May 5, 2006: Mall rat

The weekends here are Friday and Saturday as opposed to the typical Saturday-Sunday of the western world. I think this has to do with the Sabbath being on Saturday rather than Sunday, but I’m not entirely sure. My weekend, however, is Friday. At the paper we work six days a week. No one here knows about Cinco de Mayo, except maybe the Pollo Ranchero fast food chain, but even then it’s doubtful. Why is it that every time I go abroad what I miss the most is Mexican food and why can NO ONE outside North America even come close?

Victoria had a friend in town from Cairo and took off for Petra early this morning. They invited me to come along, but with all the day trips earlier in the week and future trips to Petra on the horizon, I decided to wait and save myself.

A large part of my day was spent at Mecca Mall, soaking up the wi-fi connection. I’m officially a mall rat.

…later…

It’s past one in the morning. Something’s happening to a cat outside my window. It’s probably getting impregnated. Sounds painful. This is the close of my first week. It’s been in a whirlwind. I seem to go back and forth between being exhausted and just wanting to be alone, to being lonely and feeling like I’m bored out of my mind. It’s not boredom, though, it’s more…isolation. Not being able to speak Arabic and communicate with others makes me feel very disconnected from the world. Even though I travel with Yousef, given the communication barrier, we often drive for long periods of time saying nothing, our soundtrack a tape of Arabic pop music playing the same tunes over and over. You take for granted being able to express yourself and having others understand, but when you can’t communicate even the simplest things, like buying a pack of gum, become a chore. I bought what I thought was grape bubblegum today, instead, I got what I can only assume is the Arabic version of spearmint. It was the worse tasting gum I’ve ever had in my life. It tasted…medicated. Bleck!