Language, lessons, learning

The language study continues! Arabic is such a beautiful language, but it’s not the easiest thing in the world to pick up. I just keep trying to remind myself that every new word I learn is progress, and I try not to take myself too seriously. I have encountered great moments of motivation in the form of the single elderly woman who lives downstairs from us. She always has her door open and says hi when we walk through the hallway. I came home by myself one day last week and she invited me in and fed me a stomach-full of homemade cookies. There are so many things I want to ask her about, but my Arabic is so limiting. I have gathered what her name is and that she has been living in Amman since she had to flee Basra, a city in Iraq, seven years ago. I can just tell by looking at her that she has so many stories that I want to hear and understand, but my language ability inhibits me. I leave my encounters with her feeling inspired to study harder—I want to understand her story.

This past week in Arabic class, we got on the topic of appropriate conversational topics within Arab culture. We went over some things that might be considered taboo and our Arabic teacher noted that asking about someone’s age is perfectly acceptable. People are quite comfortable telling you how old they are as growing older is nothing that one need be ashamed of. That got me thinking: Why is it, then, that we have such strong associations regarding aging in the West? How did Americans get to a place where it’s uncomfortable to ask people how old they are? I think most of our Western hang-ups on aging involve status expectations. By certain ages, society has produced for us a set of achievements that we ought to be taking into consideration. If you’re not making so much money by a certain age or if you’re not married by a certain age, then you’re not successful. Further, I think our fear of aging is also innately tied to our Western idea of planning and scheduling our lives to death. Most of us have pretty set ideas about where we want to end up over the next 15 years, and I think our fear of aging also stems from the fact that we’re scared to run out of time to plan things. I’m the first to admit that I spend so much time planning and hoping for the future that I do not take nearly enough time to enjoy my present. But I’m increasingly convinced that this is an unhealthy way of looking at life. Certainly, physical self-image is a part of the fear of growing older as well.

I’m not saying that there are no cultural expectations within Arab culture and that this what makes aging a more accepted part of life—that’s not true at all. But I am saying that I see a link between attitudes about aging, the cultural concept of time, cultural values of hospitality and collectivism, and even language. Time is not of the essence here—success is not measured by how much one checks off their to-do list by end of the day. Importance is measured in terms of family life, family name, relationship, faith, hospitality, and good conversation. This is even evident in language. The Arabic language is full of thoughtful, intentional syntax and word choice that lends itself to relationship, faith, and collectivism. I am oh-so-aware that I’ve been here for a few short weeks and I know close to nothing about the culture in which I am currently immersed. These are merely some hypotheses and silly observations I thought up during class one day. But it's a good example of how one seemingly isolated difference in culture (in this case, the appropriateness of asking someone about their age) can point towards a whole ocean of underlying differences. That is what makes living here so interesting.

Much has been going on, but I’ll highlight three particularly fabulous recent happenings:

1. Last week we got to meet Shoroq, the recently returned Jordanian IVEPer. Shoroq returned about a month ago from a year of service and cultural bridge-building in the United States. We ended up unexpectedly going to her house and spending the whole night hanging out with her and her extremely wonderful family. We experienced the epitome of Jordanian hospitality—they prepared a feast for us and the whole entire family welcomed us with open arms. Shoroq’s mother, father, and grandmother do not speak any English but they said “ahlan!” (Arabic for: “You are welcome!”) more times than I can count.
2. One evening last week, when we went up on the roof of our building to collect our dry clothes from the laundry line, there was a huge iftar feast about to begin. (Iftar is the name of the meal that Muslims eat right at sunset during Ramadan. It marks the end of fasting for the day.) Turns out it was a Ramadan staff party for all of the people who work in our building and, when we arrived on the roof to get our laundry, they invited us to join them. Being invited to break the fast with someone is such an honor, and we were so excited to experience our first iftar with a few dozen people. We spent dinner talking with and hearing the stories of some of the Darfuri/Sudanese men who work in housekeeping in our building. They told stories about their families back in Darfur, how they dream of relocating to America, and how they feel stuck because they can't make enough money to bring their families to join them in Amman. They reminded me so much of the Sudanese refugees that I worked with last summer at the resettlement agency.
3. Friday morning marked the end of Ramadan and the beginning of the Eid holiday. (Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar in which strict fasting is observed from sunrise to sunset by all Muslims. In Jordan, public eating, drinking, or smoking is grounds for detention. Eid marks the first day after Ramadan ends and is similar to Christmas in the Islamic world.) Thus, Friday was the first day that we could eat or drink publicly. But Friday morning, we woke up the sound of chanting all across the city at about 5:45 AM. Obviously, the call to prayer happens frequently here so the sound of Islamic prayers rising from every angle is not something new to us. But this was different because it was not the sound of one voice blasting from a multitude of minarets. It was the sound of thousands—perhaps millions—of voices raising up in unison. “Allahu akbar, allahu akbar!” rang from every direction. Trisha, Sara, and I went up on the roof to watch the sunrise and listen to the chanting. Needless to say, it was pretty neat.

Today marks exactly one month of SALT service which blows my mind. I can already tell that this year is going to go by much, much too fast. Last week we went to church with Nada, one of the Jordanian/Palestinian MCC workers here in Amman. She goes to a lovely Anglican church and was kind enough to let us tag along so that we could immerse ourselves in Arabic for a couple hours. After the service, we got to meet one of the pastors of the church who spoke excellent English and was excited to give us some advice for the coming year of service. He had worked closely with Julie, the SALTer who worked in Irbid last year in the placement that Trisha will be filling. He talked about how Julie went out of her way to love one of the special needs kids in her church community. The child was unable to say more than three words, and Julie went out of her way to take the time to connect. At one point he stopped, looked at us, and said,“Julie was truly a friend of the less fortunate.”

I think that if, by the time I leave next year, someone is thinking, “That Janae, she was really a friend of the less fortunate” then I’ll be doing pretty darn good. Way to leave a legacy, Julie.