chalas!! I'm done!! I can live again! :D
Summary of the past few days: Monday was fusha speaking with Aliya which went really well. I could actually understand her and speak this time. I can't believe how much better I've gotten since midterms.
The day actually sarted at 4:30 when I woke up because my stomach was bothering me. That's only important because by 12 it was hurting so much that I had my next final switched and went home. Thankfully I felt better by Tuesday because that's when I had Saleh's fusha exam. That was actually a disappointment, I didnt' feel like I had as good a handle on everything as I would've liked. But whatever, what's done is done, and hopefully I didn't do any worse than the other students.
Today, Wednesday: my make-up exam for Water was at 10:30. By just after 11 I had finished it, read it through, and handed it into Stewart (who was proctoring the exam because my professor was sick). But that's ok because it turns out the longest anyone took was 45 minutes. And this is 40% of my grade? oookay......I think I did pretty well though. Next was Amiyya at 12:30, which was a nice exam. Challenging but not too much and I knew almost everything. There are only 2 things that I know for sure I got wrong but that's because they weren't in the book and she told us to only learn the stuff from the book. At least one I know everyone got wrong/left blank. Third was Islam which we had to answer 5/7 short essay questions and I also think I did well on that one. We'll see of course, no guarantees, but I'm feeling pretty good about it all.
Now a few days of rest, packing, a christmas concert (insha'allah), a goodbye party, and mom and Molly come up the 20th! DONE WITH SCHOOL!!!!!! :D :D :D :D :D :D :D
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Friday, December 11, 2009
Dictionary of Lilahspeak
You thought it was hard to understand me before? Well now I have another language to add to the mix! So here's a little dictionary if you feel like it for when I come home. I'll be updating it randomly (ie whenever I need a study break in the next few days) so if you want to understand me when I come home, just check it out every now and then.
-yaani: um, like
-insha'allah: literally "god willing". For example, insha'allah I'll do well on my exams. Or I'm going to Turkey after this, insha'allah (assuming there's no war, natural disaster, etc. anything could happen.)
-alhamdulilleh (shortened hamdulilleh): thank god
-moomkin: maybe
-shwei: an all-around word; some translations include ish, sorta, a little, eh, etc.
-yalla: same as hebrew, hurry up!
-shookran: thank you
-afwan: welcome
-ahlan/marhaban: hi/hello/etc
-sahha!: bless you (for sneeze or cough. isn't it great? they actually have something to say for coughs!)
-walla!?: omg! truly/seriously?
-anjad?: are you serious?
-helu/helweh: cute/pretty
-zaki: tasty
-ma bidi: i don't want to (often followed by a pout)
-meen: literally who, probably will be "who's there?"
-harram: forbidden/can't
-wasta: connections. very very important.
-amiyya: colloquial dialect; one of my classes
-fusha: Modern Standard Arabic; 1 grade but 3 of my classes
...to be continued
-yaani: um, like
-insha'allah: literally "god willing". For example, insha'allah I'll do well on my exams. Or I'm going to Turkey after this, insha'allah (assuming there's no war, natural disaster, etc. anything could happen.)
-alhamdulilleh (shortened hamdulilleh): thank god
-moomkin: maybe
-shwei: an all-around word; some translations include ish, sorta, a little, eh, etc.
-yalla: same as hebrew, hurry up!
-shookran: thank you
-afwan: welcome
-ahlan/marhaban: hi/hello/etc
-sahha!: bless you (for sneeze or cough. isn't it great? they actually have something to say for coughs!)
-walla!?: omg! truly/seriously?
-anjad?: are you serious?
-helu/helweh: cute/pretty
-zaki: tasty
-ma bidi: i don't want to (often followed by a pout)
-meen: literally who, probably will be "who's there?"
-harram: forbidden/can't
-wasta: connections. very very important.
-amiyya: colloquial dialect; one of my classes
-fusha: Modern Standard Arabic; 1 grade but 3 of my classes
...to be continued
Thursday, December 10, 2009
b'sura
This really does need to be a quick update. Sooooo busy!! Ok, so the last update was the 4th...Friday...
Sunday was the 1st Host Family Dinner for the AL students (I'm in LC, language and culture. AL is purely language though I don't think it actually stands for All Language... :P ). It was also our 1st dabka show. Went sooo well!! In the regular Jordanian way, we all met at 6:30 or 6:45, and our leader, Ala, got there at like 7:15. Which meant no practicing beforehand. Then the dinner "started" at 8 and we danced after salads at...9, 9:15. We didn't have the space we were thinking of so we danced in the middle of the host families and did it twice so we could face everyone. Lot of fun. Lots of fun. Then tues was my 1st final in listening, which went terribly. It was NOTHING like the last one. But I don't feel like I failed any worse than anyone else, and everything here is on a curve, so I think I did acceptably. And anyway, it's really hard to do well in a class you hate and know you're gonna fail anyway. Then was MY host family dinner, which went FANTASTICALLY! But again, nothing like what was planned. We danced again, which was superb. [the next few names I'm going to throw out are other students at CIEE and my friends.] Then Rose sang and Joanna accompanied her; they were really good but we had no microphone and the restaurant was loud. So they had to sing 2 or 3 times; Yoo yoo (Joseph but called Yoo Yoo by my class thanks to Saleh) played his song in 2 of the sections, and I sang in 2 of them. I did well and everyone loved it, despite the fact that I had to practically scream it and because I was doing it without music I didn't have my starting notes. That made the song a bit interesting sometimes. But as I hear everyone was just so excited I knew the words and was singing this famous song that no one cared.
Today was the Re-entry orientation and Arabic post-test. The post-test was actually good because it showed me I actually learned something this semester! Of course there were questions that I had no idea, and by the end I just started circling the pretty letters cuz I was sick of it. But I understood much more than at the beginning of the semester. AND the speaking was MUCH easier. The speaking section was hilarious--I switched off almost every other word fusha-amiyya. But Najeh, the head of the department and a really sweet guy, didn't care. It was great.
As for re-entry orientation, Allison pointed out some good points, though not much that I didn't know already. It's gonna be HARD coming back! I'm kinda nervous about it, especially the Wes social life. But I'm still very very ready to be home. 10 days till mom and Molly get here!!!! and counting! :)
2 finals on Monday, 1 on Tues, 2 on Wednesday, and chalas!! Next update will be after that.
ps. ...I'm listening to a Daft Punk song on my computer and a child's toy playing "how much is that doggie in the window" outside my room.....really really weird mix....
Sunday was the 1st Host Family Dinner for the AL students (I'm in LC, language and culture. AL is purely language though I don't think it actually stands for All Language... :P ). It was also our 1st dabka show. Went sooo well!! In the regular Jordanian way, we all met at 6:30 or 6:45, and our leader, Ala, got there at like 7:15. Which meant no practicing beforehand. Then the dinner "started" at 8 and we danced after salads at...9, 9:15. We didn't have the space we were thinking of so we danced in the middle of the host families and did it twice so we could face everyone. Lot of fun. Lots of fun. Then tues was my 1st final in listening, which went terribly. It was NOTHING like the last one. But I don't feel like I failed any worse than anyone else, and everything here is on a curve, so I think I did acceptably. And anyway, it's really hard to do well in a class you hate and know you're gonna fail anyway. Then was MY host family dinner, which went FANTASTICALLY! But again, nothing like what was planned. We danced again, which was superb. [the next few names I'm going to throw out are other students at CIEE and my friends.] Then Rose sang and Joanna accompanied her; they were really good but we had no microphone and the restaurant was loud. So they had to sing 2 or 3 times; Yoo yoo (Joseph but called Yoo Yoo by my class thanks to Saleh) played his song in 2 of the sections, and I sang in 2 of them. I did well and everyone loved it, despite the fact that I had to practically scream it and because I was doing it without music I didn't have my starting notes. That made the song a bit interesting sometimes. But as I hear everyone was just so excited I knew the words and was singing this famous song that no one cared.
Today was the Re-entry orientation and Arabic post-test. The post-test was actually good because it showed me I actually learned something this semester! Of course there were questions that I had no idea, and by the end I just started circling the pretty letters cuz I was sick of it. But I understood much more than at the beginning of the semester. AND the speaking was MUCH easier. The speaking section was hilarious--I switched off almost every other word fusha-amiyya. But Najeh, the head of the department and a really sweet guy, didn't care. It was great.
As for re-entry orientation, Allison pointed out some good points, though not much that I didn't know already. It's gonna be HARD coming back! I'm kinda nervous about it, especially the Wes social life. But I'm still very very ready to be home. 10 days till mom and Molly get here!!!! and counting! :)
2 finals on Monday, 1 on Tues, 2 on Wednesday, and chalas!! Next update will be after that.
ps. ...I'm listening to a Daft Punk song on my computer and a child's toy playing "how much is that doggie in the window" outside my room.....really really weird mix....
Friday, December 4, 2009
2 more weeks!
Oh my god time flies!!!! First, Thanksgiving was SUCH a huge success!! A little under 25 people came, there was tons of delicious food, and everyone had a good time. After all the pre-stress, it was perfect.
Israel was also really good, though not amazing. It was SOOO nice seeing Rachel and the Schvimer's. It was also a breath of fresh air to celebrate Shabbat. If there's one thing I've learned while I'm here, it's that I can't live for a long period of time again without being Jewish. I've really really missed it. I also had 3-dimensional, fluffy bread! Not pitas! and bagels!!! Mmmmmmm P: There were a lot of striking differences between Israel and Jordan. That was one, all the GREEN was another. And all the sex shops and strip clubs. Tel Aviv has REALLY gotten out of control, there were at least one of those per street.
I was so out of place the first day! Turns out, in my dozen-plus years of learning Hebrew, I actually learned it. I could understand words, and on the whole understand people speaking in Hebrew almost better than I can in Jordan! But if I wanted to speak in Hebrew, even something as basic as "todah," I couldn't. It was SUCH a huge struggle to think of the Hebrew word. So I had to force myself to speak in English, which when I'm surrounded by a foreign language is not so easy. What was funny, though, was the realization that no one else could even read Hebrew! Never really occured to me that this was a completely foreign alphabet. The first night a group of us from CIEE who crossed the border together went to a Mexican restaurant and our check was completely in Hebrew. I had to sound out every little thing, and thank god it was all food like "fajita", but at least I could read it. Colin, my travel partner, and I ran into them again the next morning and they said "why weren't you with us for breakfast? we couldn't read the check!" It also got easier as we went along, and we spent a lot of time (too much time) in the Old City where probably 90% of the sellers were Palestinian. So we sp0ke to them in Arabic.
I came home Monday expecting people to be here, as usual, and to need to be social; I was not expecting 20 people at my house!! Hadil, Shireen's daughter who lives in Saudi Arabia, and her husband and child are in town. They came in for the Eid and are leaving I think on the 16th. Which means my house is crazy every day now. That also means I may be coming home later because I have work to do! The end of the year is completely crazy; Dabka dancing at the host family dinners Sun and Tues night, I'm also singing for my dinner on Tues; regular work; first final is this coming Tuesday and the next week I have 5 finals; dinner with Aamer (it's rude to refuse when someone offers you dinner, and I'm kind of ditching 2); being social and being a member of this family; a presentation in my Water class on Monday; and other stuff. CRAZY!! And then molly and mom come up I'm so excited!!! Off to Turkey!! But Hadil here also means there's an ADORABLE baby to play with. Zaid is so cute!!!! :) Up till god knows what hour, but adorable nonetheless.
The other night we had dinner at Tata Hana's house, where the Japanese exchange student Ayumi lives. She's afraid of balloons. This is a problem because next Saturday we're going to have a joint birthday party for Laith and goodbye party for me and Ayumi. And you can't have a bday party without balloons. Shireen and Hana both know a little broken English; enough to be understood but they're not good and don't really understand themselves. Ayumi's English is just as good, and although she's a level above me in Arabic her speaking skills are about as good as her English skills. So for some reason, they had me come over and Shireen and Hana spoke to me in broken English and told me to tell it to Ayumi. I guess it is easier for me because I can understand what they're trying to say and understand all the accents, and even if all parties are saying the EXACT same thing they can understand my accent the best. But oh my god I should not be a mediator for English to English!! It's annoying but also funny.
Cleaning time, and very few people in the house. Let's see if I can get a huge chunk of homework done. Ready, set, go!
Israel was also really good, though not amazing. It was SOOO nice seeing Rachel and the Schvimer's. It was also a breath of fresh air to celebrate Shabbat. If there's one thing I've learned while I'm here, it's that I can't live for a long period of time again without being Jewish. I've really really missed it. I also had 3-dimensional, fluffy bread! Not pitas! and bagels!!! Mmmmmmm P: There were a lot of striking differences between Israel and Jordan. That was one, all the GREEN was another. And all the sex shops and strip clubs. Tel Aviv has REALLY gotten out of control, there were at least one of those per street.
I was so out of place the first day! Turns out, in my dozen-plus years of learning Hebrew, I actually learned it. I could understand words, and on the whole understand people speaking in Hebrew almost better than I can in Jordan! But if I wanted to speak in Hebrew, even something as basic as "todah," I couldn't. It was SUCH a huge struggle to think of the Hebrew word. So I had to force myself to speak in English, which when I'm surrounded by a foreign language is not so easy. What was funny, though, was the realization that no one else could even read Hebrew! Never really occured to me that this was a completely foreign alphabet. The first night a group of us from CIEE who crossed the border together went to a Mexican restaurant and our check was completely in Hebrew. I had to sound out every little thing, and thank god it was all food like "fajita", but at least I could read it. Colin, my travel partner, and I ran into them again the next morning and they said "why weren't you with us for breakfast? we couldn't read the check!" It also got easier as we went along, and we spent a lot of time (too much time) in the Old City where probably 90% of the sellers were Palestinian. So we sp0ke to them in Arabic.
I came home Monday expecting people to be here, as usual, and to need to be social; I was not expecting 20 people at my house!! Hadil, Shireen's daughter who lives in Saudi Arabia, and her husband and child are in town. They came in for the Eid and are leaving I think on the 16th. Which means my house is crazy every day now. That also means I may be coming home later because I have work to do! The end of the year is completely crazy; Dabka dancing at the host family dinners Sun and Tues night, I'm also singing for my dinner on Tues; regular work; first final is this coming Tuesday and the next week I have 5 finals; dinner with Aamer (it's rude to refuse when someone offers you dinner, and I'm kind of ditching 2); being social and being a member of this family; a presentation in my Water class on Monday; and other stuff. CRAZY!! And then molly and mom come up I'm so excited!!! Off to Turkey!! But Hadil here also means there's an ADORABLE baby to play with. Zaid is so cute!!!! :) Up till god knows what hour, but adorable nonetheless.
The other night we had dinner at Tata Hana's house, where the Japanese exchange student Ayumi lives. She's afraid of balloons. This is a problem because next Saturday we're going to have a joint birthday party for Laith and goodbye party for me and Ayumi. And you can't have a bday party without balloons. Shireen and Hana both know a little broken English; enough to be understood but they're not good and don't really understand themselves. Ayumi's English is just as good, and although she's a level above me in Arabic her speaking skills are about as good as her English skills. So for some reason, they had me come over and Shireen and Hana spoke to me in broken English and told me to tell it to Ayumi. I guess it is easier for me because I can understand what they're trying to say and understand all the accents, and even if all parties are saying the EXACT same thing they can understand my accent the best. But oh my god I should not be a mediator for English to English!! It's annoying but also funny.
Cleaning time, and very few people in the house. Let's see if I can get a huge chunk of homework done. Ready, set, go!
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