catch up

Updates:

1) I have new photos for everyone. They are here:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2101478&l=7514d&id=1013451

This album features my trip to the Holy Land of Jordan, like Mt. Nebo, where Moses is supposedly buried, although it's completely unmarked and still proves elusive to surveying scans, with a view of the Baptismal site of Jesus by John the Baptist, the West Bank, and the Dead Sea. I'm not going to lie; in many ways the coolest part about seeing the Jordanian part of the Holy Land is just being able to say that I've been to these places; as you will see, it proves to be a pretty, but rather unspectacular, hilltop. Also, the trip to Madaba (the bastion of Christian Jordan), where you will see lots of mosaics (some of which feature "remixes" by the Iconoclasts! I hope someone else finds that horrible pun funny...). Basically, all Madaba had was mosaics... and a really good restaurant where we ate lunch. I have a photo of the restaurant too; don't worry. The tour guide we had for this trip also had a fascination with the fact that he should be giving the tour in Arabic, but failed to believe that we spoke any Arabic, so every three words he'd repeat himself four times, then make one of us affirm that we knew what the word is. "Through the window... Through the window. Win-dow. Ruth, what's a window? Right. Through the window, we can see... we can see..." So yeah, the trip to Christian heritage sites of Jordan was a little strange.
Also featured: the Eid/ my birthday trip to Aqaba and the Red Sea. My birthday was indeed spent snorkling in the Red Sea, followed by a trip to the one and only Chinese restaurant of
Aqaba. Which was empty, as it was Eid al-Fitr (the holiday for the end of Ramadan), but the food was good, and we had fun.

2) Speaking of which, Ramadan ended! It was pretty close at the end (Eid al-Fitr started on September 30th... and was announced the night of the 29th at 9pm on the news... There was a countdown to the decision.), but it has ended, so things like food are once again available during the day.

3) As a result, I've been able to explore more internet options! This mostly relates to Skype, but I realized how weird this situation is last night, so I thought I'd elucidate for y'all. I currently have three internet-using locations: the university computer lab, Gloria Jean's Coffee (laptop... and one of the better store names), and the university language center wireless (laptop). However, each is used for separate things. At the lab, I can check my email and write this blog and such, but can't use my computer, so no pictures or skype. At Gloria Jean's I can upload pictures from my computer, but their connection absolutely fails when it comes to Skype
, as well as the fact that for some reason they have the non-standard electrical plug shape of Jordan (there are three different types of outlets here), so I can't recharge my computer there, and the university language center's wireless (where skype works and nothing else). See how much effort I put in for all of you to hear from/see pictures of me? That said, I think I'm going to start bringing my computer here for Skyping, so email/ message me if you want to talk and we'll see if we can set something up.

4) I moved families. The night before I went to Aqaba, but that's a another story. The new family is very nice, very full of kids (the two kids, 13, and 6, as well as a herd of cousins, all boys, all under the age of 7 who are over everyday) and a dog (claimed to be half-husky... I'm pretty sure it's a variant of a chihuahua) named Lucky (actually, not as obnoxious as he first seemed). When I first got there, my host mother, Hala, and Karin (like, Arabized Karen), the 6-year-old, commented in the first five minutes that I look like Muhannad, the star of the hit Turkish soap opera Noor (for information on both: Muhannad: http://www.diziler.com/gallery/46d86dc400906b6e9cb26600b2fc6715a821656dm.jpg
Noor: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/27/world/middleeast/27beirut.html?_r=1&scp=3&sq=noor%20turkey&st=cse&oref=slogin

by the way, all the shows mentioned in that article are amazing). I personally don't see the resemblance, but I will let y'all judge.
The other part of moving is that now I live in a really bizarre place (if I wanted to get exactly to my house by cab, which I normally don't, I'd have to say next to the Israeli Embassy. Street names in Amman mean nothing, as most were created last year.), and to get to the university every morning I walk 10 minutes to the main road, take a cab for about 5 minutes to get to where I can pick up a bus, then take the bus to the university (total time: about 40 minutes). Then repeat to get back. This is for a distance that, if I had a car, would take about 10 minutes tops. However, this morning I discovered that, by taking a taxi from a slightly weird point, I can get to the university directly from without needing the bus, for only 10 qirsh more (about 15 cents). So, the new policy is that I take a cab if I can't get a ride to the bus from my host family, but if I can I spend only a third as much. Basically, getting to the university is a lot like getting internet.