New friends and parties

This past week I’ve met some really nice guys who are in the University here. They’ve taken me around to see the campus and sort of given me an opportunity to start hanging out with them, which will be cool. Most of them live pretty close to me on-campus too. They’re all really nice and will probably be the main part of any form of a social life that I’ll have here. Of course, living here is sort of similar to living in a small town in the US; there’s not a lot to do. But they’re cool guys.

I think they’re mainly interested in me because I’m from the US, in addition to being a new person to hang out with. A few of them have been or lived in the US before, so they know what America is like and are excited to get my perspective on things. And plus, it gives them an opportunity to practice their English. My one friend seems really interested in whether I drink/smoke/etc. which is funny. They all smoke cigarettes, but don’t drink or anything like that because they’re Muslim. So, they’re intrigued by the fact that I don’t smoke, but I like beer. They were also interested in whether I smoke weed or not. The influence of Snoop Dawg is insatiable… They’re great guys, though.

Last night we went to a graduation party for one of their friends, which was totally awesome. I’m pretty sure that it was because he passed his baccalaureate test (for those of you who don’t know about it, its similar to the ACT or SAT, but WAY more difficult), which means he’s finished with high school and can go to the University. Parties in Jordan are MUCH different than in the United States. For starters, there’re no girls (Eric Wright dream party?), which coincides with cultural norms. Basically, they rent out a big hall and line the walls with chairs, and they hire a DJ who has his PA and plays some fairly loud, rocking Arabic music. All the guys come sporadically and hang out for a while, saying hi to everyone and sort of mingling. Everyone is in high spirits, and is just having a great time, which makes it an enjoyable environment. Eventually, the dancing starts. Jordan has a traditional, national dance, called “debkah,” which all the men do. Its sort of similar to Greek dancing, if you’ve ever seen that. So, a few guys will start making the line and dancing, while some other guys are dancing on their own or with their friends to the music, and the rest are just standing or sitting around talking and smoking.

Now you may be asking yourself, who would find a room full of guys dancing with each other and smoking enjoyable? To that, I say “go back to Insecure-ville, where you can drink shitty beer, listen to your new Puddle of Mudd CD and try to make out with slutty girls all you want.” It was really pretty fun, not to mention the nearly endless supply of soda and cake (oh god, I had to try to justify my declining to so many people…). I got in on some of the dancing, struggled my way through trying to dance the “debkah” a little bit and got to meet a ton of new people.

So, in summary, it turned out to be a pretty nice thing to go to. Not to say that I’m ready to forfeit my silly American dance parties for Jordanian parties, but it was a nice change of scenery.

In other news, I’ve secured a CD of Arabic music for us. I’m going to get it next week from my friend and neighbor, Wasam. It promises to be everything I’ve ever dreamt of and more.