How I learned Colors in Arabic

                Two days passed along and I have made progress. Sometimes it is hard to believe that I will get anywhere because my understanding of Arabic is very little (especially ‘amiyah—Jordanian dialect), but I have learned something I never covered in class! COLORS.

                For a translation, this is how the dialogue went between my two host sisters, Sarah and Lara:

                “Do you know UNO?” –Sarah (11 years old)

                “What?” -me

                “UNO!” – Lara (7 years old)

                “What?”

                “UNO!!” –both girlies

                “Uno?”

                “NA’M! Want to play?”

                “Ah (yes)”

Yes, I know UNO, girls. Oh my god. This conversation should never have taken so much time. We have been playing UNO since yesterday at 4pm, and just finished playing at 11pm TODAY. Of course there were breaks. Little do they know, I am an UNO pro. Today I told them in broken ‘amiyah that I learned UNO when I was five. Except Lara replied quickly that she learned when she was four. Whatever, I think she is lying.

In any case, UNO is how I learned colors! Well, four colors: green, yellow, blue, and red. Who needs the rest, really? 

Other great things that have happened (and made my homesickness dwindle) include showing Lara and Sarah “Robot Unicorn Attack.” Nick Heinlein/Pat I hope you are proud! There is no word for unicorn in Arabic, and ‘rainbow’ is ‘rainbow’—nufsil-shay (same thing). Unfortunately, their internet is pretty slow, so it took 6 tries to load. They liked it, but not it was not instant-action-enough for them.

For reference, today it rained. It has been raining lately, so I am extremely happy I brought a raincoat, but not so much that my shoes are really, really, not waterproof. They love water. The reason I say this is because today we went to Souq Al-Jumaa’ (Friday Market)—which is exactly like a Goodwill but outside and with lots more haggling. My family bought me 1 JD Pink Slippers , and Lara and Sarah got new shoes (>7JD each). Now I know how to haggle.

1.       Keep denying their first price

2.       SHOW  them what you want to pay (take out exact change)

3.       If you don’t have exact change, tell them what you will pay

4.       If they say no--leave. There are so many other options.

5.       Telling them you are a poor student also helps.

Otherwise, our day has been pretty normal. Though I am glad I will be in school for over 20 hours every week…Most of the time we (family) watch TV—which is fine. But I am definitely not a TV girl. I expect to finish my long book within the next two weeks. Today we watched “Arab’s Got Talent”—hilarious. I also found out I look like some actress in one of Mel Gibsons’ movies. Any guesses?

Tomorrow is Saturday, the equivalent to our Sunday…so Sunday I go to school. I don’t know what we’re doing tomorrow, maybe more shopping. They love that stuff. They also mentioned Burger King, but I really don’t know what accompanied it.

So far, so good. Very relaxed family, we will see how relaxed they are when I push my curfew from 10pm to 12am for Thursday night fun. J

Tesba’h Al-Kher

(Good-night!)

p.s. I am not writing in Arabic to show off, it is actually becoming habitual already. I want to keep a hold on ALL the Arabic ‘amiyah I have learned so far…like, MEJNOON—“crazy.” So, it’s not for you, it’s for me.  Ok. Thanks for reading--