What're you doing in Amman?

I think I've gotten this question about five hundred times in the past two weeks, from taxi drivers, teachers, waiters, people on the street, people in the US, people from Europe.

What are you doing in Amman?

Everybody is expecting a normal answer like, "I came to study Arabic and do research at the uni's Center for Strategic Studies," or "I'm on a sabbatical," or "I wanted to see what it would be like to sunburn every time I step outside." Yeah, I'm here to do all that, and a few other things, but do you know what I've actually been doing the past three days? Avoiding the outdoors until 6 pm, haggling taxi prices with ruthless drivers, and trying to figure out how to get a proxy to work so I can watch Netflix over here (it's not available here and you have to do some complicated stuff to make your computer's IP address look like it's coming from America through a proxy- did you get all that, mom?).

After all, the short answer to the question is "I'm living here."

Nobody ever really seems to appreciate that answer. I thought that since everybody is soooooooo curious, I'd skip the post about the awesome souk we went to:

Why's that gringo got a camera out?

Or the one about how it's a thing here to wear plastic gloves whilst eating chicken wings:

Isn't the point to look like an uncivilized heathen?

Or the post about how we all found out our Arabic is far worse than realized, of which there were no pictures because we were all still in shock.

Instead, I'm going to let you see what life is really like here, the day to day operations of living in Amman, and what I'm really worried about over here. I give you...

My To-Do List

1. Learn to assess Celsius temperatures more precisely than “pretty hot,” “really bloody hot,” and “you can’t go outside right now.”

And no, I don’t want to do a math equation to know if I need to bring one liter of water to campus or three.

2. Make sure Alix doesn’t adopt a cat. Literally, make sure she doesn’t pick up one of the strays and bring it home. I know they all have fleas and rabies.

3. Buy pans that were manufactured in the past 5 years and won’t give us cancer.

Yeah, that were probably nonstick a decade ago.

4. Remember to call mom and tell her I've still managed to avoid ISIS...

...but not at 6 am on a Sunday because Sunday is a day off in America (sorry.)

5. Figure out why the bank can’t accept a credit card, debit card, or wire transfer? Is it even a bank? Are we in the 1800s? Asking for a friend.

6. Dye Alix's hair black.

DO YOU SEE HOW BLONDE IT IS??!

7. Find a covert tunnel linking the apartment to campus in order to avoid the sun. Is it more plausible to hire a taxi to pick us up and return us everyday? No, that would be lazy.

Side note: does anyone know if they make SPF 200? Preferably oil free for my delicate visage.

8. Find multivitamins to make up for my diet of bread and hummus. Ok, I also ate some chocolate today. Calcium?

9. Look into investing in a camel- for racing and recreational use. Yes, camel racing is real. I looked into being a jockey but they actually use little machines dressed up in racing stripes that whip the camels. Absurd.

This is how I really want to show up to school everyday. It demonstrates cultural sensitivity...

Are camels allowed on campus? Do you need a camel permit to park your camel outside the Language Center?

10. Make rob learn how to use a squeegee to properly clean the floors.

Because he told me I needed to figure out how to clean the bathrooms and undermining the patriarchy is always #1 on my list of things to accomplish.