Shmaghs and Christmas Eve Mass (Yes, in Jordan!)

Where to begin...well, first I'll throw up a picture of Tom and me in shmaghs (the last sound, the "gh," is similar to the sound you make when you're gargling water), which are traditional Jordanian head wraps that men wear. Actually, men in many Arab world countries wear them, but the red and white pattern shown below is specific to Jordan. Technically, this picture was taken yesterday, but I figured I'd just tack it onto my Christmas Eve post.

Right before this picture, Tom and I had agreed to do our best impression of the lack of smiling here (in general, and more of joke--people do smile), but somehow I failed...Also, I totally plan to wear my shmagh all the time. Inshallah, I will soon buy a thobe (the traditional dress-like garment) to complete the look.

Now on to the crazy part. So I just got back from, believe it or not, a Christmas Eve mass in a church in Madaba city. Madaba is a largely Christian city despite its nearly all-Muslim surroundings, so there is a fairly sizable Christian population. I felt weird taking pictures of the inside or outside of the church, but I snapped a few...

A "Christmas tree" outside the kaniza (church) in Madaba

There's something anachronistic about a neon santa adorning a centuries-old Christian relic...

It's interesting to see a mosaic of Jesus with Arabic writing, but I suppose I forget that Jesus would have likely spoken Aramaic, and this was his neck of the woods.

Another angle of the church showing the cross

I couldn't find a placard explaining who these two are, but someone told me it was Jacob and Joseph...this doesn't seem right though.

One of the two shots of the inside of the church I quickly snapped when no one was looking--Tom and I were lurking in the back because we felt uncomfortable. The whole service was in Arabic, and I think people didn't want us to be there (see below for story relating to this).

The second picture I was able to take of inside the church--a very beautiful painting.

So, as promised in the caption above, here's the disheartening story from our evening. First, I will say that going to Christmas Eve Mass in Jordan was certainly a cool experience, especially to hear the Arabic, and listen to the songs, many of which have familiar sounding melodies. That said, we had a very unfortunate experience with the priest.

When we entered, the women went to one side of the church, and the men (Tom, Rami, and I) went to the other. At first, we thought this was because we had to, but it turned out not to be the case. Regardless, Tom, Rami, and I ended up together in the back of the church. Shortly after we had entered and were standing in the back minding our own business, just observing, one of the priests (who had been in the confessional box behind us) came up to the three of us and asked us where we were from. Tom and I replied America, and Rami explained that he was from Jordan and gave his last name. Apparently, the priest knew he was a Muslim by his last name. He gave us a stern look. Rami asked if there would be a problem if he wanted to observe the service, and the priest coldly replied that there WOULD, in fact, be a problem. So, Rami, not wanting to cause any issues, left and said he would wait for us outside. Tom and I looked at each other in disbelief that this had happened. We stayed only for a short while longer (in retrospect, too long--we should have left directly after this ridiculous comment by the priest), and met up with Rami and the others outside.

I relay this story only because I'm very confused by it. Of course, Rami was upset, as were we. As far as I know, it's fundamental to Christianity to allow anyone to come to church. This, too, goes for Islam, as Tom and I have been invited several times to join our Muslim friends at the mosque (we haven't gone yet, but plan to soon). I know we have to keep our blogs anti-confrontational, so I will merely present this experience as one that I have not yet fully understood and will try to get some answers from the community. 

After our upsetting experience at the church, we all went out to get shawarmas (delicious wraps with meat and veggies and...they're hard to explain--wiki them) and the like. While we were eating, Rami left and came back with a surprise desert of kanafa (also worth wiki-ing, a delicious cheese, mini-macaroni, and sugar-sauce desert) to say "Happy Christmas." It was so thoughtful, and I had two plates' worth! Rami is the best, which is why it's all the more disheartening that he should have been treated so badly, by a priest no less! Anyway, here are some pictures of our Christmas kanafa feast...

Rami (here playing Santa) distributing the kanafa! (From foreground to background, the group from my village: Sarah B., Alison H., Rami, Sarah L., and Tom)

Same crew, new view. Haha.

Me and the Ram-ster...my eyes indicate that I forgot how to look at the camera when taking a picture of myself.

The almighty kanafa. So good.

I would love to write more, but I'm so exhausted. Tomorrow we have class early, but then we have a few hours at the center in Madaba to do Christmas things (woo!), and there's a rumor that someone might be buying us all pizza! I know it's not the traditional holiday meal, but I'd kill for some pizza (not actually of course...well...nah).

It's especially hard being away from home during the holiday season...it was great to Skype with you all yesterday, fam, and I love and miss you all very much! I'm thinking of everyone always, but during this time especially, and I hope everyone has happy holidays!

Love,

Conor or كمال

(That's right, I set up Arabic keys on my computer! No more copy-paste from Google! Oh yeah!)

Meeting in Amman/Meeting My New Home in Tafilah

This was a busy past couple of days, so I will just put up some pictures with captions. The important notes:

-All of us volunteers went to Amman for a meeting with our future mudeers (principals)

-Then we each spent two days at our future sites, which for me, meant two days in Tafilah in the south.

My mudeer, Salem (Abu Mohammad) Rufoo', and I eating together at the conference in Amman--he's a great man! (It is tough, however, that he speaks effectively no English...but this will be good for my Arabic)

From left: Jamal (the other volunteer who will be serving in Tafilah), Abu Mohammad (my future mudeer),  me, and Abu Omar (Jamal's future mudeer); We built this ridiculous structure out of straws as a team builder.  I'm not sure if this is a bad omen,  but our team lost horribly, haha. To give you an idea, we had to cheat and sneakily tape our base straws to the table so that it would seem like it complied with the requirement to be free-standing. Also, every other group had far more epic architecture. No matter, I think we had the best vibe.

The same crew, this time with the addition of a woman who is a mudeer in Ajloun (she will be working with a volunteer named Alison--you can see Alison's hands on the left, haha)

A road in my village right outside my future house 

The stairs to my future house are visible on the left. That man is the director of education for the directorate that my village is a part of--his name is Hussein Fuqeer, and he was extremely welcoming and excited about working with me over the next two years. 

The stairs to my future home, which is huge by the way--masha'allah (not sure how to translate this, but you say it when something good happens to someone, or when someone has a lot of blessings in their life; it seems to have the sense of "may god grant you even more," but I'm not sure)!

Me and the entrance--thanks to Hussein for taking this picture! (I say this because I was told it would be weird to be taking pictures in the village; this is the reason for the dearth of pictures of my surroundings outdoors).

On the immediate right after entering, there is this room, Bedroom 1 (one of many to come!)

Another shot of Bedroom 1

Next to Bedroom 1 is Bathroom 1 (yeah, that's right, there are 2!). This one has just a turk.

Around the corner, still on the right side of the house, is the kitchen, which is pretty empty, but bigger than I expected.

The other side of the kitchen, which has a door that accesses my veranda

Now, imagine you are back at the entrance of the house through the front door. If you go left, instead of right (where Bedroom 1 is), there is a wide living room type space shown above.

Bedroom 2 (next to the living room, I think--I've been forgetting even with the pictures as a guide)!

Bedroom 3, complete with worn-out princess sticker. Nice! (As I recall, BR3 is next to BR2, at the back of the house).

This is the hilarious mystery picture...I'm pretty sure my house only (haha...only) had 3 BRs, a living room, a kitchen, and two baths (shots of Bathroom 2 to come below), but I can't figure out where this picture belongs. It could be that there was a fourth bedroom, and I'm forgetting where it was, or it could be another angle of one of the 3. 

Clearly the owner had young girls in here before--note Minnie again adorning the door to...BATHROOM 2!

...Complete with WESTERN TOILET. Yeah, baby! There's also a geezer (hot water heater) and a shower (shown below).

A view of the shower head and tub--oh yeah!

For some reason, Blogger won't let me do a normal caption for this picture...it's Hussein standing on my veranda.

A shot of the grapevines (can't wait for spring or summer or whenever grapes grow), and the apricot tree in front of my house--my landlord said I can eat them whenever. Life is so epic sometimes... 

Now, for the few shots of the outside I was able to get without it being too culturally weird...

The back of my future school, Abu Baker (closest friend of the prophet Mohammad) School for Boys.

Some students from Abu Baker (pronounced like "backer," not "baker") who wanted a picture taken

A view of the back of the house where I stayed for two nights in my village; I didn't stay at my future home, but instead with some fellow teachers (one of whom will be my counterpart at Abu Baker) in this college dorm-like setup. It was awesome!

And, what photo blog of a Jordanian village would be complete without a shot of some kharoof (sheep) just cruising around?

In addition to these few photos, I have a quick video of the view from my veranda, but for some reason, my videos don't play once I put them on the blog. I'll try to ask some more tech-savvy people than myself to see if there's a remedy.

I'll check in via Skype this weekend to relay some more stories from this first village visit...and to wish everyone "Merry Christmas!"

Love,
كمال

Zeitoon: Day 2

Here are some pictures from our second day of zeitoon picking:

The path from Abu Sohaib's house (where we live) to the farm

You can see the farm in the distance (it's the plot of land with all the green trees on the righthand side).

This is Nuah, Mos'ab's brother, picking some zeitoon. (Always a good occasion for a cigarette?)

Who's that guy? ;) If you ask someone in the village, they'd say, "That's Kamal!"

From left: Mos'ab, Kamal (me), Nuah, Mawia, and Hatim (Tom); all the Shakhanbeh brothers minus Sohaib and 'Brahim

We had a delicious lunch of rashoof, which is a traditional Jordanian meal. It has a base layer of a kind of soggy bread and is covered with many delicious vegetables and drenched in jameed (a yogurt-like sauce)--it's zaki (delicious)!

Tom and I polish off the rashoof.

Mos'ab, lookin' cool

Mawia was quite good with my camera and took this cool close-up of a dragonfly resting on one of the smaller zeitoon trees.

All in a day's work!

Abu Sohaib owes us some serious oil! Just kidding--I would volunteer to do this work every day. 

This week all the volunteers are taking trips to visit our future permanent sites, so I'll be in Tafila for a couple of days. Be on the lookout for pictures and stories at the end of next week!

Pickin' Zeitoon (Olives)

Today, one of the experiences I've been looking forward to was manifested--picking olives! Olives, or zeitoon, are a big crop here in Jordan, especially because they yield the almighty olive oil, a must for every meal (or, at least breakfast and dinner, but usually lunch, too). Abu Sohaib (our host's father) invited Tom and I to join him at his farm and pick some olives for the evening. It was awesome. Just being outside and doing some earthy work was really nice since most of PST has been studying, teaching, and sleeping. Also, we worked right until sunset, so we got to see the sun slip behind the horizon out on Abu Sohaib's beautiful land. Here are a few pictures from the day (no shots of the sunset, though...sorry!):

'Brahim with a bucket o' zeitoon! (Incidentally, he only worked with us for about 10 minutes before deciding that playing with the neighborhood kids was more fun).

Abu Sohaib, Tom, and Mowia (behind the tree) set up the tarp to collect the olives as we pick them off.

A view of the olive pile mid-picking

An aisle of olive trees

Lots of zeitoon! It was a good picking session!

The view was so jameel (beautiful)!

Well, that's all for now--we have to get up early tomorrow to hit the zeitoon again. I'm psyched! Also, Abu Sohaib said he might take us to the mosque tomorrow, so that would be another interesting experience. When all is said and done with the zeitoon (after we take them to the olive press, which inshallah I will get to see), Abu Sohaib wants Tom and I to take some olive oil for ourselves to send home. So fam, be on the lookout for some fresh Jordanian olive oil...in the mail? Can I even send it via mail? Hm...I'll look into it. In any case, I'll have some made from olives I picked--so cool!