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I got behind on posting…

(11-8-12)

Man, I thought this day would never come but lately I’ve been too tired to appreciate actually being here. It is a strange feeling sitting 30 hours later on the bus, tired, with layers of sweat caked on, especially driving into a new city with your same old self. It took time, but it’s almost a week later and I feel like a real person and a hopeful one again. It may be because I can’t understand what people are saying about me. Sometimes you just have to get away from your own language. Ya feel me?

Right now, I am living in a small village with a host family. I have three host sisters and two host brothers all under the age of 15. My host mom teaches English so she speaks some. My host dad owns a store that sells home décor/repair. I am so grateful to have been put with such a nice family.

The first day I came, some relatives came to visit me, a grandmother and her granddaughter. They didn’t speak any English, so we could only make a little bit of conversation. There was a lot of awkward silence, I think about 15 minutes between idle banter. The whole visit, the grandmother was staring at me skeptically, furrowed brows and all. Every once in a while they would say something in Arabic and my host mom would sometimes translate. At the end, the grandmother said something in Arabic to my host mom which she translated, “she said she loves you”. I told her, “I do too”. Duh.

That reminds me, I called my gramma and she was so amazed that I was able to call from a village in Jordan. Now, that is some magic we take for granted.

(11-10-12)

On Friday evening, we walked home from visiting a relative hand-in-hand with my host siblings through our village. My host mom and the youngest son took off running towards the house. I was hopped up on coffee but I haven’t felt joy or laughed like that in such a long time. That day we had spent visiting relatives. We drove through the mountains in a Toyota pick-up and I caught a glimpse of the Dead Sea. It was really beautiful. We got to the village and spent a lot of time in living rooms, listening to crying babies and celebratory gun shots from a nearby wedding. One of the uncles had a machine that measures your blood pressure and we had fun with that for a while. We drank Arabic coffee and ate Indian tandoori chicken. The grandmother gave me this biscuit thing, I almost thought it was a bone or bone marrow, and told me to eat it. It was one of the worst things I’ve ever tasted. It was salty like a booger and kind of sweet but sour and I don’t even know. (It reminded me of the time Megan Lee told me she would give me $10 to eat a bouillion cube and I did. I almost barfed but never did get that skrilla...) I found out later that it was dried goat’s milk and is supposed to be good for your stomach. When no one was looking I put the rest in my pocket. I end up putting a lot of food in my pocket. People are always giving me food! And it is delicious 90% of the time. My favorite food here is dipping bread in lebenah (it’s yoghurt cream) and olive oil.

Where’s my $10 Megan?

(12/8/12)

It’s strange to be living with a family for over a month and I’m not sure how they feel about most things. Some people in my Arabic class were talking about mystical realism and it sounds like my life and translation abilities right now. Nothing surprises me anymore. I’m pretty sure Satan got in the youngest one’s boots yesterday. We went for a picnic in the mountains and settled by a little stream. We hiked around and saw some old, old buildings, a mosque clinging to the side of a mountain, and some lean-to houses. I swear I heard goats somewhere. It was just a beautiful day with the weather and all.

From there we went to visit some relatives in a nearby village. Wanna know how we got there? We switch-backed it up a steep-ass mountain with the two young'ns in the back of the pickup! One of them had his head down the whole time while the other drank tea from the teapot spout. I really thought I was going to die. Ask me about this in person sometime, it will be more dramatic. I did catch another glimpse of the Dead Sea. And once we got to flat land, the trees were all lined up along the road, guiding us to visit more relatives. Damn, can I just say one thing? I‘ve never met a grandma or a glass of sugary, sage tea I didn’t like.
 

And in sum, the language barrier ain’t so bad fer me ‘cause I don’t even know what to say in English half the time, but I feel like I’m understanding more and more each day. Slowly but Shirley (Donovan). Though, as I said earlier, it has been nice not knowing what people are saying about me. The more I learn, the more I’m afraid of what I’ll find...