soap, greenery, and paint

today some ciee kids headed to a small town called orjan about an hour north of amman. orjan and the area around it are currently developing a number of sustainable and community-friendly tourism initiatives, and we got to see/experience a number of them. first was the "soap house", a cooperative of local women making organic, handmade soap using herbs grown in their garden. the whole house and gardens smelled heavenly, adding to the already beautiful fresh air that comes with escaping amman.



then we went on a walk along a trail that passes some ruins, some ottoman aqueducts, some streams, and many many fig trees, olive trees, and poppy flowers. again, so nice to get out of the city and back to greenery, and a really gorgeous day for it.




we then were treated to a communal lunch in a local family's house, with everyone gathered on floor pillows around the food. dessert was mounds of bright and juicy strawberries, kiwis, and bananas, since the orjan valley is known for its fruit production.


our afternoon was spent volunteering as painters to give the inside of a local school a new coat of paint.



the day ended with a visit to the ruins of a church and some beautiful views out over the vibrant green of the valley and the hills of israel in the distance.

damascus

the jordan-syria border, where we spent five hours last thursday waiting for visa approval to be allowed into syria, is one of the most excellent places i have ever discovered for people watching. sitting by the foreigners visa window, i enjoyed hearing others struggling with arabic and also had a view of the madness that is the jordanian stamp window: a crowd of 40 men squirming their way towards the front of the queue; names being shouted out and passports/important documents being passed hand-to-hand to their owners as the crowd gradually rotated membership; every 15 minutes or so the group clambering to an adjacent window following whoever was handing out the passports, resulting in re-intensified jockeying for prime front-of-the-line positions- the similar image of the "mine-mine-mine" seagulls in finding nemo definitely popped into my head haha. it was also interesting to watch the arab people watch us- sitting in my corner reading i was mostly invisible, and could watch the jordanians/syrians/etc. as they observed the many curiosities of the groups of americans sitting nearby.
when we finally got our entry stamps cerca 1am, the few taxi drivers in sight were demanding exorbitant prices for the ride to damascus, so we walked off to find some legit ones. unfortunately this idea failed as legit-ness was nowhere in sight at that hour of the night, as none of the passersby we asked knew where more taxis could be found. as we stood looking around in uncertainty, one of the border guards approached us and explained that since he knew we were having trouble finding a cab, and he was getting off work and heading to damascus anyway, he would just drive us there for the normal price. as he drove us past the checkpoint it was fun to watch the amused smiles and jokes of his border guard friends who chuckled at the fact that he was acting as taxi driver for four american girls. but even this, our first interaction with the syrian people, proved that what we'd heard about their over-the-top friendliness/helpfulness/welcomingness was very true. on a side note, dealing with the taxi drivers on our amman-damascus journey was one of the most fun times i've had with arabic yet- fun to be able to talk and argue and barter, and fun to watch the amused and surprised smiles of the drivers as they listened to my poorly-grammared sass :) but i think their impressed-ness won us a few points because we ended up getting some good prices.
damascus itself, especially the old city, is a city to fall in love with and one i definitely plan to return to. we spent all of friday wandering around the old city and literally just wandered- the streets and the souq were relatively quiet since it was friday, and it was so refreshing and calming to feel like we'd left the big city bustle behind us. the old city has the tranquil pace and small winding alleys of a small rural town, with its cobbled streets lined with small shops. it also has the small-town feel in its friendliness- shopkeepers welcomed us, chatted with us, and the box mosaic man even gave me a demo of how he creates his art. there are so many beautiful handcrafts there, it was hard to resist the urge to buy a $200 scarf that had taken four months to weave, and honestly it was gorgeous enough to be worth every penny of that (even if it meant i couldn't buy it). arabic prayer flags hanging everywhere and colorful lights coating the alleys in the evening made the souq a light and vibrant place to stroll, drinking in the sights and smells of all its nooks and twisty turns.






one of the souq's main treats was reeeeally delicious ice cream with chopped pistachios that was a melting disaster i couldn't eat fast enough but so so good.



we explored azem palace, an intricate paradise with its courtyard garden, fountain, and colorfully complex ceilings and tilings.



the ummayad mosque was amazing- grand and majestic in its scope and its golden-sheened mosaic walls, but at the same time a bubbling happy center of community life with families sitting along its shaded walls and children weaving through the courtyard chasing soccer balls. we sat down to take in the scene and ended up chatting with some young girls eager to practice their engligh and then a group of five sisters who invited us to share their snacks and get to know each other. it was such a privilege to get to see inside the practices of the faithful (the ummayad mosque is one of the most important in islam)- the pilgrims at the shrine of the shia martyr hussein and the shrine of john the baptist, the great prayer hall with its bright stained glass windows divided down the middle between men and women's sides, and the feeling that the mosque was a home for community and gathering.







afterward we had a delicious terrace lunch complete with mint lemonade, and later went to hear the quirky performance of one of damascus' oldest hakawatis (storytellers).


the next morning had us up for breakfast, which included olives- syria is known as the first land to grow olive trees.


we then went to tour the national museum with its beautiful mosaics and token castle facade. we also passed by the old train station with its kaleidescope of bright stained glass windows, before making our way back to get lost in the old city again for the rest of the day.



damascus' final treat for me was to stumble upon some sort of armenian church, which of course made me think of my favorite roommate :)

cultural conversations

today my professor for arab women writers invited some of her jordanian students to our class and we spent the period discussing any cross-cultural issues that came to mind. it was incredibly interesting and lots of fun to interact with the jordanian students and contrast their views to ours on subjects that don't always come up in daily conversation. some of the highlights:
--during a discussion about gender relations, an american student brought up the idea of stay-at-home dads, and asked the jordanians whether the husband being the one to stay at home while the wife works occurs often in jordanian society. the response from the jordanian students was to burst out in uncontrollable giggles at the ridiculous notion of a stay-at-home dad existing in their society. while granted this idea is by no means a majority occurrence in the u.s., i think we're at the point where it's common enough that people wouldn't blatantly laugh at the mere suggestion of it. the differences in our perception of this concept is a great illustration of the significant societal and cultural differences regarding the roles of men and women.
--one of the jordanian students asked us whether what he had seen in movies/tv shows was accurate: that americans tend to move in together before marriage. in jordan this is something that absolutely never occurs: there is not even any physical contact before marriage, nonetheless living together, and the jordanian student explained that he did not understand why in the world americans live together before marriage because isn't that pretty much the same thing as marriage? it was intersting to me to note that i find the jordanian tradition equally as strange and illogical as he finds our ways, and all of the americans generally agreed that we found it most logical to move in with someone before marrying them in order to really get to know them and know that you're fully compatible before committing to marriage. although we came away from the discussion understanding each other's motives a little better, i don't think either side felt drawn to change their views on the subject.
also, this reminds me, a couple weeks ago i was watching tv with my host sister and the movie 'dirty dancing havana nights' was on. i'd never seen it before so i stayed to watch, and about halfway through i had noticed how the movie seemed to be overly drawing out the lead-up to the main couple's first kiss, because every time they came close the scene would change. when the movie ended with still no kiss, i got a little suspicious and realized that it wasn't the movie itself but the jordanian channel it was broadcast over that had deleted all the physically intimate scenes. another great illustration of cultural differences haha.
--one of the jordanian students had asked us whether we had voted for obama (all but two or three of us had- i guess you get a certain type of person who comes to study abroad here), and then later in the discussion asked us why we'd wanted to study arabic or the middle east. one of my classmates said something really interesting that i feel to be true: our generation's formative years were mostly lived during the bush era, during the post 9/11 years when the middle east took a spotlight in american foreign policy, and even if only subconsciously, we were all influenced by that in one way or another. for the majority of us, there was a strong sense of dissatisfaction with our government's actions and attitudes towards the mideast, and a desire to change and improve this. i myself don't have grand-scale political ambitions for my knowledge of arabic and the middle east, but i think part of my motivation is my belief that even one individual has the ability to increase understanding between cultures, both as a positive representative of america while abroad here, and as a window for my community at home into the reality (rather than the news stories and politics) of people and life over here. i know that when i come home in one piece with stories of friendship and a beautiful culture, i will be dispelling the perceptions of at least a few of those around me that the middle east is full of terrorists and that my being here is an irrational daily risk to my safety, and even if that were my only reason for being here that in itself would be a valuable and worthwhile use of time.

day of rage

hamas called for a palestinian 'day of rage' today in jerusalem, and the jordanians are showing their support. today there were protests on campus large enough to have riot police on standby, as well as other protests throughout amman.
in case you don't follow mideast news, israel has once again decided to build new jewish settlements in east jerusalem, with the unspoken goal of claiming the entire capital as israeli rather than leaving east jerusalem to the palestinians (the latter action being the one supported by the international community and numerous UN resolutions). israel also angered the arab community by dedicating a synagogue a few hundred meters from al-aqsa mosque (immensely important site in islam), which adds to the perception that israel is attempting to judaize all of jerusalem. even the u.s., which is often an overly staunch supporter of israel no matter its wrongs, angrily condemned the israeli government's actions.
jordanians are very upset by israel's recent actions for two main reasons: 1) a huge number of jordanians are of palestinian origin or are palestinian refugees who feel very strongly about their rights to their homeland; and 2) jordan, under the jordan-israel peace accords after the 1967 six day war, is the designated caretaker of muslim and christian holy sites in east jerusalem (since this part of the city and the west bank were under jordanian rule prior to that war), so jordanians take infringements on the holy city very seriously.
the israeli-palestinian issue incites anger around the world, but here at its source the issue becomes even more personal. there is so much more to be said about today and the rage the palestinians rightly feel, but i think maybe it's better to just let the stories speak for themselves.

silliness

today the list of ridiculous things i have witnessed at the gym here reached a new extreme: a woman "power-walking" on the treadmill in ballet flats. only in amman :)

one of the best worst ideas ever

242 kilometers (150 miles). 19 hours and 50 minutes. approximately 25 minutes of sleep. no dinner, no breakfast (substitute crackers, snickers bars, and innumerable liters of water). add this all together and you get dead2red, the team relay road race i ran this past weekend here in jordan from the dead sea to the red sea.


needless to say it was insane, but also insanely fun. with a team of ten friends, appropriately named team fun-and-run (though later upgraded to team mulan), we set off thursday afternoon for a crazy 20 hours of running.


the afternoon desert air was hot and dry, but luckily we only had about two hours until the sun went down. the running was accomplished in rotations of one or two km each, with the rest of the team riding along in the car and van. i think we violated every rule of healthy running i've ever learned, since with jumping in and out of cars immediately before/after running there was no option of warmup, cooldown, or stretching. miraculously though, two days later the soreness is on its way out with no serious repercussions. actually, that is not quite true, i did manage to slip down a gravel/sand pile on the side of the road right before the start of the race and scrape the entire back of my left leg. luckily the cuts weren't too deep and stopped bleeding in time to start the run (which was good since it would've taken ten bandaids to cover the length of the scrape haha). so i guess i do have a good war wound to show for it :) anyway, the running part was fun and a great personal and team challenge- we were very proud to meet our goal of finishing in under 20 hours! but as the larger percentage of the race was spent not-running, we had lots of good times in the vans to pass the hours: n*sync dance parties which our jordanian drivers enthusiastically joined in on, numerous games of hot-seat, innovative snack concoctions, cheering on our team and the three other ciee teams, watching the sun set and rise, looking at israel across the border, high-fiving the village children who came out to cheer us on, and lots of other fun team bonding.



the morning hours were the toughest, with all of us fighting sleepiness, aching muscles, and the desert sun. however, when we reached aqaba and caught a glimpse of the red sea, we found the energy for an intense last kick- spurred on by walid, our van driver (who considered his role to include being the coach), we rotated every half km or so with each person sprinting small sections. walid kept telling us the end was near, and kept being wrong, but eventually we spotted the finish line and all got out to cross it together. i have never been happier to see a finish line :)
after dropping our bags and grabbing our swimsuits we headed down to the beach for a wonderfully refreshing dip in the red sea. to our right was the city of eliat in israel, to our left the saudi border was also in sight, and across the water we could see egypt- quite the international setting. we napped on the beach for a while, ate some falafel sandwiches that miraculously appeared thanks to ahmad, then enjoyed a shower, clean clothes, and a huge buffet dinner put on by the race organizers. the next morning the sea was sparkling in the sun, its rocks gleaming red and its water eight shades of bright turquoise and blue.



we spent the morning soaking it all in before driving back to amman (with numerous jokes being made about whose turn it was to get out of the car and run haha). dead2red was an absolutely crazy but really fun experience- would i do it again? not the same route, i'm not that much of a sucker for punishment, but i would do something similar. the challenge was worth the reward and the fun :)

doctor nezar

doctor nezar is my arabic teacher here, the man i see in class ten hours per week as he tries to help us master this crazily beautiful language. as you might suspect, ten hours per week (not including 3 more hours of dialect) of classroom arabic can easily feel like A LOT, thus it takes a special individual to make those long hours even mildly enjoyable. doctor nezar definitely qualifies, for a number of reasons. first, he enjoys singing (and his voice is not too shabby) and breaking out into random song is a common class occurrence. song choices have ranged from solo acts of arabic songs we've never heard to group sing-alongs of classics such as "i believe i can fly" and "umbrella" (on the day it rained). sometimes if the general mood hits a noticeable low, we will have a class singing break, and of course it always lifts our spirits :) secondly, doctor nezar has slowly but surely given arabic nicknames to the majority of the class. it started with his inability to remember the american names of two somewhat similar-looking boys, matt and danny, so he decided to solve his memory issues by giving them easier-to-remember arabic names: sindibad (=famous arab fictional character) and dandoon. rohit was soon nicknamed melek (=king), and brian received ali-baba. then, as darren was the only boy left with no name he became al-batl (=the hero). however the girls were not to be excluded for long; alisha is now a'isha, mira is maryam, elisabeth is named after a lebanese singer that i can't remember, and i, for reasons unknown, am shahrazad. the best part is that doctor nezar continues to mess up and call matt and danny by the wrong name even in arabic, and also that he laughs to himself every time he uses one of our nicknames (which is every 20 seconds). doctor nezar's other amusing habit is illustrations. if a new vocab word is draw-able, he will draw it. and then if he likes his drawing especially well, he will circle it in a protective bubble and leave it un-erased on the board for the remainder of the class. the most entertaining day of illustrations was by far the day we were naming animals. the board was covered in pictures, including three different attempts to draw a tiger (the first had spots, the second resembled a caterpillar, and the third finally got the point across). for spending so many hours in class, we do manage to have a good amount of laughs :)