Its one of those good news-bad news situations

4 September 2011

Abdoun, Amman Jordan

SIT Campus

3:15 pm

Marhaba,

Look at me using new words. I know approximately five words in Arabic, but that is five more than I knew yesterday.

The good news is everything is not as doom and gloom as my last blog post would lead one to believe. I went on a picnic with my host family (pictures as soon as I can steal them from Hiba’s camera) and yesterday Alexandra and I met up with some people on Rainbow Street (PS: Check out this article from the NYT featuring the very same place). Rainbow Street is pretty western. There are a lot of really American places- and it is frequented by American students such as ourselves, but it is also a place that has recently become a hang out for Jordanian hipsters (if the idea of young Jordanian hipsters is hard to wrap your head around, don’t worry, I feel the same way.)

We went to a place called the Turtle Green Café. It is an American style café with American style prices (and by that I mean I paid 2.75 JD for tea- almost 4.00 USD), but we were homesick and ready for something Western. I definitely don’t want to spend all my time in American places, but it was nice to meet up with the other SIT students, drink a cup of tea and debrief on our first weekend with our host families. It almost felt like being back home with my friends, which was therapeutic in a way. These pictures are pretty boring, but they show how American Turtle Green is. It’s a pretty cool place- the type I would frequent if it were in San Diego.

I was super creepy taking this picture. At least I remembered to turn the flash off. 

So hip (but not really). 

Now for the bad news: today was the first day of school. I may have mentioned previously that I hate school- always have and always will. Turns out some things never change.  On the first day of school you still read syllabi and  talk about “class expectations” just as you have for the past 13 years.  I was in a bad mood by lunch at which point we walked to a “great café that is really close and cheap!” by which I mean it was a 45 minute walk and my meal cost 10.00 JD (14.24 USD). Seriously? That is like my budget for the whole week of meals. Tomorrow I’m bringing food from home or hitting up a sketchy falafel stand and spending no more than 2.00 JD on lunch.

A few boring details: I’m taking four classes here: Modern Standard Arabic (written), Spoken Arabic (Jordanian Colloquial Arabic), Field Study Seminar (Ask me how excited I am to sit through ANOTHER research methods class), and Thematic Seminar. I’m excited about spoken Arabic and the thematic class, the rest sound terrible.

It all ends with a huge research paper, which I’ll rant about later.  

My Dad always told me not to decide I hate my new grade on the first day of school. Clearly that lesson didn’t sink in.

Alexandra, Noah, and I are going to work on a paper for a few hours and then take a break at another café (recommended by the NYT) but if it is expensive so help me I will get a cab and go home and go to bed. I’m that kind of cranky.  I’ll say again what I’ve been saying all week: Should have gone to Vienna. Oh well, I’m here so I better make the best of it. 

All the best, 

B