Reason #12 to go abroad with SIT

Reason's 1-11 don't matter enough for their own post. The biggest reason (at this moment in time) is that my classes have been over since the 27^th of October. No Arabic, no thematic seminar, just one month to research and write a paper. Can you believe that? One month. To write one paper. Not one week to do 3 papers, 4 finals, and a debate tournament. One paper. That’s it. Piece of cake.

In a lot of ways, it is like having a job. I go to SIT everyday where I work on my paper. We’re supposed to have 5 interviews to gather information for our projects. So far I have one, and have another scheduled for Tuesday. Considering the fact that my 40 page paper is due on December 3^rd, I’m a little behind. My local advisor, who works for the Royal Scientific Society, is very nice, but was out of the country for a while. He is supposedly lining up my interviews, but I’d like to get them done and start writing. I offered to schedule them myself. Nothing doing.

So all in all, it is pretty easy. I get up in the morning. Go to my “office”, work for a few hours, and go home. Inshallah (Allah willing) I’ll start going to interviews too.

My office and rainy Amman. My pictures are boring since I stopped traveling and started writing. 

It has turned cold and rainy in Amman. Winter makes me homesick for my cozy apartment with Kim, Alex, and Kaitlin. I miss our scraggly Christmas tree and paper snowflakes. I miss the piping hot wood stove at my parents house and sitting on the porch on frosty mornings. I even miss Starbucks red cups and Christmas lights in Target, even though it is only mid November.

Next week we’re supposedly having a Thanksgiving dinner at SIT with all the students. They really should celebrate Thanksgiving here; it is a very Arab holiday. You hang around with family and eat too much. That is the definition of Arab celebrations. 

THIS JUST IN: My advisor just called me to tell me that he just lined up an interview that could be the biggest one of my paper. I take back what I said about him before.

Back to work. If I'm going to to do this interview I need to re-write my interview questions so that they sound like something a real adult would say.

Until next time,

B