Love at First Sight

Wednesday afternoon I was sitting in the cafeteria at Hebrew University. I had just gotten out of a class about early Protestant texts in Europe, and I had, as usual, fallen asleep. It's hard to listen to Hebrew for 90 minutes straight! I am understanding more and more, but I still get to the "overload" point before class is over and my mind just checks out. Plus, I hadn't eaten much all day, and I knew I had to get a sandwich or something or else I wasn't going to make it through 6 more hours of Arabic.

So I bought an avocado, lettuce, and tomato sandwich on a wheat hoagie. The thing cost me 13 shekels. 13!! I'm pretty sure that one tomato, 1/2 an avocado, the hoagie bun, and the 3 pieces of lettuce probably cost about 4 or 5 shekels. They are really making a killing off of those things.

Anyway, I went and sat down at a table and started wolfing down the sandwich so I could go to the library and meet with my Arabic tutor. A man dressed in an army officer uniform approaches my table, sets a folded note down in front of me, and starts talking rapidly in Hebrew. I understand nothing of what he's saying, but I smile politely and nod a couple of times, thinking he's passing out invitations to some event or something. And the "I live in the West Bank" part of me feels a little nervous, wondering if he's accusing me of something (he is, after all, wearing an army uniform). After a minute or two, he asks in Hebrew, "Is everything ok?"

"Yes," I answer, "but..." I stare at him and wonder if I should tell him that I have no idea what he just said, or if I should just leave it alone because I don't really care. "You don't speak Hebrew!" he says in English.

"Well, yes," I answer, not wanting to explain that I do speak Hebrew, but not when people talk that quickly.

"I was just sitting over there and I saw you. You are the most beautiful girl I've ever seen. I've really never seen anything like it. Here is my number (and he gestured at the note). I know we don't really know each other, but I would love it if we could go out for coffee or something. I'm sorry to interrupt your sandwich."

I sat there shocked. Really. What am I supposed to do in this sort of situation? I probably smiled or nodded or said, "No, it's not a problem that you disturbed my sandwich," or something, but I'm really not sure. What I do know is that after delivering his message in both Hebrew and English, he walked away quickly, and I finished my avocado sandwich and went to the library.

Later that evening, after my Arabic class in Jerusalem (another 3 hours in a different language--but this one was actually enjoyable), I was walking the 2 blocks home from the store. It was about 9 pm and, as usual at this hour, the streets were deserted. Suddenly I heard someone walking behind me, playing music on his phone. (Palestinian shabab have this weird habit of turning music on their phones and blasting it out of the little phone speakers when they want to look cool or impress someone.) Uh-oh, here comes trouble. Luckily I was almost home and hopefully, if I ignored him and let him get in front of me, I could walk in peace.

No such luck. I heard him approach. I slowed down to let him pass. As he passed, he turned around and said "Hello" in Arabic. "Hello," I responded in Arabic, knowing from previous experience that when I say something in Arabic, people leave me alone and just assume I'm native.

No such luck with this one. "Are you a foreigner or an Arab?" he asked in Arabic. "Foreigner," I said, looked away and kept walking, hoping he would get the hint that I wasn't giving him the time of day.

"Are you married?" Oh no. It's another one. How many of these people skip straight to the marriage question? "Yes." "No you aren't." "Yes, I am." "No. You aren't." Excuse me sir? Why are you calling me out on my marriage? I knew he didn't think I was married because I was walking alone at night, so I conceded. "I'm engaged, but I'm getting married next month." That should get him to leave me alone.

"Is he Arab or a foreigner?" "A foreigner." I didn't want this guy to think that I just up and marry Arab men.

"Do you want to exchange your fiance for me?" Excuse me? Did you just ask me what I thought you asked me? No, I do not want to exchange my fiance for you. This was not flattery. This was straight up harassment. Luckily, I was a few paces away from the store across from my house. I pretended not to understand the man and kept walking.

"Walk with me," he said, reminding me of Kohor on The Testaments (you know the creeper who employs Jacob as a stonecutter). The feminist in me gets fired up. Excuse me? Don't order me around. Don't tell me what to do, and don't think you're getting some action tonight. The only action you'll get is three slaps to the face if you keep talking to me.

I walk toward the store. "Where are you going?" "I have to buy something. Bye." "Bye," he says, and turns away. Wow, that was easy. I stayed in the store for several minutes to give him time to walk away. After buying my stuff, I checked to see if he was outside. Safe. I couldn't see anyone. I opened the door and walked out. And THERE HE WAS, skulking in the shadows.

"What?!" I said in Arabic. "Walk with me," he said. "No," I stated emphatically, looking disgusted. His shoulders drooped and he turned to walk away. I stormed into my apartment building. No such luck tonight, buddy. I certainly wasn't born yesterday.

That's two in one day, people. And I didn't even change perfume or laundry detergent brands...

Stranger on the Train

Ready for another story from my trip to Spain and Morocco? Most of my time in Morocco, sadly, was spent on the train. I rode from Tangier to Rabat on Saturday, from Rabat to Assilah on Sunday, and from Asilah to Tangier on Monday. If I did it again, I would definitely try to spend less time on the train and more time in Morocco.

The problems with the trains in Morocco, as in the rest of the Middle East, is you never know when they are going to come. You can be positive that they aren't going to be early, but they might arrive up to 5 hours late if it is a long-distance train, and that's totally normal and just something you have to plan for.

Looking out the train window

On the ride from Rabat to Assilah, I was feeling great. I had just gone to church and had a beautiful experience in the teeny congregation in Rabat with just a few expat families. I had ridden the train before, and this time I could actually see out the windows. What could go wrong?

After about an hour a man got on at one of the stops and, stopping by the empty seat next to me, said something to me in French. "I don't speak French," I said in Arabic. "Oh," he said in Arabic. "Is anyone sitting in this seat?" "No," I answered, which was good because he had already sat down.

"You don't speak French but you speak Arabic?" It was the same question I got all over Morocco. Why in the world would this foreigner speak Arabic but not French? "What do you do? Are you working here?" He was wearing a suit and seemed educated, so I assumed that this was harmless getting-to-know-your-seatmate small talk. I answered in short, simple sentences--I didn't want to be stuck talking to this guy for several hours--and started pulling my ipod toward me.

He didn't get the hint. He was friendly enough, but I have a hard enough time understanding Moroccan Arabic--and he kept flipping into French, which made him impossible to understand.

After several minutes, in which I learned that he was going to medical school in Casablanca or something like that and had studied in France, he asked me where I was getting off. "Assilah," I said. "Oh, I'm getting off at the stop right before that! I have a car there. If you want, we can get off together and I can give you a tour of the area before taking you to Assilah!"

No. No, no, no. I don't care if you are wearing a business suit and have business cards. I don't get off the train with strange men to get in their car alone with them. Not in Morocco, not in Egypt, not in Jordan, not in the West Bank. No.

I politely refused. Perhaps it was too polite. I turned to look out the window, feeling superbly uncomfortable. How to get this man to leave? 5 minutes later he nudged me with his knee. "What are you thinking about?" he asked. What?! Are we dating now? What I'm thinking about is none of your business! Unfortunately, I wasn't brave enough to say that (I really didn't want to cause a scene and I felt safe enough on the public train), so I said instead, "I'm looking at the green fields. We don't have a  lot of green where I live." And I pointedly turned and looked out the window again.

 

5 minutes later he was at it again. The food cart came around, and he asked if I wanted anything. "No." I certainly didn't want this strange man to start buying me food and drinks and think he was going to get a half-day date with me. "Coffee and a water," he said to the food cart guy, and handed me the water bottle. "Thanks," I said, wanting to put the water back on the food cart. "It's nothing," he said, which is true, because water costs like 20 cents. But still. I didn't want to be accepting favors from this man.

10 minutes later, after trying to start a few conversations with me, he asked, "Do you mind if I go out and smoke?" No, of course I don't mind, since I won't have to talk to you, but since when did you need your seatmate's permission to go out and smoke? (I guess you can smoke in the closed area between cars on trains in Morocco. At least you can't smoke in the cabins!)

While he was gone I thought about what I should do. Should I get up, grab my luggage, and move to another cart? But what if he saw me leaving? What if I couldn't get another seat? I wasn't worried, since we were on a public train and I speak Arabic, but I didn't want to deal with him any longer. Finally I decided to stay, realizing that he should know straight up that foreign girls don't get off the train with random strangers.

When he came back, he started talking to me again. "We're getting close to my stop. It'll be about another 30 minutes. (Oh no, I thought, do I have to sit by you for that long?) So, you're getting off the train with me, right? I'm excited to be giving you a tour."

"No." I said it firmly and unapologetically. "I'm sorry, but I can't." "Why not?" he asked. "Is it because you don't know who I am? Look," he said as he pulled out his id and medical school card. "This is me. Now you know who I am. I'm a safe person."

What the heck? How does showing me your id suddenly make me think that it would be a good idea to get off the train and ride in your car with you through a strange town? "No, it's not appropriate. I'm engaged," I said, trying the oldest trick in the book.

"I'm engaged too!" he said. Liar. "She lives in France." Liar. I don't believe you for one minute. "Ah, so you understand. I can't go out with strange men because I'm engaged." "No, no, it's ok! We're just going as friends!" "No, we aren't friends. I just met you on the train."

It went on like this for several more minutes. Finally, he said, "Are you rejecting me because you're afraid for safety reasons?" If I'm straight up with him, maybe he will leave me alone. "Yes. I don't know you. I don't care if you are trustworthy or not. I don't go out with strange men anywhere."

At this point he started getting mad. "I'm offended! This is my honor you're talking about! I can't believe you don't trust my honor. You are passing up a great opportunity. I can't believe you would say no to me." What, are we having a breakup fight now? "Well, I don't care about your honor. I care more about my safety. And the answer is no."

We argued back and forth for about 10 more minutes. I grew more and more astonished as the time went on. Does this man really think I'm going to change my mind? He finally threw in a last-ditch attempt at convincing me: "True, you shouldn't get off the train with any strange man. But you should trust your feelings. And I'm a trustworthy guy." And any man that gets mad and starts arguing when I won't get off the train and ride with him in his car definitely doesn't give me warm-fuzzy feelings. I said no a final time and turned to look out the window. I could feel him seething beside me. After a few minutes, I heard him get up angrily and walk away. Safe. He's gone for good. I quickly put my earphones in and left them there the rest of the ride. I didn't want anyone else to try and talk to me.

And what did I notice after the strange man left? I was sitting next to this sign on the window.

I know now that it says "emergency exit" in French (thanks google translate!) but to my limited French, it told me that the alarm bells in my head were correct. "Issue of Security," it seemed to say, as in "going out with a strange man in Morocco is a definite security issue."

Life as a Lone Traveller

A few weeks ago I took a trip to Spain and Morocco. Alone. The thought of travelling alone in two countries I had never been before was a bit terrifying at first. But then a week before I left I was talking to my mother on Skype, and I realized, "I live in the West Bank. ALONE. I always travel alone. I think I'll be ok."

However, travelling alone always brings with it the hilarious, the creepy, and the wow-these-people-are-so-nice-did-they-really-just-go-out-of-their-way-to-help-me. So here you are: life as a lone traveller in Spain and Morocco.

*First, you have to know that I speak very little Spanish. Very, very little. I can count to ten, nod my head yes or no, and say tu hable Ingles?" I think we've seen in a previous post, however, that my Spanish skills were unfortunately more useful than my English, Arabic, Chinese, or Hebrew skills in Spain. One day I was trying to find an internet cafe. I was planning on leaving for Morocco the next day and I wanted to compare flight and plane prices, connect with my friends in Casablanca about church on Sunday, and try and find a place to stay. Basically, I was desperate for internet. I was staying in the Madrid temple's patron housing, so I asked the person at the front desk (who, thankfully, spoke excellent English) where an internet cafe was. He looked up the closest ones on his phone, printed me off a map, and wished me luck. Unfortunately, I needed more than luck (I realized several hours later that he had given me the wrong map!)--I needed a miracle. After getting off at two different metro stops and consulting my map for at least 20 minutes to try and figure out where I was, I finally walked into a pharmacy. Surely pharmacists speak English, as the medical world converses in English, I thought to myself. "Tu hable Ingles?" I asked. No. Not at all. Not even enough to understand "What's the name of this street? Nombre? Calle?" The pharmacist wanted so badly to help that she kept speaking to me rapidly in Spanish and gesturing at the map while I looked at her helplessly. Finally she turned to one of the several customers that had accumulated since I had entered the store. "Excuse me," she asked in Spanish, "do any of you speak English?" One of them did and, as everyone in the store looked on encouragingly, translated the pharmacist's directions: "This is the wrong metro stop. You need to get back on the metro and go in the opposite direction." (It was at this point that I realized the map was wrong.) "Gracias," I said as I left the store. Thank you, thank you, thank you for wanting to help enough to ask your other customers to translate, I thought as I walked back toward the metro. (By the way, after another hour of searching, I discovered that the internet cafe had closed. Fail.)

*I took a day trip to Toledo to visit the Christian/Muslim/Jewish sites there and see a place where, at one time, all of them had lived together in a relative peace. While I was there I stopped in at the Santa Maria la Blanca synagogue, which was, according to my Triposo ipod app, "constructed under the Christian Kingdom of Castile by Islamic architects for Jewish use" and is owned and preserved by the Catholic church. I was a little overwhelmed at the mix of religion, architecture, and tradition, and stopped by the table of the nun who was selling some of the art on display in the former synagogue. "I live here," I said, pointing at a picture of Jerusalem. "You do?" she asked excitedly and then, in Hebrew, "Do you speak Hebrew?" Shocked, I asked her why a Catholic nun in Spain would speak Hebrew. "Our order's founder was born in Israel...he converted to Christianity and started this order. We want to be a bridge between the Jewish and Christian communities, so he is teaching us Hebrew and we celebrate all the Jewish holidays here, in celebrations that are open to the public." And this, my friends, is the odd story of a Mormon girl from Utah and a Catholic nun conversing in Hebrew in the middle of Spain.

 

*A little later in the day, I stopped by the mosque of Cristo de la Luz in Toledo, which is one of the oldest mosques in Europe (and which was later converted into a cathedral). After examining the Arabic graffiti on the walls, I sat in a corner to give my feet a rest for a minute. "I wonder what the Arabic graffiti says," I heard someone say IN ENGLISH. Finally, someone I could understand! "It says God is the merciful one," I offered. Turns out this family was from Toledo, Ohio, just visiting their daughter who was studying in Switzerland and taking a side trip to the other Toledo. OHIO. People, this family was from the very state that I am planning on moving to next year, and their daughter has some good friends at THE Ohio State University. The only people who speak English in the whole town, and they're from Ohio.

*A lot of my stories are from Toledo. I got on a bus to go back to the train station, and since the sun had gone down and it was dark I got a little disoriented. I was trying to figure out which stop to get off at, and I looked out the window and saw a train. But just as I was about to get off, I saw a bridge and remembered that we had passed over a bridge just after the train station, so I settled back in my seat, deciding that maybe the train was up the tracks a little way instead of sitting at the station. And then suddenly, before the bus driver could close the doors (we were 2 bus stops past where I had seen the train by now), a woman came up to me and started speaking excitedly in Spanish. Seeing that I understood nothing, she finally said, "Train?" When I said "si, si," she shouted to the bus driver to reopen the doors and, pointing back the way we had come, said, "Train, train." I got off and yep, sure enough, the train I had seen was indeed sitting at the station. I have no idea how that woman knew I wanted to go to the train station, but I thank her and divine intervention for helping me get off when I did.

*After several days in Spain, I attended one last temple session before going to Madrid. Spain was wonderful and the temple was spectacular, but I really missed speaking to people in English. Or even Arabic or Chinese or Hebrew. Basically I missed understanding and being understood by people. Friday evening, as I was at the temple, one of the workers started speaking to me in (native) English. Turns out she and her husband were from KAYSVILLE, Utah and were missionaries at the Madrid temple. People. My PARENTS live in Kaysville. It just happened that I ran into one of the only English speakers in the temple, and it just happened that she was from the same small city in Utah that my parents live in. It was a huge sign to me that God loves me and is very aware of me.

 

*I took a train from Madrid to Algeciras, where I wanted to catch a bus to Tarifa and then take a ferry to the port in Tangier. However, when I got to the bus station, no one could confirm my guidebook's directive that there was actually a port in Tarifa and ferries actually did depart from there to get to Tangier. When the bus came, I tried to ask the driver. "Tarifa? Ferry in Tarifa? Ferry to Tangier?" I tried. He finally nodded, and I knew that at least this bus was going to Tarifa, if nothing else! But then as I was walking to the back of the bus a Moroccan woman asked me, "Are you taking the ferry to Tangier from Tarifa? My husband and I are also taking the ferry...when we get to Tarifa maybe we can split a taxi to get to the port." And it was a good thing that I had them to follow, because the bus dropped us off almost a mile from the port and there were no taxis. Luckily I had them to follow, rolling our suitcases all the way!

*I have lived in the Middle East for more than 14 months now, and I have been all over Egypt, Jordan, and the West Bank. I thought I was used to the cat calls and harassment that girls with white skin, red hair, and blue eyes experience in the Middle East. But dang, the men in Morocco were like nothing I have ever encountered. I got in to Rabat around 10 at night and got off the train to try and find my hotel. Within seconds of leaving the train station, young shabab (young men between the ages of 14-28) surrounded me. Some of them offered to help me pull my one small piece of luggage, others of them told me I was beautiful in French, Arabic, and English, and one of them was so persistent that he followed me to my hotel (a mere block and a half away from the train station, thankfully!). "Excuse me," he said, "Have I seen you before?" "No," I stated emphatically. "No really, I think I know you. Didn't I meet you at..." he left it hanging and I waited, expectantly, to see where he thought he knew me from. "Nope," I stated, knowing full well that we had never met before. As I got to my hotel door, he said, "What I really mean is, will you go out for coffee with me?" Guys, I've never seen the men so over-the-top pushy. I probably could have gotten married within the hour if I wanted to! I'm pretty sure in 3 days in Morocco I was asked on more dates than I had in 6 years at BYU. And no, this is not a reflection on my pathetic social life in college. :)

*I stayed in this totally sketch hotel in Rabat. It was only 15 dollars a night for a private room with a shower in the room (although there were only two toilets per floor, in separate rooms in the hall). But hey, it was only a block and a half from the train station, it was super cheap, and I didn't have to go wandering far in the streets of Morocco to find a hotel (and be attacked by the shabab all along the way). I had absolutely no desire to touch anything on the bed or the floor, though, so I pulled out a sheet I had brought for this very purpose and rolled up in it before I got on the bed, moving the pillow out of the way and instead sleeping on my dirty laundry bag. It was freezing in the room, though, so I put on several shirts from my dirty clothes pile and tried not to die in my thin sheet. I woke up several times in the middle of the night, certain that I would freeze to death, but I finally got up at 6, grateful to have survived the night (and hopeful that I hadn't contracted any worms or diseases from the room). I realized that I had forgotten my flip flops, but there was no way I was going to stand barefoot on that shower floor. I put a plastic bag on the floor, turned on the water, and tried to step in. BAM. Naturally sloped shower floor + wet plastic bag + mid-calf-high step into the shower = big bruise on my calf from falling. Thankfully I didn't touch the floor and the water was even warm.

When I saw the room I thought to myself, "My father would die before staying at this hotel. But hey. $15 a night."

*The next morning, after my freezing night at the hotel, I was supposed to meet my friends Brooke and Max at the train station, where they would take me to church. I was super excited to go to church in Morocco, but even more I think I was excited to see someone I knew and speak English. Imagine my dismay when they didn't show up at the appointed time. 8:20 came and went. 8:30. 8:40. I'm pretty sure she said church starts at 9...did I miss them? Did they forget about me? Did they get in an accident? Did Brooke send me an email changing the plan and I just didn't get it? Before I panicked, I realized I had Brooke's number. But every pay phone was phone-card only, not cash. I finally walked up to a group of chatty girls. "Excuse me," I asked in Arabic. "Do you know where there are pay phones where you can use cash and not a card?" "Just use my phone," one of the girls said, in English. "Welcome to Morocco!" I called twice to no avail. And then the nice girl tried to call. "It says this is an invalid number," she said. Invalid number? Can I panic yet? I don't have the address of the church...I don't even have Max's number! I thought to myself. Trying not to cry (it had been a long night, ok?!), I walked back in the train station to try and find another phone. The most beautiful thing I have ever heard was someone shouting "Breanne!" as I wandered through the station. Turns out there are two train stations in Rabat, and Brooke and Max had been waiting at the other one. I almost kissed them, I was so happy to not be abandoned at a train station in Morocco! And church was wonderful.

*And finally, although I had many, many more adventures, I will end with this one (although my layover in Rome and a crazy experience on the train in Morocco deserve their own posts, which are forthcoming). The train stations in Morocco are kind of wild. Some of them are in the middle of big cities, and some of them are in the middle of nowhere. Literally. After my stint in Rabat, I took the train to Assilah. By the time we got there, it was after dark. I got off the train and saw everyone walking to the edge of the platform and disappearing into the darkness. My guidebook said that you had to walk a few kilometers from the train station to the town, so I grabbed my suitcase and walked off into the darkness. Wanting to make sure I was walking the right way, however, I turned back and asked an older woman (in Arabic), "Is this the way to get to Assilah?" And just like everyone else in Morocco, she responded to me in French. "Please, speak Arabic," I said. "I don't speak French." "Arabic? You speak Arabic? Come. Come with me. My son is waiting on the road. You can ride with us. Where do you need to go?" They drove me right to my hotel (which was much less sketch than my one the night before and only $10 a night, by the way) and, when I asked if I could pay, she just laughed and closed the door. Thank you, dear woman, for giving me a ride so I didn't have to walk down a dark highway alone! (But the next morning, when I was walking back to the train station and two shabab asked me if I wanted a ride, I politely said no. Don't worry, I only take rides if there is a woman in the car!)

The Assilah train station, situated in the middle of nowhere.

So that's it, my friends. Travelling alone certainly gave me some crazy stories, but above all, I realized that people are so willing to help. So, anybody want to join me on my next adventure?

*PS (can I put a PS on a blog post?): my sister just reminded me that I forgot to tell the story of when I pretended I could only speak Chinese. I was getting pretty sick of people harassing me in English, French, and Spanish. When I got to Assilah, I went for a walk around the town, but it was dark and as has been seen, the creepers come out in the dark. I was walking around the Old City, just heading back go my hotel, and suddenly I see this guy out of the corner of my eye making a beeline for me and speaking at me in English. I shook my head. "我不會將," I said in Chinese. I don't speak that language. He tried Spanish and French. I kept shaking my head and repeating in Chinese, "I don't speak that." BAM. Less than 15 seconds of refusing in Chinese, and he walked away. Success. I think I'm safe with Chinese as my "native" language all over the Middle East...

Stuck in Spain, Part II

Continued from this post.

I'm sure you have all been on the edge of your seats wondering how this story will end. And I'm sorry to keep you in suspense for so long, but I have learned a little secret about my life: I can barely live without internet. And another little secret? For some reason my internet at home seems to go down every weekend. I know. Talk about frustrating. I have almost gotten to the stage of wandering around with my ipod trying to find an open signal so I can check my email.

Anyway. When I left off last, I had just left Meribelle's information booth to walk over to the pay phones to call my sister. Just as I was about to sacrifice some of my remaining Euros to the cause (thankfully a few had fallen out of my wallet into my bag), Meribelle came running up with a handful of coins. "Here," she said. "Use these." I refused, telling her that I had several Euros that I could use. "Oh well," she said. "Take them anyway. If you don't use them you can bring them back."

This woman must be a saint. Or an angel. Or both. I hope her place is reserved in heaven. I put several Euros in and began the first of many 2 Euros/minute calls to the US. And wouldn't you know it? Just as my sister answered and I started frantically explaining to her what to do about the plane ticket, watching the seconds tick down and putting in another Euro every 30 seconds, some man comes up to me and starts speaking to me in Spanish. I shot him the can't you see I'm busy and I don't speak Spanish? look and kept talking to my sister. And then. AND THEN. He started asking me in Arabic for money. Or maybe it was English. Or maybe he was still speaking Spanish. I couldn't really tell at that point. I looked at him, incredulous that he would be asking me for money, and a little bit disgusted that he would interrupt this incredibly expensive phone call to beg. "I don't have any money. No. Not any," I told him, almost laughing at the ridiculousness of it all.

By this time it was getting late and I was getting desperate. "I think there is a Western Union nearby," I told my sister. "Let me run out and see when it closes and I'll call you back with the info." So I ran out of the station, across the huge parking lot, crossed three streets, and went into the Western Union. Unfortunately, that one was already closed, but the one down the street "stays open until 10," said the man at the counter. So I went to the one down the street. "Tu hables ingles?" I asked hopefully. When the man at the counter shook his head no and said, "Espanol? Francais?" I looked at him closely and said "Arabi?"

Success. He was Moroccan. After finding out that they close at midnight and I don't need a Western Union code or anything, yes my family could just send it online, yes it transfers immediately, and yes I'll be right back, I ran back to the station and called my sister again. "Ok, they have a Western Union and you can just transfer the money. I need 50 Euros. Thanksifitdoesn'tworkI'llcallyouagain" I said and hung up before I had to put in another Euro.

I checked with Meribelle to make sure my luggage was still ok in her information booth and then ran back to the Western Union. The time was 8:30. My bus left at 9:00. I still needed to get the money, run back to the station, pay for my ticket, and get on the bus. And maybe, I thought, the adrenaline pumping, just maybe, I'll make it.

I burst into the door of the Western Union and ran up to the counter, panting. The man was chatting with someone else. I started tapping my toes in impatience. He kept chatting (I'm assuming it was a customer). Then he looked up at me and said "Just a minute." "I'm sorry, but can you hurry?" I asked, my panic overruling my manners. "My bus leaves in 20 minutes."

When I had almost exploded from the pumping adrenaline, he turned to help me. "Do you have the confirmation number?" he asked. "What? What confirmation number? Can't I just give you my passport?" "Nope. I need the number," he said. Desperate, I saw the green phones lining the wall. Pay phones. The kind you pay after you call. I left the counter and ran into an open booth. Broken. I tried another booth. Also broken. I paced back and forth waiting for a working booth to become empty and then ran inside to call my sister and get the confirmation number. Busy. I called again. Busy. I called again. Still busy. I tried my mother's number. Busy. "They're on the phone with each other!" I thought frantically, as I dialed my father's number. "Dad. I need you to get ahold of mom and tell her to get off the phone with Jocilyn. I need the confirmation number!!! My bus leaves in 12 minutes!" I shouted into the phone. My father, ever the calm one, said, "Can I transfer you some money?" Yes. Yes. Transfer me some money and I'll call you back in exactly one minute.

I rocked back and forth in the booth for exactly 55 seconds and called him again. "What's the code," I asked. No time for pleasantries, my bus leaves in 11 minutes. "I'm still waiting for the page to load!" he said, exasperated. "Can't you get on the bus and pay them in Madrid when you arrive?" "I'll try that. If I don't call again that's what I did," I said and ran out of the booth, out of the store, and across two streets.

I forgot to pay for the phone call. Realizing that my honor was more important that making the bus, I ran across two streets and back into the store. Interrupting the customers at the counter, I said, "I forgot to pay" and shoved 20 dirhams at him (about 2.5 dollars), even though it only cost 4. As he was fishing in the cash register for change, I said "Never mind!" and ran out of the store, back across 3 streets, across the parking lot, and into the station to try and buy a bus ticket. Panting, sweating, and almost hyperventilating, I watched in horror as the bus tickets man, on the phone, started pulling at least a week's worth of receipts out of his drawer and setting them on the counter, all the while talking rapidly in Spanish on the telephone and occasionally glancing at the man who I assumed he was helping. 4 minutes left. 3 minutes left. The man is still on the phone, spreading out the receipts, and I am about to miss my bus. With 1 minute left before 9, Meribelle walked into the office. "Did you get the money?" she asked. "No," I panted. "I want to know if I can get on the bus and pay in Madrid." Finally the man hung up and Meribelle spoke to him. My rough translation: "Has the bus already left?" Checks his watch. "Yep." "Can she buy a bus ticket and pay in Madrid?" "What is her problem? She has been in here 5 times already and she doesn't speak any Spanish and I don't speak any English." "Her wallet was stolen!" At this point everyone in the office turns and looks at me and they mutter a collective sigh of pity. I nod pathetically. "No she can't. But there's a bus at 10 pm."

Meribelle turns to me. "There's a bus at 10." "There's a bus at 10?" I almost melted into a puddle of relief and sweat. "What am I running for? Will he reserve a place for me on the bus? I will run and get the money and come right back."

With a promise that he would hold a seat for me until 9:45, I ran back to the Western Union. Again. The man looked up as I burst into the store again. By this time I think he had gotten used to it. Once again I went to the green telephone booths and sat in one. I called my sister. "Mom is at the Western Union. They wouldn't let me do it online. She had to go in to the store. She should be there now."

Call #2, this time to my mother's cell phone, met with success. "Do you have the confirmation number?" I asked. "You don't need it," she said. No. No, I very much need it, thank you very much. Confirmation number in hand, I told my mother, "Tell Jocilyn to try and find the cheapest option for getting a new flight, please," hung up, and walked over to the counter. My new bill for the calls to America were still covered by that 20 dirham bill I had shoved at the owner, so he took my confirmation number, looked at my passport, and gave me the money. Thankfully I had a few dirham left (I had taken them out of my wallet when we reached Spain) and I had them changed to Euros (the Western Union/pay phone center/internet cafe also happened to be a money change place, conveniently). And then I walked back to the port (no need to run this time). And yes, throughout this whole process I thought about the horrific memory I have of that time my parents were visiting and we were stuck at the airport in Amman. Definitely not something I wanted to repeat in at least 3 lifetimes.

I got my bags from Meribelle (and asked for an evaluation form so I could tell her supervisor that she saved my life and needs a raise--she just laughed and shrugged like it was nothing), bought my bus ticket from the bus ticket man (he still couldn't speak any English, and I still couldn't speak any Spanish) and I walked out to find the bus. After getting back almost to the Western Union and sure I had missed it, I walked over to some people standing at a stoplight. "Tu hable ingles?" I started, but then stopped. Arabs. Great. They speak Arabic. Thank goodness for all of these Moroccans in this border town! They had no idea what bus I was talking about, but motioned to a bus station another block away.

Nope. I knew that wasn't the right one because that was the bus station I had used several days before. Panicking once again, afraid that I would miss the bus after all of this madness, I headed back to the station. Passing some guys on the way who asked me in Spanish if I needed help (they must have seen me walking back and forth), I just asked them in Arabic if they knew where the bus to Madrid was. I guessed right, they were Arabs, and they pointed me to the bus.

Phew. It was only 10 minutes late. At 10:12 I had loaded my luggage, sat in my seat, and we were on the way. I was exhausted and hadn't eaten since breakfast, but I was too worried about paying for another plane ticket and getting out of Madrid to be able to sleep much. I drifted off into a nightmarish sleep, dreaming of me running back and forth and never getting anything done (or was that reality?), until we pulled into Madrid.

5:50 am. NO WAY. I took the 10 pm bus and still made it to Madrid before 6 am (they told me the 9 pm bus gets to Madrid at 6). I grabbed my luggage and ran inside, found a pay phone, and called my sister. "I'm in Madrid. Did you buy a ticket? I think I'm going to make my plane." "Yes. I did. It leaves at noon."

"Ok. I'm going to the airport now. If I call you from there please try to cancel my ticket." And I ran outside to the taxis.

"Airport," I said, as one taxi driver motioned me over. "How much?" At this point, I was willing to pay anything, but I only had 30 Euro left. "27, 29 Euro," he said. I pulled my money out to make sure I had enough and jumped in.

Sure enough, it was an 8 minute ride to the airport, and sure enough, it cost 27 Euro. I will never pay that much for a taxi ride again in my life, but it was totally going to be worth it if I could make my plane and somehow get my money for the other ticket refunded.

I grabbed my suitcase and started running into the airport, naturally slipping and falling to the pavement (I had been on a bus all night, ok?) and getting a nice green bruise to show for my pain. The taxi driver looked worried, but I just got up and kept running into the airport.

I found my line and looked at the people. 6:10 am and 14 people in front of me. I turned to the man just in front of me. "Me. Flight. Siete," I said, trying to make him understand. I pointed in front of him. Thankfully, he understood, and told the rest of the people in line (after I struggled with the next four, who obviously didn't understand what I wanted at all) to let me cut in front of them. I have no shame in times like these.

I checked in, grabbed my ticket, and ran to the boarding area. When I got to my flight, there were still at least 50 people in line. Great. There's still time to find a pay phone and have Jocilyn cancel that flight. 5 minutes of searching later (and after asking an employee who thankfully spoke English), I found the phones and called my sister. "I made it. Please. If you can cancel the flight, please do. Thank you." Thanks for staying up until almost midnight to call Expedia for me. Thanks for not thinking I'm insane (although that thought apparently cropped up, as was mentioned in the comments in my previous post).

I walked over to the boarding area, got on the plane, sat down, and tried to dry the sweat off. The 12 hours of adrenaline rush was a little too much for me, and after I ate my hallal breakfast (I keep trying different special orders to find out which one is best, but I think it depends on the flight. Mostly I just like being served first, let's be honest, especially if I'm sitting at the back of the plane) I fell into an exhausted slumber.

When we landed in Rome, I found the next boarding area, sat down, and forked over the money to check my email. "Flight cancelled" jumped off the page at me. It was from my sister. "Dear Breanne, I'm sorry this was such a mess for you. I called Expedia and they said since it was booked within 24 hours, the ticket is 100% refundable. I cancelled it and got all the money back. Hope you have a nice flight. Jocilyn."

I love Expedia. And I love my sister. And I love Meribelle. And that German couple. And all of those nice people who helped me through those manic 12 hours.

Lessons learned? First of all, I need to learn Spanish. Second of all, don't miss the train. But third, I learned that people are good. It's something I don't always remember as I face ridiculous political situations every day. The past 6 months have been hard, very hard, and it is easy to think that everyone in the world is selfish and mean and only cares about land and money. But this experience, as crazy and expensive as it was, was, I think, God's way of telling me, "Breanne, people are good. They are so good. Look at all these people who helped you, went way out of their way to help you, just because they are good and you needed help."

So yes. I'm glad it happened. I went to Spain to decompress, to be reminded of my temple covenants, and to come back to a fresh start in Jerusalem. And you know what? It worked. Al-Hamdulillah.

The Move to Bethlehem: Part 1

I have been considering moving to Bethlehem for several weeks now, for several reasons. First of all, I wanted to be forced to speak Arabic every day...even when I was tired and didn't want to wander the streets of East Jerusalem to find someone to talk to. Secondly, the rent (and cost of living) is MUCH cheaper in Bethlehem, in part because it is behind the separation wall and the economic situation is not the best. And thirdly, I came here to experience life on both sides, and what better way to see what life is like in the West Bank than to live there?

With these considerations (and after a lot of prayer), I decided to move to Bethlehem. Sahar, a Palestinian member of the church who also lives in Bethlehem (and has been a great help and friend to me), had given me several options of people she knew who were renting out apartments, and I finally decided to go with one right next to the checkpoint. The house was surrounded on three sides by the separation wall (pictures to come) and seriously looked like a prison, but I decided I wanted to get the whole experience and so grabbed my stuff and move in.

The "apartment" was actually a guest house, with 5 or 6 rooms with private bathrooms. The kitchen and living room were shared, but other than that each room was private (although some rooms had 4 beds in them!). However, no one had been staying there for months, and the landlord said that no one was going to be there until Christmas (and then just for 2 nights), so I thought of it as moving into my own apartment and not a guesthouse.

Imagine my surprise when I opened the door to my new apartment with all of my luggage and saw a man sitting inside! "Oh, hi," he said. "Are you moving in too?"

Too? Too? No. No, I'm not moving in too. I'm moving in! This is my apartment! At least, that is what I thought it would be. I was so startled that I didn't say anything except a feeble "Hi, nice to meet you" and started taking my stuff back to my room. I was so shocked and overwhelmed that I didn't notice that there was a step down between the kitchen and my bedroom. I was carrying a large box filled with pots and other kitchen supplies, and as I stepped into my bedroom I missed the step and fell flat on my face, dropping the box and spilling the contents everywhere.

Unfortunately, the box also had a large bottle of canola oil in it, and when the box dropped the canola oil broke open and started spilling everywhere.

This was the last straw for me, and I did what any reasonable person would do: I started crying. And then walked out of the house to make some phone calls to see if I could get myself moved out of this awkward situation.

However, NO ONE was answering their phone. I walked back to the church in Bethlehem (my apt was 3 blocks away) to see if the people I was trying to get in contact with were there having a meeting, but the church was locked up and everyone was gone. And after about 14 phone calls with no luck, I finally called Arlissa, another member of my branch, and started crying. This was not what I was hoping for when I decided to move to Bethlehem!

Luckily for me, Sahar didn't stay in her meeting for too much longer and called me back as soon as she got done. "Is there some sort of emergency?" she wanted to know. "Because you called me like 9 times!"

Well, yes, there is an emergency. "There's a man living in my apartment!" I told her. She was just as shocked as me (thanks, Sahar, for validating my reaction!) and immediately asked if I wanted to go check out another apartment farther in the city. I went and spoke with the landlady and told her I felt awkward about the situation, and she totally understood and didn't even ask me to pay any rent (for the 1.5 hours I lived there...). And Sahar took me to another apartment, rented out by her niece, and not too far from where she herself lives.

Let me tell you, friends, that as soon as I saw the empty apartment (2 bedroom/1bath/kitchen/living room) and verified that no one else would be living there with me, I moved in that very night. It was actually more like 15 min. And let me tell you all, it has been amazing to have my own apartment! Of course, I don't have any mid-40s nice British men for roommates, but that is one thing I can do without!

I'm Too Uncultured to do Anything but Laugh at Modern Art

Last week was the opening of the "Jerusalem Art Show," which was a venue for contemporary art in the Old City of Jerusalem. When I heard about it, I had two thoughts go through my head: "I don't do large groups of artists walking around smoking and talking about the deeply moving inspiration caused by those streaks of paint," and "This could be pretty cool. At the very least, I'd have something to blog about!"

So naturally I went. It was all for you, dear blog readers. And for me, since I needed a good laugh.

When I got to the starting point (we were going to walk around the Old City to several different venues), I thought to myself, "Yeah, I really don't do large groups of artists walking around smoking and talking about the deeply moving inspiration caused by those streaks of paint, but I'm sure I'll have some crazy stories to blog about!" And I wasn't disappointed.

The first building we went in was still under construction/renovation. Like everything else in the Old City, the walls were cracked and the staircase was temporary and pretty questionable. One of the artists was doing a presentation, and we all had to wait and go in 5 at a time (the room was pretty small). Before we went in, we were asked to agree on a performance (from a list of 7) that the artists would do for us. We picked #7, which had as its description an old Chinese story. This told us absolutely nothing about what he would actually do, which should have been my first clue.

I started getting really nervous when we walked in because there was a man dressed all in black and wearing a ski mask standing there. I immediately went into "emergency mode," looking around for possible exits in case things got out of hand. However, then someone mentioned that he was from Taiwan, and my fears of Hamas-led "art" immediately vanished.

When we came in, he asked for a volunteer to move the pile of sand on the floor about 6 inches to the left with the shovel while he did the same to another pile of dirt behind the table. As this occurred in silence, the rest of us searched desperately for some sort of meaning or inspiration (well, most of the rest of us--I was struggling to hold back the laughter).

And then, that was it. He finished moving the pile of dirt, walked over and saw that the other woman had moved the pile of dirt, and called for the next group of spectators to choose a performance.

I walked outside quickly and tried to compose myself (I was laughing pretty hard), while the rest of the people in my group kept asking each other, "What was he doing? What did it mean?" "Well," I wanted to say, "He was moving a pile of dirt. It means that now he has twice as much floor area covered with dirt than he did before." But I didn't say anything.

AND THEN. One of the guys from my group came up and asked me, "What was he doing? What did it mean?" "I have no idea," I said. "Oh," he said. "I guess that's art, right? Imagination."

"Or dirt," I thought.

But it turns out that this guy was much more interesting that piles of dirt being moved around. He was from France and was on a solitary "tour of the world." And he'd been out for a year and had explored all of Asia!! Pakistan, Thailand, Vietnam, China, Syria...he'd been all over. He said he planned another year to hit Africa and South America. And he was just traveling by himself, sleeping in hostels, mingling with the locals, and backpacking around the world.

Guys. What an AWESOME idea. I don't think I would ever have the money (or the emotional stamina) to do such a thing, but just talking to him about what he had done made me think for just ten seconds about doing a similar thing. (The crazy thing is he said he'd only spent about 9,000 Euros in that year!)

And the oddest thing? He spoke Chinese and had lived in China for a couple of years! For some crazy reason I keep running into Chinese speakers--but a guy from France doing a tour of the world that was fluent in Chinese?! My life is so weird.

There were some other exhibits, including this one about olive trees that I didn't really understand, but with the ice broken with the first show, I could laugh about all of them (and all the artists smoking and talking about the deeper meaning of life) without feeling uncultured.

I did get to go out on some rooftops and get some pretty spectacular views of the city, though!

I guess I'm just not cultured enough to appreciate modern art...

Living Life in Four Languages

One of my goals for my time here in Jerusalem is to come back fluent in four languages: Hebrew, Arabic, and Chinese, and of course it would be wonderful if I could still speak English. :) This has proved to be a wonderful challenge, and I have all sorts of awkward and hilarious adventures as I try to keep the four languages separate in my head. Sometimes, however, it doesn't always work so well.

A couple of weeks ago I was in the Arabic-speaking Palestinian city of Ramallah. I had ridden the bus and spoken to people in Arabic on the way there, but when I hailed a taxi I got in and started speaking to the driver in Chinese! That was awkward.

Another time I was crossing the separation wall to get into Ramallah. I wasn't sure where to go, so I asked these women (in Arabic) if they knew where the bus was to go to Ramallah. They just stared at me, uncomprehending, and one of them finally said (in Arabic) "Arabic. We speak Arabic." "I'm speaking Arabic!" I said back. I knew my Arabic was intelligible, but they just weren't expecting this white girl with red hair to speak to them in Arabic and so they thought I was speaking English or something!

Sometimes it is hard for me to know what language to speak to people: Hebrew, Arabic. Most of the time it is quite obvious, but sometimes I can't tell the nationality of the person before I start speaking to them! Like the other day when I was going to my kickboxing class. I couldn't figure out how to lock the locker (turns out you had to insert a 10-shekel coin), so I asked these girls walking by in Hebrew if they spoke English, and then asked if they knew how to lock the locker (in English). Then they turned to each other and started speaking in Arabic! "I know how to ask that in Arabic!" I wanted to shout, but I didn't. They didn't know how to lock the locker, either, so I guess it didn't matter what language I asked them in!

Another day I was on the other campus of Hebrew University (I take classes on the Mount Scopus campus, but I had to go to the Givat Ram campus, on the other side of the city and right next to where I live right now) to do some research in the library there. I asked a man in Hebrew for how to get to the library, and he walked with me there to show me the way. We exchanged small talk in Hebrew, but I was really struggling to keep pretending like I was understanding what he was saying. Suddenly, we passed someone right as we got to the library complex and the man giving me directions started talking to the other man in Arabic! "You speak Arabic?!" I asked (in Arabic), now aware that he was Arab-Israeli. "I speak much Arabic much better than I speak Hebrew!" I said, thinking of how it would have been so much less awkward for me if we had been speaking in Arabic.

A few days ago I went hiking in the forest near Jerusalem with another grad student. We knew that the hiking trails were right next to the parking lot of the Ein Kerem Hadassah hospital, but we had no idea which parking lot! So we started asking around--but couldn't seem to find anyone that spoke English. I do speak a little Hebrew, but I am always missing vital words in the conversation. For example, in asking someone where the hiking trails are, I can say, "Excuse me, do you know where the ..... is?" but unfortunately I don't know how to say hiking or trail. Yeah. Doesn't do me much good. (This happens to me in almost every conversation in Hebrew. I am missing those key verbs and nouns...which I guess is motivation for me to study harder!) Anyway, I asked one security guard (in Hebrew) if he spoke English, and he said (in Hebrew) "No." When I looked disappointed and was about to walk away, he said, "Don't worry, I speak great Hebrew! What do you need?"

Great. Him speaking great Hebrew did little for the fact that my own Hebrew skills are so minimal! My friend and I tried to explain that we wanted to go hiking. "We want to...travel...near the hospital," we said, trying to make motions like we were hiking. "You want to walk around the hospital? Why?!" he asked. "Go ahead and walk around it!"

I walked up to another security guard and asked him (in Hebrew), "Do you speak English?"

"No," he answered in Arabic.

"Oh! Do you speak Arabic?"

"No," he answered in English.

Utterly confused at this point, I just stumbled through another hand-motioning game of showing that we wanted to hike. Luckily, he knew where the trail was, and we were on our way.

And one final story: since I have to take a level test for Arabic at the end of October, much of my free time is spent studying Arabic and re-memorizing vocabulary. The bus is the perfect place to do this, but I get some strange looks from a lot of people (yes, there is a lot of discrimination in Israel between Jews and Arabs. Shocking, I know.)

I was on the bus studying a list of vocabulary words when suddenly the man next to me said (in English--he was from America but I think had moved to Israel), "You're studying Arabic?!!!" with a look of slight disgust on his face. "Yep," I answered. "Ugh," he said. "It's such a...guttural language."

Yes, well, maybe I like studying guttural languages! It's prejudice like this that inspires me to work even harder at becoming proficient at both languages. And maybe, just maybe, one day people won't have such strong feelings of disgust about either a people or their language!

And just because blog posts are always better with pictures, I'll leave you with this one.

"I think it's mosquito!"

I think we have already established the fact that I have absolutely zero drawing skills. I can draw circles (and even ovals!) with lines coming out of them for legs and call it any animal you can think of, as demonstrated by my pig drawing skills at work.

Anyway. Yesterday I was sitting in my Hebrew class and we were supposed to practice the verb "to give" by saying "I give you this [fill in the blank]" with the blanks provided to us by the teacher. She had little cards with pictures of animals, gifts, cars, etc on them.

Except me and my two partners got a whole stack of dogs, which doesn't make for very good vocabulary practice.

So the girl sitting next to me, from France, decided to take matters into her own hands and started drawing simple pictures on the back of the cards.

I thought I would help out, so I drew a cat. It didn't look much like a cat, so I wrote "meow" next to the mouth. And the Arab girl sitting on my other side wrote "cat" in Hebrew at the top.

It was sitting on my desk just waiting there while my teacher was giving instructions, and all of a sudden the French girl looked over at my cat drawing, gasped, and said in a heavy French accent, "Oh my gosh, that's a cat? I think it's mosquito!"

Yep. I laughed about that one for hours and hours.

Guess who wins the prize for fool of the day?

Sometimes I like to pretend like I am important. I live in DC (which makes me awesome), I work for the government/military (which also sounds cool), I work with high-ranking international military officers (even cooler), and I have this awesome government id that lets me into all military bases and government buildings.

Yeah. I'm pretty cool.

But things always happen to remind me that really I am not as important as I would like to think.

Like yesterday.

The new class of international officers (67 of them) just came in this past week and Monday was their first day of briefings at NDU. Many of them have never been to the US before and some of them are still struggling with English. So as a staff, this first week they are here we have the opportunity to orient them to how we do things in the US.

I was assigned a group of 9 officers, and after taking them around to get id cards, etc all day, I took them on the NDU (actually the Coast Guard) shuttle to the metro to show them how to use both the shuttle and the metro.

The Coast Guard building, where the shuttle stops to pick us up, is right next to NDU and about a 4-5 minute walk from the building I work in. I walked 6 of the officers (the other 3 didn't need metro orientation) to the shuttle, but right before we got to the stop, I realized that I had forgotten my metro card. Panicked and feeling like an idiot in front of these officers, I told them to wait right there and I literally ran back to my office to get my metro card. And then I ran back.

Don't worry, I only ran out of my heels twice. And it wasn't even awkward to be running along in heels and then lose one of them and have to run back for it.

Anyway, I ran back to the officers and, just my luck, the shuttlewas still there, just 100 feet in front of us. However, when we were about 20 feet away, the shuttle closed its doors and drove away!

Still panting from my run, I just chuckled when one of the officers said, "He did that on purpose." He must have seen me running and thought it would be funny if he just left me!

Anyway, I was trying not to be frustrated as I waited for the next shuttle while explaining the metro map to the officers. It was such a hot day (probably in the 90's) and I thought I was going to die of heat. The black pants and heels were just not cutting it for me, and I seriously thought I would pass out from the extreme temperature.

And then, as I was riding the shuttle to the metro, I realized that I didn't even need my metro card because I wasn't riding the metro! I was just taking the officers there and then riding the shuttle back to work!

Yes, friends. Sometimes I act first and think later. And for this, I win the prize of fool of the day!

Awkward/Awesome

[Sorry--I started writing this post on Wednesday but blogger has been down.]

Awkward: Today after I got to work I pulled my female coworker aside. "Breta," I said. "Do you know how to tie a bow?"

She looked at me dumbly. Like, who doesn't know how to tie a bow? "I only know how to do bunny ears," I said. "This is really embarrassing and has affected my social life since kindergarten. But just look at my suit. Obviously bunny ears aren't doing the trick.

Can you teach me how to tie the other kind of bow?"

She laughed at me, but we quickly realized that the other way of tying shoes works better with shoelace. The bow looked even worse when I didn't do the bunny ears trick.

We finally decided on a "kimono type look." I think it is much better.

Awesome: I had to drive my boss to the airport this morning. I have really, REALLY been missing my car and so I basically jump at the chance to drive anyone and anything. Plus, I was really excited to drive the big government van again.

When my boss was ready to go, he looked at me and said, "Do you have a jacket?" I stared at him dumbfounded for a minute, thinking, "Do I really need a suit jacket to drive you to the airport?" I finally said, "You mean, like a coat if I get cold?" (It is summer, after all!) "Well," he said, "My car doesn't have a roof."

Yes, my friends, I drove a convertible around Washington DC. Definitely awesome. I am pretty sure half of the people in the city were gawking at me, and as I drove over the Potomac I saw the most beautiful sunrise ever. What. A. Dream.

Awkward: After my awesome day at work I was walking up the escalator at the metro center near my apartment. All of a sudden my heel caught one of the stairs and I totally biffed it, falling into the side. All of a sudden people sprung into action. People were swearing and shouting and grabbing me to pull me up before I got sucked in. It was super awkward. I tried to pretend that it was just a little trip until I got to the top and started walking. All of a sudden I felt this hot wet liquidy thing running down my led. I looked down and my foot was covered in blood. Feeling a little faint (and still in a lot of pain from the fall), I walked over to the side and lifted up my pant leg and saw that I had three very deep holes in my knee (from the escalator) and they were gushing blood. I have seriously never bled that much in my life.

Several people rushed over to me and one of them said, "Did you fall, ma'am? You got ta report that! Are you gonna be ok? You should seriously report that."

Report this! What I need, lady, is to get the blood cleaned off of my knee!

Luckily, I was right next to a hospital so I went into their bathroom and cleaned up my leg and my shoe, put 3 bandaids on, and walked home.

It might not look that bad, but those are pretty deep! They bled for several days.

Awesome: I walked into the Barlow Center (housing is on the 3rd and 4th floor and offices, reception areas, etc are on the 1st and 2nd) after work and there was some sort of China-Utah relationship reception going on in the lobby. I watched it for a minute to see what was going on (I was less interested in the shrimp and more interested in the Chinese :) and one of the girls walking by started talking to me. I told her I speak Chinese and she said, "Do you want to come in and have some food? We have plenty!"

Yes, actually. I love shrimp and I love Chinese. Shrimp, French cheeses, delicious tomato bread things, egg rolls, chocolate cake...it was one of the most delicious (made even more so by its free-ness) dinners I have eaten in a long, long time. And I got to speak to these awesome people in Chinese, I found out that my coworker was the home teacher of two of the American girls that were helping out, and the older couple that was there knew someone from my mission.

Small world.

Awkward: I went to the church that evening (after washing the blood out of my pants) for choir practice. I was still limping so the holes wouldn't open up again and gush blood, so I was taking the stairs a little carefully. Not carefully enough, though, because I totally biffed it down the stairs, again.

At least the holes didn't open up and start gushing, though!

And that, folks, is the reason my life is so awesome. All this in one day!

"I look like an escaped convict!"

Yesterday I got my picture taken for yet another id card. I am not sure why people can't just keep these things in their system (especially since the first picture I had taken for my new job actually looked good) and then use them for every id card, but whatever. I guess then I can just pull out whichever card best fits my mood for the day.

Anyway. I got my picture taken. When the guy taking the picture asked if it was ok, I said "yeah" after barely glancing at it. Because, well, when I was 16 and getting my first driver's license, the guy taking my picture took one but, after looking at it, I declared it unfit for humans to look upon and asked to have a different one (I think I was blinking or something). After he took the second one he said, "Honey, you aint gettin better than that!" (I think he left out both the "honey" and the "aint" because I was in Brigham City and not the deep South, but my time here has made me put a southern accent on all of my memories because they sound cooler that way.)

I was so mortified (was I always that ugly? What was he really saying about my appearance? What if I still looked horrible?) that I decided to never take a 2nd picture if at all possible.

Well. That works out sometimes (actually never) but it didn't work out this time. When the id card printed I was horrified to see that I looked like an escaped convict. My black-and-white shirt had also changed to a rainbow-colored shirt so something weird was going on with the printer, which made it only worse.  My shortness placed me below the camera so I was looking up at it, and the flash (and the printer) washed almost everything out of my face so it was almost like two eyes staring up out of a white abyss. Worst of all, I decided not to smile because my cheeks always look double size in smiling id card photographs.

Needless to say, I look incredibly creepy.

When I walked back to my office two of my coworkers wanted to see my picture. "I look like an escaped convict!" I said. "You do!" shouted one, while the other simultaneously tried to reassure me by saying, "No you don't." I laughed the hardest at their reactions. The one who thought I looked like I was an escaped convict said, "Well, it's because you aren't smiling. You look creepy."

And the card (an official government id) is good for 3 years. Maybe I will pull it out when I need an id that says, "I'm an escaped convict and super creepy!"

Glass-Enclosed Revolving Doors

I hope no one was too disturbed by my grammar post--and I also hope I didn't scare you people away from making comments! I only check them once for grammar mistakes. Just kidding! I am also terrified that now people will start checking my blog for grammar mistakes. But it's my blog and I'm not making money off of it. So I can make grammar mistakes if I want to, right?

Anyway. Today I was walking into a store that had a revolving glass door. It was dark outside and there was a shady looking fellow standing a few feet in front of the door. I was trying to avoid eye contact with him and so walked quickly up to the side of the revolving door so I could get in the store.

BAM. I walked right into a glass barrier. Unbeknownst to me, the revolving door was shielded on the side with glass. I stepped back, trying not to be too embarrassed (even though I had just walked into a glass wall) and tried to find a way into the store. I walked in a small semi-circle around the door, but I couldn't seem to find a place where the glass opened! The revolving door was right inside but I couldn't figure out how to get in there. I checked the hours again, but it was still open. Weird.

Just when I was about to start feeling the glass to see if I could find an opening, the shady guy behind me spoke up and said, "It's right there in the middle there." I looked up and, sure enough, there was the elusive opening, right in the middle of a semi-circle of glass enclosure around the door. I mumbled a quick thanks and ran inside the store.

It was so awkward I stayed inside the store an extra 10 minutes so I could be sure the guy was gone when I came out!

A Broken Toe?

This is quite possibly the lamest story you will ever read about a "broken" toe, but hey, lame is what I live for!

Anyway, this past week I was out in Ohio visiting a graduate school. Details about the rest of the trip to follow. I just happened to be staying in an extremely nice hotel, and I also happened to have a serious sinus infection that kept me up for much of the night (this was much to my chagrin, as I had to get up at 4:30 am Utah time--I was 2 hours ahead). On one of these excursions to the bathroom to clear my nasal passages so I could breathe (the bathroom was just in my room, but it was a really big room. Nice hotel = big room), I kicked my shoe that I had so carefully placed right next to my bed so as not to kick it in the morning.

Nice try, but it didn't work.

As soon as I kicked it my toe started screaming in agony. Somehow, only my ring-finger toe (what are those toes called, anyway?) had taken the full brunt of the shoe attack, and I could barely walk. If my sinus infection wasn't enough, the pain in my toe made it so I could hardly sleep at all.

The next day I tried not to limp, because I was trying to impress the people at the graduate school, and I thought it would be a little awkward if they asked why I was limping and I said, "I kicked my shoe last night." Yeah. It would make me sound weak. And so I bit my lip and suffered with the pain.

At lunch time, however, I knew that something would have to change. I got a band-aid so I could tape my toe to the one next to it, so it wouldn't move, and took off my shoe. This is what I saw:

Yep. You can bet I gasped in surprise. The natural crookedness of my toe only added to the drama. Thankfully, my limping was validated. I really thought it was broken.

However, after several days of walking on it, the bruising went down and now, a week and a half later, it is only a little sore.

So I don't think it was broken. Maybe I broke open a few blood vessels, but hey, I've done that several times in my life!

Valentine's Day Elevator

Today I got in an elevator in the library, hoping to go from the 5th floor to the 3rd floor. I was unpleasantly surprised when, a few short seconds after the doors closed, there was a grinding sound and a quick drop (during which time my stomach flew up to my mouth), and then the elevator jerked to a halt in between floors 4 and 5. At least, I think it was between 4 and 5. The doors wouldn't open and the elevator was just sitting there. After my stomach dropped back to its usual place and I realized I was stuck, I calmly pushed the 3rd floor button repeatedly, figuring that this was the best way to get the elevator to move (and not fall all the way to floor 1).

I guess it must have worked, because after about 30 seconds (I was just about to call the operator!) the elevator started moving again and stopped on the 3rd floor. I was unpleasantly surprised a second time when, after a valiant struggle, the doors opened about 3 inches and stayed there. I pushed the "door open" button repeatedly and then tried to pry the doors apart by hand (which tactic has worked every other time I have been stuck in/outside of an elevator), but once again, it was to no avail. The doors closed and I was once again stuck inside the elevator.

Thankfully someone pushed the elevator button on the 6th floor before I called the operator, so I just rode it up and then back down to the third floor. This time the doors were sluggish, but they did open wide enough for me to squeeze through.

As I reflected on this incident, I realized that the elevators must be programmed to respond to certain holidays. Since today was Valentine's day, the elevator was most likely giving the guys a chance. I mean, what could be more romantic than getting stuck in an elevator with a guy after you have almost dropped to your death and then the doors don't open? It sounds like destiny on so many levels.

The only problem though? I was alone.

Demon Washer

The past few weeks have been CRAZY. I won't spend time telling you about the horrifying amount of research papers I have had to write (approx. 50 pages due this last week) and the extreme number of personal statements I have composed (18 different ones), in addition to 20 hours of work and 19 credit hours. Whew! Just reading that makes me tired.

Suffice it to say, at times I have felt a little possessed.

Apparently, so does my washer.

The other day, I threw my clothes in the washer during the short 20-minute period that I had run home to change my clothes and grab some lunch before going to my other job. I didn't have time to put two loads in, so I just threw them all in together.

When I came out 10 minutes later, this is what I saw.


Here it is from another angle (please excuse the messy state of my kitchen):


Yes, folks, that washer used to be sitting right next to the dryer. Somehow it moved forward all the way and then, when it ran out of cord and couldn't go straight anymore, it turned a 90 degree angle. All by itself.

And that was when I knew my washer was possessed.

A Squished Spider in Shakespeare

I think we have already established the fact that I hate spiders. Really. I try to be adult-like most of the time, but spiders put me over the edge every time.

Even in my Shakespeare class.

Today we were sitting in class in a circle. I was sitting close to the wall, with my backpack sitting open in the chair behind me. One of my classmates was giving a presentation. We were all silent.

And then I saw movement on the wall out of the corner of my eye. I turned and saw a spider crawling quickly, almost over my open backpack. There was nothing else I could do. I was sitting next to the girl presenting and quickly said, "I'm going to squish a spider." (The whole class saw the spider at the same time I did.)

I quickly took off my shoe and slammed it, hard, against the wall. I then calmly put my shoe back on, apologized to the girl giving the presentation, and class went on. The laughing only lasted for about 30 seconds. :)

Taco Bell, round two

Remember snake girl from Taco Bell?

Well, today I went to Taco Bell at the Cougareat to grab some lunch. There were 10 students in line and twice that waiting for their food. Taco Bell goes through hundreds of customers everyday, and I just happen to be one of the million on an almost daily basis.

Anyway, at Taco Bell they usually ask for your name (although sometimes they ask for your favorite movie) and so today I was ready to give them my card and my name after ordering the chicken burrito, to go. But snake girl was my cashier and instead of asking what my name was, she said, "It's Breanne, right?"

I laughed and said, "I come here way too much." But actually, I think it was the snake incident that made me memorable...

The Cell Phone Girl

You know who they are. Those people that don't seem to know when, because of the time and the place, a cell phone conversation is not socially acceptable.

Like in the middle of church. Or while taking a test. Or while sitting in a "no cell phone" area of the library. Or in the middle of class if your class has less than 50 people. Or when sitting at the dinner table.

The list goes on and on. Sometimes I want to turn and look at those people and say, "Not here. It's not socially acceptable." But I just give them "the look" instead, which they usually ignore because, well, they are on the phone.

So anyway. Today I was taking a survey. A paid survey. Can I just say that I have run into this sweet setup where I get emails about surveys that the BYU business school will pay me to take and if I want to participate, I just sign up for a time and go? I get $5 a survey, too, and they usually take less than half an hour. Lunch money for a week!

But I digress. We were in a rather large room with about 50 computers. And there were 4 of us. And we were waiting for the survey person to give us the instructions. One girl there, eager to take advantage of the silence, got on her cell phone. After 2 or 3 minutes, the survey person said, "Ok, let's get started." The girl on the phone didn't even look up. The survey person cleared her throat and said a little louder, "Ok, we're going to get started. Please put everything else away." Still nothing but loud cell phone conversation from the cell phone girl.

The survey person glanced over at me and I snickered, trying to let her know that I, too, thought this awkward situation was incredibly funny.

Finally, the survey person walked over to the cell phone girl and said, "We're going to get started, if you could put that away." "Oh, ok," was the reply.

And then she said into her phone, "Look, I'm taking a survey right now, so I'll call you later." And all 4 of the rest of us just snickered, thinking, that is so not socially acceptable.

Is there a time when in situations like this a cell phone conversation (loud, not even whispered!) is ok?