So recently, I've been spending a bunch of time with my brother Sameer because he is leaving next week for school in Israel (sad!). So I've hung out with him and his friends a lot, and its insane how much they remind me of all you guys back home. Kind of reminds me the most of Tim, Rafa, Conor, Colin etc and all our times in high school just fucking around with music and random shit. Both Abed (Sameer's best friend) and Sameer listen to so much American music like Band of Horses, Temper Trapp, and pretty much everything we listened to high school- back in the days I somehow could afford to go to all those concerts. Anyways, they took me to a great used book place that had all these books in Arabic, then the occasional Tom Clancy sci-fi for like 20 piaster (like 30 cents). 

Driving through the city with music that I love and am familiar with was something I never thought about missing, and didn’t realize how much I love doing that at home until I got into Abed’s car. Driving around with him, his girlfriend Leila, and Sameer with the wind blowing through the car, music blaring, and watching the people and places we go by just fills me. I’ve never felt like a wallflower before, but here I kind of do, and I love it. I feel like every day I’m observing, taking in, absorbing, every single thing that I can. When anyone asks where I want to go, I never care. Let them decide, I just want to see. I am almost like Nick Carraway from the Great Gatsby, being dropped into others lives here- going along with their adventures and seeing where it takes me. 

All of us in the program see how rediculously different some things are here, and at some point, we just have stopped thinking things are as insane as they may seem.

Yesterday, Aseem brought up the cleanliness of the kitchen to the atention of our class- asking who had all this hoobs (bread) in the freezer. Our ISP teacher went on to think this was some metaphor for people not dealing with things, and that we needed to vent our feelings or something. This rediculous conclusion, along with the language barrier, made it take a good 5 minutes to figure out what the hell was going on.

Language barriers have seemed to cause a lot of random problems here, especially when it comes to learning grammar in class. Or when someone is trying to say that you have a lot of “us” (to help you with something), and they just say you have a lot of ass instead. Or when you are given directions to “turn straight” to get to a cafe in a random part of the city and get lost. Many people speak english really well here, and while that can be great, sometimes its just better for all of us to stick to the Arabic. 

One thing that is insane here is the driving. Lanes? Not quite a thing. Yes sometimes they’re painted on the asphalt, but why follow those when you can speed around someone and go through busier streets than LA on a friday night? And I don’t think I’ve ever seen a stop light. So when you want to turn or do anything, I guess you just kindof have to go when you think you can, which in reality means speeding as fast as you can through honking speeding cars hoping you don’t get hit. Or hit a person for that matter, because people seem to have decided that running through these mini highways is a better idea than walking the extra 50 meters to the nearest bridge that runs above it. Sometimes, though, walking across these highways is the only option (when I say sometimes, I mean most every time). So here the process goes:

Watch the speeding cars for a few seconds, try to find a four inch space between two of them- there’s your prey. watch that little break in the chaos come closer to you, step of the sidewalk, and be in the ready position to book it like you never have. OH and you better not be in a big group, or else you al will just turn into ‘those assholes’ who stopped all the traffic by almost causing a 5 car pile-up. Now its your chance. You see a car (or 50 cars) approaching, and you just cant handle the wait any longer. So, you just put your hand up close your eyes, and walk.  Cool, good thing you survived until next time. 

PS, since there's barely any internet I can't upload photos- but I will do that soon

Oh Hey I'm a Woman in the Middle East from a Women's College!

I love this place, I really really do, the people are amazing, my new friends are incredible, it's beautiful here (beautiful in an everything-is-the-same-color-beige kindof way), and I love practicing my arabic. So note that this is coming from my background of Western Liberal Feminism. As you also all know, I go to Scripps WOMENS college.

So, for all my fellow women back in the states, please take advantage of the freedoms that you have. To be clear, this means nothing about Jordanian women being un-free, womens rights here are incredible, women are treated with a huge amount of respect. When men walk in front of women down the street it is not because they feel themselves to be superior, but because they are protecting their wife or friend or daughter, they want to protect them if anyone comes up to them. And this is not some 'patriarchal illusion' that needs to be fought by some neo-liberals like the Femme movement (to all those women I spoke with who told me the femme movement was purely good while I went on and on about the disgusting problems with it, hate to say I told you so! hehe), but women are not as safe here as men are. It is not safe for me to walk alone late at night, I must be escorted by a man. I take a deep breath every time I enter a taxi, hoping to God that he will not tell me he loves me, tries to kiss my hand, says something disgusting to me that I would not repeat. I've been quiet, and shy about it, I didn't want to cause a fuss. But two days ago, two men yelled at me from their car, and I had decided I had enough. Just to be clear, I wore baggy pants, a long sleeve shirt, a scarf wrapped around my hair (because being a white, blonde haired, blue eyed woman also attracts unwanted attention-- only because I look different. But all women constantly get unwanted attention here, no matter what you look like). So I decided to stop being docile and threw up my hands and yelled "shoo biddak??" Next thing I know, the men on the sidewalk in front of me turn around and say "mind fudlik" and have me walk around them. The men in the car looked shocked and stopped and drove away.

I felt amazing.

Wearing my headscarf gives me a sense of ability, that I can go around by myself. People don't immediately know I'm a foreigner, and its great.

So anyways, long story short, I'm not supposed to walk to take a taxi by myself. Last night we went to a movie, and I needed to get home by ten. My family wanted me home by 10, and so by 9:15 I was trying to find a way to get to a taxi. The only way to do so way to was to get a guy to take me out to a taxi. As minutes passed, I felt more and more upset. Why can't I just walk out there by myself? I was struggling with my liberal feminist upbringing and the reality of safety, but I reacted in a way that only put my perception of my un-freedom here. I asked my friend Mike to take me out to a taxi by 9:30, he agreed, and offered many times to go out to taxi, and I just was feeling a burden on men, like my actions were completely dependant on a man. Mike never did anything wrong. I asked if he was sure he would walk me out to a taxi, a few blocks away, and he sarcastically replied, "Well what am I supposed to say, no?"He never meant it in a bad way. He was totally kidding, of course he wanted to take me to a cab. But this killed me. I felt that he didn't see that my whole ability to travel, even leave a room, was not in my hands. I felt I was not responsible for my own body. His comment, although a joke, got to me. I ended up being late to get home and felt terrible because I didn't want to make my family feel badly, or mess up relations by going past my 10pm curfew.

We left all together from the film, because I didn't want to be a burden on anyone, but also knew as a woman it was unsafe for me to leave alone. So we walked in silence, with my scarf wrapped around my hair, to the second circle, and I tried apologizing for being cold to Mike, but I ended up blowing up at him. Basically, all of my confusion and frustration at not being able to be sovereign over my own body was directed to Mike. I think it was good that it happened, because I had no idea how much this was getting to me. Maybe this gets to me more than most because I go to a women's college, where the ability to have ownership over your body and thoughts, and the actions you take, trumps all else.

Sorry this is such a deep post, but I really had to unpack all of this. Driving home from the film after I yelled at Mike, my sister and her boyfriend talked to me. Talking to them made me realize that to feel sovereign over myself here I must adapt. I guess this is what you could call culture shock for a women's college student. Being strong and using my arabic, wearing my headscarf, is really helpful, because these are all my choices, give me a sense of agency that implements change: people treat me with much more respect when I do these things. Also, my sister Sausan told me that it is much safer than we were told at SIT. I know that they are telling us the worst case scenario, and just like in any other part of the world, including southern california, as long as I'm smart about my locations, where I go, and how I dress and act in public, I am more than safe. This goes against liberal feminist critique of 'slut shaming', but here, conforming to cultural norms is what gives me more freedom.  Yelling at the taxi cab driver if he is inappropriate, making a scene. Everyone stops making comments as soon as I tell them to stop. I just have to be an agent for myself. I was afraid to do so before in fear that I would insult some cultural difference, I was much too sensitive to this to the point that I wasn't advocating for myself.

That's all for this morning, I'll have a lighter and more fun post soon!

PS, I got to drink a diet coke yesterday, and it made my day. Everything is diet pepsi here, and it is NOT on par with coke. never.

Why can't people talk like they're reading from the Qur'an?

Sunday, September 2nd

I am on hour five of my twelve hour flight to Jordan (of course that doesn’t include my two hour flight to San Francisco and my four and a half hours to Chicago), and I can’t be more excited! I have never been to the Middle East, but since first semester of my freshman year, I have been obsessed with this region halfway around the world from me, and now I am seeing if all my hard work has paid off. I honestly can’t believe this is finally happening, I’ve felt like I was working towards an imaginary goal far off in my mind for so long. 

Yesterday, my Mom was sweet enough to fly up to San Francisco with me so we could spend the entire afternoon watching movies and just having quality time. It was so hard leaving my home since I had only been home for three weeks between my Arabic program and studying abroad, so every moment at home with my parents I cherished. My parents are the world to me, my best friends, my everything, so I think the hardest part about this entire trip will be to be separated from them. 

This morning, my mom and I woke up and went to the SFO airport to meet Becca Rosenthal and her parents. She goes to Claremont McKenna and we’ve really clicked- it’s so great to be traveling all this way with someone else. Saying goodbye to Mom was heart-wrenching- we both teared up but know this is what I need to do for myself. After getting through security and saying goodbye to our parents, Becca and I definitely needed an 11am drink. Of course I got Hennesy, and we spent the next hour or so speaking with a guy named Tyler from Chicago- or as I call him, handsome tanned man with the full sleeved tattoo- and the bartender. By the way, I had completely forgotten how much everything costs in airports- just one drink was $20! 

Once we got on our first flight to Chicago, Becca and I really got to know each other which was great. The flight wasn’t long at all, and when we landed we had to check in at Royal Jordanian which was a nighmeare.The guy was mean and wouldn’t let me take my carry-on onto the flight because it was ten pounds over- sweet talking him did nothing to change his mind. So I bought a new bag once through security and put my few personal items in it. 

We also met a girl named Katy right before we got onto the flight who is on our program and she’s really nice! Can’t wait to get to know her better. And that brings me to the present moment, where I am descending down with about 30 minutes left on the flight. Just finished fixing my makeup, listening to my favorite new mixes, and spraying a little salt water in my hair to remind me of home.

Our first day was Monday, but I haven’t had the time to write because it’s been crazy busy! Monday morning I met everyone at breakfast, and there’s 26 in the Modernization and Social Change program and 5 in the Health program. Everyone was so nice! It’s crazy that there’s so many people frmo the Claremont Colleges here: Me, Becca, Christian, David, Dante, Asseem, Julian, and I. I don’t know any of them well except for Julian, because we were both on KSPC staff together and also had radio shows. I’m in shock about how nice everyone is on the program, and how I genuinely like everyone on it! We have stayed at a really nice hotel for three nights, and like I said earlier I got to meet everyone at breakfast Monday. After that wewent to the SIT building, which is past the abdoun circle. Let me tell you, the area our building is at is one of the wealthiest places in all of Amman! Various embassies line Damashq street, and apparently zoning rules are not really a thing here because huge mansions are tucked in between the embassies. On the buildings- there is an actual law stating that all buildings must be made from Jordanian stone, so all the buildings are a creamy color and comeletely made of stone. This makes for the entire cityscape and region to appear as a similiarly beige tone, since there’s so little greenery and painting the stone is strictly prohibited, and reflects the color of the abundant sand. This is actually the beauty of the city- words can’t accurately describe it, but pictures explain it better. 

I have been really bad at blogging this week, but next week I will be better I promise! Here are some pictures to sum up a few of the things I did. Lots of hookah, some drinking (yes people do drink in Amman), dancing, and oh did I mention lots of hookah?

 Anyways, so I have moved in with my family, and they're SO AWESOME. So we live in West Amman near 8th circle, and to understand circles (I'm sure you don't want to), you can look at this lovely map.

As I was saying, my family is perfect. They are a Palestinian Christian family (which is surprising considering less than 4% of Jordan is Christian) from Ramallah. In total, I have three sisters and one brother. My brother is not your typical Arab man, Samir is a Tibetan Buddhist who loves raiiki, yoga, and inscense. Oh did I mention he is vegetarian? Pretty much belongs in California. And Abeer is my sister, who is so so funny and we get along perfect! She studies learning disabilities and has told me I have almost every one of them (hey- she was not too far off). I'm so sad she's leaving to study at the UK on Tuesday! Mama works at a school and is more reserved than the rest of the family, but is so sweet also. Baba is retired, but he works selling his cakes at Turtle Green, my favorite cafe on Rainbow street that Samir also happens to work at. Sausan is my oldest sister, she is not here yet because she's been studying in Amman, but I've heard great things about her. Apparently she also loves music like I do and will be showing me around to all the best concerts. Finally, my other sister is married and I met her and her husband Ramsey yesterday. This hammered a big lesson into my head that I have been struggling with:

Even if you spend your entire summer only speaking arabic at an intensive program, you don't know SHIT when it comes to speaking Amia. For those who don't know, classical arabic is Fuhsa, which is what I have only studied. Ramsey decided to only speak Amia, the language that people actually speak in real life, to me yesterday. This happens everywhere I go and it is SO FRUSTRATING. I am learning Arabic all over again, because literally half the words are completely different, certain letters are not pronounced, vowels completely dissappear from the beginning of a word, and so forth. So my goal for this week is to learn Amia well enough to understand what the hell people are saying to me. Why can't everyone just speak like they are reading straight from the Qur'an? If they did, then I wouldn't have ended up at circle two tonight when I swear I tried telling the taxi driver to take me to circle eight in Amia, which just about doubled my taxi cab rate to 3 JD- this is insane.

I want to tell more but I am falling asleep. More stories to come! Hint: I got to see Ayman Ramadan today!!!! It was a CMC reunion at Douuar Abdoun with the mass of Claremont students and our favorite prior teacher! I'll update tomorrow.