Week One

     As I sit here thinking about my first week in Amman, I have so many great thoughts about this amazing place. Also, I know I was going to try to post something everyday, but with my studies I have found that that is going to be impossible. I am hoping it will be more like two or three times a week. So back to my experiences here. I attended my first Arabic church service. I had a little headset thing that was playing a translated version so I could understand and I am once again reminded of how startlingly different Christian churches are around the world. I was told that this was the biggest Christian church in Jordan. So, I being from a relatively small Christian church in the states, I'm thinking this is going to be one those "super churches" with thousands of worshippers. However, I couldn't have been more wrong. It was a small, two or three room church, with maybe 75 people and that's being generous. It was probably closer to 55. Even though they were a very small church and I could understand maybe half of what the translator said, the power in that room was amazing; it nearly brought me to tears. Just knowing that a few hours to the North, South, or East they could be killed for what they are doing...
     In stark contrast to the small Christian church I had visited earlier, I went to see the King-Hussein Mosque. This place was HUGE in every sense of the word. It was made completely of marble and was a spectacular sight to see. While I was not there during the service, I was able to look around the whole building - which took about a half hour - except for the prayer room because that is reserved for Muslim men. Speaking of that, Laura was not even allowed in the mosque because she was not covered from head to toe. This was something that gave me a reality check because this place is at times so westernized that you can forget you are in an Islamic country with very strict rules.
     Oh, I went to my first Jordanian home a few days ago which was just like everyone said it would be. While they didn't serve dinner due to how late it was, they had snacks, tea, more tea, more snacks oh more tea, more snacks, and more tea. They just keep coming and when you say, "No thanks, I'm full," they bring you more. I left thinking I could never want food again, but it was a tremendous experience.
     In other news, I started my first Arabic classes. By the way, it is SO hard. My teacher, Dr. Ramadan is a great teacher; he has a P.H.D. in teaching Arabic. We got through the alphabet and some greetings in Fhusa, or classical Arabic, and we start spoken Arabic on Monday. For those who don't know, which is probably most people, Fhusa is what they speak on the news and in the newspaper and about 65% of Arabs understand it. While spoken, or ammea, is different for each region of the Middle East and other Arabic speaking countries. So Fhusa is a lingua fraca amongst the well-educated Arabs because someone from Jordan and someone from Saudi Arabia would not be able to understand each other very well because they both speak their ammea Arabic.
     As far as food goes, I had some killer humus and zambusik and of course I ate too much shrawma. But, I tried one thing that stands out among the rest because of the hype that surrounded it and then it had an utter fall from grace in my eyes: TURKISH COFFEE. I was looking forward to that Turkish coffee, but it tasted like hot dirt water. It was so bad. I don't know if it was just the place where I got it or what, but it was terrible. So unless you like dirt, I would not recommend Turkish coffee.
     So what are my plans for the weekend? Well, I am going to Wadi Mujib, basically the Arabic Grand Canyon, and the Dead Sea. It should be pretty awesome and I am really looking forward to it. There will be many pictures, I promise. I will try to have another blog up soon. Thanks for reading.