Week Two

August 30th 2008

Nothing of much import happened on this day. Basically I just hung out with the family. And coughed my poor lungs to death. I have had this horrible cough for the last few days and it shows no signs of getting any better. I spent most of this day sleeping! Yeppie...so boring!

August 31st 2008

Okay so today was the nastiest day of my life. It started out okay. I had to take an Arabic placement exam and then sit through a long explanation of Ramadan. But later in the day I took a taxi home. I had the driver drop me off at the grocery store that was no more than a block from my house. As I was walking toward my house this Brown Van was in front of me. The Van started to slow down and stopped right as it reached me. Now I didn't stop or anything, but I turned my head to the side and looked into the van and OMG it was so gross. There was this man driving the van and he had unzipped his pants and was holding all of his junk out for me to see and smiling at me. I about threw up on the spot. I couldn't even think of something to say. I just kept walking toward my home. EWWW!!!!!! Of course now in retrospective I just laugh but how gross. Now before my family decides to be like I knew the middle east was bad. Please remember this could have just as easily happened in America and this was the first less then respectful thing that had happened to me since I came to this country.
Anyways, later that night I went out with the family and met even more of the family. They all seem like very nice people. We sat on the porch for hours and just talked about this that and the other thing. But to be honest I sat on the porch in a daze for most of the night trying to understand what they were saying in the fastest Arabic I had ever heard in my life!
Anyways that was my day. Not to interesting!

September 1st, 2008

While this was the first day of Ramadan it really wasn't all that exciting. Mind you my family is Christian so we do not celebrate and thank god we don't fast either for this month. Seriously though this was a rather boring day. I had my registration appointment with the RD and signed up for which classes I would be taking this term in Jordan. After that I just sat around campus with Tanya and Elexer and we made complete tourist of ourselves. Taking pictures of this that and the other thing.
Later I sat around and chilled with the family. Not too terribly exciting. Watched a few Arabic series. They are all different for the month of Ramadan.
Anyways, I have this cough and it is killing me. So tomorrow I have to go to the doctor. :( Doctors equal bad!

September 2nd, 2008

I went to the doctor today and I must say it is an experience unlike any other. I mean seriously. I go to this doctor and first we sit in his consultation room. Which is like this hostile room where he asks you what is wrong. Or better yet he asks your host mom what is wrong until she tells him just to ask me. haha. Anyways, then he took me behind this curtain where there was this tiny little room that he uses to examine you in. He had me sit on the table. And hands me this pink piece of cloth and tells me to cover myself up. Now mind you I am wearing long pants and a loose shirt. WHAT THE HELL WAS THERE TO COVER!? Anyways he then precedes to exam me. Which was the cheesiest examination of my life. Cough here, breathe there. And then after two minutes says he is done and goes back into the consultation room and gives me antibiotics and an inhaler. But he never told me what was wrong just to take this! How jank is that!!!!!!
Anyways, the rest of my day has been me sitting around and helping Tareq with his homework.
Oh and I had fried chicken? haha

September 3rd 2008

Another boring day at the University. Actually we really did nothing this time. We got our Arabic placement test results. I got placed into the fourth level and only the fifth level is higher. I think I am going to try and replace myself into the fifth level. I just think that I could have done better and that I was a bit on the nervous side. I mean it had been awhile since I had seen any of that stuff. I just simply don't want to sign into a class and two weeks down the road be bored in that class.
Anyways so last night Elizabeth and I decided to forsake our old shisha smoking spot and try out a new area of the city. We decided to go to the sixth circle and attempt to find somewhere else to hang out. Well as it turned out we ended up walking all the way to the seventh circle and found this area called Wakalat St. It was pretty cool. Kind of like a strip mall but not really. Anyways this place is like really happening with the locals. So we found this shisha bar and smoked some jamaica haha. Anyways, I didn't realize where we were at and when we were leaving I took a taxi back to my house that turns out was almost literally next door. Man did I feel stupid!!!! My taxi cab cost 30 cents basically!!! I told my host mom what I did and she just thought it was the funniest thing in the world that I decided to take a cab from Wakalat street! Oops chalk another one up for the foreign girl!
Anyways hope fully this weekend we are going to take a trip to somewhere out side of Amman so maybe I will have something better to write about!

September 4th 2008

Today was the last day of our orientation. Finally! And let me tell you it was as boring as all of the other days. Actually so boring in fact that I don't remember it enough to talk about. But in the evening I finally got my scared little friend Tanya to come out and play. Haha. Really I just bugged her until she decided to risk the scary taxi ride and come smoke shisha with Elizabeth and I. We went to Wakalat street again. And this time I found the bridge that I could just walk over and I was not stupid and I didn't take a taxi!!!
Okay the end of that day!

September 5th 2008

Again another boring average as hell day in Amman. A few of us decided to go to the movies. But other than seeing Hancock this day is not all that great. Kat and I did spend a little bit of time planning a trip to go to the Arabian Horse Club and go riding. They are supposed to be some of the best Arabs in the Middle East! Or at least in Jordan. Hopefully that is part of what I am going to do next week.

September 6th 2008

Miscommunications I was supposed to go to Uym Qais with a few of my friends. But Elizabeth didn't hear me correctly when I said I really wanted to go and she thought I said I didn't want to go. So now hopefully I am planning on going next weekend with Kat. Can you believe my luck? This is seriously why I always travel alone. It is so much easier. By the time I called Elizabeth she was all the way in Irbid with Lisa! Geez!!!!! Anyways I am over it now. Mean while I went on my first jog since I got to Amman! OMG I am out of shape. And FYI to all of you who think Jordan is so unsafe I feel safer running through Amman than I do through Bloomington.

September 7th 2008

Today was my first day of Arabic class. OMG...Okay first of all I am not going to try and switch into another class. My class will do just fine. I don't hear english at all for about three hours every single day! Wow OMG I have never been in an arabic class that they didn't teach in English. I mean this is good. But a bit on the over whelming side at times. However, I am keeping up. I know what is going on. Which is all that matters. But also the other reason I decided not to switch is that I really enjoy my teachers alot so far. Anyways, that is all I have to report for this day. And this I guess makes the end of week Two!