I've Said It Once Or Twice Before

You roll up your jeans, take off your shoes, and sit with your toes near the edge of land and sea. The waves slither up, then recoil. Over and over and over. It's predictable. Boring, even. But you sit there every day because the sight and sound and smell of it is enough to bring you peace.

Yet even when you feel nothing, that awesome, incomprehensible power is still churning in the deep. And every so often, a tiny swell will manifest on the surface. Nothing unheard of, unseen before, or even noteworthy. But when you least expect it, the water's metronomic lapping at your feet that you've gotten so, so used to will be interrupted by a sforzando of power that you feel. 

You're not soaked--not even close to it--but you're so surprised that you gasp for air and your heart beats faster. In that moment, your mind becomes acutely aware of and your soul reverently in awe of just what exactly is before you.

***

And I'll say it again and again and again:

I never thought that love would be like this. That I could love like this.

Baqa'a

Alright, I'm way behind on blogging about actual Jordan things. I'm such a procrastinator when it comes to blogging about events. Ideas and other random things are so much more fun to write about! Speaking of which, I think it'd be cool to do a weekly post centering on a certain political issue. See that little poll off to the right there? Vote on it, and then next week I'll write a post that analyzes all four options (and argues for one in particular). AREN'T YOU EXCITED?!?!!?

Also, I still gotta get crackin' on those posts about feminism. If my life wasn't a black hole of Arabic right now, this blog would be a lot more exciting, lemme tell ya.

Moving on. I got a call two Thursdays ago asking me to give a talk in church . . . which started in twelve hours. A little crazy, but I managed to pull something together! I spoke about how developing Christ-like attributes is the key to helping us develop our talents, focusing on five specific traits that I thought were important--patience, humility, courage, faith, and charity. The general outline went a little something like this (I know you guys don't care, but I want to jot this down so I remember):

• Patience
• Doctrine and Covenants 67:13
• Luke 21:19
• Example from the life of Christ: His amazing patience with Peter.
• Matthew 14: 29-31
• Matthew 26: 26-46
• John 18:10
• Matthew 26: 69-75
• Humility
• 1 Peter 5: 6-7
• Example from the life of Christ: John 5:30
• Courage
• Deuteronomy 31:6
• Example from the life of Christ: Matthew 27: 11-24
• Faith 
• Articles of Faith 1:4
• Example from the life of Christ:Matthew 27:54
• Charity
• Ether 12:35
• Example from the life of Christ: Mark 10: 46-52

After church on Friday (where our friends' 10-month old baby son took his first steps!) I went to work making my first batch of homemade cinnamon rolls. This was a big thing for me, because I hate using yeast (using yeast...say that five times fast usingyeastusingyeastusingyeastusingyeastusingyeast). Despite my best efforts, I always manage to kill it. There's nothing quite like the feeling of waiting anxiously for dough to rise, only to check on it hours later and see that you've failed. The puny lump of mush just sits there in the bottom of the bowl, cocking its little gelatinous eyebrows at the audacity you had to think that baking like grandma was within your realm of capability.

That's exactly what happened on my first attempt with these cinnamon rolls. I have no idea how the yeast died--the water was tepid and the recipe didn't call for any salt, so my best guess is that the flour and sugar staged a coups d'etat.

Me likey frosting.

Intrepid woman that I am, I gave the recipe another go and whaddaya know! The dough rose. I could've sworn I heard it cheering for me--Yeah, Kristi! You did it! You're a superstar!! You raise me uuuuuup, so I can stand on mooooountains--but I can't say for certain. Even if it had been, the cheers wouldn't have lasted long seeing as how I promptly drowned the entire mixture in two cups of melted butter.

Lemme tell ya, those babies turned out amazing (I got the recipe here, but used the frosting from here). I remember spending hours trying to make homemade cinnamon rolls for Brock during the first Christmas season of our marriage, only to fail miserably. Four years later, and look at me now, son. Look. at. me. now. I am very accomplished homemaking-wise. (Catch that tamyiiz, Arabic grammarians??? What whaaaaaaat, or, for all you Jordanians out there: شو شووووووووووووو)

Brock and a guy from my Arabic program,

BOOM, DAWGY.

Clayton, play volleyball with the University of Jordan team team (see pictures here). One of the guys on the team, Mostafa, invited us all over for dinner on Friday. He lives in a Palestinian refugee camp on the outskirts of Amman called Baqa'a. For context, here's a snippet from the Wikipedia article on Baqa'a:

The Baqa'a refugee camp (Arabic: البقعة‎), first created in 1968, lies 20 km north of the Jordanian capital Amman, and is home to around 80,100 Palestinians who are registered as such with the United Nations, making it the largest camp in Jordan.

Baqa'a was one of six camps set up in Jordan in 1968 to house the Palestinians who left the West Bank and Gaza Strip during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. Between June 1967 and 1968, residents were housed in temporary camps in the Jordan Valley. When Baqa'a was set up it had 5,000 tents for 26,000 refugees on an area of about 1.4 sqaure kilometers. UNRWA replaced the tents with 8,048 prefabricated shelters between 1969-1971 with contributions from Germany. Most of the residents have since then replaced the original tents and prefabs with concrete shelters.

I love living in Amman because it is so multi-faceted. Amman is arguably the most Westernized city in the Middle East, and by far the most cosmopolitan seeing as how the vast majority of Jordan's population are refugees from somewhere (Palestine, Iraq, etc). A twenty-minute taxi ride can take you from Abdoun circle--buzzing with Mercedes Benz SUVs, posh restaurants, and swanky cafes--to this:

Main street in Baqa'a. (Photo Credit)

On the cab ride over, our driver put in a CD and cranked up the stereo. The bass started bumpin'. Mostafa, sitting in the passenger seat, turned back to look at us and smiled.

"You like this song?"

"Yeah!" we replied, our voices barely audible over the rattling car. "Who sings it?"

"اشر"

That's when I noticed the hook: http://youtu.be/22Uwe3H2oBk

As soon as I recognized the song, we crested over a huge hill down into the Jordan Valley--with the huge settlement of Baqa'a sprawled out before us. It was one of those moments when I asked myself How. did. I. get. here?

I specifically remember shaking my moneymaker to this song at RMHS's back-to-school dance my senior year. Standing on "The Rocks" with hundreds of my sweaty, horny [drunk] teenagers having the time of my life because I was single, with my girlfriends, and--lemme just come out and say it--a damn good dancer. Seriously. Somebody get me on the next Beyonce tour.

Usher's "Yeah!" always brings me back to that moment. And there I was, six years later: Same song, same nostalgia, heading into a Palestinian refugee camp for a dinner-date with a guy that my husband plays with on the University of Jordan volleyball team? Jolting, much? 

For whatever reason, this experience was bittersweet. It was sweet because it grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me saying "LOOK AT YOU! YOU ARE LISTENING TO USHER....IN JORDAN! YOU ARE IN JORDAN! YOU ARE FULFILLING A DREAM!"

At the same time, it reminded me of homehome--highlighting that fact that homehome is not Jordan, no matter how comfortable I feel here. Even though I love the States and miss my family, I will be so sad to leave the Middle East because life without Arabs will truly be dimmer.

Bar none, Arabs are the kindest, most welcoming, most generous people I've ever met. They make the Middle East for me. It may sound weird to describe a Muslim-majority group of people as Christ-like, but that's exactly what they are.

Mostafa and his family were no exception. There were so kind to us. Mostafa paid for the cabfare there and back (refusing to take no for an answer!) and his mother prepared so much food! Delicious tabbouleh salad, kubbeh, stuffed grape leaves, roasted chicken, fresh fruit. We brought some cinnamon rolls for dessert, but ended up making somewhat of a cultural faux pas. We knew it was customary to bring a small housewarming gift or dessert, but what we didn't know is that you should never expect to actually eat it there. You need to think of it as a gift that they will enjoy later once you've left--not something that actually adds to the meal itself.

The thing is, there is no such thing as an Arab potluck because by bringing food to share, you are implying that they will not be able to provide enough food for you--either they are too poor, or not generous enough (a greater offense, in their eyes).

Unfortunately, we did not catch this nuance. After dinner was over, we kept asking "Do you want to eat those cinnamon rolls now?" and they refused time and time again. We'd brought plenty for everyone, so we thought the explanation was that they just didn't want to try this foreign American food. Rude! Thinking they didn't want the cinnamon rolls at all, I took them home with me.

Oops.

Live and learn, right? :) It was still a really fun evening. Mostafa isn't very talkative at all, but his older brother, Malik, came up and joined us after a while--and he helped get the conversation rolling. We saw they had a deck of cards in the room, so we taught them how to play slapjack. They loved it! Brock also busted out his one-and-only card trick (which, to his credit, is actually pretty impressive) and just about blew Mostafa's mind with it. He kept yelling out the only exclamatory English phrase he knew: "OH MY, GOD!!!!!!!! OH MY, GOD!!!!!!!!!!"

Speaking of exclamatory phrases, HOW DID THIS POST GET SO FREAKING LONG?!?!?!?!

Mantra

I'm a wee bit embarrassed to tell ya'll my mantra, because it's kind of pathetic. But it's helped me a lot this past week--I've been crazy productive and I'm feeling gooood.

It all started out a few weeks ago with I approached Brock with a proposition. I love the guy, but sometimes his humor is a little too Wayne's World.  After a particularly "That's what she said!"-heavy day, I plopped onto the bed and said "Honey, I just want to feel like I'm married to an adult. Could we lighten up on the junior high jokes?"

And that's exactly what Brock did. Things were going along just peachy until the tables turned.

The sink was full of dirty dishes, and it was my turn to wash them. "I'll do it later tonight, don't worry!" I assured Brock. But, you know, life came up. And when I say "life" I mean The Internet. Before I knew it, it was 11:30pm. Brock walked into the kitchen and looked at the sink.

"Lovey, you forgot."

At that moment, a light bulb went off in my brain. Did I seriously not have the self-control to pull myself away from what I wanted to do? How did I let an entire evening pass by without accomplishing the one chore on my list? Why did I need Brock policing me? I'm sure he wants to feel like a husband, not a parent. Needless to say, I felt pretty stupid. 

Hence, my mantra: "I am an adult."

I say this to myself (sometimes outloud...) whenever I have to do something I don't "feel like" doing. Because that is the essence of adulthood--putting work before play and realizing that life isn't about you and what you want to do. This mantra has helped me with . . . 

• Making myself go to bed at a decent hour
• Not hitting the snooze button in the morning
• Consistent scripture study
• Waking up 90 minutes earlier every day to get ahead on my homework
• Writing down weekly goals and actually doing them
• Pulling myself away from mindless interneting
• Assessing issues I'm having with language-learning and actually fixing them. (Even if this means reading Arabic newspapers for five hours on one particular day.)
• Setting a timer for myself as I set out to accomplish 15-minutes tasks 

I have been a productivity MACHINE this week, I tell you! It's this awesome self-perpetuating cycle: I feel so good when I act like an adult that it makes me want to act like one ALL THE TIME!!!!!!

My mantra is a reminder that I have the self-control to make myself do lame things (or at least I should). It's so easy to excuse your laziness by saying "Oh, I'm just a procrastinator." But really, isn't procrastination just a lack of self-control? This was the epiphany I had as I looked sheepishly at that sink of dirty dishes.

For whatever reason, "I have no self-control" sounds a lot worse than "I'm a procrastinator." 

"I'm an adult"  is a great way to shame yourself into acting like one. Because if you tell that to yourself and then display a lack of self-control, you'll feel so stupid that you'll eventually succumb to self-pressure in a desperate attempt to salvage your pride. 

I'm sure there's a more eloquent explanation, but you get the idea. 

So that's my mantra. Before you know it, I'll be exercising, eating vegetables, and taking vitamins.

Talkin' Dirty

Scene: 1:00AM. Face washed, teeth brushed, alarm set, day over. Brock and I have been chatting and joking around before going to sleep.

"Hey Kristi, what are my chances of gettin' lucky tonight?"

"0%."

"What?!? After I've been so funny and cute during all this pillow talk?!"

"You've improved on the Cute Scale, but the Gettin' Lucky scale holds steady. At zero."

"But aren't those two scales correlated?"

"No. And even if they were, correlation does not imply causation."

"Well, what is the Gettin' Lucky scale correlated with?"

"Leaving me alone."

"Pfff. Yeah. Inversely correlated."

***

This is what happens when two dorky Mormons get married.

I Am Woman

Names mentioned on the front page of the NYTimes last Monday.

I grew up in a traditional household with traditional values and plenty of upstanding male figures in my life. My mother seemed intent on wringing the masculinity out of me by enrolling me in piano lessons, sewing classes, cotillion, ballet. I even studied voice with a professional opera singer. I was constantly being told to walk with my shoulders back, hold my spoon correctly, watch my language. My mother bought me dresses, made me wear nylons to church, and put French braids in my hair each morning before school.

My dad taught me the beauty of sweat and the joy of dirt. He encouraged adventure, bruises, bumps, scratches, messy ponytails, heaving lungs. He praised me when I came home with bloody knees and high-fived me for jumping off cliffs at Lake Powell.

I grew up in a yin-yang.

I believe women should be treated equally, but men and women are not equal. This difference is crucial. You can charge at the windmills all day long, but it won't change the fact that men and women are simply built differently. I think people would save themselves a lot of time and energy if they just acknowledged and accepted these differences.

I don't see feminism as as zero-sum game. One gender's win is not the other's loss. Men and women need to work together on feminist issues. The goal should be a combined crusade toward societal betterment.

I wish some feminists swallow their pride and lower their middle fingers. I think the reason why the word "feminism" leaves such a bad taste in people's mouths is because, unfortunately, a minority of feminists can be hypersensitive, hypercritical, and uninspiring. (To be fair, every group I identified with has "those" people--feminists, Mormons, Republicans...)

The perpetual state of yin-yang I grew up in has helped me understand the value of balance. I am a feminist because I believe women's empowerment is a direct path to a better world (see here and here and here and here). I'm hoping for a new wave of feminism that values balance. I want to work to bring it to fruition.

Care to join me?

Bad News

I bought these crackers that are coated in rich, dark chocolate. McVities Digestives, to be exact. I can't stop eating them. I would say they're like manna from heaven, but that's so cliche. Instead, allow me to compare them to nectar from the gods. Like sex on the beach. My Achilles heel.

"Hold up," you say. "You found something delicious to eat? Shouldn't this post be titled 'Good News?'"

PROBLEM: They're digestive crackers.

And, like I said, I can't stop eating them.

Conversations on Culture

I have speaking appointments several times per week with a teacher named Ibrahim. We've gotten to know each other pretty well over the course of the past month or so, and my conversations with him are some of my favorites.

Last week we were talking about women and the hijab and I mentioned that I find it funny how some girls in Jordan wear a hijab, but super tight clothes. Granted, the do cover the skin . . . but clothes don't have to show skin to be revealing.

Ibrahim commented that this is a problem in Jordan, and that girls like this are not respected.

A joke popped into my head. "Hey . . . what's the word for 'neck?'"

"Raqba."

"Okay. It's like above al-raqba they're Muslim, and below the neck they're . . . "

" . . . Christian!"

I burst into laughter while Ibrahim apologized profusely for his joke. Even though that's essentially what I had been planning on saying, he was worried that he'd offended me. After I'd thoroughly convinced him that he hadn't, I saw a twinkle in his eye. He was holding back a comment.

"Yes?" I said.

He smiled, but was still reluctant. I felt like I was waiting for a volcano to erupt.

"Did you want to say something?"

 . . . . "Mosque on the top, church on the bottom!"

The remainder of the speaking appointment was pretty much a waste since we couldn't stop laughing. I think it's a good sign of the times that a Muslim and Christian can poke fun at each other without drawing ire :) (Now if only the same could be said for Muslims and Jews!)

On a slightly unrelated note, I have another story pertaining to culture and religiousness. Every day on my way to school, I walk by a series of small shops--a barber, a convenience store, etc. Several girls from the program also live in my building, so there's a constant stream of college-aged American women passing by these shops on a daily basis.

My friend Weston was talking to one of the shopkeepers recently when the shopkeeper asked, "Oh, do you live in the same building as all the binaat mutadayineena min amreeka?"

"All the religious girls from America? Yeah, I guess that's what you'd call them, "answered Weston. "How do you know they're religious?"

"Because of the way they dress."

CHALK ONE UP FOR MODESTY!! BOOM, DAWGY. 

Glad people are noticing our efforts to respect the people, culture (and ourselves!) here.

I'm sure the fact that we live next to Ukrainian prostitutes provides for great juxtaposition.

One of my fleshier ensembles.