Dead Sea

So, I’ve been in Amman for over a week now. Classes are hard as hell. I have class from 1-6 with like two 5 minute breaks inbetween. Our professors are hard core!! But they are amazing teachers. I think I’m just starting to realize just how freaking hard this language is. I come home from class and feel like it’s impossible to ever get fluent in this language!
I saw the ancient Roman theatre in old Amman a few days ago. It was pretty sweet. I walked all the way to the top of the theatre and thought my lungs were going to collapse.
The night after, we went to this fancy outdoor restaurant called Jennah (which means Paradise) for dinner a couple nights ago…. I had a greaaat time ;) They had the cleanest bathrooms I have seen in Amman. By the way the bathrooms here are pretty gross. No toilet paper and usually no toilet seats… haha just the bowl and lid, YESSS!!!
There really isn’t much to do in Amman itself. We got a hookah for our place. We smoke Argila/ hubbly bubbly twice a day. Haha It’s so funny that they call Shisha hubbly bubbly here.
I have two greaaat roommates… all we do is laugh together. We crack up at the stupidest stuff. We get along great and spend loads of time together.
Yesterday was a jam packed day of sight seeing.
In the morning we went to the city of Madaba in Jordan. It’s one of the oldest cities in the country. We went to this Greek Orthodox that has this one mosaic piece on the floor of the Church from the 6th century. The Mosaic is a map of all the religious sites that were in Jerusalem at the time. After that we went to the Virgin Mary Church which had some old Mosaics in it too. They were pretty awesome.
In the afternoon we went to Mt.Nebo. That’s were some believe Moses is buried. The view from that point was gorgeous. You could see the Dead Sea from there in the distance.
By late afternoon we were driving down the mountain through the desert in a festive bus full of 11 other students, with blaring Arab music. Our driver Abu Muhammad is one of the funniest people I have ever encountered. He’s a very round cute hairy man. I’m in love. Anyways we saw some Bedouin (nomadic Arabs that live in the desert) tents on the drive down to the Dead Sea and a bunch of camels. Abu Muhammad stopped on the side of the road and started chasing after one. It was beyond hilarious.
We got to the Dead Sea and went to a more private part of the beach. We ran into the water and it was sooo weird. The salt water content in the sea is so high that you just float. You could be out in waters that are hundreds of ft deep and you just sit there and effortlessly end up floating! Even if you try to keep your body vertical you flop over on your back or stomach. It was awesome. So I was pretty much just laying out in the water and gliding around for a couple hours. Then we bought this black mud that you rub all over your body that’s supposed to be rejuvenating. So we put it on and took it off after about 20 minutes, and our skin was baby soft. It was bloody radical to think that I was on the lowest point of land on the surface of the Earth. On the one side of the sea was Jordan and on the other was the mountains of Palestine. We kept on hearing gun fire off in the distance… but I didn’t really know what that was about…
Anyways I’ve been trying to get my internet to work for hours and finally got it up and running so I could write this post. I’m about to pass out like a baby manatee with cataplexy!

Marhaba

IM IN JORDAN!!!!

My first day was okay.... I guess...NOT!!!
IT WAS BLOODY AWESOME!!!
The flight was almost unbearable, 6 inches of leg room and what seemed like one million arab babies crying in unison (they were soo freaking cute though). It was a 12 hour direct flight, JFK to Amman. I think I slept for 20 minutes total. I stepped off the plane and took a deep breath and what did I smell??? Cigarretes!!! mmmmm. The airport had no smoking signs everywhere, yet you see dudes smokin it up. It was pretty funny. The 45 minute drive to our apartment was awesome. Amman is just desert with random establishments everywhere. We got to our apartment and it was sick, much better than what i expected. We're living on the top most level of our apartment complex (6^th floor). Our living room is surrounded by windows and we have a pretty cool view.
After we got settled our professor took us to his friends place for dinner. His wife made maddd food. 3 giant platters for 12 kids. ENORMOUS plates of rice and yogurt topped with huge pieces lamb meat, it was overwhelmingly delicious. We had mint tea...delicious.... Turkish coffee... delicious... my head was going to explode because my taste buds were on ecstasy.
The people's whose place we were at were all like we're going to eat with our hands. I thought i was about to school everyone with my hand eating skills. I look over and realized I was doing it all wrong! They were straight up rolling big balls of rice and meat the size my fist into their palms and eating them. It was beastly and awesome. So junglee.
We've been hitting up the sheesha place next door to our place like its our job. We're becoming friends with the manager and the waiters, everyone is incredibly friendly.
Everything so far is so much better than what i expected. The least exciting thing so far was my freezing cold shower, but I was too happy about everything so far to even care.
I'm chillin at the sheesha place right now, they have wireless internet here. The waiter has been coming by and teaching us some Arabic. Classes start in two days. Life good.

Some initial thoughts

In less than 48 hours I will be in Jordan. It hasn't hit me at all yet. I'm just chillin in my bed in good old Dayton, OH. The house that I am in has been with me since the day i was born. I don't enjoy change. The furthest move I have ever made was to Oxford, OH haha. When I've traveled outside of the US it has been with family... and close friends if you count spring break. The point is, I have rarely been outside of my comfort zone. This trip is huge for me. Do you smell that? yes yes, that's freedom. Am I....
nervous?... yes
excited?... hell yes
homosexual goat?.... fuck yes
Right now I'm sure I have a pretty inaccurate perception of the way Amman is going to be... I picture India, but replace all the Indians with Arabs, less traffic, less people, more hijabis, a better sounding language, and instead of rikshas there will be flying unicorns.
The fact that Jordan is a Muslim country is also a reason I am so excited to be going on this trip. I will be able to get in touch with the religious side of my roots. I'm not saying Im going to be spending all my time in masjids, I'm just excited for that atmosphere. Hearing that Athan (call to prayer) in the morning, that kind of stuff sends chills up my spine, it's beautiful.
Well..... Until Jordan