Day 4 fee Al-Urdun, or how camel spiders scare the living hell out of me

today was my first day of school. well, *official* day of school. let me tell you, it was absolutely terrifying. my ustadhtii is named Nour, she is a sweet lady. only 24! and for three hours straight it was all bloody arabic. well, except for when me and my ...3 other classmates stared at her with completely blank stares. which seemed to be about every 12 minutes or so. haha.

but we gave it a try! which counts. and honestly, can you imagine sitting in a class period which was spoken entirely in arabic? yeah, didn't think so. (note, this mini ego boost for myself was not directed towards my arabic speaking friends, al hamdulalah.)

anyway, we covered a lot of ground on our first day. i believe steve said it best when he described it as "basically, we wiped out the first half of our first semester of 101, and relearned everything."

which is so ridiculously true. honestly, EVERYTHING i have learned, from saying simple things like "how much?" or "i want" or conjugating verbs! all different. damn you, colloquial! blast!

but it's definitely an adventure, to which i appreciate it. :)

hmm, what else? Maisel's class was fairly stellar. we discussed what we willlll be discussing this semester, such as how to shop, get around, sports, the culture of amman, etc etc.

our first assignment was to go OUT to the university students as well as the faculty and obtain directions on how to get to "wayne mustashafa al-jamea?" [where is the university hospital?]

he gave us key words, and we had to get the directions bil arabii... holee crapppp. i was totally trippin'. luckily sandra and i found these two very nice girls who asked us if we wanted the directions bil arabii ow bil engliisi. yeah, begrudgingly we asked bil arabii. and so it went. the conversations. the new colloquial words. the swelling head. the freaking out. ahhh, i love completely new worlds, let me tell you.

but! for a much more exciting bit of the evening--let me present you the camel spider story of d00m. it goes something like this:

we went out to dinner this evening at a wonderful restaurant. sitting outside, large tents, many waiters helping us, waiting to refill waters, serve our plates, etc. communal food, happiness, shay and good company. it was jolly. we even got this awesome middle eastern cloaks to wear because it was very chilly outside. (i will guess 50 degrees? yeah, screw you middle eastern stereotypes. YOU ARE FAIL!)

in any event... on our end of the table we began to heavily discuss the prospect of coming upon a camel spider. and you think, oh? camel spiders? that ain't no thang. they sound cute. like a fluffy little camel looking spider. maybe i will have one as a pet.

WRONG.

camel spiders, are hideous demonic creatures that EAT the insides of camels when they have crossed over to death. they are huge and attack humans if they are provoked and don't bother killing them because they will shoot you with their guns... or maybe venom darts, leaving you unconscious to consume your innards. fannnntasic! and so, with this in mind. we started a longgggg conversation about what we do if we caught while whilst in the Wadi Rum, camel riding in two weeks. yeah, the stories got pretty ridiculous. we discussed bombing them, spearing them. steve suggested taming the spider and letting it do your biding. scare off people. kill off feral cats. be a super spider. shoot it with other guns. 50 calibur, maybe RPG's. thoughts even wandered to the idea that if you TRIED to tame the spider, it would eventually turn on your and you'd wake up to the little shithead trying to dive down your throat. "nuh uh, you jackass. you aren't killing me TODAY!" and why not try cuddling with the spider? it could be a new idea. a new favorite pet. however, i am not sure this would be advised. they are vicious. they kill. they hiss and fight and could kick your ass in a fight. so i wouldn't get on it's bad side.

and for another terrifying idea, how about as we are riding camels in the Wadi Rum, your camel suddenly collapses and dies and HORDES of these devilbugs start running towards you and your once majestic animal to eat eat eat. (oh yeah, they can run up to 10mph. THAT'S FASTER THAN YOU, MY FRIEND!) sick sick sick!

i am definitely going to have nightmares til forever and beyond. and now? for some show and tell:

disclaimer: i am well aware many of these ideas are false, but roll with it, okay?

Sweet Dreams! Foorsa Saeeda!