Home Stretch

Since the travel break, our whole class seems to be in a sort of second year slump. With hundreds of vocab words to learn a week, not to mention in class work and homework every day involving extremely difficult grammar that is way over my head (and hey, I am supposed to be a linguistics major over here!) our brains-alright I’ll stop with the collective, MY brain is just about fried.  Hopefully I’ll be able to hang on this last week of classes.  Next week is jam packed (or is the saying jammed packed?) with tests, exams, presentations, etc. but thankfully I have something positive to look forward to: my parents arrive a week from yesterday! I am really looking forward to showing them around the city and taking them to my favorite places.  After that we are off to Dubai for a few days for a brief family (minus a few) vacation.

            Two weekends ago Evelyn, Ian, and Ben, Ben’s coworker Josh and I went out to Wadi Mujb, a canyon of sorts about an hour outside of Amman, on the Dead Sea. I wasn’t quite too sure what we were getting into but I had heard that we ‘had to do some wadis’ before we left.  Ben mentioned that there would probably be water involved, a statement I obviously didn’t take seriously enough, and ignorantly I dressed for any other outdoor activity: cotton pants/top, socks, and gym shoes.  Josh picked us up at 7am sharp and we were arrived by 8:15.  Although I was still a bit uncertain as to what Wadi Mujib was all about, things became clearer when I saw the selection of lifejackets, and was asked to sign a variety of safety waivers.  Without hesitation we threw on the soaking wet lifejackets provided at the entrance and headed out away from the sea, towards the canyon.  We waded against foot deep water that turned into waist deep water (Think I was regretting all that cotton and socks? You bet!) until we reached the first of many obstacles. The wadi is full of waterfalls, rocks,  and other natural barriers that we needed climbed over, on, around, etc. to get to the next level of the canyon.  There are ropes, and a few metal bars fastened to the rocks to aid in our climb but it was still quite a feat to maneuver up and over the rocks.  About an hour and a half of playing and exploring later, we arrived at the end of the Siq—a beautiful waterfall to splash in and enjoy.   By this time we were all completely soaked so putting our entire bodies under the waterfall was no problem.  About three hours later we arrived back at the entrance platform, took of our soaking lifejackets, and futilely tried to ring out our clothes.

Wadi Mujib was probably my favorite excursion of the whole trip, and thanks to lax safely regulations in Jordan, an experience that could certainly not be replicated in the states.  I do have one word of advice for anyone wanting to give it a go: wear proper foot attire.  In the 2-3k long Siq we probably saw more than 12 pairs of completely destroyed shoes- flats, sandals, even dress shoes, of people that were clearly not informed of what was ahead.  Ian did manage to benefit from it, though.  He miraculously found a perfectly decent pair of New Balance hiking shoes in his size floating in the water, and took them home with him. Why the previous owner of the shoes ever decided to take them off is beyond me, but hey-Finders keepers!!

Since then I have been completely swamped with school work and haven’t had a chance to go out and explore too much.  Last week we had a group trip out to Ajloun, a forest preserve/castle in the North, however we were all extremely tired from the early wakeup call and generally apathetic towards the trip. Even our tour guide managed to nap during lunch.

View from the top of Ajlun Castle

Nevertheless it was a beautiful green area, and nice to see some green in a terrain that is generally brown and dry. 

Last Monday I went to my last hash run of the trip.  I don’t believe I mentioned this earlier but there is one man, he is Australian-Jordanian but grew up in Jordan, who looks freaky freaky similar to uncle Ricky.  I told him about it and he consequently told all his friends and introduced me to my “aunt” and “cousins.”  I swear he is a Tully, and his drinking habits seem to be in line with a Tully too.  I met a variety of interesting, hilarious, and wonderful people at the hash and will really miss them.  I said goodbye to them last Monday but isha allah not goodbye for good.  I sincerely hope I get the chance to come back to Jordan someday to finish this whole learning Arabic thing, and experience more of what Amman has to offer. 

Running at the Hash! There's me on the left.

"Virgin circle"- All of the first timers are humiliated in the middle

As I mentioned earlier this week is extremely busy and to be frank, will be quite hellish. We moved through three chapters (like, 100 pages of material) in two weeks and the fast pace of the program is starting to catch up with me.  We have a test Sunday, Tuesday I will give a 20 minute presentation (in Arabic, duh) on influential women in Islam, and Thursday we have our final cumulative exam.   At times I miss having a real summer, but I wouldn’t trade the experiences I have had here for anything. I  have learned so much about myself,  Arabic, and the region- most importantly that I can’t wait to return :)