just back from my site visit! so i went to see my future home for a couple of days. went down on saturday. i successfully navigated my way through six busses to get there. my bus was boarded twice as we got further south. i think this was because of the bombings in aqaba. dont anyone at home worry. there hasnt been any fall out in the rest of jordan, and there is no talk of sending us back home to the states. anyway. the bus ride. just outside of amman, the landscape suddenly turned to desert. i mean real desert. i even saw a couple of mini sand dunes on the side of the road. i really mean small ones, but they looked just like in pictures, all wavy from the wind. then we started climbing up into the mountains. as we descended from the peaks, there was an amazing canyon. think of the grand canyon, but with less sharp lines because it is limestone. this is the canyon where petra is. it was breathtaking really. so we drove along this canyon until petra. i should mention that in amman, a group of seven argentinian backpackers got on the bus. it was the first time that i knew what it was like to see a group of obvious travellers. also, the bus driver jacked up their price by a jd. i knew how much it really cost, so i was able to negotiate my way into the fair price. anyway. they got off in petra. ok, so on to my site eh? turns out that the view just outside my door is this amazing canyon. my town is gorgeous. i am living in a small studio apartment. it has a bathtub and a sitdown toilet! this is very exciting, as we have all been using turkish squatters. it isnt so bad, but they have a tendency to smell a bit. not much you can do about it really. apparently it is great that my place is so small because in the winter it will get really cold and i will actually be able to heat a small space. my yard is shared with my counterpart. it has grapes, a lawn, a fig tree, apricots, peaches, apples. i also have rabbits and chickens. oh, and a lawn. a real take your shoes off and walk around in it sort of lawn. my counterpart doesnt sugar her coffee or her tea, too, so it is a nice break from the sugar. i cant believe that this is how i am living. the center i am working in is really active. the girls there elect a small council of girls to plan activities. my job looks like i am really going to have to work hard to be creative with it and come up with anything new to do. when i asked my counterpart what the girls wanted from me she said exercise. basically i came across the world to do aerobics classes. i think also what i am doing could be classified as public diplomacy? not exactly the world changing work i was looking for. it is ok though, although i dont know if i am excited about how easy the work is going to be. maybe it sounds spoiled, but i was really expecting to have to tough some stuff out and be seeing really difficult stuff every day. and it isnt that i am not. i dont think i will ever get used to seeing a fully veiled woman. i mean it is just shocking to see a woman all in black. gloves and not even a space for the eyes. some of them look through a veil.
so, back to my place. i live about thirty seconds from a public park. it has flowers and grass and even a playground. unlike the other towns i have been in in jordan so far, my streets are clean. jordan has a real litter problem from what i can see. but there was no garbage on my street. i get the feeling that my town has a bit of money trickling in from the close booming tourist area. it is ok though, because the tourists dont make it up to where i am, and the people of my town dont really speak english. not learning arabic was something i was really concerned about. there is a swanky hotel in my town at the bottom of the hill. it is an old rock city that has been preserved as a hotel. i suppose that brings in a bit of money for the town. further out from me is what looks to be a significant bedouin area. lots of camel hair tents, a couple camels, and lots of herds of sheep and goats. one of the male volunteers near to me speaks a bedouin dialect. i am hoping to learn a bit more about the bedouins. apparently if you go to a bedouin tent, you can stay for forty days without question. i wont, but i am sure that i might be able to visit with some of the local bedouin community. behind my house is a mountain, kind of. i guess i can also hike up to the top of it. my town seems very safe, people are out walking around and in the garden till late at night. last night, my counterpart and i watched the sun set over the canyon. then we watched the moon come up over the mountain. the sunsets here are the most beautiful i have ever seen. really bright reds and oranges. and the pace of life here is slow enough that you can sit and watch the sunsets over coffee with friends and neighbors. speaking of coffee, my host family has decided that americans drink coffe from big mugs, so they now serve me gigantic coffee cups of turkish coffee. it is tasty, but kind of like having four espressos with sugar.
one final interesting note. the guy named andy is living in or near zarka. this is the town where the infamous zarkowi comes from. although, his name just means "from zarka". anyway, the people in the town took him around visiting. apparently he has met zarkowi's brother... maybe they are just messing with him.
and finally, inappropriate american songs of the week: korn's rendition of another brick in the wall, venga boys we like to party, and yes, kanye west. cant believe it. also, i think i might have heard united states of electronica on a french satellite radio station. ok. gots to run!