man, it has been a while since i posted. so much happens that i cant remember it when i sit down to type. a couple of weeks ago, was my first visit to amman. we went to a king hussein summer camp. most of it was just kind of hanging out, but there is a traffic safety center for kids and this day was learning how to act around cars. the car situation here is absurd. my typical ride in the car involves me and five to six others (all adults) crammed in a five person car. then you barrel down the road. there arent lines on the road and you kind of make your own rules. also, you honk nonstop. jordanians use their horns to warn that they are coming, turning, slowing down, speeding up, just to say hi, whatever. ive heard a couple that are pretty worn out. anyway, there isnt a lot of car safety here, so the camp was trying to teach the kids. we didnt really end up doing a lot. a fellow volunteer and myself ended up making a mural for them. it was a map of jordan that was filled in with the jordanian flag. there was a seatbelt around it and it said jordan first... your safety first (in arabic of course). cheeseball, yes, but it felt like the first thing i have really done here. someday, i will get around to posting some pics on here, and it will come too. oh, yeah. we were delayed getting to the camp because the kings royal army or something wanted us to go to their training center. so we went to the army camp to watch a video about how they train. it was wierd. then afterwards the volunteers sang a song to the army. basically the jist of the song is that jordans army is protecting the homeland, flag and abdulla. they laughed. im sure we sounded ridiculous. but my host family loves that i know the song and has me sing it all the time.
i had my mid training language test, and tested novice high, which is the level we need to get out of training. however, i still can't really communicate about much of anything significant. i did manage to use it to make my first successful bargain. i went out shopping, because i really needed to. clothes here wear out faster than you can imagine. anyway, i bargained three dinar off a pair of shoes. when i got back my trainer said that i had gotten a reasonable price. it was a small victory in my integration here. i can shop like a local... kind of.
i also found out where i am going to be living. my town is called taibeh. it is about 25k from petra, and an easy day trip to aqaba. i am down in the south of the country pretty much all by myself. most of the other volunteers are in the north. i felt a little sad. but my post is actually awesome. i went to a party to meet the other volunteers this weekend and met the girl that i am replacing. apparently i am the fourth peace corps worker at the center, and the last two have left early because they got married. maybe it is in the water. i wont drink it... anyway, it is on a mountain and gets incredibly cold in winter. but other volunteers will visit often because it is so close to such cool stuff. the center is the second best girls center in the country. i will be starting with exercise classes, but then ramadan hits and i will be mostly observing. i am going to do the fast and my counterpart/landlord/center director wants to take me to the mosque for the twenty seventh night, which has some significance that i dont recall right now. i will let you know later. the center sounds really well organized and my house sounds awesome. it is a small studio with fruit trees outside. i am going to visit it next weekend. when i pictured coming to the peace corps, i pictured hut living. but as another girl put it, this is more like corporate peace corps. the living standard is nicer, but there is a lot more social and emotional pressure. we will see how it pans out.
i figured out my first political cartoon the other day! it was a picture of sharon holding a bottle of oil, that was the west bank and giving a drop (gaza) out of a frying pan onto the ground. he was crying and the title said something like "does it hurt much?" but it was in arabic. pretty exciting to figure it out though.
i am out of time, but not things to say, i will think of more and write later. i got a phone though. my number is 962 0796202991. my mom said you may need to leave out the zero in front of the seven though. call whenever you want. i am ten hours ahead of cali, but will answer any time, cuz i have a wierd schedule. love you all and miss you! i will write again soon and let you know how gaza pull out looks from here.