I say tomato, you say "banadurra"

Last week I did a language trade ("I'll help with your English if you'll help with my Arabic" kind of deal) with Farouq, a Professor of Computer Science at Yarmouk University on his "Dumon", a 1000 square meter plot that serves as a large garden. He showed me how to water his tomato plants (which he does once -- total -- before they give their fruit), how to harvest "kusa" (a zucchini-like vegetable), and he said a lot of things that I couldn't understand.

Farouq speaks with an accent, and was charged by one of my teachers to help me with "Amia", the local Jordanian dialect of Arabic (there are actually several within Jordan, and the manager of the movie store we frequent told us that he finds people from the south of the country -- physically closer than Durango is to Denver -- generally unintelligible). It was the second time that I had met with him, and was doing considerably better than the first, but was still having trouble following much of what he said.

Now, when most people (ourselves included) say that they are studying "Arabic", they are actually studying what is called "Modern Standard Arabic", or "Foos-ha". Foos-ha is a strange language, because, really, no one speaks it on a regular basis except for newscasters. Nearly everything, however, is written in Foos-ha, and, for all intents and purposes, it tends to be similar to most countries' "Amia". And, for the majority of the trip, I really believed that.

In addition to chatting with Farouq, I have also made friends with the manager of the falafel shop across the street from our dorms. He is Egyptian, and easy to communicate with, a fact I gave little thought until this week when I was sitting, watching the news with him when two of his Egyptian friends came over. I could barely understand the gist, the general area even, of what they were trying to communicate to me. Likewise, they were having intense difficulty understanding what I wanted to say, which I, of course, interpreted as mispronunciation (which may have been a part of it). Suddenly, though, as my friend began relaying to me what they were saying, and relaying to them what I was saying, I realized that he has been easy to understand because he speaks to me in Foos-ha. His friends, however, did not understand Foos-ha to the point where he had to translate my Foos-ha into Amia so that they could understand it. I was speaking Arabic, and they were speaking Arabic, but we needed a translator nonetheless.

It suddenly dawned on me that it is as if I am walking around Irbid speaking like Shakespeare without meter (and with a few "cools" and "hips" thrown in). Daphna is my little Juliette, and, despite the success that we have experienced in four short months, there is a long way to go before we will ever walk into a store in this part of the world, and have someone ask us where in the country we're from. Daphna suggests that two more years of living here and taking classes might suffice.

But Farouq is still trying. On Saturday he invited me to a "guy's night" where we and a couple of his friends played cards, ate melon with knives, drank apple juice, and talked about bad words in multiple languages. I could understand a great deal of what they said, and they all liked asking questions about proper usages and pronunciations of English words. Nonetheless, had they wanted to, they could have made many jokes at my expense without my knowledge. But at least my partner and I swept the night's games.

I guess, for now, that will have to do.


Your Arabic words of the day:

To play cards -- La-ebah el-waraq -- لعب الورق

Love is from God (an expression suggesting that you can't choose who to love) -- "El-hob meen Allah" -- الحبّ من الله

Palatial Camel-Humps

Expectations are everything.

Like, when you expect to get an adventurous camel-back tour of one of the most beautiful places on earth atop your trusty white camel (which, of course, brings to mind the possibility of rescuing your beautiful and ever-thankful princess-wife from the tallest tower of some Sultan’s desert castle) and you end up spending the majority of your Wadi Rum tour stuck staring at a camel’s ass. Yes, that was me and my albino steed, Shorban, tied to the back of Daphna’s much taller camel for a lack of guides. Desert mountains towered out of the sand on every side but forward, where Haran’s camely-tail swung back and forth in the smallest arc, like a small unsteady paintbrush wavering in the wind.

It had been days of ecstasy, and of shattered expectations. Traveling with our friends Mark and Ken in Israel had brought us to many of the holiest places on Earth (be you Jewish, Christian, Muslim, or even Bahai) and to some of the best falafel stands in the world. Crossing the border though, wanting to show off the best of our experiences from our time in Jordan, we had been led astray. Daphna was beaned with an apricot in the Irbid Suk (which simply doesn’t hold a candle to its Jerusalem counterpart). We were mislead in a restaurant in Ajloun. Finally there I was, my view of heaven obscured.

Our tour led to “Lawrence of Arabia’s spring,” a beautiful location sadly lacking a spring (though there was a camel troph – I almost asked Daphna to water my camel a la Rebecca, but Shorban did it himself). And on the way back, we camel-trotted, which was marvelous save for the bouncing up and down in an uncomfortable position on a wooden saddle. Everyone else did have fun, though.

I was still sore when we pulled off the road on the way home to take pictures of the sunset over Wadi Araba, the desert just north of Wadi Rum. We missed the turn for the lookout spot and pulled into what appeared to be an extended driveway. As Ken scampered to the ledge of the mountain, his new SLR camera in hand, I waddled to the edge of the road and joked to Daphna and Mark that the gate at the end of the driveway had three crowns on it because the King was about to walk out.

It was then that we noticed the two men walking down the mountain towards us in coats despite the evening’s intense heat. At that point I would have been happy to head out quickly – as much attention as Daph and I attract walking around Jordan it is nothing compared to the four of us together, and while much of it is well-meaning, endless shouts of “Welcome to Jordan” can begin to feel invasive. But the two men walked up to us, and introduced themselves as Ali and Hamdan, local Bedouins that summer in Wadi Araba. They asked about where we had come from, and then announced that we were outside Prince Hassan’s (the King’s uncle) desert palace where their friend is a guard.

“We are going to have tea,” they said, and with that, they escorted us into the gate, and to the guard shack immediately behind it. We sat as more Bedouins joined and brought out their famously sweet tea (“Bedouin Whiskey,” as they call it). Ali regaled us with tales of hunting gazelle and hyena, and of his travels in Israel and Egypt. About an hour later he announced, “We are making dinner.”

It wasn’t a question, nor an invitation – it was simply a series of unstated but assumed facts: we are cooking a local delicacy, you will stay here and join us for a meal, and that is that.

“Thank you, and we are very happy to join you,” I said. “But I should warn you that I don’t eat meat or fish or dairy or eggs or honey.”

Ali stared at me.

“Why?” he said, as if I had just told him that on Mondays I do everything while doing a moonwalk on stilts, which in his mind might have been a similar statement. All of the other Bedouins in the room laughed.

I tend to try and avoid being in group food situations where I am not in control of my menu, or when I have not at least had the opportunity to bring my own food. Here, I had accidently walked backwards (alas, it was not a Monday) into a sticky situation – the Bedouin culture is an intensely hospitable culture, but it is also one where a guest’s actions can easily be insulting. When the food arrived it was kibsa, rice cooked with vegetables on a large tray, about three feet in diameter, topped with chicken. Spoons angled out of the side of the dish towards the four of us, and the Bedouins dug in with their right hands (truly never touching the food with their left), and covering it with a goat-milk yogurt.

I did my best not to insult our hosts, picking at the rice I could get to that had not contacted the meat or the yogurt and eating dry bread and the cucumber that they handed the four of us (I think I did enough to please Ali, but the chef seemed frustrated that there were several pieces of chicken left at the end of the night, mostly in the area towards Daph and my corner of the dish). It was a difficult thing to do, an odd personal balance beam of uncomfortably stretching my own boundaries while alert to the way I was stretching the borders of our hosts' hospitality. The majority of the Bedouins finished very quickly and commenced egging the four of us on to eat more, to the point where Mark and Ken began, in turn, insisting that Hamdan continue to partake. Finally, one of the men took away the tray, and replaced it with more tea, and apples and oranges, and then we turned in time to see a man carrying a gigantic watermelon through the gate to the palace. They sliced open the watermelon and left it on a tray under the mostly-full moon, telling us that it needed time to cool because it had been in the sun all day (still attached to its plant, of course).

It is amazing the power that a single person’s actions can hold in defining a broader group. Until we met Ali and Hamdan, I had felt that Mark and Ken had no good reason to have a positive impression of the Jordanian people. Between Ali and Hamdan and Fadi, a Bedouin living in Petra who invited us to join him in his cave for more Bedouin Whiskey and some fresh fire-baked Bedouin bread, they had plenty to write home about.

We left shortly after partaking of the watermelon, Ali offering to escort us around the Wadi Araba desert if we finished with Petra early enough the following day. We didn’t have time to meet with him again, but that night’s visit (a desert palace, perhaps, but lacking its prince, a rescue attempt, and, thankfully, my noble white steed) will remain a highlight of our time here.

Dancing with Distinction

Thursday was the last day of class for most of the students at the Language Center, and so at the end of the day there was a small party at the Center and then a volleyball game engineered by the Italian girls. A couple of the Korean students came, as did a Turkish student, and few of the Italians’ Arab friends (another “mini-UN” as one of the students remarked). We had a couple of extra players, and so took turns sitting out and watching the disorganized game as it took on aspects of soccer (one of the Palestinians had a better record heading the ball over the net than many of us had hitting it at all) and chaos (you mean there are positions in this game?!?).

The first time that I sat out, I ended up chatting with one of their friends named “Ash.” We talked about the game for a bit, and then I asked where he was from. He said Egypt, to the North, in the desert. I asked if it was a heavily populated area, as I’d heard that outside of the Nile Basin, Egypt has a fairly sparse population. He said, “Truthfully, I couldn’t tell you.” In fact, Ash has only visited Egypt once – he was born in Jordan to a Jordanian mother and Egyptian father, spent the first twenty years of his life in the UAE, and considers himself Egyptian.

It is not uncommon here that people report their nationality as something other than their place of birth and the location of their livelihood (sometimes it makes me feel as if I shouldn’t say that I’m American, but rather from Kiev, or that Daphna is German or Czech or Polish). Ash carries Egyptian citizenship (and only Egyptian citizenship), and yet the point underlines one of the many issues in the Middle East: it is incredibly difficult to find a home here. Many families have generations that live in Saudi Arabia, and, perhaps now, the UAE, without being considered a part of the countries. Even the smaller, less oil-rich countries are strict about new-comers, and people attach themselves heavily to places that they’ve never been, something which is highlighted by the Palestinians, a lesson we learned when Daphna first met with a friend of ours, Lana.

When Daph asked where Lana was from, Lana said that she was Palestinian, and Daph asked, “Oh, where from?” Lana answered, “Haifa.” Daphna said, “Oh, it’s such a beautiful city!” And Lana said, “I’ve never been there.” It is a startling contrast to America, where citizenship is granted by birth, and where “Where are you from” tends to be defined by the now (or, at the very least, by your generation – just as I can’t imagine saying that I’m Russian or Romanian, I can’t even imagine claiming that I’m a New Yorker, no matter where my dad was born). And, in a time when money and jobs move people all over the Middle East (for instance, only 5% of the residents in the UAE are citizens), it is understandable why countries would not want to accept so many newcomers, and yet it is also hard to feel that the complete lack of identification fluidity is a problem here. If you can live in my country, where your father also lived, and always be recognizably and identifiably an “other” (an other which, most likely, because you’ve grown up in my country you can not identify with), how can we ever be equal?

One of the many things that I love about America is the inability to walk its streets and point out non-Americans. They’re wearing different clothes? Doesn’t matter. They’re not speaking English? Still doesn’t mean anything. They can still be American, and the moment that they are American, they’re as American as anyone else is American. Here, it is not the case. Even the Palestinians that carry Jordanian passports are not “Jordanian-Jordanian” as we’ve heard some people call themselves (and this despite the fact that the West Bank was part of Jordan until 1967). This is the “Arab World” and at Yarmouk University there are over 2000 foreign students, but they will never confuse themselves for Jordanian (and it is unlikely that any Jordanian would, either).

It is an ironic psychological boundary for a part of the world so renowned for its hospitality (and it was just today, as we sat on the sidewalk in the shade, that a shop owner, without expecting anything in recompense, brought chairs out from his shop and offered us water while we rested), and it has been one of the saddest things for me on this trip. I could not ask these countries to change their ways, because that would be asking them to lose their identities, but when does humanity begin to trump culture?

Last night we joined the Italians for dessert behind their building with some of their same friends from the volleyball game. After partaking, their friends taught us the dubka, the traditional Arab dance that has slight variations in every country (it’s like the “Amia”, the variations that every country has of the Arabic language). We learned the Iraqi and the “Shemali” (northern Jordan and Palestine) versions. It is a simple dance, intended to be mastered by everyone, and built on as ability allows. But even though every country celebrates with the dubka, every country does it differently, and can recognize the nationality of everyone else by the way that they dance. Even in joy there is distinction.

And now, with some trepidation, and, dare I say, a great amount of joy, we are headed for Israel on Monday to celebrate Jackie Siegel’s wedding, to see Daphna’s family, and to pick up our friends. At Jackie’s wedding we will dance, I am sure, in single-sex circles, to traditional music, while moving predominantly clockwise, all just like the dubka, but, to anyone who knows, it will look very differently. We will be in a country where some people with roots in every corner of the world will call themselves Israeli (or even Israeli-Israeli) without trepidation, but also with others who live within its borders with no citizenship to any nation-state, whatsoever. And I am afraid that, despite all of the love that is sure to be there, I will be no less confused.

Your Arabic Phrases of the day:

Kurat at-tairah -- Volleyball (Literally airplane ball)
Meen Ayna Antee / Anta? -- Where are you from? (to a female / male)

There's no "I" in "The Other"

Last night our Nigerian-Saudi friend Ahmed-Fellata met us at the West Gate of the University with a friend of his. His friend, who for pronunciation purposes we will call “MJ”, is an Irbid native also studying Engineering at Yarmouk. He introduced himself and said that he had “insisted” that Fellata allow him to accompany us to the café – a remark that caught me as funny because several of Fellata’s friends who’ve met us have told me exactly the same thing (I picture Fellata cowering while they approach, sternly slapping a ruler against the inside of their hands, growling, “Let me come. . . .”).

Our conversation roamed from movies, to immigration issues, to school. MJ mentioned a history course that both he and Fellata had taken, called “Jerusalem.” Daph and I couldn’t stand the curiosity, and we asked what they studied in the course. They described it as starting at the founding of the city, with great weight on the Crusades, and ending in the present day.
What, we asked, did it say about the present situation?

Now, you should know that we are outed to Fellata. He knows that we are Jewish, and is aware that Daphna speaks fluent Hebrew. So, when MJ began to talk about how Arabs could not rest until Jerusalem was under their control, Fellata tried to steer the conversation in as “PC” a way as he could manage, while trying to contain the laughter that was slipping into one of his big, loopy smiles. MJ talked about the injustices that have occurred in the past sixty years, some of which we had heard of, and some of which, like Israeli soldiers not allowing Muslims under the age of 45 into the Dome of the Rock, we had not / had reason to doubt. MJ suggested that under Arab rule, everyone would have uninhibited access to their holy sights. Fellata suggested that it be an international city. MJ mentioned that Jewish control of Jerusalem was merely a sign of Muslim deviance, and that once Muslims were again on the proper path in front of God, it would again be their city.

As our Arabic has improved, and as we have begun to read the newspaper (oh so slowly) and other texts, we have learned much more about the Jordanian view of Israel. We did several classes on reading newspaper articles about “suicide bombers,” a term which was in most of the texts we read, though our teacher contended that Muslims call them “Martyr bombers.” We did a listening exercise that suggested that Jews had stolen a cornerstone of the Al-Aqsa Mosque. On Friday we took a test, the text of which claimed that Ajloun Castle is a reminder to Muslims to re-take Palestine and restore the glory days of Saladin.

It is difficult to know where to stand when these issues arise. There is already a terrific amount of pressure in knowing, simply, that the people we meet may never meet another Jew in their lives, and that the impression we make may be incredibly important. When, though, do we speak up? How can we without alienating, or even endangering ourselves? And what does it mean if we simply say that we hope for peace?

After carrying on in our discussion, MJ paused for a moment and said, “We don’t have a problem with the Jews, though. Just the Zionists.” He mentioned that there are Arab Jews, though many of the communities he mentioned no longer exist or have thoroughly diminished: in Iraq, in Syria, in Yemen, in Iran, in Morocco (which is still fairly sizeable). When we chatted later in the night, alone, Daph asked if I thought he had realized that we were Jewish. But really, I think he was just trying to remind, or show, the Americans that the Jordanians are not a hateful people.

Finally, Fellata said, “And what’s so funny is that we’re all cousins,
Muslims, Christians, and Jews!”
And Daphna said, “Yes, brothers.”
And, for a moment, the table was silent.

Your Arabic Phrases of the day:
Mumkin – Possibly, Possible, Maybe
Yan-ni – it means. . . (Used as “I mean” or as a mid-sentence pause for thought reorganization like “Like”)

The Other Pilgrimage to Mecca

Last night we ventured into Amman for the second time, and met our friend Ahmed “Tupac” (here, if you’re named Ahmed, you need a nickname: in our phone alone are Ahmed “Fellata,” Ahmed “Tupac,” and Ahmed “Lebanese”). He brought us to a place we’ve heard praised by several people around Irbid: Mecca Mall. And, immediately, it was obvious why we’d heard so much: Mecca Mall is everything that Irbid is not. It is glitzy, it is foreign, it is humongous – within its walls alone are a bowling alley, a movie theater, a skating rink, multiple arcades, extremely expensive stores (Timberland, Polo Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger, United Colors of Benetton) and a humongous food court that featured all of your American favorites: McDonalds, KFC, Burger King, Pizza Hut, Starbucks, Caribou Coffee. . . .

We wandered the mall for hours (largely because there is little else to do in Amman at night without involving alcohol), gawking at the expensive brands, the ridiculous amount of English, and the swarms of people that at times made the mall hard to navigate. We took a small splurge, and Ahmed and I each got a drink at Starbucks (ahh, that sugary American taste. . . .) and Daph grabbed an ice cream cone as we learned about Ahmed's background. His family lives in Saudi Arabia, but he was born in Eritrea and spent nearly a year in Turkey, so he has been around, and his English is so good that, coupled with his t-shirt and slightly baggy pants, it would be easy to take him for American, with a slight accent that could be from, vaguely, most ethnic inner cities.

For me, though, the main focus of the trip was the food. I pulled us all out to the grocery store across the street (somehow it seemed more interesting than the grocery store in the mall) and, though we failed in the tofu search, we found black beans. I could hear some vaguely classical music start shooting through the back of my brain, could see Raphael’s painting of Mary’s ascent to heaven. . . and we bought two bags. Then we headed back to the mall.

We had found a Chinese restaurant in the food court that had a vegetarian section on its menu and the last menu item was “Tofu and Vegetable Hotplate.” Come dinner time I headed straight there, and Daphna next door to Chili House, a local fast food joint that had a veggie burger. I approached the Chinese Restaurant meekly and asked the man at the counter in Arabic if there was anything other than tofu and veggies in the dish. “No tofu,” he said in English. And that was that.

The veggie burger, it turned out, was vegan, and I decided to try Daph’s before jumping in for my own. She brought it to the table and set it down – it was deep fried, on a bun with a slice of onion, a slice of tomato and a light serving of ketchup. The salad it came with was iceberg lettuce (the first time I’ve seen it here) with tomatoes, cucumbers, and beautiful slices of bell pepper. Daph bit into the burger, and mumbled, “What is this, potato?” And it was. The “burger” was like eating a latke on a bun. Other options at the food court were limited, so I had falafel.

Eating out in Jordan (and especially outside of Amman) as a vegetarian is a very difficult thing to do. As a vegan, it is limited to certain appetizers exclusively: hummus, falafel, ful, mutabal (basically babba’ghanoush), and a variety of appetizer salads. At non-traditional restaurants, it can be even harder – we accompanied Evan to an Italian restaurant before he left this week, and there was not a single available menu item that I could eat. For obvious reasons, we do a lot of cooking at home.

Beyond that, food can be difficult as soon as it involves more than just the two of us. We have been shy to invite friends over for meals (and even to join friends at the “family-style” restaurants around), as meals here are not considered complete without meat ("white beans or garbanzos?" doesn't seem to cut it), and suggesting that you are a vegetarian results in expressions of pity and the immediate question, “Why?” This is not a society given to meditating on the issues behind vegetarianism, and that is clear even in the practices of Hallal, which, we've been told, extends an animal’s suffering in order to best drain it of blood. But unlike in certain parts of Guatemala, where I almost felt bad rejecting meat (where some people, for economic reasons, clearly had no option other than what was immediately available), here I do not – this is a land of plenty, a cradle of civilization for the richness of the earth (and the produce here is incredible, especially as we move into summer). Indeed, veganism owes great debt to Middle Eastern cuisine: homos, falafel, lentils, tahini. People here very much have the option of vegetarianism, it is simply not (yet) considered.

So Amman verged on a complete gustatory success, but alas. The mall, however, did impress us, and as we pulled away we saw that another of the malls we’ve heard so much about was a mere 100 meters from Mecca Mall. From the outside it also appeared lavish, and huge. We were astounded by that, especially in the light of what we know to be the Jordanian economic position. It is certainly not horrible, but minimum wage here is just over $140 a month (wages are not paid hourly, and a friend is working 72 hour weeks for under $160 a month). As we frequently have trouble staying within our $70 weekly budget (which doesn’t include rent), it is difficult to understand how people make ends meet, and even more difficult to understand how Jordan can sustain dozens of luxury boutiques all next door to each other, especially when the 16% sales tax is added onto the already jaw-dropping prices (Ahmed had been quoted a price of 600 dinar – almost $900 – for a pair of shoes at one of the stores in Mecca Mall). We don’t see it here in Irbid, where there are nice buildings but nothing spectacular, but the presence of the malls speaks to the existence of a strong, powerful, upper class.

And, writing about the excursion today, it feels like being that much closer to home – that much closer to all those things "American" – makes us feel so much further away.

Your Arabic phrases of the day:
Limatha? – Why?
Matha? – What?
Shu? – What? (in the local Jordanian dialect)
Ayna? – Where?
When? – Where? (in the local Jordanian dialect)

The Notes that Never Made It

In the past week we've had several mini-events that didn't make it into the last blog, and we wanted to update you all on them.

My favorite moment from the week was when Daphna turned in an assignment with the title: أنا سنيّة. She meant to write: أباسنيّة, which is the name of our favorite Ethiopian restuarant back home (Abasynnia). Instead, أنا سنيّة means "I am Sunni." Our teacher picked it up and went fairly white. We hadn't truly discussed religion, and here it appeared that Daph was well on her way to converting. . . . And what did lentils have to do with her conversion, anyhow?

At least, in this heavily Sunni country, she didn't write "I am Shiite." We might have had to find an early flight home. . . .

Oh, the little dots that are so important to Arabic. . . .

The same teacher invited us to lunch last Thursday at a restaurant. She introduced us to several new dishes -- semi-pickled turnips, fatoush (Middle East taco salad: basically "Israeli" salad with fried bread in it), an odd canned-mushroom salad, and more. At the end of the meal, Daph and I did what was only natural. We grabbed the bill. When our teacher realized we were serious, she went really white and got rather upset. Apparently, while trying to be American-polite, we had insulted her honor (though she still won -- she was able to pursuade the cashier in Arabic to take her money and not ours. . . our skills are still not beyond hers). . . .

Speaking of (and in) Arabic, each week at the Souk, we start at the same dried beans and spices store that we are loyal to because on our first visit, due to a misunderstanding, we overpaid and the owner called us back and returned the extra money we had given him (even though it was clear, due to the denominations, that we didn't have a clue). Now, each week he gives us a chocolate and his cousin speaks "Arabeezi" (read, Spanglish without the Spanish but with Arabic) with us and helps us select what we want for the week. This week, his cousin, who is 18, told us that he wants us to teach him English. We agreed to do a trade at 6:00p the next night. True to form here in Jordan, he called around 8:00pm and asked where we were. He and another cousin then joined Fellatta and us at a cafe. Between Fellatta seeking advice on how to pursue a Tunisian student, and the boys talking about their various girlfriends (and the holy grail -- an American woman), we spent more time talking about dating then. . . well. . . it felt a lot like middle school. Is it love that is the international language?

We have also been peer-pressured by our other teacher, Rayjahn, to go on the Language Center whirlwind trip through Wadi Rum (the desert valley), Aqaba (the Red Sea Resort), and Petra this weekend. Wish us luck. Clif Bars, here we come!

We want to thank, again, everyone who has posted on the blog. Your e-mails and comments make us very happy, though we have some difficulty commenting back, for some reason. Know that it makes our day to read your notes.

We will be sleeping in the desert, now, for the second night of Pesach, perhaps even a stone's throw from where the Jews wandered oh-so-many years ago. We hope that you all enjoy your Seders, and find in the holiday a holy, happy, and (if desired) transformational experience. We are sending our love and thinking of you all.

Your Arabic phrases of the day:

Mustahil! مستحيل Impossible! (like in Kung Fu Panda.

Hal anda Elijah aseer anib? هل عند اليجح عصير عنب؟ Does Elijah have grape juice?

Fee hummus woh salata?

". . . Maybe it's the third world, maybe it's his first time around. Doesn't know the language, holds no currency. . . ." - Paul Simon

That about sums it up.

OK, so we now have a little bit of currency, and we can ask if someone has hummus and salad and greet someone without (if we're lucky) completely making fools of ourselves. As soon as someone else speaks, though, I resort to my minimal Chinese and crawl into the fetal position. Daph just starts rattling off the alphabet in Spanish.

Welcome to Jordan.

OK, so, really, it's not that bad. Everyone here is sweet, and tries to communicate, and most are happy to try and find someway to help.

But really, I'm getting ahead of myself. We should start back on Tuesday afternoon, where we left off. You see, after all that poetry (which, I should brag, has gotten me compared to Gwen Stefani -- if you don't know who that is, just ask, *ahem*, Mark), we headed to Philli and Sevonne's wedding. Philli was a close friend of Daphna when she spent a year in Israel during high school. He is sweet, and was so excited to see her that I thought Sevonne might get jealous, but really they both just floated through the evening. The ceremony was beautiful, complete with pauses for the camera, and was followed by a multi-course meal and a disco party. Very wonderful, and, in an odd way, very Israeli. Who else would dance the hora to a throbbing techno beat? Nothing like the holy land. . . .

The wedding was a wonderful way to leave our Jewish segment of the trip for the time being. On Wednesday morning we headed to Turan, an Arab village in northern Israel, to visit Vera, a friend of Daphna's through Building Bridges for Peace. We were still in the same small country, but it felt like a rather large transition. We left the crowded, small apartment-style living of urban Rishon for the houses and olive trees and Arabic of a new place. And Vera's family (see pictures) was wonderful -- sweet and loud, funny and friendly and hospitable. Who knew that okra could taste so damn good? But it was OK -- we only ate about 7 meals a day. We also met Vera's fiance, Iyad. They will both be in the states in the Fall (Vera, unfortunately not very bright, was forced to accept a Fulbright Scholarship to get a Masters in the States so that she could escape the constant belittling in her town for her poor intellect). Everyone should have them over for dinner.

While we were at Vera's, Israeli election results came in. The village was a hard place to be when the right wing (including a man whose largest premise was to force Arab Israeli citizens to go through loyalty tests or be deported) did so well. It felt to us like Vera, in particular, was in a lot of pain -- her family has endured a lot, and to have this type of agenda in the ruling coalition is scary. It interested us as well, that there are four different Arab political parties, three of which each have around four seats in the parliament (the fourth protested the war by staying out of the elections, which seemed to me like when Israeli students "struck" by not going to class when the government raised the price of education -- who, exactly, are you hurting here?). Vera suggested that, if the four parties united, and all of the Arab's voted, they'd get over 20 seats, enough to be in the coalition. It didn't seem that simple, though -- the parties are not that similar, and one is even a communist party. Ever hear that one about two Jews and three opinions? Well. . . .

Finally, we are back to this morning. Iyad dropped us at the Nazarene Express in Nazareth (for an hour, we were Ben and Daphna of Nazareth!) and we took the bus into Jordan. It was a beautiful drive -- the green hills of Israel's Jezreal Valley gave way to the arid hills of Jordan, which had far less agriculture but far more olive trees (Iyad told us, "If there are Arabs, there are olive trees"). We pulled into Irbid, a sprawling, fair sized city in the hills. Daph said that the approach was like the approach to Jerusalem, minus the green. We clambered out of the bus, and somehow, found the university. We arrived at the security gate, and asked about the language center, and they pointed us to another security center, and they made a phone call to find out where it was and then waited, and then made a phone call to ask someone else, and then walked us the 100 yards to the Center.

At the Center, we met Ahmed and Omar, one of whom will most likely be our professor, and both of whom were flabbergasted by our complete lack of Arabic. They kept saying things like, "But you know. . ." and we'd just look at them blankly and they'd shake their heads and look at each other, as if perhaps the other one was (hopefully) using us to play a practical joke on him. We met the director, who reminded me a lot of Bruce Heitler, came in and said hi, and had the foreign student liasion, Ayhem, show us to our apartment. Ayhem brought us to a well-used but large one bedroom apartment in the corner of campus. It has white walls and beige carpets and ugly but useable furniture and a TV that gets the local Jordanian stations. Nonetheless, it's cute, and Daphna has promised to spruce it up.

Ayhem then called a driver and took us on a tour of campus and the city, showing us where many things that I can't remember are. It was very sweet and detailed and, after showing us the incredible student center where you can do mosaics and ceramics and painting (we think they're free, but aren't sure), he brought us to his office and gave us some materials. One of his co-workers practically begged us to come practice Arabic with her and to teach her some English, and then we went home.

Even after a good afternoon's rest, though, it's best not to try to order vegan food in a foreign place without a dictionary. Now, we did it ("sandwich felafel" and tea and water and hummus and salad for two for under five dollars), but it was kind of ugly in the process. A lot of very blank looks, shall we say.

Now, 'tis time to go shopping and fall into bed for an early night (so, the afternoon's rest wasn't so good). We have tomorrow and Saturday as our weekend, and classes are supposed to start at 8:30am on Sunday. Wish us luck.

Arabic word(s) of the day:
Been Hehbak = I love you

Been hehbak, everyone! Thanks for all of your comments and e-mails (we love them!) and we hope to talk to you soon!