Orientation

No one seems to be amused by the same things I am. I could feel the other students cringe when I laughed and whipped out my camera to photograph the creepy lingerie mannequins. I don’t want to be one of ‘those’ people, but I just can’t help it when something as perfect as niqab lingerie is in front of me.

We had another interesting, lengthy conversation with Abu Barakah tonight. We, or really he, talked about everything--from how the Yemeni dialect is the most pure form of spoken Arabic (the first time I’ve heard a non-Yemeni claim this) to how Shi’a Islam is “not really Islam.” It struck me how Sunni criticism of Shiism is so similar to Western criticism of Islam is general, or really any culture’s criticism of the ‘other’: ‘They’ don’t practice a legitimate religion, they don’t treat their women well, they are terrorists, they are savages, and above all they are nothing like us. To clarify, he and many Sunnis, do not consider Shiism to be a part of Islam. Judaism and Christianity are much more similar and acceptable according to them. As Abu Barakah said, “the only difference between Christians and Muslims is that Christians believe their prophet is the son of God. That’s it.”

We had our orientation today. It was short and simple. There was practically no mention of the situation in Cairo or the likelihood of some students moving there. I have a feeling it won’t happen and the more I hear about Cairo, the more unsure I am if I even care. There is no way I could turn down the chance to live in Cairo, but Amman is just so easy and comfortable. I was walking alone around my neighborhood and along some busy streets and I barely got a whistle and a couple stares. The only catcall I got, if you could even call it that, was one guy who looked at me and yelled, “Fuck you, black man!” (In English. I have no idea what he thought he was saying).

I’m finding it hard to photograph a lot of things in Amman. Even though some streets have struck me as really pretty, the atmosphere can’t be captured. A lot of the houses and apartment complexes look fancy and modern in some ways but also resemble compounds. Because of all the hills, one can often get peeks of the other side of the city on the horizon, but it’s nothing worth taking a picture of. Hopefully when I go to the citadel, I will get some good views. In the meantime, the best thing about walking around the residential neighborhoods are the strange and fragrant flowers all along the sidewalk.