a fairly timely bath. Not so. After we changed into bathing suits, we were taken into the washing area and told to dumb hot water over ourselves. The woman then disappeared, and we thought she would be back within minutes, so we quickly started washing. And continued washing. Eventually, we were as clean as we could get, so we turned off the water and sat waiting. We were left in there for so long that we would periodically start washing again because we didn’t know what else to do! Just sitting on marble slabs, pouring plastic bowls of water over ourselves in the company of a lone cockroach on the wall. Ew.

Finally the woman came back in with her hair all tied up wearing nothing but swimsuit bottoms. I expected that I would have to take off my top, but honestly – did the attendant really need to be naked as well? Apparently. The first stage of a Turkish bath, after the preliminary washing, is having all of the dead skin scrubbed off of your body. Shway painful, but not bad, and I thought that would be the worst of it. But no, after rinsing all of that off, the attendant began soaping me up from head to toe and then began the massage phase of the bath. Massages are supposed to be relaxing, and yes, a harder massage is nice, but oh my gosh that was extremely painful! It was made even more uncomfortable by the fact that the attendant kept yelling at us because we were sliding away from her – it was not our fault that it is impossible to find traction and sit still on a marble slab while completely covered in slippery soap suds!

After washing our hair, she took us into the sauna to sit for a little while. Once we were settled, she began berating us for a tip, with her hand held open and pushed into our faces. Where did she think we had that money? Not only were all of our things locked up in the dressing area, but she just finished washing every inch of our bodies and she hadn’t found any money yet! I really hope that was the only time in my life that a naked woman yells at me “Tip tip, money! Bakshisha!” while I am naked as well. Despite all of that awkwardness, I’m glad Claire and I went – it truly was an experience, and wow my skin was super soft afterwards!

The next day, we went back down to Sultanahmet to walk around the Topkapi Palace grounds (again, we did not pay the entrance fees to actually go into the palace… my advisor is going to be upset with me) and visit the Sulaymaniyah Mosque. We ended up going on a huge adventure completely around the outside of the Grand Bazaar to find this mosque, and when we finally thought we had stumbled across it at noon, we discovered we were only at the main gate of the University of Istanbul! At least we got to see a noontime demonstration in front of the University against the ban on women wearing the hijab on campus (Don’t worry Allison, we stayed away).  It was interesting to see, on our walk alongside the gated University, that women were using the windows of the parked cars along the lane to put on their hijabs upon leaving the University. In Amman, you only see that in women’s restrooms or salons – private places.

We finally made it to the mosque, though, but sadly it was under reconstruction, so we only got to see a small entrance hall (that was nowhere near as impressive as the area closed off) inside. At least we made some tomb-cat friends that followed us across the street for lunch. After that we did some shopping at the Grand Bazaar. I think I liked the Spice Bazaar better – the Grand Bazaar is basically a huge maze of stores that look exactly the same, filled with salesmen of varying pushiness and rudeness. It was an experience at least!

Claire and I ended up just sitting in front of the various fountains around Sultanahmet for a few hours after that, biding time until we had planned to meet my friend Ethan from Rochester at a cafe he told us about. We were exhausted, but if we had gone down to the hostel, we would have only had about 45 minutes to rest before we had to leave again to go back to the same area for dinner. Finally it was time to meet him, and we went to the address of the cafe we had looked up – it turned out to be a rooftop restaurant in the Pierre Loti Hotel. We waited for 45 minutes but he never showed, so we decided to check out the restaurant anyway since we were tired and starving – so glad we did. The meal ended up being fairly cheap and delicious (with fresh squeeze juiced! We were so excited…) and the restaurant had a fantastic view of the Blue Mosque. It was a successful end to the day despite the disappointment of not seeing Ethan.

On our final day, Claire and I went on what turned out to be about a six hour cruise on the Bosphorus – an hour and a half ride up the strait to a small fishing village on the Asian side of Turkey, where we spent three hours sitting on the deck of a restaurant just relaxing in the sun next to the water (there really wasn’t anything else to do) before getting picked up and making the same trip back to the dock near the Spice Bazaar. On the trip out, we staked out a great seat on the top deck outside for pictures, but soon found we were absolutely freezing. We braved it for most of the trip, but finally caved in and went inside for the last 20 minutes of the cruise. The houses and buildings along the shore were amazing to see – I wonder how much those cost?

That night, we successfully met up with Ethan! He came up to Istiklal street and we had a nice dinner at the cafe Claire and I had breakfast at most mornings. It was so great to see him, and it was reassuring to hear that he had been changing in some of the same ways that Amman has changed me – even though it might be hard adjusting back to life in the US, and later on to school back in Rochester in the fall, at least I won’t be going through it alone, and I’ll have someone I can talk to who understands what I’m going through.

Cairo. It was an experience.

Finally back from my spring break, and settled back to life in Amman. I left for Cairo in the early morning of the 10th, stayed for three days, and then headed to Istanbul on the 13th for five days. It was an amazing trip. I’ll start with talking about Cairo in this post, and follow with a post about Istanbul. So much happened… they each deserve their special focus.

We were supposed to be met by a driver from our hostel upon arriving in the Cairo airport, but as I thought it might, that plan fell through, so we ended up paying for the airport taxi to take us downtown to find our hostel. The drive through the city was incredible – it’s so much greener there than in Jordan! It was breathtaking at first, and we were all so excited. However, it was also incredibly dirty, especially once we got downtown. The city reminds me of Savannah, GA, mixed with New York City, with a lot of Arab thrown in. Our taxi driver didn’t know where our hostel was, or even where the street was, so luckily we were driving around on Friday morning – the streets were dead, although there were enough people around for him to ask for directions. Once we got to the hostel, we had to wait about an hour to check into our room, so we ended up sitting in the reception area talking with one of the managers for a long time. The people at the Sara Inn Hostel are fantastic – so helpful and nice. It’s really more like a hotel than a hostel, except for the prices, and it’s in a great area of Cairo – just a 7 minute walk from the National Museum, which is where we spent the afternoon.

The museum was pretty cool, but we soon discovered that we hate crowds of tourists, although we got a chance to utilize our Jordanian mosey. It was also shocking to be around foreigners who did not dress as if they were in a Muslim country. It’s as if they didn’t even realize the culture they were going to be in! Girls were wearing short shorts, women with extremely low-cut tops and shirts that showed their hips… It was shocking for us.

That night, we took a dinner cruise on the Nile and got to see some belly and sufi dancing. Very touristy, but it was cool to see, and it was beautiful out on the Nile. Nice with a cool breeze, and we could see the lights of Cairo on one side and the lights of Giza on the other.

The next day was pyramids day. First we went to Giza where we dealt with people trying to scam us at every turn, mad horses (my friend Claire’s horse actually fell over at one point just because he didn’t want anyone to ride him) – there was no way we were going to ride camels that day, 3 hours in Wadi Rum was plenty for this semester – rain and electricity storms, and our guides hitting on us – as everyone did in Cairo, so whatever. The stormy weather was pretty fun – all of our pictures in front of the big pyramids are absolutely crazy looking! The static made our hair fly up, quite lovely. At least it wasn’t as hot as it could have been that day. Giza was followed by driving down to Dahshur to see the Bent Pyramid and climb up the Red Pyramid – I could have gone inside the Red Pyramid, but I didn’t think I could handle climbing down a cramped and hot tiny shaft for 60 meters just to stand inside an empty, extremely hot room. Claire and Robin did, and were in a huge amount of pain for four days afterwards – they had to bend over for the entire descent (and climb back up!) – not fun. I was happy enough just sitting at the top. After Dahshur, we went on to Saqqarah to see the steppe pyramid that Imhotep built and, after some confusion, we bought an extra ticket to see the new tombs, which was shway creepy. After making our guide leave us (he wanted 60 Egyptian pounds to show us around – no way!), we followed a small bedouin man down to a very secluded area, where we watched as he unlocked a heavy, creaky metal door and motioned for us to go in ahead of him. We all hesitated, thinking “Wow, he could just lock us in there,” but of course we ventured in – it was worth it, being inside two very different tombs was really cool. After a full day exploring all of the pyramids we were absolutely exhausted from all of the walking, the heat, and constantly dealing with stares, harassment, and scams, so we ended up sleeping for 4 hours after getting back to the hostel, waking up to eat a quick dinner we ordered for take-out, and then going back to sleep for a long time.

For our last full day in Cairo (which was Easter Sunday) we decided to explore Coptic and Islamic Cairo. We took the metro over to the Coptic area of Cairo and explored one beautiful church and cemetery, along with a place in the middle of the cemetery that is said to have been a resting place of the Holy family. We tried to go to the second Coptic church down there, but they were only letting Egyptians in that day, which was a little sad – apparently it was the more popular of the two churches. From there, we decided to take a taxi to the Citadel to see the mosques there that my advisor had recommended. That taxi alone was enough adventure for the day. The driver was actually really nice about negotiating a price, and while he drove he pointed out some of the bigger areas we were passing by. Just as he was about to point out the Citadel in the distance, we all heard a huge bang from the car. All three of us in the back are completely shocked and wondering if we’re going to die, but the driver just looks at us, apologizes, and continues to point out the Citadel. We noticed he was gripping the steering wheel as if he was holding on for dear life, and we finally figured out that a tire had just blown. We said this, and he replied with “No stopping, no stopping here.” We were amazed. He proceeded to drive a ways down the street until he found a mechanic, and then told us to stay in the hot car while they replaced the tire. We didn’t fight him on that point – it would have been such a hassle to deal with ditching him for another taxi.

We finally made it into the Citadel and saw the mosques of Mohammed Ali and Nasir Mohammed, and then began the long search for the mosque of Sulayman Pasha that my advisor had suggest I find – he said it was out of the way, but a real gem, especially since not many tourists found it by themselves. My friends were silently cursing me as I tried to run ahead of them and ask people which way we should turn – they were in so much pain from climbing into the pyramid the day before! – but the mosque was completely worth it! It was absolutely gorgeous, my favorite from the entire trip. It’s small compared to the other mosques we saw, but so beautiful and peaceful. Just as my professor had said, we were the only ones there, and we just sat in the main room for a long time, cooling off and marveling at the ceiling. Eventually, a man came in and offered to show us around – we were all shway wary of that, since we had been dealing with people the entire trip demanding tips and payment for telling us just one little fact that we didn’t ask for, but the man never asked for anything – he was just so happy to show us around his little mosque! He took us into the central courtyard, and from there to the tombs of the family that had the mosque built, as well as the tomb of an imam. It was really special. A great way to end the Cairo trip in my opinion, even though we didn’t get to go to the big bazaar or the Islamic area of Cairo.

The pictures are up on Facebook – hopefully these public links will work for you!

Cairo I

Cairo II

The next post I write will be about the five days Claire and I spent in Istanbul after leaving Cairo. This upcoming week is going to be fairly busy – I have a research paper due for one of my classes that I will need to be working on. Haven’t had a chance to start it yet as I’ve been exhausted at the end of every day since coming back from spring break – it’s amazing how much traveling takes out of you. We only had four days of classes this week, but it seemed like Thursday would never come! And just a quick note: I only have one month left here. One month, and counting. Wow. I can hardly believe it.

Spring Break! — Middle Eastern Style

I have been sooo busy since the last time I wrote – almost two weeks ago. Midterms took a lot of time, and then there was all of the frustration over course registration, applying for financial aid, applying for a summer internship, and planning my spring break – which starts tomorrow!

I am flying to Cairo tomorrow morning and spending three nights there with my two good friends in the program Claire and Robin. While I’m nervous about all of the scams, harassment, and stealing that happens in Egypt, I’m extremely excited to finally see the Pyramids, go to the museums, visit some mosques, see Coptic Cairo… I’m actually going to be there over Easter, which will be pretty interesting. We were able to book a private room (with our own bathroom!) at a pretty nice hostel in downtown Cairo, and it will only cost me around $35 for the entire time we’re there. Not bad. They even said they would be picking us up from the airport, which would be amazing since a lot of the hotel scams happen en route to a hotel. When I called the hostel to reserve a room, they took our flight information, but who knows if they will actually follow through… Guess we’ll find out tomorrow!

From Cairo, Claire is going with me to Istanbul on the 13th. We were able to reserve two spots in a pretty awesome hostel near Taskim Square, but there weren’t any private double rooms available, so we’ll be staying in a dorm. I’m actually really excited for the experience – I’ve never had a chance to stay in hostels before, and I’m really excited to meet random people. Claire and I have a huge list of things we need to see in Istanbul – writing this post right now is making me extremely excited! How am I ever going to get through the five hours of work ahead of me? We’re staying five nights in Istanbul and then returning to Amman on the 18th. We have the next day off from classes, and I’m looking forward to the time to relax and catch up on sleep. My host family seems really sad that I will be gone for over a week, but they keep giving me tips about traveling in Cairo and Istanbul – especially on the differences between Egyptian and Jordanian colloquial arabic.

Despite being so busy, I was able to take a day-trip to the Dead Sea with my friend Santiago on Saturday while everyone else on the program was on the second trip to Petra. We took the cheap controller busses to Al-Bahr Al-Mayt (the Dead Sea) from downtown Amman – that was an experience in and of itself. I’m used to the small busses here since I’m usually taking them to and from the university, but I’ve never taken them outside of Amman where they wind through the small villages. While we were waiting for enough people to get on the bus to justify leaving the bus station in Amman, three old Islamic archaeologists from Iraq started talking to us. We chatted in broken Arabic and English for a little while, and I tried hard not to be overly friendly and let Santiago talk most of the time, but somehow the men ended up taking a picture of just me and them! They asked us for a picture, and Santiago thought they wanted him to take one of just them, so while they were outside the bus trying to communicate, I decided to step out to help them – and then they managed to persuade us to take a picture all together — and then Santiago was given the camera and next thing I knew I was with all three of the Iraqi men. Oh well – it was kind of funny, and they didn’t bother me after that. They were actually pretty helpful in making sure we figured out the transition from one controller bus to another in one of the towns we passed through, and that we got off at the stop for the Dead Sea.

When we were finally dropped off, after about 2 hours of waiting and driving, we realized that we were still five kilometers from where all the beaches were! After going through a check point, we managed to persuade workers at a restaurant still under construction to let us use their alm0st-finished bathrooms, and then walked down to the nearby Holiday Inn, which, we found out, was also still under construction! We were dreading making the long walk down to the beaches, but managed to catch a taxi the rest of the way.

We went to the Amman Beach, which was supposed to be cheaper than all of the hotel beaches (which are all pretty much 5-star hotels), but it still cost us 12JD each! I’m sure it was one of the cheapest beaches we would find, but that was even more expensive than the private beach I went to down in Aqaba. Oh well – it was completely worth it. The Dead Sea is amazing! There is nothing else like floating effortlessly for an hour in that water. It was incredible. The water was slick and oily on my skin, and there was literally no way that I could sink – the only annoying part was that I was made accutely aware of scratches I didn’t even know I had gotten, and that it was slightly uncomfortable at first holding my head out of the water (I didn’t really want to deal with extremely salty hair, even though there were fresh water showers along the beach). Santiago and I both paid the few dinars to get covered in the black Dead Sea mud and bake in it for 20 minutes – it actually started to get uncomfortable after a while (and some of my skin had a reaction to it – just minor irritation for about an hour after I washed off the mud) but it was totally worth it – my skin still feels amazing! It was a greaty day-trip. There was a 2-for-1 sale going on in the gift shop at the beach, so I ended up buying a mud face mask, some lotion, and a couple bars of soap to bring a little of the Dead Sea back with me. Anyone interested in a little spa relaxation when I get back?

Oooh Jordan…

Yesterday was my last program day-trip – we went to see a few of the desert castles (including Amra and the Azraq fort). I am not going to talk much about it – it was a nice trip, but it was also really windy and cold out in the desert and I was exhausted from studying for midterms all week. Amra was probably my favorite site – the frescoes there are absolutely gorgeous.  We also stopped at the Azraq wetland reserve after we went to the fort, and that was really nice to see. Most people probably wouldn’t believe that there used to be a large oasis there! It’s much smaller now due to overpumping, but preserving what is left is a high priority for the Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature. I will share the links to my pictures when I finally get a chance to put them up.

As I mentioned, I’ve had midterms this week. Not fun. Almost all of my free time has been spent studying and preparing. I finished all of the sections for my Modern Standard Arabic midterm last week and I did really well on them. I was supposed to do the talking section of my colloquial midterm on Wednesday, but we ran out of time, which was really frustrating. So now I have to do both the talking and writing portions tomorrow, the same day that I have my big Archaeology midterm. Aaahhh I’m so sick of studying… I’m looking forward to a relaxing weekend with no trips – almost everyone else on the program is going on the second trip to Petra this weekend, so I’m planning on relaxing and spending some time with my host family. It’s been three weeks since I’ve been able to sleep in on the weekend!

Thinking about classes and my living situation for next year has made me a little sad this week, and I realized that it’s because I have gotten so comfortable here. Yes, I really miss my friends, family, and life at home, and I know that I’m going to love going back to a place where I am not immediately seen as foreign, but there’s a lot about this country that I have come to love. First of all, I absolutely love hearing the call to prayer five times a day. I usually don’t even notice it anymore, but when I do I love to sit and listen to it – it is so beautiful and calming. I really wish I could understand it all, but just listening to it is enough. I’m going to miss how Friday mornings are completely dead until around noontime when men start rushing to the mosques. I’ve only been living with it for about two months – I can only imagine how hard it must be  to move to a place like America for someone who has grown up following the call to prayer all their life.

I’m really, really going to miss the food and bread. It’s going to be weird to walk on a busy street and be able to look the men I pass in the eye – it might take me a while to get used to the fact that I don’t have to ignore most of the people that pass by me. I’m going to miss seeing all of the women wearing the hijab, although it will be nice to not be among the minority who don’t cover their hair. Some of the scarves are so pretty that I wish I didn’t look so awkward when I try to wear one. I am actually going to miss the crazy controller busses! It’s almost comforting knowing that, no matter the time of day, there’s going to be a Suweileh bus rolling around soon – I’m no longer nervous about the fact that there really is no schedule here. I probably won’t miss the crazy weather that changes drastically within the span of five minutes (example: it was only cloudy before I walked out of my host family’s apartment door, then it started to rain once we got outside, the rain turned into a downpour on my walk to the building I had class in, within 10  minutes it was hailing, and then it was actually snowing for a short time, but just half an hour later it was sunny again!) but I’ve gotten used to the crazy experiences that come of it, and I know I’m going to miss laughing at the end of the day at whatever really annoying experience I just went through.

What’s really weird to me is that I’m going through this mini freak-out period now of all times, instead of when I actually only have a little time left. I still have a couple weeks before Spring break, and then I have about a month after that – why not freak out then, when my trip back home is actually within site? I’m just trying to take comfort in the fact that I like it enough here to be sad about leaving. I know the time will fly by, but I’m trying to focus on making it all count and not looking ahead to much – which will be easier once registration for classes and the housing lotteries are finally finished. And at least I know that this place has already found a way into my heart for good.

Umm Qais and Jerash

On Saturday, I went on a program day trip to see “Roman Jordan” – Umm Qais and Jerash. Both are in northern Jordan, and I have to say, the northern area of Jordan is gorgeous. I love the desert in the south – it’s beautiful in a soulful, desolate way – but it was absolutely amazing being surrounded by so much green in the north! It was also the first day of spring, and, very fittingly, everything was blooming. There were flowers everywhere, and my friends kept making fun of me because I would get excited everytime I saw a pretty flower. The weather was sunny and warm, and it was finally spring – of course I was getting excited! I’m so ready for the hot weather to come.

While Umm Qais and Jerash are both Roman sites, they’re very different. Umm Qais was originally Roman, but an Ottoman village was built on the ruins later on, so there is a huge difference in some of the architecture. A lot of Umm Qais has yet to be excavated, but we were able to walk through the theater (an oddity as it faces West, not North, by the way) and among the remains of one of the churches, as well as what remains of the Ottoman buildings. The best part of Umm Qais, however, was the view. I was able to see Golan Heights and the Sea of Galilee, as well as the Yarmouk River – I think we were maybe only 2 or 3 miles from the border. It was incredible! A little hazy, but the view was still fantastic. Surprisingly, there were also a whole lot of lizards skittering around the site. They were actually kind of creepy, because we would be walking between some of the Ottoman buildings, and all of a sudden we’d realize that a lizard had just been by our shoulders. Our guide tried to catch one, actually — I don’t know what he would’ve have done with it if he had succeeded.

From Umm Qais we went back down to Jerash for a delicious lunch, and then a touristy show about the Roman army and gladiators. It was pretty hilarious to watch, but I had already known a lot of what they were talking about. The best part was at the end when there was a chariot race. After that, we walked through the ruins. Jerash is much bigger than Umm Qais, and there are a lot more Roman ruins there. A lot of it is still underground, too. We walked up to the theater and got to hear a couple drummers and a bagpiper (bagpipes have become a part of the Jordanian culture, actually), we saw a few churches, the temple of Artemis… There were columns everywhere, but what I couldn’t get over was the endless field of green grass and yellow flowers! It was incredible. It actually made me feel like I was in Ireland or somewhere similar (even though I’ve never been…). It was also kind of crazy to be walking down the colonnade and see, just across the nearby street, a modern town.

I uploaded my pictures to Facebook while typing up this blog. Some people have mentioned that the links to the supposedly public photo albums are not working — hopefully you are able to see these!

Umm Qais and Jerash – 1

Umm Qais and Jerash – 2

Midterms started today. I am absolutely exhausted right now – I spent the beginning of the week studying, and I still have about three more tests this week, plus two more next week. It’s really annoying not being able to camp out in the library until the early hours of the morning – I’m pretty sure my host family missed seeing me over the weekend and at the beginning of the week, especially since Saturday was Mother’s day here, but I really needed to find a quiet place to study during the day. I can’t stay up late to study, either – I am absolutely exhausted by 9 or 10 at night, and all I want to do is crash in bed. I’m really looking forward to this time next week when all of my exams will be done!

I’ve been thinking a lot about going back to the US and spending next year back at school. I faxed in my housing forms yesterday, and have been e-mailing professors to try and figure out what courses I will be taking next year. It feels really weird to be thinking that far ahead when I still have two months left here, especially since I know these last two months will fly by!

Wadi Rum

I never thought that I would like being in the desert, but traveling through Jordan has changed that – I absolutely love the desert, especially the landscape of southern Jordan. Most of all, I love Wadi Rum. We got to experience the Wadi in three different ways during the weekend program over-night trip: first, by a 4×4 truck tour, secondly, by spending the night in a shwey Bedouin camp, and thirdly by a three-hour trek on camels from the campsite to the Wadi Rum visitor’s center. Each one showed a different aspect about being in the desert. If I ever come back, I will be kicking my fear of heights in the butt and will force myself to go rock climbing – that would be an experience unlike any other. I’ve also heard they offer hot air balloon rides over the Wadi, which I would love to try.

The 4×4 tour was really a lot of fun. We started around 1:30pm and didn’t arrive at the campsite until after 6:30. The Wadi is so big that, even though we spent five hours driving around part of it, there was always a new and incredible view. We stopped frequently to climb up some of the rocks, and each step gave a different perspective. It was incredible. Being in such a large group, however, had its drawbacks. There was always someone talking, and while it was fun to chat with friends in my truck, it did not let me get the true experience of being in the desert. It must be awe-inspiring to walk silently through the Wadi, hearing only the wind. At one point, we stopped at a large sand dune and walked all the way up to the top – it’s incredibly difficult to walk up sand, by the way! Running down made it all worth it, though. My favorite part of the day, however, was watching the sunset from on top of one of the rocks. It was the most incredible experience seeing the sun rapidly disappear behind the mountains in the distance, bathing the stretch of desert before me in even more red and gold colors. Words can’t describe it, and the pictures I took barely capture it.

After the sunset, we were taken to the campsite where we would sleep. I say it was a shwey Bedouin camp because it was kind of a hotel in the desert, just with tents. It was quite an adventure trying to find a 3-person tent for my two friends and I when we arrived. There were electric lights in paper bags all over the ground in the campsite (to look like candles) but the area of tents for women did not have the lights turned on at all.  We stumbled around in the sand for a few good minutes as we tried to find an unoccupied 3-person tent, which was difficult since there were also no lights inside the tents and we kind of had to feel our way around inside to count the number of beds. It was actually too exciting when we finally found what we were looking for. We had real mattresses to sleep on in the large tent that was sectioned off to make rooms for two or three people, as well as a bathroom with sinks, toilets, showers, and hot water (although most of us, including myself, did not indulge with a shower… we would only get just as sandy the next day, and there was only a flimsy shower curtain separating the square-foot of shower space from the toilet area in each stall). We had a delicious meal of rice, kebabs, hummus, baba ganuj, and bread, and then there was dancing and music. The night was crisp and windy but not unbearably cold, and the sky was clear – there were so many stars out there! It was also a full moon that night, which kept us from completely stumbling through the camp. While I wanted to stay up late, I just couldn’t, which was probably a good move – the wind was so strong that it kept waking me up during the night. When my friend and I went to go get ready for bed, we were fully expecting to have to hold our cell phones up for each other so we could dig through our backpacks and move around without tripping on the carpets or over the beds, but to our happy surprise, we found a small candle and a box of matches placed at the back of the tent!! It was amazing how happy we were to have that small bit of light, even though it didn’t really help us see that much. It was comforting to fall asleep to the light of the candle, though, which we left lit for the third person in our tent who stayed up later.

In the morning we woke to the sounds of around 90, maybe 100, camels outside of our camp. After a small breakfast, we loaded all of our bags into two pickup trucks and went over to the camels, where the girls were immediately bombarded by Bedouins asking if we wanted to ride their camels. I was swept away by one 15 year-old boy whose name I found out was Sheddy, and he took me to a camel named Haman. I lucked out – I didn’t have any camels attached to me and Sheddy only had to take care of my camel, so soon after we started the walk he gave me the reins to Haman and let me guide him most of the way. Sheddy also really liked to be “Number one!” as he kept saying, so he often asked me if it was okay if Haman ran. I was all for it, but now that I’m sitting here with a sore bottom, I don’t know if it was such a good idea to let Sheddy make Haman run so much – camel trots are even worse than horse trots.

Haman was probably the most pimping camel of the bunch, for several reasons. As I said, he liked to run. He also really enjoyed cigarette smoke – Sheddy often had a cigarette in his hand, and about half of the ones he smoked were really more for Haman. Haman also really liked to smell the other camels’ butts. It was slightly awkward for me whenever we were around another group of camels, because Haman wouldn’t leave them alone. Maybe that was part of the reason why Sheddy kept making us run… The camel ride was amazing though – we only stopped once to look at the carvings of Lawrence of Arabia and Prince Abdullah (who became the King of Jordan) and have shai with some Bedouins who were camped there. I ended up buying a really nice dress with embroidery on it, and while it doesn’t fit very well right now, it should be pretty easy to alter and it’s really beautiful. I also didn’t mind spending a little money that would benefit the Bedouins, as opposed to just buying something only a little cheaper in downtown Amman at the souk.

The camel ride lasted for three hours, and as amazing as it was, three hours was just about all that I could handle, so when we saw the visitor’s center in the distance (it reminded me of an oasis, actually) it was with a sigh of relief all around. We said goodbye to the camels and our guides, had a leisurely lunch and a look around the Wadi Rum “museum”, and then jumped on the busses and headed back up to Amman. The one thing I found interesting that I read in the museum was that the Wadi is, obviously, constantly changing from erosion, but also, it is being pushed up from the ground (by tectonic movements) faster than it can be eroded at the top, so within so many years, Wadi Rum will look drastically different than it does today, with taller and much skinnier rock formations.

Miraculously, I was able to put up all of my pictures from the weekend on Facebook already. There are two albums as I didn’t get the chance to weed through all of the pictures (I had about 146 before I deleted some, and I quickly got rid of a few that were just absolutely terrible before posting), so I hope you are not bored when you look at desert scene after desert scene… I took so many pictures because I knew that they would never be able to fully capture the experience of being there, and I hoped that the more I took, the better the chances that one of them would affect all of you in a somewhat similar way to how actually being there affected me.

Wadi Rum
Wadi Rum – 2

Pictures of Aqaba, around Amman

I was finally able to successfully put pictures up on Facebook. Here are the public links to the two new albums, one of Aqaba, and one of some random fun around Amman. I will probably add more pictures to the second one later on, so keep this link!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2073966&l=d6e1c&id=3708149  – Aqaba

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2074042&id=3708149&l=8147d  – The Kingdom

I cannot wait for the weekend to come… Going to Aqaba last weekend and having a day off yesterday makes school and work so much harder to get through! This weekend is the big overnight trip to Wadi Rum, one of the best desert valleys in Jordan. We get to spend a night in a Bedouin camp and ride camels! Very excited. It’s crazy how fast March is slipping by…

Aqaba

In honor of the spring break I am missing back home, and as a result of planning for a possible three-day weekend for the Prophet’s birthday (it turned out not to be a three-day weekend – we have tomorrow off as a holiday, but that is all), some friends and I went down to Aqaba for a weekend on the beach. The weather was absolutely amazing, especially since Amman had been pretty cold and gloomy over the past week. Traveling down from Amman – not so much.

I did no planning for this trip myself – my friends went to the JETT bus station to buy roundtrip tickets and they picked out the hotel. The JETT buses are the best way to get down to Aqaba, but the ride is not fun: at least four hours on a double-decker bouncy bus. We left at 6pm, but didn’t get to the station in Aqaba until 12:30 am. There was a tanker accident on the road that we got stuck behind. It held us up in a traffic jam for about an hour, and then a little ways after that we had to take a detour on a dirt road next to the highway to bypass the section where the tanker had crashed. I didn’t see it as we passed, but apparently it looked like it had been pretty bad. And then the customs security check took a while to get through. So by the time we had arrived, we were all thoroughly sick of the uncomfortable chairs, harsh lighting (that was never turned off to allow easy sleeping), and loud music/movies that never stopped playing. All we wanted was to pass out at our hotel as soon as possible, but that was another adventure…

We stayed at the Amirah hotel, a small budget hotel located in a sort of alleyway with several other budget places. It kind of freaked me out at first when our mean taxi driver dropped us off back there. There were six of us who went together (two had arrived earlier in the day) so we were splitting up into three rooms, and Robin and I shared a room the first night. It was the sleaziest, crappiest hotel room I have ever slept in! I understand that budget hotels will not be nice-looking or all that comfortable, but this room was horrendous: no shower curtain, which wouldn’t have been that much of a problem except for the fact that our bathroom floor was already flooded from the leaking toilet, which actually broke 10 minutes after we got in the room; 10 inches between the edge of the sink and the toilet; only two minutes of hot water; the most stained pillows I have ever seen; random peanut shells that kept popping up under my feet; a cracked mirror; endless flies; and a wonderfully sleezy small balcony giving us a veiw of the alleyway. After taking showers and attempting to go to sleep, Robin and I ended up breaking down into hysterical laughter, caused by exhaustion and frustration. It felt so good to laugh it off!! We actually ended up tearing apart the room to try to construct make-shift blackout curtains so we might actually be able to fall asleep on the foam mattresses. By 2:30 we had finally settled down and were able to get some sleep.

The next morning we met the other four girls for breakfast at the Ali Baba restaurant right near our hotel for breakfast (we made fantastic hummus and tomato sandwiches with our cheese omelettes) and then grabbed a taxi to go over to the Royal Diving Club’s beach. It’s about a 15-20 minute taxi ride outside of Aqaba, but the beach was fantastic! Nice lounge chairs, towels, a pool, a restaurant/bar (that wasn’t serving alcohol, even though more than half of its menu consisted of various drinks), and various water activities (snorkeling, scubadiving, jet skis, tubing…). We just sat relaxing on the beach for the rest of the day – it was amazing. We could see Israel, Egypt, and were only 5km from the Saudi Arabia border from our beach chairs.

Although I really had wanted to go snorkeling (and my boss had recommended the Royal Diving Club because it was on one of the better coral reefs that Jordan has access to), I didn’t get to. We didn’t feel like getting into the sea right away, so we ended up swimming in the pool to cool off soon after we got there. Walking back to our chairs, the girls noticed that someone in our group was leaving a trail of blood on the sidewalk! It turns out I sliced my toe pretty badly either in the pool or walking on the pool deck and hadn’t even felt it. We found some iodine to clean it up with and the bleeding stopped soon after I applied pressure, but it kept opening up whenever I walked anywhere for the first few hours, so I didn’t want to deal with that while trying to snorkel in salt water. I was disappointed, but I still had a nice time just relaxing on the beach. We’re planning on going back for a weekend before the end of the semester to do some snorkeling, as none of the other girls got to do it either (they waited too long and just missed the last trip).

We ran into quite a few other people from our program that night after we had dinner, and we stayed out exploring the town, which really didn’t have that much to offer. Aqaba is really just a crappy town on the Red Sea. We did get to wander through the Movenpick hotel – very nice and expensive place – but we ended up just sitting in one of the pubs that catered to ex-pats and talking for a long time. It was a nice place to get away from the extreme harassment that we were subjected to on the streets – and I thought Amman was annoying! Aqaba is really just a tourist town, so I thought that maybe the harassment wouldn’t be bad, but I was wrong. I guess seeing foreigners dressed in revealing clothing (because of the weather and swimming) just intensifies it.

That night, Robin and I switched out of our crappy double room and moved into a four-person room with two of the other girls, Suzy and Hannah. While it kind of sucked having to share a bathroom with four other girls (the floor never dried from our showers, and the hot water didn’t last very long again) it was a much better room than what we had the first night, and it saved us some money. Saturday, we split up into two groups and walked around the town doing a little shopping. I bought a gorgeous silver ring that I couldn’t resist – buying silver out here is cheaper than at home because they price it by weight, and the man who sold it to me knocked off a few JD because the morning had been slow. Robin, Suzy and I ended back at the ex-pat pub for a light lunch, and we sat talking again for a long time while we idled away the time before our bus left at 4:00. The bus ride back was much better – still uncomfortable, but at least the movie wasn’t played as loudly and we arrived in Amman after only a little over four hours.

The weekend was exactly what I needed: relaxing and refreshing, and lots of fun with friends. I got some pretty good pictures – I didn’t take many as I have already gone through half of the batteries I brought and we have a trip to Wadi Rum this weekend – but I’ll try to put up what I have soon, and I plan on stealing the photos my friends took. I got to see the mountains on the drive back that had been invisible at night on the way down – absolutely gorgeous. I will never get over the scenery. The rocks looked like they had been painted with almost-vertical stripes of dark brown and red. Wadi Rum is in the area we drove through to get to Aqaba, so I am really excited to head back there. How incredible would it be to live in a place like that?