Arabic.
Really? Ambitious much? You couldn't have started this off with something a tiny bit simpler?
The truth is, I don't really have much ambition to learn Arabic, and I've shown fairly little discipline for studying it in the past. I'd SO much rather have the language gods bestow Arabic proficiency on me. Still waiting for that.
In the meantime, I really, really have to do something about this. I'll be starting a new job here this summer-ish/fall, and while it's an English-language workplace (technically, though certainly not entirely), there's no question that every bit of Arabic I can use with colleagues will make a difference - in comprehension, in rapport, etc. That's not to mention the off-site work-related stuff that will involve interaction with people who may or may not speak English. So, it must be done.
I don't have a really good plan for this yet. Since E has been at this for several years, we have a host of Arabic teaching materials in our possession, including a couple of very accessible textbooks for spoken Arabic. At the moment, Salim is not very helpful in facilitating focused book-study time, but I'd like to try to work something out on that front. Otherwise, we have some lessons in iTunes that I can play pretty much anytime; I'm hoping to absorb some of that subliminally even when it doesn't have my full attention. Sigh. This doesn't sound very promising at the moment, does it?
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
Thursday, April 4, 2013
Best Accessory Ever!
And by that I mean my child. Probably not a healthy characterization.
But being here with a baby is a vastly different experience from being here without one. In a good way. For one thing, this is a super baby-friendly society. As in, virtually everyone is happy to see me out and about with my baby. Well, really they're mostly happy to see my baby. Complete strangers - adults, teenagers, and kids - will stop in the street to say hi to him, touch his cheek, or kiss him. Once a small boy, maybe six, stopped what he was doing to study Salim for a minute and then came over to pat his head. He patted his head!
Because everyone is so kind to babies (and to people with babies) I worry a lot less about baby behavior than I would in the U.S. If we're in the supermarket or on a bus and Salim starts getting chatty, even noisily so, it's not a big deal. That takes a lot of pressure off of going out!
I also worry less (both for better and worse, I suppose) about how I present myself. No one harasses a woman with a baby, so I'm much more relaxed when I go out. Maybe most of all, I feel a fair amount of license to do whatever I need to do. For example, once we were out running errands with E, and I had Salim in the carrier. E had an appointment to get his hair cut, and Salim fell asleep in the carrier as we were arriving at the (men's) salon. I really wanted Salim to take a good nap and didn't want to risk waking him up prematurely by wandering around outside in the traffic. So I sat down in a big armchair in the salon and watched E get his hair cut. That doesn't sound like much, but I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that I may have been the first woman ever to walk into that salon, much less to hang out there for half an hour. Salons here are generally men-only or women-only, but baby trumps all!
But being here with a baby is a vastly different experience from being here without one. In a good way. For one thing, this is a super baby-friendly society. As in, virtually everyone is happy to see me out and about with my baby. Well, really they're mostly happy to see my baby. Complete strangers - adults, teenagers, and kids - will stop in the street to say hi to him, touch his cheek, or kiss him. Once a small boy, maybe six, stopped what he was doing to study Salim for a minute and then came over to pat his head. He patted his head!
Because everyone is so kind to babies (and to people with babies) I worry a lot less about baby behavior than I would in the U.S. If we're in the supermarket or on a bus and Salim starts getting chatty, even noisily so, it's not a big deal. That takes a lot of pressure off of going out!
I also worry less (both for better and worse, I suppose) about how I present myself. No one harasses a woman with a baby, so I'm much more relaxed when I go out. Maybe most of all, I feel a fair amount of license to do whatever I need to do. For example, once we were out running errands with E, and I had Salim in the carrier. E had an appointment to get his hair cut, and Salim fell asleep in the carrier as we were arriving at the (men's) salon. I really wanted Salim to take a good nap and didn't want to risk waking him up prematurely by wandering around outside in the traffic. So I sat down in a big armchair in the salon and watched E get his hair cut. That doesn't sound like much, but I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that I may have been the first woman ever to walk into that salon, much less to hang out there for half an hour. Salons here are generally men-only or women-only, but baby trumps all!
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