Merci beaucoup!

Since I’ve been inconsistent, these and future blogs will be kind of scattered collections of past and present experiences.

It was 9 p.m. and I knew that it was going to take a while to battle everyone else for a cab. Noticing an empty one zooming by, I chased it down, catching up with it as it approached the circle.

I was half-jogging next to the car, tapping the passenger-side door to get the driver’s attention and signaling that I wanted a ride. He nodded and I hopped in.

“Bonjour!” he said. “Merci beaucoup.”

I smiled and greeted him back in Arabic. I had just left from my colloquial Arabic class at the French Cultural Center.

He made a couple more cute remarks about France, then he started asking me how I liked the French classes there. I told him that I wasn’t there for the French, but the ‘amiyya (colloquial Arabic) classes that they offered. Then he said that he had just gotten out of a language class himself. He was learning English.

I proposed that we both practice our languages, his English and my Arabic.

“Hi, what do you do?” I asked him in Arabic.

“I drive the taxi,” he said in English.

“What company do you work for?” I asked in Arabic.

“I work for the… ’ama?... shoo ism…”

“General?”

“Yes, I work for the general taxi company,” he said in English.

“How was your day?...”

And so the conversation went on, both of us happening to have recently learned similar conversational expressions and seemingly matching up perfectly for practicing, except that I was speaking in his language and he was speaking in mine.

We talked the whole way back to my apartment, with him eventually offering his brother’s services as a language tutor to help me develop my Arabic. I respectfully declined. Of course, he continued to insist for another minute or so, in true Arab fashion.

***

I couldn’t tell if it was really 90 degrees in that hotel room, or if I was just burning up with anger.

I had spent the last hour tossing and turning in bed, sweating, pulling at the sheets and trying to shut my eyes and relax. Nothing was doing. It was 2 a.m. and I was pissed off.

Two hours ago I was on lying on a Red Sea beach in Aqaba, watching shooting stars streaking across the midnight sky and enjoying the communal camping atmosphere of Arabs grilling, laughing, singing and chattering nearby. The Israeli beach town of Elat was directly across from us, maybe a mile away, sparkling with its infrastructure and development. We could have probably swam to it, if we really wanted to get shot.

To our left and across the sea was Egypt and behind us was the Saudi border. It was a neat spot to wonder about, with four countries crowding each other for pieces of the same Red Sea real estate.

Earlier in the day, before we rented a car and took the four hour road trip (which ended up being closer to six hours) from Amman, the others, Saif, Riaan and Faheem, had all wanted to sleep on the beach. Saif had done it before and he said that it was a cool experience. I wasn’t so sure and had mentioned it to my Fulbright director during a routing checking-out conversation (I have to let him know whenever I’m leaving Amman). He told me that it was an unnecessary risk and that I shouldn’t make him worry. “Would you do it in the U.S?” he asked.

I agreed with him and thought that I would be putting myself in harms way unnecessarily. I thought of my family and what my family might feel if something happened to me because of a dumb decision. I resolved that I was against the sleeping on the beach idea.

Once in Aqaba, we spent some great time on the beach, then decided to eat dinner and find a cheap hotel. A few of them were almost too cheap to believe, before I noticed cockroaches scurrying across the floors of the rooms. Finally we got to a place that seemed clean. It was 30 dinars for the night (more than the 10 or 20 that we had heard before) but I figured it was worth it, since it was clean.

We went back to the beach and spent a few hours there, enjoying the warm weather and the festive atmosphere (it was the weekend after Eid). There was a small shack hut opened on the beach all night, with hookah and other treats. Saif and I walked over and bought some juice and the others ordered up some hookah.

The atmosphere was calm and relaxing, while being simultaneously abuzz and awake. The sound of the calm Red Sea water, gently washing up against the sand; the laughter and song; the fires and the smell of flavored tobacco.

After a while, Saif and I headed to the hotel (Faheem and Riaan were against the hotel and I guess Saif was just going along with me to keep me company).

Within minutes of being in the room I saw a cockroach in the bathroom and I was furious. Not only could I have stayed on a beach for free, but I had specifically chosen this hotel because it was clean.

But whatever, right? What’s a cockroach going to do? Why not just get in bed and sleep, who cares?

That’s what I thought, but an hour later, I was still fuming over how I had gotten ripped off. Plus it was insanely hot in that room.

Another hour later, Saif and I were back on the beach. I figured screw it, at least we can enjoy the experience of being out under the stars.

Between the shooting stars, the singing, the weird squeeling Arab kids who’d dive into the Red Sea at 3 in the morning and the extremely late-night picnickers (I don’t know who decides to show up at the beach at 3 a.m. with the whole family and baskets full of food) it was beautiful.

***

I haven’t been able to update recently because of schedule insanity and midterm exams, but things have fallen into place now, thankfully. More updates to come!