Ok so, I managed to get here safely and soundly. I left this past Saturday around 8pm and got into London's Heathrow airport at around 8am the next morning, London time. On the way to my connecting flight I met some fellow CIEE students. We hung out in the restaurant area for a while and then we headed to the gate about an hour later. That's when I realized that I hadn't yet gotten my new ticket and had to rush back in 20 minutes to get it before the flight left. Luckily, the lady at the counter helping me worked quickly to get everything printed and then I rushed back to the flight with 5 minutes to spare. The flight left around 1030am for Amman, Jordan and that's when I began to feel the rush of traveling further East than I ever had before. I sat next to a sweet old Irish couple who had been to Jordan many times before. We talked about the region, travel, food, the people, Ireland, and old sayings in Irish like "The poorest of ink is better than the strongest of memory," and "You'll be dead for a thousand years." The first basically means that you should keep a written account of things because it lasts longer than we do, and the second is like the ancient origins of YOLO - take that Drake.

So, we flew off the damp rock of England and into the clear skies above the Swiss Alps where we ran into some turbulence, over the Greek Isles and down in low through Philistine airspace. We made a giant and pointless circle that got me really antsy and then we landed in the desert. Yep, the desert. We landed, then walked down the mobile stairs to the tarmac. I stood on the pavement and looked into the setting Arabian sun and said to myself, "I'm in the desert." In fact, I kept repeating this to myself and to others as they asked me of my first impressions. Something about the fact that this sprawling low-level city is located in the middle of the Jordanian desert with no reliable river or water source nearby awes me. Honestly, with no disrespect, the nearest water source is the dead sea, and like it's name suggests nothing lives in it or lives that drinks from it, so who was the first to plant a Jordanian flag in the sand and say I claim this land in the name of the Amman, Jordan and all it's people!?

However, regardless of what it was when it began, it is an incredibly lively city with it's 5am wakeup call via the nearest mosque, it's raceway/bumper car-like roadways, and it's very outgoing people, either willing to walk you all the way to your destination or nag you for the foreigner that you are. Needless to say it's a very interesting and nuanced part of the world with it's Ammii dialect of Arabic, stable government, and tumultuous neighbors by every border. My host family is great, very welcoming, warm, and friendly, and they have just begun to shun my English. Insha'allah I will learn quickly. Classes will start tomorrow - my first time ever being on a semester schedule. I look forward to all my classes - Arabic, Colloquial, America's and the Arabs, and Alternative Perspectives on the Middle East and I also look forward to what has been forewarned as a daily fashion show of Jordanian students attempting to show each other up. I have no interest in participating, but instead to watch on in awe like the first time I landed in the desert.

And although I did not take this Google Image picture, it is taken from atop the Amman Citadel near the downtown area. The flag pole in the picture is the highest in all of the world and the flag is also the largest in the world. It's base is in the center of one of the Royal Palaces of His Majesty the King of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein.

Masalaama,

George