Counting Sheep...and Hyenas?!

I know what you're thinking:
"Conor came into contact with hyenas in Jordan, consequently learned the word for hyena in Arabic, and potentially had to count them, but probably didn't because his title suggests a sort-of-clever-but-mostly-obnoxious pun not inspired by truth but stemming from wordplay for wordplay's sake, the kind of thing for which Conor is infamous. What's more, this blog post will probably recount the tale of how he came into contact with hyenas and maybe had to stand by while his hosts fired rifles at them. But, Conor will probably have no pictures of the hyenas or the shooting-at thereof because it was probably one of those times when it's best not to be the guy trying to whip out a camera, especially in front of the shepherd whose marble-mouthed Arabic is effectively unintelligible, but whose kind heart speaks a language common to all humanity. Conor will ask me to take his word that it's the truth, and I will, because I'm Conor's family/friend/life partner, and I trust in the unusual nature of his life trajectory and his propensity to tell a good story while sticking mostly to the truth."
You're right.
You're spot on.
Here goes...

So, at this point, I've procrastinated this blog post for so long now that I'm not even sure when this adventure happened. It was at least a week ago. Probably more. Sometimes I curse my horrid memory. But, mostly I forget why I want to curse it and don't bother. Anyway, by now, I'm far more settled in here (though by no means "settled in here") in the village and am even observing classes at my local school in preparation to begin teaching the week after next. But, I'll get to all that stuff in a later post. You want to hear about the hyenas.

At least a week ago, but decidedly--no definitely--more, my landlord, Abu Bakir (his real first name is Omar, but as Bakir is the first name of his first son, he goes by Abu Bakir in the Arabic tradition of paternal nomenclature), invited me to spend a night with him and some of his family "in the wild," as he said in his limited English. Something about his choice of words, his slightly comical accent in English, or maybe the fact that I would otherwise sit at home alone in my room and lament my decision to live alone in Jordan for two years, inspired me to join him for what would turn out to be an adventure I would never forget. (In theory. Consistent with my limited memory, it's already such a stretch for me to chronicle this story no, so far from when it took place, that the odds don't look good for me to remember this beyond March without the textual proof. And so I write!)

The night began with me grabbing a sleeping bag and a backpack full of supplies and cramming myself into an overstuffed pickup truck with my landlord and a bunch of his brother-in-laws and cousins (some of whom share both titles...welcome to Jordan and marrying your uncle's daughter). As we drove off towards the desert-like area where my landlord keeps his sheep, the guys in the front of the truck were blasting some old Bedouin music. A man was playing an instrument called the rababa, which, if you can imagine, is a sort of upright guitar with only one string that's played with something like a violin bow. Scratch that. It's nothing like an upright guitar. It's more like...hmmm...as a kid, I used to try to make guitars out of shoeboxes, toilet paper tubes, tacks, and rubber bands. It's more like one of those with just one string...if I played it upright with a stick. It sounds pretty similar. This, coupled with a shrill voice whining out Arabic that's indistinguishable from the noise a baby makes when it means "I shat myself, but I'm incapable of speech so I'm involuntarily crying until someone makes the poop disappear from the blasted sack that keeps it strapped in close proximity to my genitals" makes for an altogether ridiculous sound. All that said, it's slightly intoxicating.

With this Bedouin love song as the soundtrack to my experience, I bounced along in the back of the pickup truck as it dodged potholes in the dark on our way to the halal, the "farm" where the sheep are kept. One of the guys in the front seat turned back to me with a grin, which I know to mean, "I'm about to practice my English, but likely the pronunciation or word choice will confuse you. Even so, I want you to smile and pretend that you understand. Otherwise I will become upset with you for not understanding me. It will be your fault. Make the right choice." Luckily, in this instance, I understood both the pronunciation and the choice of words...well, sort of. My grinning Jordanian counterpart, mid-pothole-bounce, looked around as if to indicate that his words to follow would describe the whole experience and said, "American cowboy." I thought to myself sarcastically, "Yes, Mohammad. I feel just like an American cowboy." I said to him, "Yes, Mohammad. American cowboy."

I should fastforward a bit. We rode in the truck for some time, bouncing along, until we descended down a winding path to the area where the sheep are and where my landlord's shepherd lives. We gathered wood, built a big fire, and planned for a night of sleeping outside. My landlord and his brother cooked Mansaf, the Jordanian national dish made of rice, jameed (a kind of yogurty sauce), and chicken, on the fire. We ate it in the traditional way by using our hands, making little balls out of the rice and chicken using the jammed as a glue, and popping the Mansaf balls into our mouths.

I should fastforward a lot because I'm honestly quite tired from writing this post and, as you know, there are no pictures to go with it, so I don't want to lose you, you know, as future blog readers by writing an obnoxiously long post that will make you never want to read my stuff again. But, I supposed I should at least get to the hyenas. (fastforward sound effects)
The Mansaf was delicious.
We drank tea with milk fresh from sheep utter.
We talked and laughed by the fire and watched the stars.
We fell asleep.
The shepherd descended into the herd of sheep and slept within their ranks. Awesome.
I awoke to men frantically whipping out rifles and screaming duba'a, which is Arabic for "hyena."
The rest of the night was essentially sleepless, as every hour or so one of the guys would frantically wake everyone up to go on a hyena hunt to keep the sheep safe.
As it turned out, we only heard the hyena laughter and saw their eyes light up in the distance.
No contact with them.
And, thankfully, no killing, either by the hyenas or the guys.

The end. Hah.

Joining the Village People...

...not those "Village People." But, if it were, then YMCA might stand for Young Man's Celibacy Association or You Must Chant "Allah." Something along those lines. Haha. Yikes, life here is different. But great, truly!

Anyway, please accept my apologies for the delay in updating this blog. Transitioning into new life in my village has been intense, to say the least. As it's been so long since I've posted anything, I'm not even sure where to begin with the last two-ish weeks of my life. Hm...let's see. On the first night of moving to my new village, I crashed with my future landlord because my house was COMPLETELY unfurnished. Right away, I got a taste of how conservative this village is. I was not introduced to, nor did I even see, any women in the family (and, to date, have seen perhaps only 5 or so out-and-about; by which I mean, on their rooftops hanging laundry, or stepping outside for a moment to corral their little ones indoors). The gender separation here is strict. The following day, when my landlord and I were out in Tafila city (the closest thing I have to a city near me, which is about 30 km away) getting things for my new place, he had to give his brother-in-law and wife a ride. Before she got in the car, he instructed me not to look at her or greet her, as it might be problematic. Even he did not make eye contact or greet her...welcome to my life for two years.

Let's move on to the furnishing process. My first big purchase for my house (rather, my room, as I only really use one room of this mansion) was a bed. But, not in the way you're thinking. It's common for beds here to consist of a headboard, footboard (is this what you call the thing at the other end?), and a sort-of pallet made of wood that actually supports the mattress. This way, when everything's all dressed up with sheets, it looks like a sturdier sleeping apparatus than it is. I had my reservations about the pallet's ability to hold me, but my landlord insisted that it would be fine. That night, on my first night in my new house, after a long day of shopping for the "essentials" (it's incredible how little one actually needs, how little the PC allowance affords, and how much I really was "splurging" on a bed, which was a nonessential upgrade from the cheaper sleeping farshas that many people use; I just thought it would be nice to be up off the cold floor), I carefully lay down on my new mattress on top of the pallet of suspect quality, zipped myself into my sleeping bag, tried not to think about how cold it was, and held my breath. Several seconds later, I smashed through the pallet and into the floor.

Yep, it was, in retrospect, a hilarious start to my first night. I cried, sure. But, I also laughed. It was too late to call my landlord to explain, so I moved my mattress onto the cold floor, bundled up with an extra blanket, and thought that things could only look up from here, literally.

And they have. Everything has been going great. Of course, there have been a lot of challenges, setbacks, cultural faux pas (how do you pluralize "faux pas"?), and the like, but overall things have been great. Below, I've included some shots I just now took of my room and kitchen, the only two rooms in the house which have anything in them and look remotely different from the pictures of barren rooms I posted a while back. I'm still figuring out where to fit clothes and how to organize. Forgive the disarray.

Here you can see the door to my room, my cheap plastic table/chairs set, and a bunch of junk that hasn't found a home yet. I'm going crazy with no system of organization. I keep thinking, "Oh, I would put this here and that there if I had a desk and some shelves," but I definitely can't afford them. I think of making something out of recycled water bottles. Haha...we'll see how that goes.

To your right (he says in his best tour guide voice), you can see the bed on which Conor sleeps and through which Conor occasionally smashes. I have my soba (Arabic name for small heaters like that) propped on the chairs to take some of the edge of before bed--it's so cold here! Also, taking my guitar was the best decision for my sanity. I've been working on a couple new songs! Inshallah, I'll find a way to record them to YouTube soon. The curtain you can see was a gift from my landlord--one of the two things he was able to spare to help me furnish the place; the other one was the 7-shaped rug that adorns the floor and makes it bearable for me to walk from my bed to my closet.

The closet, at left, was my other big purchase: 25JD (where 1JD is approx. $1.40). A lot of people were confused as to why I wanted a closet (hizana in Arabic). In general, houses here don't have rooms with closets built in and, yet, it was reacted to as strange that I would want to buy one.  How am I going to keep my dress clothes nice without one? Plus, I needed a source of organization, even it was at the expense of a bulk of my move-in allowance. Here you can also see how my free 7-shaped piece of carpet doesn't cover the entire room. But, I made it work. I strategically arranged the voids left by the 7 to be where I take off my shoes, sandals, and slippers (the last of which is necessary indoors here for going from one room into the bathroom), and the other empty space is under my bed, where I wouldn't need carpet anyway.

The text-wrap thing has stopped working for some reason, so I'll just write the rest of the commentary via caption. The maps that I brought from home have been great to fill the white walls, as well as for pointing out where New Hampshire is to the boys who come to visit and ask where I'm from. As you can see, I have a TON of books and am in dire need of a bookshelf. The plastic set of drawers was a recent purchase that set me back 10JD, but it's worth the piece of mind I get from being able to keep most of my clothes out of sight. 

Here's the door to my kitchen. I've been trying to sort and recycle all my trash, as you can see to the left, but there's no infrastructure here to deal with it, so I'm not sure how that will work out. To the right of the door is my one electric hot plate for cooking and my essential tea kettle, which I've been using to boil water to take hot bucket baths because my "shower" has no water pressure, and the water is bearably cold, at best.

This is my space for kitchen creations...pretty nice, huh? Don't mind the dishes--I didn't have a chance to wash them  before taking this picture because I'm waiting until morning when the water won't seem as freezing.

 This is the drying line I rigged up. The only spot in the house with anything to tie my rope to, and the windows help (somewhat) to get some sun to the clothes. I would dry them outside, but there's no place to really that doesn't involve me encroaching on my landlord's space where his wife hangs the laundry out to dry. That's more trouble than I want to invite. So inside works. Haha.

I can't believe I'm doing this, as it's the same thing I used to think was funny when the international students at SMC would do it, but I'm actually including some pictures of me with food I made. This is mostly to show my mom that I'm not starving, as she might think (I love you, Mom!). Food-wise, I've mostly been living on bean and vegetable soup, which is easy enough for me to make and really nice in the cold. However, I made a delicious pasta with grilled eggplant (baithinjan in Arabic), tomato (bandura), and onion (baSal) (at left), as well as did some french fries/eggplant fries with grilled tomato (at right, and so good!). Also, after recently finding out where I could buy eggs, I had a great breakfast of homefries and eggs this morning, but forgot to get a shot for proof. Take my word for it. ;)

OK. That's all the energy I've got in me for this post. Be on the lookout for my next one, which will, inshallah, recount the epic adventures of my times out with the sheep, especially the one where we slept by the fire and had to ward off hyenas...that's just a teaser for now! Love you all!