I also went to the Royal Car Museum, which was exciting. It makes you think though, of how many priceless cars the king has, while so many Jordanians struggle just to live day to day. The cars were amazing, but you have to wonder if it is really necessary to own a Rolls Royce tractor.
In other news, we had a monsoon. It rained for about four days, but it stopped in the morning on my way to class. However, by the time I got out of class, it was pouring and the streets had turned into rivers. The manhole covers had been blown from the ground and the manholes were spurting water. One of the main streets in the university had flooded so badly that someone had set up benches to cross it. I waited in line for my turn to cross the street over the benches, which is quite strange now that I think of it, because lines are not implemented in any other way in society here. People were yelling at everyone to so faster, as girls with covered faces wearing long robes and heels tried to cross the benches somewhat unsuccessfully. Eventually I got out of the university and went home for the day, where I couldn’t dry my shoes or my clothes because my brothers couldn’t figure out how to turn on the heat, and of course there are no dryers.
I also took a quick trip to the Dead Sea with my brothers, which was exciting. We clearly went the way everyone in Jordan goes, rather than floating in a marked off area in a nice resort. We parked the car in a nice dirt parking lot, which probably used to be the Dead Sea before the water level went down. We walked past people trying to sell camel rides on camels that looked like they were about to die. We paid a dinar and a half to rent a table for an hour to eat the 1.5 rotisserie chickens that we bought on the way there. We watched little kids swim in the shallow water and some teenagers swimming fully clothed out a bit deeper. Suddenly, we were serenaded by a man with some sort of small guitar-like instrument with one string. He even incorporated our names into the song. Everyone proceeded to stare at us, so that was an experience. It was interesting to see how people treat their children here. I saw a couple babies almost dropped into the sea or onto the rocks as they were handed off to another relative by their arm. American kids are babied for sure. The biggest problem I noticed was the amount of trash in the large dirt parking lot. There were zero trash cans, and trash was everywhere. Because the sea is so salty, all the trash that had made its way into the sea was visible, because it floated. I would love to implement trash cans at the Dead Sea.
I am slowly adjusting to how communal the culture is here, and how it is very anti-individualistic. It is sort of a nice feeling to realize that you belong to something bigger, even if you might have to sacrifice your own wants or needs. For example, in Arabic culture, it is important to eat with your right hand, especially when taking from a communal dish or bowl. The reasons behind this involve the tradition of the right hand being clean and the left hand being used for cleaning and therefore dirty. I tried to ask my brother if you could just switch the hands to make it easier for yourself, as I am left-handed, but he just reinforced the fact that it is not for you, but for the community that this practice continues.
This week, I had to read some disheartening stories for my Contemporary Arab Women Writers class. “Distant View of a Minaret” was the most interesting and thought-provoking for me. The class continues to be depressing and extremely interesting at the same time, but it is important to take everything the professor says with a grain of salt. She tends to make some very sweeping generalizations and this can be dangerous when teaching to a class filled with Western students, some of whom have never studied the subject before. I guess the plight of being a feminist in an Arab country can be a lot at times, and it is hard to not be passionate about such a topic.
High Point: Ghadeer telling me I am the best student in my فصحة class!
Low Point: 4 days of rain
