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.