insomnia

I can't sleep -- it's 1:30 in the morning and I'm exhausted, but for some reason I can't sleep. I have already found another idea for a tattoo, decided to build a pinhole camera to make up for the one I lost (because I really can't justify the purchase of another one) and listened to a lot of J Dilla and Neil Young.....because they are similar.

This week was something of a roller coaster. I began the week, fresh back from Wadi Rum and adorned with the henna which has now faded to an unnatural orange that makes it look like I scribbled on the inside of my hand with a marker like a second grader. Not something that is beyond me, but, for lack of a better description, this is honestly what it looks like. Anyway, that evening I came back for dinner, was very well received by everyone at home and fed....again. That night, however, was Qur'an study again, so I was relegated to the study, which was fine since I had a lot of work to do anyway. Nothing like being trapped by the discomfort of the local religious leader to really force you to get your shit done.

The one person who came in to check on me, though, was Seti. For those of you who haven't been reading, Seti is the maid. She and I get along very well as she is incredibly sweet, if somewhat young-minded, though I wouldn't expect anything more from someone who has not spent much extensive time with anyone her own age since she was 18 and came to this country with no knowledge of the local language. The second time she came to check on me, she asked me if we could look on googlemaps for her house again. The context for this request is that last week she explained to me that she knew nothing about computers, so I (in my mind now, foolishly) tried to help her find something familiar on googlemaps -- an attempt which proved fruitless because she knew neither the street name of her house nor the English spelling of her neighborhood. On our second attempt though, she told me a little bit about how much she missed her country and, as her eyes welled up with tears for just a moment, how the last time she was on the phone with her son, he asked her only once to come home. My dueling emotions were first telling me that I was so stupid to have shown this to her and that reminding her of what she's missing and has been missing for the last 12 years, that being her son's entire youth and her marriage. On the other hand, though, I can't imagine that she doesn't think of home every day already. Either way, I'm at a loss. The only conclusion I've been able to come to thus far, though, is that, young-minded or not, no one deserves that.

Over the next few days, on a completely different note seeing as life apparently goes on, it was found that it may actually be possible for Jackie and me to visit Damascus as well as Beirut during Eid, since we may be able to send our passports back to the embassy, get them back with visas, pay for a bus through Damascus to Syria and still pay less than a plane ticket. This new development was, however, still overshadowed by the stress of planning the trip logistics because I have a lot of trouble with commitment, like my dear friend Zoe who I believe still has trouble peeling an orange for this reason.

Things that made this week nice, though, include:

- lunchtime argileh at a new, super-secret cafe that is not frequented by CIEE students

- having my french tutor tell me that I do have a shot at passing the test that I need to pass when I get home

- baking cookies for my host family and, subsequently, having a long and mostly Arabic conversation with my host mother, who is now trying to convince me to stay for the year.

- sitting in on a World Affairs Council meeting, which not only consisted of about 20, nine-bajillion-year-old Jordanian men and one woman, all of whom were once MPs, ambassadors, etc., but was also conducted entirely in Arabic (read: my only contribution to the entire event was sitting there and looking pretty, rather, not horrifyingly wrinkly)

- getting to retake a test that I failed (to be fair, I'm in a class that I don't really belong in because, to be quite honest, I think that the administrators forgot about me and then used the hyper-scientific assessment of throwing darts at the fucking wall to determine my placement.)

- taking an online quiz about what shape I am at Betsy's house.

- finally getting another language partner after having been dumped by my first one, who I never even met

- getting the number of an older-than-he-looks, tattooed, bald-headed Jordanian man named Ahmad who, a) was a bouncer for a long time, b) is who I should apparently call if I ever have a problem and c) invited me over to his house, where his wife will make mansaf, and then out on the town, where he intends to help me get a tattoo.

I apologize that non-cohesive posts have now become a trend here. Bear with me while I develop, you know, basic writing skills. Also, I'm only sort of sorry that this post isn't as much fun. I just have a lot of feelings.....nothing more than feelings.

love,

anneke