AC

Today I am grateful for air conditioning. I used to think that the weather in Amman was hot. I would be hot before I made it halfway down the block on the way to work. By the time I would reach the service taxi, I would be sweating. The trip back home was even hotter. This is compounded by the fact that cars turn into saunas when they sit out in the sun. It seems like nearly every time I get to the service station in Al-Ashrafiya, a service taxi fills up right before I get there so I have the pleasure of waiting in the taxi in the sun for several minutes before it fill up. I don't think the heat would be quite as bad if there was a lot of water that I could just jump into as soon as I left the taxi, but Jordan is a desert and there is very little water. However, that changes a bit when you are in Aqaba. The weather is much hotter, but the Red Sea is waiting for you at the end of the street. Today I walked down the street and could feel the heat radiating off of the pavement through my sandals. I jumped into the Red Sea and the top six inches of water was warm. The water wasn't uncomfortably warm, but it was definitely not cold either. It wasn't even cold enough six feet under the water to be a shock to your system when you jump in. The real shock that the Red Sea brings to your system is when it gets in your eyes, nose and mouth when you jump in. Hopefully, not all three of those happen at once. I try to keep my eyes closed when under the water, but I can't control the splashes of other and I would have to say that salt water in the eye is no good. I did get several gallons of salt water up my nose when attempting to learn how to dive however. I was mostly successful, but times like this are when I realize the why I was born in a land-locked state. Water is not my element.

=)

And a Little Child Shall Lead Them

She told me that today she was fasting. I have to admit that I was a bit surprised at this revelation. I knew that all of the children who were older than eight were encouraged to fast as a part of Ramadan, but I didn't even know if she was older than eight. My confusion was enhanced by the fact that she came to the activities department at the same time as the younger group of kids who weren't fasting. To my surprise, she is actually nine years old. Developmentally she is a few years behind. I don't know all the reasons for that, but she is definitely battling some disease. This becomes apparent when she stands up and her legs are a bit stiff and her belly is a bit swollen. It becomes even more apparent when she smiles and half of her teeth are rotting away. The final straw comes when she takes off her sunglasses and the whites of her eyes are actually yellow. Despite all that she must have gone through in her life and is currently going through physically, she is one of the children at the orphanage who I have never seen without a smile. She makes people happy simply by being around them. That's just the type of person she is. Now, we are nearly a week into Ramadan, and she decided to take on the challenge of fasting from sunrise to sunset. This isn't an easy task for anyone, let alone a child or a child who struggles with physical ailments. But she wasn't put out or grumpy at the prospect. In fact, she was excited and determined. After telling me that she was fasting, she proceeded to tell me the other things that she was doing for Ramadan.

1. Not eating a sandwich.
2. Fast from sunrise to sunset.
3. Working to make her mom happy and not mad or frustrated.
4. Don't hit her siblings.
5. Pray five times during the day.
6. Drink tamr hindi after breaking her fast in the evening.
7. Eat qatayif or Ramadan pancakes.

Her reason for doing this was not simply because the other kids her age were fasting or that she was forced to by the people at the orphanage. Rather she made the decision because it would make God happy with her. That is the power of the faith of a child. It's been a really neat experience to see how the children view Ramadan. Everything they do takes on a special significance. They are generally just as happy and energetic as they are when they aren't fasting. They also spend more time listening to the Qur'an and learning and reciting parts of the Qur'an. My favorite part of the day is listening to the entire group of kids recite Surah Al-Fatihah or the first chapter of the Qur'an. These kids may have been given the short end of the stick as far as life goes, but they have the potential to make a big difference in their lives. All they need to do is put their enthusiasm and faith to work for them. They are so strong. There is a reason that the scripture says, “And a little child shall lead them.”

=)

Garbage

Today I witnessed a rare occasion. I saw a Jordanian get up from his chair next to his shop in Wast al-Balad, walk over to one of the small garbage cans welded onto the power pole and throw some garbage inside. Throw garbage inside a garbage bin? Who just does that? Not many people here in Jordan. A few days ago I was even shocked to watch a Jordanian youth who was walking by one of the big dumpsters throw some garbage in the dumpster as he walked past. It seems like people are much too busy or tired or something to take the time to find a garbage bin of any shape or size. If there is any natural or unnatural hole or divot in the road or sidewalk, that is a good enough garbage can. Heck, the road is a good enough garbage can. What usually happens when someone finishes with a wrapper or a plastic bag or a paper cup is that they simply toss it out into the street. When I first arrived in Jordan, I was a bit shocked at how dirty everything seemed to be. There was garbage in every street. It wasn't small amounts of garbage either. There would be entire piles of garbage sitting the road. It would get really funny when the pile was sitting next to an empty garbage bin. Sure there are some people who take the time to throw the garbage in the bins, but the mindset is that it's so much easier to just drop a single wrapper on the ground than to take the time to walk over to the garbage bin and dump it in. I mean that's a lot of work for one wrapper. There are also people who have a job specifically to pick up the garbage in the street. However, they don't get everything or even close to everything. I have also learned that fences and any shrub or small bush are excellent garbage catchers. The wind grabs the garbage laying on the ground and moved it along until it happens to pass by a fence or other object that is permeable to wind but not plastic bags. The wind is therefore allowed to pass through, but the bag or other garbage is caught.

I have never been part of an official highway patrol, but I have participated in picking up the garbage that was around the school grounds or on the ground close to the landfill just outside on town. I was always amazed at how clean our school grounds would look and yet we would pick up so much trash. At least it looked like a lot of trash. Cleaning up the garbage on the roads next to the landfill just felt like a waste of time. In my mind, more garbage would just come and replace it anyway. I would still help and participate because I couldn't leave a job half-done. Maybe that is the mindset that a lot of the garbage guys have in Jordan. They are getting paid to pick of the trash in the streets of Amman, but they know that as they pick it up, more will come to replace it. I think that would make doing a good job difficult at the very least and the job wouldn't feel very fulfilling. It's one thing to be in charge of cleaning the streets in America where you can look at them at the end of the day and everything looks cleaner and like a nicer, newer place. It's quite another thing to be in charge of cleaning the streets in Amman where you can look at them at the end of the day and nothing looks different. Ten minutes ago, you picked up the trash along the street, and now another pile is waiting for you. What difference does it make? This is a mindset that is in the whole country. Will it change? It could, but it would take a catalyst and a lot of time.

=)

Jude

I found my sister Emma's look-alike.  Jude has brown hair that is curly around the edges and falls to just below their shoulders, deep brown eyes that can sparkle with amusement, and a slender body build that given the right coaching could produce a stellar athlete. But it wasn't simply Jude's physical characteristics that reminded me of my little sister. The moment Jude walked in with her mother and noticed the many people sitting on the patio that she didn't recognize, she clung to her mother and would hardly leave her side. Emma used to be just as shy.  Now, she is one of the more outgoing out of the bunch of us kids. That being said, there is hope for Jude. It only took me an hour or two before we were playing “Rock, Paper, Scissors.” It wasn't without effort on my part though. It required a paper frog that actually jumps, several questions that she could answer with either holding up fingers such as how old are you, asking even more questions with a barely perceptible tsk for a no, and a paper rose. At that point her interest was peaked enough that she would answer my questions. At first she would talk through her mom, but eventually she was comfortable enough to speak to me directly. We talked about food and the fact that neither one of us like mulukhia and her favorite fruit which just happens to be watermelon. We talked about her favorite color, orange. We talked about animals and it turns out that her favorite animal isn't a nice pet type of animal such as a cat or dog, but a lion. At least that's what her favorite animal was that day. And we got a picture together. I don't think she was actually smiling in the picture because every time her mom would pull out the camera, she would suddenly remember that she only met me that night and would fall silent again. She also wouldn't look at the camera. I know cameras can be scary, but she was having none of it. The whole evening was very enjoyable. There was good food, good company, and good conversation. When Jude and her family got up to leave, each one of the younger girls was allowed one of the sweets on the table to eat. And yes, Jude took my recommendation. Who knows? Maybe she would have chosen that one anyway. If so, all that means is that she has excellent taste in her desserts. If not, then I made a new friend and that's something that someone can never have too many of.

=)

Wadi Hassa!

What would happen if you combined the Narrows canyon in Southern Utah and the jungles in Swiss Family Robinson? Wadi Hassa. That's what happens. Some call it a tropical desert. The trip didn't start out very tropical. Definitely more on the desert side of life. In fact, there wasn't a single, growing, green thing in sight. As we approached the river that runs through Wadi Hassa, everything remained brown and dry. However, along the banks of the river, green reeds and other living things were in abundance. Looking at the horizon while standing next to the river, you would see a green strip right next to the river where everything was growing. Following that would be a brown strip where nothing was growing. Finally you would see a blue strip that had no white clouds to mar the pattern. I didn't spend a lot of time staring at the horizon because shortly after getting outfitted with helmets and life jackets we were heading down the river. The first part of the adventure was the first of many “water” slides. Basically we slid down some slippery rocks. It was pretty great. Only a short while later, we reached the first pool. Most of the pools had big rocks or cliffs to jump off of, while we simply chilled in some of the other pools for a while before moving on. Two pools in particular had great cliffs to jump off of. The cliff at the second pool was the picnic spot for lunch. Lunch consisted of sandwiches, fresh tea and almonds. I think it's pretty great that Arabs love their tea enough to haul around all the equipment necessary to fix tea while sitting on a rock that has a small river on one side, and a hill that is nearly a sand dune on the other side. The worst part about eating lunch was that we had to stop moving momentarily and we weren't in the water. Because of that, the flies had a chance to catch up to us. I think I had nearly twenty flies on one sandal. I also think that the spot we stopped for lunch was the worst spot because it was around so much standing water. Other attractions in Wadi Hassa included but was not limited to standing behind a waterfall, walking through the reeds that line the river, spotting some frogs, birds and other wildlife, and sitting in a natural hot pool that didn't smell like sulfur. Believe it or not folks, water in Jordan isn't naturally hot unless it's been sitting out. However, this one stream of water is heated by unknown means that haven't always been in place. Until a couple of years ago, this stream also contained cool water. Since the water is pretty warm and bordering on hot, a few rocks have been placed strategically to dam off the stream a bit and create nice place to sit and rest at the end of the trek through Wadi Hassa. It would have been even better if it had of actually been the end of the trek. But after climbing out of the water, we then had to walk up the dusty road to where the bus was waiting to take us back to Amman. The walk itself wasn't too bad, but I definitely gained new appreciation for the significance of Jesus washing the feet of his apostles. It had only been one day and we were in water for most of it. However, that dust wasn't just sand. It was a fine powder that stuck to your skin and didn't fall off once it dried. It simply caked on more layers. The drive back to Amman was nearly as exciting as the trip down the river. As we climbed up the mountains on the side of the river, the only evidence that Wadi Hassa exists lay is the green line snaking it's way down the canyon. We had only traveled about 2 km, or less than 1.5 miles, and it took us five hours. It's crazy how time flies when you're having fun!

=)

O Susannah!

It took a minute for my brain to register that the music I heard as I was walking down the street was actually familiar. At first I thought it was because the music being played sounded like a music box on a sound system similar to the music played by the gas truck. Then I realized that the familiarity ran even deeper. The tune wasn't the Happy Birthday song or one of the other two songs that the gas truck plays. The tune came from a much earlier stage of my life. Notes to O Susannah, The Farmer in the Dell, and Yankee Doodle rang out through the neighborhood. I couldn't quite see the source of the music until I went around the corner. Then I saw a cotton candy machine. The strangest thing about this machine was not the music it was playing, but the fact that the only person in the vicinity of the cotton candy machine was the person who was making the cotton candy. It seems like every time there is cotton candy, there is also a line of eager children who are simply dieing to eat the sugary goodness. I didn't stop for any cotton candy, but I would say that the music made my day. Who knew that you could be walking in the middle of Jordan and listen to Yankee Doodle? Now you do.

=)

Rappin'

My schedule at the orphanage changes very little, but today was one of those days that was different. A few weeks ago, I was informed that other volunteers would be in charge of the activities on Mondays and Saturdays. There have been other days when I have shown up to the orphanage only to learn that the kids would only be there for a few hours. On those days, I have simply spent the remainder of the time in the baby department. I can't complain about that because those babies are also very cute. However feeding babies can get old after four and a half hours of it. Today was one of those days. When I learned that the kids would be leaving the orphanage only an hour and a half later, I asked the woman who informed me of this if they had a regular schedule when they left the orphanage. The answer was no. They didn't have a set schedule. That does make planning my days a bit more difficult, but that's also to be expected. Today the difference came when I was invited to go with them to the center. I was thrilled to accept. Eleven o'clock came up rather quickly and the bus loaded even quicker. Apparently I wasn't the only one who was excited for a change of scenery. We also didn't even have to wait to arrive at the other center for the fun to begin. As we pulled away from the orphanage, the bus driver turned up the music and the kids busted out some dance moved in the aisles. I was rather impressed at how good some of them were. All of them seemed to have a natural sense of rhythm, even the kids who really struggle understanding how to play the piano. After a bit of an adventure in trying to find the center, we finally reached the center which was really couple of dance studios in a mall. The kids from the orphanage made up just over half of the group of kids there. The rest of the kids had families who paid for them to come. It was interesting to see the difference in the development levels between the two groups as the day went on. Maxim was the dance instructor in the first room. They went through a series of warm-ups and then worked on a set dance they have been learning. I have no idea what style of dance it was, but the dance moves were things you see at dance parties in America. At this point, there wasn't a very big gap between the kids from the orphanage and the other kids. However, the other kids were a lot more focused and, generally speaking, they picked up the dance a lot quicker. A McDonald's lunch break was the next item of business. All of the children were very excited. After that, we went into another room where the kids were learning about rap. They had already made up a rap about learning how to read and write a few days before. It wasn't a very long or difficult rap, so it only took one kid about three minutes to teach me the rap they had created as a group. Then all of the kids split up into smaller groups to make up another rap. Music was pumping in the room to give the kids a nice beat to work with. It wasn't long before lyrics started flowing around the room. The only thing was that they were all coming from the kids from normal families and not the kids in the orphanage. I was pleasantly surprised at how well those kids could read and write. Then I looked at the kids from the orphanage. They had given up trying to create a rap. Some were drawing. Others were bouncing off the walls. I also noticed that one boy had even misspelled his name on the corner of his drawing. Shortly after that, one of the other women also pointed out the developmental gap. In her opinion, the cause of the gap is the fact that the kids in the orphanage don't have a normal family. As much as the employees try to create a stable and positive environment at the orphanage, it's just too hard. It's also hard for a child to develop at a normal rate when their 'normal' family situation is also crazy. Throughout the summer, I've found it interesting that the kids prefer to have me draw pictures for them. They prefer to have me roll out their play dough. They prefer to have me color pictures for them. They also don't think they can figure out how to play the piano. They just don't believe that they can do it themselves. At times I think their favorite phrase is “Ma Ba'arif.” Or “I don't know.” Sometimes, I don't know how to respond to that. At other times, I simply affirm that they really do know how to do it. After moments like that, it's really neat to see them focus and do what I had asked them to do. Bravo 'Aliek! Shatar!

=)

Fanoos

Ramadan has been creeping up on me for quite a while now, and suddenly it's almost here! Ramadan lights, commonly called Christmas lights in America, are popping up on almost every street corner and in windows throughout the city. Fanoos, or Ramadan lanterns, are also seen swinging from posts by the street vendors. These lanterns are a pretty big deal for the people here. Most of them are extremely ornate with Qur'anic script written on the glass. I found out just how big of a deal they are when I attempted to draw one. It was a bit of a tricky thing because I hadn't heard the word fanoos before. However, after I saw a picture of one, I got the general idea. But getting the general idea just won't cut it. I looked at picture after picture, and attempted drawing even more styles than I looked at, but none of them were good enough for the craft the women at the orphanage had planned. My attempts must have been getting worse and worse because, one of the women finally drew a lantern for me to then take and trace onto a slab of styrofoam. Forty eight outlines later, I could finally, hopefully, draw a decent Ramadan lantern. There are many reasons that Ramadan lanterns are important to the people. The first is that they have become a big tradition and a part of their heritage. Another is the symbolism of light. In many traditions, including Islam, light is related to God. The lanterns are also pretty. It's fun to see how people here are preparing for this holiday. I have heard of people who practice fasting so that the month of fasting won't be as big of a shock to their bodies. I see people who decorate their houses, prepare for guests, and prepare a lot of food. There are also those people who are always on the lookout for their fellow man who might need a hand. The other day, I was riding back from work in a taxi with a few other Arab men. When we pulled around a corner, we saw a vehicle that was stopped on the left side of the road. As we got closer, we could see the owner of the car trying to fix his car, while the rest of traffic was trying to maneuver around him. I wouldn't have been surprised if we would have gone around him as well, but instead, we pulled up behind him and our driver asked if he needed any help. Then the rest of the Arab men piled out from the taxi and helped the man push his car out of the road to a place where he could get help. The first thing the driver said when he climbed back in the taxi and we started moving again was a mild reprimand at the other men for grumbling about the lost time. Then he said, “This is Islam. When you see your brother you must help him.” Words to the effect that Ramadan is also close and they should be extra kind to their fellow man were also included for effect. I would have to agree with that taxi driver. That is Islam. Awareness for those around you and an effort to help them. Granted nobody's perfect, but generally speaking, those people I have been around while here in Jordan were genuinely interested in being of service.

=)

Epic Fail

At times it has been difficult to think of new craft ideas that the kids at the orphanage would enjoy. This morning, I was hit with the inspiration to make paper plate tambourines with the kids. Since I would be walking through the balad on the way to work, I knew it would also be rather easy to pick up the necessary materials. I was right. The first store had paper plates, markers, and tape. The second had the macaroni noodles that we would use to put between two paper plates as the noise-maker. The first group of kids was already in the art room when I arrived, and they were very excited to see what was in the bag I was carrying. Coloring their plates didn't take nearly as long as I had hoped it would and soon six kids were clamoring around me yelling for me to put noodles in their plates next. That was only the beginning of the chaos. Immediately after handing the musical instruments back to the kids, they proceeded to be very 'musical' with them and the volume in the room was suddenly 120 decibels. The last time I can remember being around noise that loud is when I was running the swather last summer. Okay, so that was a bit of an exaggeration, but those homemade tambourines were extremely loud. They were so loud, that every kid on the floor could hear the racket we were making and came running to see what was going on. Some of those groups of kids were allowed to come in and make a tambourine for themselves, but fortunately other groups were kept out of the room. It didn't take very long for the other women who work in the activities department to decide to find something else for me to do. Apparently, they didn't really want kids running around with hearing-destroyers in their hands. It took them a bit longer to think of something and even longer for me to understand what they wanted me to do. Ramadan is just around the corner, so I spent the next hour and a half or so outlining Ramadan lamps on Styrofoam. Turning the kids loose on decorating those will be one of the activities in the next couple of weeks. The entire activities department seemed to breathe a sigh of relief as the last tambourine was finished and the kids were settled down doing something different. I was also relieved. I hadn't remembered those tambourines being so loud. However, as I thought about it, I decided that there were a couple factors that increased the noise level.  The first was that I was only able to find plastic plates.  Anything hitting one of those plastic plate will be much louder than if it hit a paper plate. The second possible difference is that the kids were much more liberal with how hard and often they shook the tambourine because it was something they hadn't seen before. However, this would be hard to prove and would require some extensive research on random groups of kids throughout the world. Therefore, I will now be changing my major to Tambourine Development and will focus my life studies on how children play with homemade tambourines.  Psych! That was a joke and I will not be changing my major. What I will be changing is the type of crafts I think of for the kids at the orphanage. Noisemakers were a fail, an epic fail. But I guess, if they had to fail, at least it was epic.

=)

Sunrise... Sunset

The day began rather early this morning even though it ended a bit late the night before. I spent the weekend camping under the stars at an organic herb farm in Ajloun which is in the Northern part of Jordan along with  the rest of the BYU interns. Festivities began yesterday evening with bread, hummous, vegetables, and grilled chicken and lamb. Dinner was served at a later time than most people had anticipated, but you'd think we would be used to the fact that nothing in the Arab world runs on a time schedule. A great example of this would be catching a bus out to Ajloun to go camping. We had planned on meeting up with a group of people at the bus station at three, but when we arrived, the bus was already full. So we had no choice but to wait for the next bus. At first the driver told us that the next bus would be here in 10 to 15 minutes, but the actual translation of that statement is that they had no idea of when the bus would actually arrive. The next bus didn't arrive. However, after sitting at the bus station for nearly an hour, another bus arrived that was willing to take a group up to Ajloun. It wasn't the normal route of that bus, so the fare was slightly higher. By that time there were also more people waiting for a ride to Ajloun or Jerash than there were seats available on the bus. So even though we were some of the first people waiting for the bus, we still had to push our way onto the bus. After arriving at the farm in Ajloun, we spent the next four hours chatting and sitting around a fire made of a few sticks and a few pieces of coal. After eating, we also sang around the campfire and danced the dubka to some lively Arabic music. Later in the evening, we shot off the fireworks we were able to buy or rather firework because we only had one firework that fortunately had 16 shots in it that lit up the sky for the 4^th of July – a few days late. Sleeping that night was an interesting experience. The ground was rocky and most of those rocks seemed to find their way to where I was trying to get some rest. I must have dozed off at some point because the next thing I knew, the sun was peeking over the eastern hills and the neighbor's rooster was crowing. What a great way to start the day! After watching the sunrise and looking at the beautiful countyside for a couple hours, the rest of the day began. Watermelon was breakfast, galayat bandura was lunch, and then the work began. Rocky soil took on a whole new meaning. The farm where we were working is an organic herb farm. Their current project is terracing the hillside so that they can use it to grow more herbs. For the next five or so hours, I hauled rocks and dirt up and down the hill. I have to say, the manual labor felt wonderful! It's a bit different than the projects I've worked on back home on the ranch, but the dusty sweat and exhaustion were still the same. Mansuf was the next item on the agenda. I cannot lie; that was some of the best mansuf I've had while in Jordan. And that's saying something because I've had a some pretty dang good mansuf. The sun was on its way down by the time we finished  cleaning up the campsite and was completely behind the hills before I reached my apartment.  Sunsets here aren't very spectacular because clouds basically don't exist this time of year in Jordan, but it was rather fulfilling to be able to say that I rose with the sun and was still up when it set.  I mean how neat is that?


=)

The 4th of July

Believe it or not, today was not a national holiday here in Jordan. However, a group of us did gather for a bit of a celebration this evening. It's been interesting to see that when Jordanians think of American food, they always think of hamburgers and pizza. Those might not be the most common foods eaten in America, but that is the association that they have. No one even thinks about roast and mashed potatoes or enchiladas or anything else like that. So we decided to be as American as possible and have pizza and root beer floats in honor of our nation's birthday. Finding fresh ingredients for the pizza wasn't very difficult except for finding the yeast. There are so many bakeries where you can buy fresh, good bread for hardly anything that buying the bread is one of the daily chores in a family here. Therefore yeast was hard to find. Eventually we found some in the cupboard in the boy's apartment. Now that's what I call a fully furnished apartment. Everything is included from the furniture down to the utensils and in this case, the yeast. The real struggle for this American meal came in finding root beer. In this case, even the third time wasn't a charm. After visiting C-Town, Miles, and Safeway supermarkets, we were finally able to track down some good old A&W root beer at Cozmo. It wasn't an easy process because when we asked where the pop (or soda to some of you folks) was, they showed us the Pepsi and the Coke. When we asked for the root beer, they told us that they didn't sell beer or alcohol because it was haram (forbidden). Eventually we were able to get the idea across that all we wanted was a certain type of pop by the name of root beer. Dinner was a success. I mean, it's hard to beat fresh, homemade pizza with fresh seasonings, sauce made from fresh ingredients, and fresh toppings. Then we topped that off with some root beer floats. The only thing missing were the fireworks. No one had a wedding party going on, so we didn't even have that in the background. Guess you can't have everything...

=)

Ka-Boi

Sketch by Brigham Teichert

Arabs love their families and they love talking about their families. They have also loved hearing about my family and how we are ranchers. At first I wasn't sure how to explain growing up on a ranch not to mention that I didn't have the vocabulary I wanted to explain what we did. So I talked around the subject until they got the idea of what I was telling them and filled in the blank. I started out by telling them that back home, we had a lot of animals. One of my little sisters raised chickens. The other one loved taking care of her cats. My brothers and my Dad worked with cattle and owned horses. At that point they got really excited and asked if my Dad was a real “ka-boi.” Did he wear a hat when he rode his horse like in the movies? The only thing that got them more excited than answering yes to that question was adding that I also rode horses and that my brothers were also very good at roping. I wasn't surprised that they were excited to meet a real cowgirl, but what surprised me is how fixed their attention was on the hat. Maybe part of that is due to the significance that is placed on what someone wears on their head in this part of the world. The pattern on the koufeyah that many men wear tells everyone else if you are Jordanian, Palestinian, or Iraqi. At least, I can recognize the patterns for those three nationalities. Even more emphasis is placed on what women wear on their heads. Some women leave their hair uncovered, but women will wear a hijab more often than not. Some of the hijabs only cover the hair and leave the face and neck exposed. Other hijabs leave only the face exposed. Some women will also wear a veil when they are out in public so that the only thing that is visible is their eyes. Other women will go one step further than that and cover even their eyes when they are out in public. I don't know all the reasons for why they choose what style. I have heard from many different sources that the prettier the woman is, the more of her face she will cover in public... I have yet to learn all of the reasons.

=)

Football aka Soccer

Soccer is the biggest sport in many countries in the world including Jordan. I will have to admit that I have never been the biggest soccer fan. I simply was never around it growing up. About the most soccer exposure I ever had was talking to my cousin who is an amazing soccer player and playing soccer in PE, but neither one of those qualify me as an expert by any means. I had never even seen a soccer game live until a few years ago and until now, I had never watched a soccer game on TV. This Sunday, Spain and Italy will face off in the championships of the Euro Cup. Underdog Italy upset Germany yesterday with a final score of 2-1. I didn't actually go watch that game, but the day before, I went to a restaurant called Baboonej and enjoyed the game along with many other interns and even more Jordanians. Jerseys from both the Spain and Portugal team filled the restaurant along with many snide remarks about both teams. Conversation was starting to get pretty heated and then the game started. That is one great thing about watching competitions like this: you can let the players do the talking. I was privileged enough to hear many people talk big games for various players, but to someone who knew next to nothing about the teams, they were virtually meaningless words until I saw the players actually back them up. I was also lucky enough to sit next to people who were experts on the game. Shortly after the game started, the hookah smoke started drifting freely about the room. We had run into a group from the BYU Jerusalem Center, but after a bit, the hookah smoke was getting to them and they left to find some fresh air. We'll give them a break because they didn't have enough time to get used to Jordan. Yelling at the TV also started up about the same time. I didn't do enough of that to lose my voice, but there were many others who did. That's devotion to a team right there. The game was a low-scoring but exciting game. After overtime, the score was still 0-0. Penalty kicks decided the game and Spain came away with the win to the delight and relief of many in our party and to the disgruntlement of others. I was just happy to be there!

=)

Raindrops

The Castle

It wouldn't be lying to say that Jordan is the driest place that I have ever lived. When we arrived in the middle of May, the vegetation was already dry and brownd. I don't know what this place looks like in the winter, but I imagine that is the time when things are green and beautiful. I was surprised at the amount of dead vegetation I saw. Back home, May is when things turn from brown to green because we have finally reached the end of the winter. The snow melts, usually we get some showers and then things really start to dry out until the end of July to the middle of August when we get thunder storms. However, to my surprise, I didn't have to wait until I go home to see rain. Prior to coming, I had heard that they had received a couple of showers in late May the last year. I also know how big of a shock that was to the people in Amman including my director Annie who had never seen rain that late in the year before. My time in Amman has been a dry experience excluding the time spent in bodies of salt water known as Aqaba and the Dead Sea. However things were shook up a bit last Friday. The day started early on a bus headed to Northern Jordan. The first stop was a place called Um Qais. There, many Roman ruins lay on a hill overlooking the sea of Galilee. When I stepped off the bus, I remarked to my roommate that the air felt a bit more humid than usual. It didn't feel humid, but it didn't feel as dry as it has been either. That day, I also saw some clouds which is also a rare occurrence in Jordan. One of the really neat things about touring Roman ruins in Jordan is that you can walk through them and touch them and walk and stand on them. I have a feeling that if they had been in America, you would only be able to stand on a raised boardwalk and look at but don't touch the ruins.  After Um Qais, we headed south to Ajlun where a castle is still standing that was built about 500 AD. It has a long history that includes several different empires and consequent additions onto the castle. At the castle, we were able to explore nearly every nook and cranny. I did decide that if you were to have a castle, the Middle East would be the place for that. In a dry climate, moving from sunshine to the shade is at least a 10 degree difference, but moving from shade into the castle, we got another 20 degree difference. It was very cool inside that castle in more ways than one. We left the castle and climbed back on the bus to head to Jerash which has another city of Roman ruins. I believe it is actually the most complete city of Roman ruins. However, prior to going to Jerash, we took a pit stop at a game refuge. The main attraction was some deer. They looked very similar to the deer back in the States except that they keep their spots even when they are older. There were also a few people offering horseback rides on half-dead looking horses. I didn't take them up on the offer, but I did notice that the horse's tail were splayed out as if there was a storm coming. I didn't think too much of it until it started raining. It wasn't a downpour, but the rain was definitely heavy enough to get the road wet and slick. After that, our bus was fishtailing around the corners on every switchback down the mountain. We didn't die, but we also weren't able to go see the ruins in Jerash. However, a group that went on the same trip the next day reported that the castle in Ajlun was still wet and damp.  Maybe it rained a bit harder than I thought.

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Happy Endings

A few nights ago, I attended a film festival and watched a Jordanian film called “Habibi.”  It was in Arabic with English subtitles. The story takes place in Gaza and revolves around two people who met at college before they had to leave and go to Gaza because of the Israeli occupation. In the movie, a friend is killed by the Israeli soldiers. Because of that the main character's (Layla's) brother joins the Hamas. Layla loves a man named Qays but he is a poet who didn't finish his degree and is now working in construction. Consequently her family thinks that he is not good enough for her. Through his sorrows, he paints poetry of his love for Layla on the walls around Gaza. The words in the poems are enough to start people to talking about Layla. So her family decides that in order to save her honor, she must be married right away to a man that she doesn't love. Qays and Layla try to run away, but he is caught with a fake visa and the plan simply falls apart. After both returning to their homes, they commit suicide. He goes too close to the border where he is sure to be shot and she goes to the sea and drowns herself.
 That is how the movie ends. The storyline reminds me a bit of Romeo and Juliet, but I never really cared for that story either. I'm definitely an American when it comes to movie preferences. I like happy endings. I have also heard the flip side that many people dislike American films because they all have happy endings and that isn't real life. Maybe it isn't completely true to real life, but when you see that someone got their own happily ever after, it gives you a bit of hope that you can also find a happily ever after. In my mind it's much nicer to go through life hoping for something better than to go through life thinking that there is no way that anything good can come of life, that life is just too hard to be enjoyed.
Another interesting thing about this film is that the director also played the main character of Layla. I don't know how common this is, but she did do a great job with both roles. After showing the film, they had a brief question and answer session with the director. One of the more interesting questions was about the hijab. The character of Layla seemed to be the type of person who wouldn't wear a hijab. However, as the director pointed out, in Gaza, women wear the hijab even if they aren't religious. So to portray someone not wearing the hijab would be unrealistic. Also if I understood what she said correctly, she also mentioned that she wanted to show that there is more to every person under the hijab. Another funny question was how the main character smoking was important to the story. Were they partly funded by a cigarette company? The director hadn't even thought of that. They weren't funded by a cigarette company, but for Layla, it was a way to destress. They were probably a destresser for the director as well. Directing a film is no easy task especially when you are also playing the role of the main character as well. I'm sure she needed some way to destress. However, it just makes you wonder why she didn't choose to bake a chocolate cake or brownies instead. I find that to be a marvelous destresser.

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Connections

If I'm not making Cokeville connections, I'm making BYU connections. Last night, I met a girl who will be attending BYU this coming fall, in sha' allah. The visit was actually a planned event for the purpose of introducing her to some fellow BYU cougars. She just graduated from high school and wants to study accounting at BYU. Basically, she chose the right school seeing as how our accounting program is within the top five in the country. She seemed excited at the prospect of a new adventure, but her father seemed a bit nervous. I can't blame him. It would be hard to send your daughter to the other side of the world in order to go to school. He tried to talk her into going to Turkey, but she wanted to go to America. The reason he tried to get her to consider Turkey is because that is the place where he will be spending a great deal of time over the next several years as the Jordanian ambassador to Turkey. Their house was beautiful! And ginormous. I basically spent the first five minutes at their house trying to scrape my jaw off the floor. First we went through a greeting line that strongly reminded me of going through the line at a wedding reception in the States. Just after the line was the sitting room where we were served lemon and mint juice which is very delicious. We sat and chatted for a while then moved outside to the porch and did a bit more of the same. When the food was ready, we moved back inside to a large room that was perfect for serving a large group in many different ways. The food was delicious! My personal favorite was freekeh which is a dish made from green wheat with chicken piled on top.  I was also glad that I wasn't the only girl that went back for seconds. After dinner, we moved back to the porch for dessert of kanafa and watermelon. After chatting for a bit longer, we then had tea. I took the za'atar tea that was made from fresh leaves picked from their herb garden right next to the porch. We finally arrived back at our apartment at 12:30 this morning. And I almost promptly went to bed. It was a great evening!

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Let's Party!

Weddings are a big deal in most cultures, but in Arab societies weddings are the biggest holidays. The wedding celebration starts the evening before the actual wedding at the home of the groom. A few days ago, I arrived at one of these parties at 7 pm after receiving an invitation from the uncle of the groom. One of the biggest differences between this celebration and parties in America is that the women party in one area and the men party in a separate area. So after arriving, the women in our group left the guys to their own devices and entered the women's tent. Over the next hour, many more women arrived and filled up the tent. Then the dance party really began. Men were not allowed in the tent, so several of the women removed their hijabs and let their hair down. Some girls had long, beautiful hair that hung down to their waist while others had beautiful hair that was about at their shoulders. One thing I learned about Arab dancing is that I'm just as bad at that, almost, as at “American” dancing. I think the Arab women rather enjoyed watching a few American girls try to fit in. It didn't work very well especially for the blonde ones... Eventually, the women and girls lost their reservations about us. The younger girls, around 14 years old, were especially interested in us and kept asking us questions about things from dancing to jewelry to college life to what we thought about Jordan. Some of the girls became like additional arms because they stayed right next to us. During the five hours following our arrival, the women's tent was a big dance party with some henna on the side and the men's area was one explosion after another. Fireworks galore were set off all through the evening. Handguns and shotguns carrying blanks were also shot off at random intervals. Bubbles, foam, and sparklers decorated the area and music pulsed through the air from every corner. Mansuf was the main course. One word: Delicious! The only problem with the food was that we didn't eat until 1 in the morning. We also ate it with our hands so it was a good thing that I had practiced once before so I didn't look like a total idiot... just half of an idiot. I love that Arabs make such a big deal about weddings. What a wonderful thing!
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Breakfast =)

This morning for breakfast I ate chocolate cake and I feel great about that! Last night I realized that I had all of the ingredients that I needed to make a chocolate cake in my cupboard. So I whipped up the batter, poured it in a pan and prayed that I had the oven close to 350 degrees F. Cooking on our stove is very different from the cooking I have done on other stoves. For one, this stove is gas powered. I have cooked on a gas powered stove before, but the other ones I have cooked on had more than two settings for the flame like this one has. I also don't think I have used a gas powered oven to bake anything before. One of the trickiest things is that we can only light the bottom of our oven. This meant the top was the last thing to finish cooking. All I can say is the domestic goddesses must have been with me because my cake didn't burn! Ice cream on the side and strawberries on top finished the plate and made for a well-rounded meal in more ways than one. The first is that cake this delicious is very good for maintaining a well-rounded shape. The second is that every food group was represented. Sugar, of course, made up the fats section. Strawberries contributed for the fruit. The eggs in the cake were the protein. Ice cream is definitely dairy. Flour is a grain. And chocolate is a vegetable considering that it comes from cocoa beans. If that doesn't convince you, just google it and you'll see what I'm talking about. I know you are all jealous about my breakfast, so I won't tell you that it was also the main course last night – with a portion of chicken and rice on the side.

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Playdough!

One of my favorite activities growing up was to help my mom make playdough. I love adding the food coloring so that it turned out as my favorite color, but even more than that I really enjoyed the places you could go with a healthy imagination and some playdough. The possibilities are basically endless. What isn't endless is my list of craft ideas for the kids at the orphanage. So I hoped that if I brought playdough to the orphanage, I could entertain them for at least a week. Making the dough was almost as fun as I remembered and just as messy. My hands were an interesting tie-dye of colors for a couple days until the dyes rubbed off my skin. In one night, I made three batches of playdough and turned the dough twelve different colors. By the end of day one, we were down to eight colors which was better than one color. We also had a major mess on the floor. Some of the younger kids just didn't quite understand that the goal was to play with the dough on the table and not tear off small pieces to throw on the ground. Day two saw slightly better results with the dough staying off of the floor and colors that leaned toward gray at the end of the day. Day three is coming up. I'm rather excited to see how long this playdough will last because the day the kids get bored of playing with it is the day that I will need to come up with another craft...

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Burn!

As I walked up the hill toward the orphanage today, I passed a group of boys gathered around a fire. Some parts of this scenario weren't very strange, but others were most definitely interesting. For starters, it's not uncommon to see people burning garbage, but that usually takes place in one of the metal garbage cans that line the streets or in a deserted field in the middle of a group of apartment buildings and not on the middle of a sidewalk. It's also extremely common to walk by a group of boys or several groups of boys in that part of town. However I think the thing that struck me the most was what they were burning. Textbooks and old homework. School is out for the summer! I can't count the number of times that I have threatened to burn my textbooks, but the hope that someday I will be able to sell them back to the BYU Bookstore before they reach their quota has stopped me multiple times. Maybe this next semester, I'll just cut my losses, burn the books, and count it towards money spent for entertainment.

Fate of the Textbooks

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