"Life needs Movement"

Please take a moment to gaze into the sunset provided (if you don’t have one at hand) and have some existential moments before continuing this post.

Okay, so before we left for Jordan someone told us the best advice they were given was to “embrace the ambiguity”. I think my happiness at my site has been because I have tried my hardest to do just that. I tend not to overthink too many things here and go with the flow of village life. Today was a brilliant success because of that current life motto. 

The day started just like many others, waiting for the bus with my neighbor (he goes to the center), playing with the kids, chalkboard dot-to-dot, breakfast with one teacher, and outside for recess. At some point the bus disappeared and returned with what seemed like 100 16yr old girls. They came into the center and no one knew why. All the kids were loaded on the bus and I did my best to leave as well. After an agonizing conversation about not understanding anything during the workshop (which is apparently why we were overrun by giggling girls), already knowing about the topic (breast cancer/pap smears/family planning), and just wanting to leave, I FINALLY got the okay to run away when another teacher basically said “um…no” and walked out. We were done dropping off the first few kids when we realized we actually left one girl at the center. OOPS! 

We arrived to pick her up and there is a gentleman there who wanted to speak with me. He told me he is an English teacher at the school and his friend is giving a presentation and wondered if I could edit the powerpoint. No problem, I took my neighbor boy and we went to a room in the center to use the computer. We promptly found out the internet is not working and he couldn’t access his email. Okay, he said we could go to his house (his wife is home so it is okay).  I said sure to that and we were once again off to drop of my very confused neighbor boy, and edit this bad boy at his house. It turns out we live maybe 5-minute walk from each other and that he lives in the most beautiful house I have seen here. He later told me he built it (its several houses/apartments inside a compound with a playground, an enormous veranda, and a garden) for 65,000US dollars. It’s majestic. Anyway…I am getting off topic. We went up to his office and started to edit this really boring power point about something related to website interfacing. After we got half-way through, the presenter called, they have a brief conversation and then he hung up and said, “do you have plans this afternoon?”. 

 Ummm.

 Stop. 

What do I say? 

Ambiguity embraced. I said, “no, why?”. He wanted to take me to Amman to meet with her (the presenter), so we could all sit together and edit. I said okay because I was apparently feeling invincible.  After calling my center director and talking to my landlady, we were off!

He speaks amazingly fluent English and told me his life story between the seemingly non-stop phone calls. He was a police officer for 25 years, worked with the UN (in Bosnia and Croatia), retired to teaching, owns a spare car parts company, a supermarket, and is a manager for a tourist company. Oh also, he has a BA in English, Masters in Computer Sciences and is about to start a PhD in Management. Needless to say, he has some stories to tell. I was just elated the stories were in English! We finally arrived in the general area of Amman, where we went directly to the Prince Hussein Hospital and met with some radiologists. It was here I discovered that I can indeed sleep with my eyes open. After they spoke for an eternity (okay, maybe 30 min), and being invited by several doctors to lunch, we left. Next we went to a printing press to order labels and business cards. Again, ambiguity embraced. I sat, smiled (but not to men), drank coffee without sugar, smiled some more, and acted generally oblivious to my surroundings. 

Finally we made it to the Dr’s house (the presenter). She lives in one of the upscale neighborhoods in Amman and teaches at Philadelphia University (I believe). We walked in and are instantly called back to meet her mother, who is confined to her bed with a broken leg. She was approximately the age of Mother Earth, if I had to guess. She explained to me that her father is Lebanese, her mother is Turkish, she married and Iraqi, and now because of blood transfusions, she is becoming Jordanian. She was hilarious. She is an author/poet, and continues to write for various magazines, particularly on the topic of youth development. I was in awe that I even got to sit in the same room with her, let alone that she request to meet the American and she called me beautiful :)

We then spent the next 4 hours editing the powerpoint. We went through every slide and made her practice each word (it was in English). It probably would have gone faster if we weren’t off topic and laughing hysterically 60% of the time. I was just so happy to be speaking English with people. After we finished the powerpoint, we went to pizza corner and had a delicious meal of cheap pizza. At 7:00pm we said goodbye to the professor and went on our way back to the Valley. 

On our way home he nonchalantly  said one of the most poignant messages I have heard. We were talking about his life and how he is always busy, always in school, or at work, or helping someone, and he said

 “Life needs movement”

 Heavy. Let it mean what it will for you, but I completely latched on to this and connected with the thought. It was hard for me to believe this statement came from the same man, who hours earlier, after leaving me in a car for 10 minutes while he went into a store and left me to watch random children stare at me, said “You are driving me stupid”.

 We had a fantastic ride home and talked about how he feels about punishing his sons (against harshness), discipline in schools (against yelling at students), teaching methods (wants more real-life implementation), and general life stories. It was refreshing to listen to him and hear his desire to change things. Also, this was the most I think I have talked WITH someone since I have moved to my village. Normally I make feeble attempts at conversation, which then leads to me sitting in the corner during my visits with the hajat (elderly women) posse. It was nice and now he is my tutor, so win!

Thank you for the advice, RPCV I don’t remember from Staging, I am so happy I chose to embrace the ambiguity today….and that I didn’t get killed by a random man whose car I chose to get in.

Paparazzi!

So I have learned over the past couple weeks that children wanting to pose for the camera is a universal desire. As soon as I busted out my camera, I had twenty new friends! Well, not new, but they were definitely more interested in me.

I have been sitting in each of the three classrooms or the past month trying to get a grasp on what happens daily and where I can be used the most. The amount of teaching varies by day, but I have witnessed teaching regularly (on some level) in two of the three classes, so that is a fantastic start! Typically the lessons consist of the teacher drawing shapes or numbers in a small notebook that the child then identifies and colors. The same lesson is taught each day. I felt as if I was in Groundhog Day for a week as I was watching a child repeat the same action of identifying and coloring a square and the number hamsa (5). I think this would be a great place to add activities to make the lesson interesting and perhaps have a more successful retention rate. I am always on the lookout for new fun lesson ideas about: shapes, numbers, colors, etc …so message me if you have ideas! Thank you all for your desire to donate supplies to our center. I am going to speak with my mudeera and the teachers to see what they think about it and what they feel we need most. If it goes through my director, I may be able to get more donated (customs can be difficult sometimes). 

The kids and teachers are still pretty fantastic and I cannot wait to have adventures with them. Rumor has it, we will go on picnics when the weather is nice again. Right now it’s the rainy season (like the Midwest). Most of Jordan actually saw quite a bit of snow the past week, but none here. I was assured it never snows here. Several of my friends in the other villages and cities in Jordan were lamenting about the cold, lack of heater, lack of food, and the copious amount of snow. I still don’t have a heater because it isn’t cold here, no snow and plenty of food. I am absolutely lucky in that sense. On the other hand, it hasn’t stopped raining for longer than 6 hours for the past two weeks. I am pretending I am in Seattle and going along with it. It also seems to stop raining just long enough for me to wash all of my clothes and hang them up. It then continues to steadily and heavily downpour for days. At this rate my clothes may never dry. 

Other than the somewhat gloomy weather, things are going smoothly here. I am doing the Lent thing for the first time in my life and it has been interesting to say the least. It has shown me just how hospitable and thoughtful Jordanians are. After the initial look of being appalled with me not eating sugar for 40+days, they have made it a point to give me tea without sugar during visits, have fruit or veggies as a snack instead of sweets (for me only), etc. They are amazing. My mudeera (prinicipal) brought me fish and veggies one day because of not eating meat; she also brought me biscuits and breads from Amman because she doesn’t think I have enough food here to eat. As assertive as she can be at times (like when she tried to put me on the Atkins diet) she genuinely cares about me! My village has made me feel incredibly loved and welcomed on a daily basis. 

There are numerous days when I wake up and wonder why I am here, how I got here, why my neighbor won’t stop knocking on my door, why there is a child staring at me through my window (note to self: always close curtains!), how am I going to make it 20 more months. I then think of the faces of the children at my center and how happy they are in these pictures. 

 On those hard days, I have looked at these pictures and realize…they keep me here.

Some of my fantastic students: (just as an aside, photos of minors/students is not an issue here, I checked :) enjoy! )

 not that I have favorites, but he's my favorite. I basically stalk him all day. This was their lesson today, coloring strawberry shortcake for the 40th time.

Why yes, I did make that day of the week poster in the back. It says "Today: Wednesday" and then has a space for yesterday/tomorrow and weather conditions.

 Get ready for more pictures later, but please enjoy this video of an impromtu dance party in the class with hearing impairments