((A note: Prepare for a deluge of blog posts in the next week or so...I will be catching up on everything I haven't written about yet, including Spring Break in Italy and my sojourn to Israel))
Today is May 2nd, I fly back to the United States on May 13th. I can't believe it. I am a conflicted melting pot of emotions; a part of me is so ready to leave Jordan and return to my friend and family that I can hardly wait five minutes, let alone eleven days. An equally strong and vibrant part of me aches at the thought of leaving; this dusty, smoky city has become my own. I love Amman; I love the eccentricities of taxi drivers, chatting with the baristas at the coffee shop below CIEE's office; I love going to Mr. Falafel for lunch and hearing the call to prayer reverberate through the skies five times a day (and night) from minarets that tower into the skies, bringing together the urban cityscape and unique Islamic architecture.
I will miss many things about Jordan as a whole. I will miss that you can literally go anywhere in the country in five hours or less, I will miss the beautiful mountains and valleys surrounding Amman and throughout the country; I will miss the vibrant greenery in the north, the bright desolation of the sandy desert, the sun setting over the Wadis. I will miss passing shepherds and their flocks, miss seeing Camels lounging atop a hill or in the back of a truck. I will miss the dumpster kitties that are almost as prevalent as cigarettes in this country, I will miss turkish coffee, and kanafe, and hummous, fuul, fresh arabic bread and rice of every kind, I will miss tea with mint, sage tea, and the wonderful breakfast at Books@Cafe. I will miss the staff of Books@Cafe; the waitress who recognizes me every week and says "Sabbah Al-Kher". I will miss speaking arabic; "mumkin" and "mashi" and "aywa", "schwea" and "alhamduliallah" and "enshallah". I will miss seeing arabic signs on the road, miss Gerard's nutella ice cream, miss the wonderful custom dagger shop next to the Roman Ampitheater downtown. I will miss my peer tutor, I will miss my professors. I will miss Citymall, and MeccaMall, and Abdoun Mall - at the flat escalators and marveling at the ridiculous prices of these clearly western commodities. I will miss "haraam" and "halal". I will miss the history. I will miss seeing random collections of roman columns, traveling to crusader castles, hiking up a mountain and passing the remains of an ancient bath. Most of all, I will miss the people; be it a discussion of philosophy with a Jordanian PhD student in a cafe, a casual conversation about Jordan's future with a woman passing by, or simply saying "merhaba" and "ma salaama" to the kindly man who runs the convenience store near my apartment. The people of Jordan welcomed me, and I will miss them.
Don't get me wrong, there are definitely things I will not miss. I'm not going to bother writing them out - ask me about them sometime if you're curious once I'm home. And I do miss many things I took for granted in the States - that despite my new found knowledge, I'll probably start to take for granted once I'm back into the American swing of things. A week or so ago, I was ready to just get up and go. I was stressed. I was tired. I did not want to put up with the 'Jordan' way of doing things anymore. I wanted the closest plane to just take me across the atlantic and say yalla bye to this country. But now, as the date of departure comes closer, I am reflective.
Classes ended today, and I realized I probably won't be seeing some of these professors ever again in my life. I certainly hope I run into them in the future, over the course of the semester I have gained invaluable knowledge from them without exception. With regards to my arabic class especially, I built bonds with professor and students that I haven't had in an arabic class before - that I doubt I'll have again. This whole experience has been a whirlwind; it will take some time to sort it all out in my mind. It has been amazing, it has been horrible; the highs have been about as high as you can get, and the lows were pretty deep down there. But I wouldn't trade a single second of it. I can't imagine being any place else in my life right now. And though I am sad to leave, I am excited to come back home as a changed person. I will always carry a piece of Jordan in my heart, where ever the future takes me. Jordan has opened the world to me and I wish there was some way to express my gratitude. Enshallah, one day I will return to gaze upon the wadis and the rose walls of Petra; but until then, I will cherish these last days and make the most of this beginning of the end of my semester in Jordan.
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