Saturday, January 29, 2011

What would the Bangles say?

And after that exhale...I just wanted to share this:


Can't help but think about it.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Jordan in the Asia Cup

Sorry this was a little late, I've been busy almost every day for the last few weeks...

Anyway, for those uncaring about international soccer tournaments, the Asia Cup has been going on for the last month. Jordan has had quite the impressive showing, especially after drawing a group with Japan (favored to win it all), Syria, and Saudi Arabia. All solid squads.

Jordan went 2-0-1. Every night Jordan didn't lose, the streets of Amman were packed with cars full of young Jordanians blasting music, honking horns, and waving flags.

J-O-R! D-A-N!

After my little romp with Team USA two years ago, I knew that Jordan playing in the Asia Cup was going be a big deal.

I made the students in my conversational English class rate all the teams in the Asia cup on a scale from 1 to 10, giving reasons why they thought each team deserved their rating. India was voted the worst, Jordan garnered a 5.5/10, and Iraq, Iran, Japan, and South Korea were voted to be the most likely to be the Final Four.

This hard lookin' sonuvabitch was a major factor in Jordan's success.

So, the fact that Jordan came out second in their group and moved to the quarter-finals was a huge deal. So huge, in fact, even after Jordan lost to Uzbekistan 2-1, Jordanians still partied anyway...

And also, demonstrated against unemployment and elections.

I didn't really get it, I thought there would be either utter heartbreak or riots. After some reflection, however, driving around acting like lunatics seemed the appropriate response. Like most things here, without a Jordanian explaining things to me, I can't always figure out the motivation behind the public's reaction to events.

Childrens birthday party....?


Mabrook (Congratulations) to Jordan. Hopefully one day, we'll see them in the World Cup.

What a nice picture.

Monday, January 10, 2011

A Saving Grace

I learned something today.

There is one thing that, no matter what, makes me feel like I'm at home, anywhere in the world.

Dick Whitman.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Holy F#%$, I forgot all my arabic.

Post to follow...

12/31/10 Update: Ok, so it's not as bad as I thought. When I got off the plane, no one understood any of my attempted gibberish at all, which was, needless to say, depressing and scary. But, after a few days, Jordanians been striking up conversations with me that are more along the lines of "Where are you from?" and "I have family in Missouri," than "Are you stupid?"


I'm not dumb! I just haven't been here in two years!

Amman is more or less the same. Some new restaurants have opened, and some old ones closed. Everyone still uses unleaded gasoline and looks angry all the time. I have already found the Amman version of Bucktown (which is where I'm looking into living), and I landed a gig teaching conversational English twelve hours a week at a language academy near the University of Jordan. Not bad for three days in the Hashemite Kingdom!

This is more like what I was doing in Chicago after getting back...

I'm gonna be looking at apartments over the next few days. If anything interesting happens, I'll put it on here. But probably not.

Either way, Happy New Years!

I'll see something way less beautiful eight hours before you guys. Bittersweet.


Sunday, August 22, 2010

All Systems Go

It's official.

I bought my one-way ticket to Amman. I leave December 27th.

Let sanity reign over me.