I leave tomorrow morning to catch a flight to Beirut. I’ll be there for 3 nights, in Jerusalem for 2 nights, and then in Cairo for 2 nights as well. Then I spend one more night in Amman before my direct flight to JFK and my flight from NY to BOS arriving a little after midnight on the 23rd.
Part of me is more than ready to be home, and to be with family and friends that I haven’t seen for almost four months. It’ll be phenomenal to sleep in my own bed, in my own room, to drive my car, and to experience the absentmindedness that comes with the everyday routine only found in one’s real home.
Yet, a very substantial part of me isn’t ready to leave… and probably never would be were I to stay longer. Part of it is the people on my program, my family, the staff, and the people I’ve met in Jordan. I am surrounded by very ambitious, connected, and bright people at Bates as well as in my group of friends from MA… but, as much as I love them, there’s something that is entirely different about the students I’ve spent the most ridiculous quarter year of my life with. All of them, whether majors in Arabic or Middle Eastern Studies, or people who decided to go to some random place where people would think they’re insane for going (like me), came to a country in a region that is horribly generalized, stigmatized, and considered by many Americans to be incapable of functioning like a “normal society.” Most of us mentally prepared ourselves for a horrible semester that we’d have to power through. It was easier for some than others, but I think Jordan and SIT far exceeded our expectations… al hamdilallah.
It’s come up in conversation a number of times that no one except those of us on SIT Jordan will ever be able to truly understand what our experience was like, no matter how detailed our retelling might be for a third party. I think this is very true, even compared to students from another semester. Everyday has been an adventure, and we’ve all shared our individual stories of excitement, frustration, pain, sorrow, discomfort, and elation, and I truly believe we’ve lived and learned vicariously through each other’s experiences. It would be impossible to truly GET what that meant to a person without the context of our group dynamic, the background of our experiences, and the feelings we all shared and struggled with.
Moving on from a finite stage of one’s life is always bittersweet. Whether it's the end of a favorite year in middle school, graduating from High School and having friends travel many hours away, or moving away from home to start a new chapter in your life, there’s an immeasurable sadness along with the excitement of the future. I remember how sad I felt saying goodbye to my friends at college after visiting this semester. I knew it’d probably be over half a year before I saw many of them again, and replaying their goodbyes in my head wishing me luck, or asking me to stay safe, on that lonely, lonely drive back down 95 evoked that mixed feeling. It was a good sadness, because I knew I had such phenomenal people in my life… It was the same feeling I had when my parents said goodbye the day I flew out, and when I found the notes they had hidden in my luggage and heard their voices as I read aloud in my head the same points of uniqueness about choosing to study in Jordan, passing up far easier opportunities, that I mentioned before, and that, though they’d miss me deeply, the benefit I would get and the way my life would change would be worth the pain of separation. The feeling that came with those words and simultaneously that change in my life is indescribable.
You can hear that change in the goodbyes between many in SIT Tribe too. In the awkwardness of not wanting to admit the reality that many of us may never meet again, and at the same time, the heartfelt appreciation for what the other person has done, both academically…such as in the incredible job done by everyone on their Independent Study Projects (I wish you could have seen the presentations and heard the breadth and depth of the work) and how that has changed the researcher, the class, and the staff… and also in the personal changes we’ve experienced and imprinted on each other.
It was definitely heard during our re-entry and evaluation excursion yesterday. When our academic director, Dr. Raed, said, “you’ve been my students, but once the program is over you will be my friends.” I heard it too when my friends Ian and Ben played “Big Country” “for the last time,” with Ian playing a guitar with all of our names carved into it.
I’ve heard changes the whole time I’ve been here. Like one of the first days when I had a drop off in the downtown, and everyone around me was speaking Arabic and I had no idea what they were saying or where I was. I heard it when I spoke my first few words of amiyah, and in the excitement in a Jordanian’s voice when I’d speak to them in their native language, or when I completed my first full conversation with a cab driver. I heard it when my youngest host brother said my name, or another new word, and when my host mother and I would laugh at something ridiculous the children had done (again, though varied in the free reign they have here in the Arab world, overall, children are the same EVERYWHERE). I’ll hear it the next time I talk to a stranger like the random guy at the bar in JFK before I left, who said “be careful, we’re the godless infidel over there,” and that I now know for a fact he’s wrong, and can call him on it. I’ve heard it and felt it in the daily call to prayer…the beauty of the melodies, and the passion in the voice, despite my even firmer commitment to a secular public sphere after having lived in a country with an official state religion, and where culture and religion are practically inseparable. It was even audible in the conversations I’ve had with other students over regional events, life, love, or how their cup of Nescafe (something I won’t miss) was.
The sound isn’t all me, or my peers though. The theme of the program is “Modernization and Social Change,” and you can hear flickers of that change in the hopes of lecturers on women in Jordan and the struggle to fulfill their rights. We listened as professors spoke about Islam and Modernity, and countless lectures deviated to discussions of the revolutions throughout the Middle East and North Africa, and the effects likely to be seen in Jordan. It came out loud and clear in my ISP research, discussing what democracy means with the leaders of that movement here, what media coverage is like in the west, and alternative media opportunities the youth movement could look to.
It’s been and will be heart wrenching to say goodbye to this country, to my life for the past few months, and to these people we’ve all called family or tribe. But the sound of goodbyes is the sound of change, and while I’ll miss this experience dearly and the people I’ve met more than tears or words can show, I’m a much better person for having known them and been here, and I know that everyone else, Jordanian and American alike, is changed from our time here. The path they’ll be taking over the course of the next few years, though it would’ve been exciting anyway, is even more so after this. I can’t wait to hear about their lives in the future.
Part of me is more than ready to be home, and to be with family and friends that I haven’t seen for almost four months. It’ll be phenomenal to sleep in my own bed, in my own room, to drive my car, and to experience the absentmindedness that comes with the everyday routine only found in one’s real home.
Yet, a very substantial part of me isn’t ready to leave… and probably never would be were I to stay longer. Part of it is the people on my program, my family, the staff, and the people I’ve met in Jordan. I am surrounded by very ambitious, connected, and bright people at Bates as well as in my group of friends from MA… but, as much as I love them, there’s something that is entirely different about the students I’ve spent the most ridiculous quarter year of my life with. All of them, whether majors in Arabic or Middle Eastern Studies, or people who decided to go to some random place where people would think they’re insane for going (like me), came to a country in a region that is horribly generalized, stigmatized, and considered by many Americans to be incapable of functioning like a “normal society.” Most of us mentally prepared ourselves for a horrible semester that we’d have to power through. It was easier for some than others, but I think Jordan and SIT far exceeded our expectations… al hamdilallah.
It’s come up in conversation a number of times that no one except those of us on SIT Jordan will ever be able to truly understand what our experience was like, no matter how detailed our retelling might be for a third party. I think this is very true, even compared to students from another semester. Everyday has been an adventure, and we’ve all shared our individual stories of excitement, frustration, pain, sorrow, discomfort, and elation, and I truly believe we’ve lived and learned vicariously through each other’s experiences. It would be impossible to truly GET what that meant to a person without the context of our group dynamic, the background of our experiences, and the feelings we all shared and struggled with.
Moving on from a finite stage of one’s life is always bittersweet. Whether it's the end of a favorite year in middle school, graduating from High School and having friends travel many hours away, or moving away from home to start a new chapter in your life, there’s an immeasurable sadness along with the excitement of the future. I remember how sad I felt saying goodbye to my friends at college after visiting this semester. I knew it’d probably be over half a year before I saw many of them again, and replaying their goodbyes in my head wishing me luck, or asking me to stay safe, on that lonely, lonely drive back down 95 evoked that mixed feeling. It was a good sadness, because I knew I had such phenomenal people in my life… It was the same feeling I had when my parents said goodbye the day I flew out, and when I found the notes they had hidden in my luggage and heard their voices as I read aloud in my head the same points of uniqueness about choosing to study in Jordan, passing up far easier opportunities, that I mentioned before, and that, though they’d miss me deeply, the benefit I would get and the way my life would change would be worth the pain of separation. The feeling that came with those words and simultaneously that change in my life is indescribable.
You can hear that change in the goodbyes between many in SIT Tribe too. In the awkwardness of not wanting to admit the reality that many of us may never meet again, and at the same time, the heartfelt appreciation for what the other person has done, both academically…such as in the incredible job done by everyone on their Independent Study Projects (I wish you could have seen the presentations and heard the breadth and depth of the work) and how that has changed the researcher, the class, and the staff… and also in the personal changes we’ve experienced and imprinted on each other.
It was definitely heard during our re-entry and evaluation excursion yesterday. When our academic director, Dr. Raed, said, “you’ve been my students, but once the program is over you will be my friends.” I heard it too when my friends Ian and Ben played “Big Country” “for the last time,” with Ian playing a guitar with all of our names carved into it.
I’ve heard changes the whole time I’ve been here. Like one of the first days when I had a drop off in the downtown, and everyone around me was speaking Arabic and I had no idea what they were saying or where I was. I heard it when I spoke my first few words of amiyah, and in the excitement in a Jordanian’s voice when I’d speak to them in their native language, or when I completed my first full conversation with a cab driver. I heard it when my youngest host brother said my name, or another new word, and when my host mother and I would laugh at something ridiculous the children had done (again, though varied in the free reign they have here in the Arab world, overall, children are the same EVERYWHERE). I’ll hear it the next time I talk to a stranger like the random guy at the bar in JFK before I left, who said “be careful, we’re the godless infidel over there,” and that I now know for a fact he’s wrong, and can call him on it. I’ve heard it and felt it in the daily call to prayer…the beauty of the melodies, and the passion in the voice, despite my even firmer commitment to a secular public sphere after having lived in a country with an official state religion, and where culture and religion are practically inseparable. It was even audible in the conversations I’ve had with other students over regional events, life, love, or how their cup of Nescafe (something I won’t miss) was.
The sound isn’t all me, or my peers though. The theme of the program is “Modernization and Social Change,” and you can hear flickers of that change in the hopes of lecturers on women in Jordan and the struggle to fulfill their rights. We listened as professors spoke about Islam and Modernity, and countless lectures deviated to discussions of the revolutions throughout the Middle East and North Africa, and the effects likely to be seen in Jordan. It came out loud and clear in my ISP research, discussing what democracy means with the leaders of that movement here, what media coverage is like in the west, and alternative media opportunities the youth movement could look to.
It’s been and will be heart wrenching to say goodbye to this country, to my life for the past few months, and to these people we’ve all called family or tribe. But the sound of goodbyes is the sound of change, and while I’ll miss this experience dearly and the people I’ve met more than tears or words can show, I’m a much better person for having known them and been here, and I know that everyone else, Jordanian and American alike, is changed from our time here. The path they’ll be taking over the course of the next few years, though it would’ve been exciting anyway, is even more so after this. I can’t wait to hear about their lives in the future.
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