Saeed eid al-shakr!

It’s hard to believe how quickly time is going by- the semester ends in three weeks! Wow. The past couple weeks have been a blur of Arabic midterms and a research paper on the Iran-Iraq War. Admittedly, my stress level about academics here is SO much lower than it is at home; I wasn’t even stressed while forcing myself to churn out another three pages on said 1980s Middle Eastern conflict. Tired of writing, yes, stressed out, no. The paper got turned in on time and I did well on midterms, so low-stress mode works just fine.

Anyway, happy Thanksgiving to all of you! I hope that everyone had a safe and pleasant holiday yesterday. I came home from school at about 6pm and napped for a couple hours, which was much needed. I was invited to a couple of Thanksgiving feasts last night but opted for staying in and hanging out with my roommate and neighbors instead. Getting into the holiday spirit, I bought some cranberry sauce and my roommate made chocolate pumpkin bread. Even if we were sans turkey, we at least had a couple of the essential ingredients. I definitely missed my family more than usual yesterday, but it was a decent Thanksgiving.

This evening I met a few friends at the Hussein Cultural Center to see “The Queen,” which was showing for free as part of a European film festival. Good movie- an interesting look at the British Royal family and the aftermath of Princess Diana’s death. Tomorrow I may go back and see a Greek film set in the 1920s about a group of brides making the voyage to America to meet their new, yet unseen, American husbands. We’ll see.

Overall, this has been and probably will be a quiet weekend. I can’t think of much else to report, so I’ll leave you with some pictures from our trip to see Umayyad sites a couple weeks ago. Ciao!

Take note of the road signs behind us. Iraq? Saudi Arabia? Take your pick.


Qasr 'Amra. It was used as a royal country home of sorts during the Umayyad period (680-750 AD) and is particularly special because of its baths and the amazingly well-preserved frescoes inside. The domes are characteristic of Umayyad architecture.


Castle Harraneh. They claim not to be sure what it was used for- royal home? Meeting place? Fortress? I'd personally go with the last choice, given the narrow arrow-ready windows and the sheer size of the place. If you look closely, you can see one of my classmates sitting on the top of the castle above the entryway.


Azraq Castle. The door that I'm opening is interesting because it is made of basalt (as is the entire castle) but was designed such that it is remarkably easy to open and close, given its weight. Very architecturally advanced for that time period.


Ostriches! They were next to the restaurant where we stopped for lunch. Unlike many semi-wild animals, the ostriches were just as interested in us as we were in them. As my classmate in the foreground is demonstrating, the appropriate thing to do when interacting with ostriches is of course to stick one's finger into the cage.

cultural context

Last spring I took a course called “Foundations of Human Communication.” Among other things, we discussed characteristics of different cultures. One such quality is that of context. America is low-context; we expect reliable road signs, products clearly priced in stores, printed schedules that people actually follow. Not much is left to communal understanding. Many non-western countries, however, are high-context; implicit understanding and group assumptions are more the norm. Jordan is one such locale. There are street signs all over Amman, which might imply low-context tendencies, but they are almost useless because no one knows streets by official names anyway; everything is in relation to major landmarks, traffic circles, or unofficial street names. If you tell a cab driver that you want to go to Abu Bakr as-Saddeeq Street, there’s a good chance that you’ll get a blank look. However, if you request Rainbow Street, he’ll know exactly where to go. If, for example, I wanted to go to the Jordan River Foundation’s showroom and the driver didn’t know it, I would say that I wanted to go to First Circle in Jabal Amman and from there continue straight on Rainbow Street. This method of giving directions took a little while to get used to (especially since in the States many cab drivers have GPS systems), but once you get the hang of it, it works well. There have been some problems with neither my friends and I nor the driver knowing where exactly the destination is, but most drivers are more than willing to stop and ask for directions, so it works in the end.

I was thinking about high-context versus low-context today while running on the treadmill today and staring at the wall ahead of me, Shakira wailing away on my iPod. At home, I was quite comfortable in my low-context culture. I took my planner everywhere and made lists of things to do, groceries to buy, people to email. Whenever I had to drive someplace new (or old- I get lost easily), I invariably put the addresses into Mapquest and printed out the route. Punctuality meant getting to work, to class, to meetings, to wherever, early.

…Returning to that low-context culture might be a bit of an issue come May. I technically bought a planner (after much searching- even the office supply store didn’t have any!), but I don’t really like the format so I’ve barely used it at all. I either write homework assignments on the margin of the day’s notes or I ask someone else for confirmation. Although I don’t drive here (Amman driving is scary. Many, many times worse than DC.), see the above paragraph for how to give directions. Punctuality to class means getting there before the professor (who will probably be a few minutes late).

While I’m discussing this cultural tendency toward fluidity (as opposed to rigid, set structure), I should mention the highly loaded phrase “insha’Allah”. If you go to the book shop and ask when the next packets for class will be ready, you might hear, “Wednesday- insha’Allah [God willing].” This statement does not mean “they’ll be ready on Wednesday.” Insha’Allah gets tacked on to almost anything referring to the future and allows for the reality that things may or may not actually happen. However, fate aside, if it were the U.S. and someone said that something would be ready on Wednesday, it probably would be. Here, insha’Allah is like a disclaimer; the reality is that your packet *might* be ready on Wednesday, but it could be Thursday, or Sunday, or really whenever the employee gets around to preparing it. Insha’Allah is the phrase that you love to say but hate to hear. It allows for wiggle room regarding deadlines, getting together with people (“maybe we’ll get together sometime, insha’Allah” = “we might…but probably not”), and really life in general, since things often don’t go as planned. I still get anxious when I make a request and get the “insha’Allah” response (since I know that very little here is prompt), but I think it’s good to realize that really no one has definitive control over the future.

As I write this, my neighbor is busy trying to get our wireless back up; insha’Allah he’ll get it working soon and I can post this entry today (Tuesday). Yalla bye, asdiqa’.

PS- I had a non-creepy conversation with a cab driver today; it made for a nice ride home. The difference was definitely that the driver didn’t even try to ask me many personal questions. He knew that I was foreigner, and asked me where I was from. I guess surprised at my Arabic, he asked if both of my parents were American. However, beyond that, we just discussed studying Arabic and living in Amman. He remarked that he had driven a couple German students earlier and that their Arabic was pretty good too; I said that we study a lot and our professors are good. At the end of the cab ride, he insisted on giving me my change, which was a nice gesture (I was prepared to give him JD 1.5 for a JD 1.3 fare, since it’s normal to round up). I know that my previous entry made taxi drivers look pretty sketchy (and some of them really are), but there are genuinely pleasant, respectful drivers as well.

a sampling of sites

Here are a few pictures:


The sunset in Wadi Rum. I had not known that the desert could be so incredible. Che bellissima!


Setting out on our three-hour camel trek across the desert in Wadi Rum. Sixty camels made for quite a caravan.


The main ruins at Pella in the Jordan Valley. Pella was one of the Decapolis cities, ancient Roman cities that formed a major trade route across this region of the Middle East. We spent a day touring three of them (no Jerash pictures in this entry; those will come later). Note also the greenery in the background. The Jordan Valley is so verdant compared to the rest of the country; much of the local agriculture is produced in this area.

Some lovely columns from the church in Pella.



Basalt columns lying amid an olive grove at Umm Qais. Much of the city (another Decapolis member) lies unexcavated beneath these trees.

The view from Umm Qais. The mountain on the foreground (left) is still Jordan. The body of water is Tiberius (aka Sea of Galilee); beyond it is Israel. The mountainous areas on the right are the Golan Heights as occupied by Israel. Talk about proximity of countries.

More pictures to follow. Yalla bye, 'asdiqa.

Wandering

Not a whole lot to report these days. I’ve spent the morning today drinking tea and doing homework. Yesterday, my roommate (Katherine) and I took a cab down to Jabal Amman and met some friends for a leisurely brunch. Although the food was good, cheap, and plentiful, the service was absolutely awful. It was a good thing that we didn’t have to be anywhere else; the food came in courses and we had to ask for the final course four times (from various people) before it finally came. We never did get the refills on coffee that we asked for repeatedly. Nevertheless, the time was spent with wonderful people out on a lovely terrace overlooking the city, so I can’t complain too much. After brunch, Katherine, a friend, and I decided to wander around Jabal Amman and get to know the city better. The streets of Amman seem to have themes. Fairly close to the café, we came upon a street where there were literally six or seven pet shops selling mostly birds and fish. Later on our sojourn we passed through a street filled with auto mechanic shops; after that came a couple blocks of furniture stores. Our friend eventually had to leave, but Katherine and I kept walking. Eventually, we reached the Zara Center, home to such designer stores as BCBG (think: very basic tank top for JD 60, i.e. about US $90), at which point Katherine said, “hey, I think we’re kind of close to where we live!” So after looking around in the designer stores and pretending to be wealthy, we kept walking and did, in fact, eventually reach the apartment. Having taken a rather circuitous route (it was a bit by chance that we made it back home and didn’t end up in a random neighborhood in East Amman somewhere), we walked for well over two hours.

I would have to say that walking is the best way to get to know a city. It gives you more time (than in a car) to take in what you’re seeing, meaning more time to orient yourself and see how one neighborhood blends into the next. Although navigating the streets of Amman is still a dizzying task (how I miss the grid system of DC!), it’s getting better. Insha’Allah the more we wander, the more this city will make sense.

By the way, speaking of themes, Katherine and I determined that our neighborhood’s theme seems to be bakeries & sweets shops. Off the top of my head, I can think of five within easy walking distance, not including the bakeries in the grocery stores. Yum.