Holy crap, its been an adventure. I yelled at a man in Jordan and I don't think he liked it very much. Mainly because I am a white american female. im about to warn you no punctuation or capitalization is going into this cause im typing like the wind.
So in the holy land, we weren't actually allowed to leave the hotel due to our lack of proper visas which we only had transit visas. AKA you can sleep in our fabulous hotel but since you are an american woman i break wine glasses on you cut your thumb and comp your drinks and then totally become an indian giver. forgive any remarks, just elementary school language. so we get to the airport in jordan and i finally lost it. some of you saw my updates but for once i broke down and cried in that god forsaken "roayl" airport. F THAT NOISE. That place is horrible. waiting waiting and more waiting, the sign starts flashing "boarding" and then "last call" and then we kind of freak out. i ask the security man to let us go through the checkpoint because our plane was supposed to be leaving and he just told me no. no explanation no nothing. i argue with him for a while and say the #1 thing you dont ever say to a foreign person in their country "CAN I SPEAK TO SOMEONE WHO SPEAKS ENGLISH!?" yeah. I went there. So after more refusals to tell me anything productive or interesting or informative I felt defeated and cried. I felt weak and useless and hopeless and worried that I was gonna be trapped in that hell hole. Well we eventually caught our plane and away we went.
The flight to Addis Ababa was pretty chill, found a 3rd classmate on the plane and away we went.
Arrival in Addis was pretty normal, the Visa line went really quick. basically you hand them a $20 and they let you into the country. I heard someone say that its very corrupt here so I wont be the typical partying american out on the town. we will do that in our hotel rooms. BTW, I totally have my own room to myself. there are 7 girls and 6 of them instinctively paired up, and I purposely didn't form any alliances. I feel more chummy with the guys anyways. I don't know what it is but I just get along better with dudes. I am super lucky to have my own room, but I also switched rooms about 3 times because my professor wasnt happy enough with my quarters. I'm fine with that. I didnt have to carry my bag up the stairs. no elevator here. no bueno for my 50lb bag.
The elevation is kind of really freaking annoying. Back home where the air is thick and clean I can take three stories no problem thanks to the steps at the Alkek building. Here I'm winded going to the third floor (technically its the second floor cause they label by ground first then second which actually makes a lot of sense, its european too). Huffing and puffing up the stairs is really annoying because I can do it no problemo at work and school and home. I LOVE STAIRS. I hate elevation. It just makes me feel week so I just save the huffing and puffing for when I get into my room to show as little weakness as possible. I'm not sick from the elevation just lacking in general O2 molecules.
So the drive from the airport is crazy, taxis harass me everywhere i go, poor people are everywhere, and I saw a hooker the very first 10 minutes im in the country. No hookers during the day time though. Everybody tries to dress super classy, but I like to look at the TShirts everybody wears under their button downs. You can tell they were donated cause its super american stuff.
Apparently they have a KFC and a Dominos out here. I wont cave to american food for a while. Not til the last week when I'm dying for something from home.
So when I got to breakfast the very first time, they had some weird grains out and eggs and the weird bread called Ingera (tastes like sourdough, looks like a melted gray crayon) and a few other things like rolls and weird things that ive tried and can choke down pretty easy. I've been drinking my coffee black LOADED with crap tons of sugar because thats the only way I can do it. But hey, I don't make a face and insult them and their #1 product. I'm a badass now. I can drink black coffee with sugar. HOLLA!
I saw a giant tortoise when i went to lunch with my prof yesterday. It startled me when it moved, and i jumped. you know how I like to jump when things scare me. My prof laughed super hard at me. So we stopped and took some photos and the guard was just laughing at us. Who sees tortoises just chillin eatin some grass in america? NOWHERE BUT THE ZOO. This was just hanging out no pen or nothing. Super awesome.
So I've done lots of sleeping and LOTS of reading. I've almost finished the Hunger Games series, and I think they did a good job with the movie. I don't know why everybodies panties were in a bunch. OH WELL.
I'm signing off, Ill update with some new pics latas! Love you all and I hope all is well with you. I can't wait to see you all again.
PS, thanks for the supportive emails! and keep em coming!
~Alyssa, The Travelling Fool
So in the holy land, we weren't actually allowed to leave the hotel due to our lack of proper visas which we only had transit visas. AKA you can sleep in our fabulous hotel but since you are an american woman i break wine glasses on you cut your thumb and comp your drinks and then totally become an indian giver. forgive any remarks, just elementary school language. so we get to the airport in jordan and i finally lost it. some of you saw my updates but for once i broke down and cried in that god forsaken "roayl" airport. F THAT NOISE. That place is horrible. waiting waiting and more waiting, the sign starts flashing "boarding" and then "last call" and then we kind of freak out. i ask the security man to let us go through the checkpoint because our plane was supposed to be leaving and he just told me no. no explanation no nothing. i argue with him for a while and say the #1 thing you dont ever say to a foreign person in their country "CAN I SPEAK TO SOMEONE WHO SPEAKS ENGLISH!?" yeah. I went there. So after more refusals to tell me anything productive or interesting or informative I felt defeated and cried. I felt weak and useless and hopeless and worried that I was gonna be trapped in that hell hole. Well we eventually caught our plane and away we went.
The flight to Addis Ababa was pretty chill, found a 3rd classmate on the plane and away we went.
Arrival in Addis was pretty normal, the Visa line went really quick. basically you hand them a $20 and they let you into the country. I heard someone say that its very corrupt here so I wont be the typical partying american out on the town. we will do that in our hotel rooms. BTW, I totally have my own room to myself. there are 7 girls and 6 of them instinctively paired up, and I purposely didn't form any alliances. I feel more chummy with the guys anyways. I don't know what it is but I just get along better with dudes. I am super lucky to have my own room, but I also switched rooms about 3 times because my professor wasnt happy enough with my quarters. I'm fine with that. I didnt have to carry my bag up the stairs. no elevator here. no bueno for my 50lb bag.
The elevation is kind of really freaking annoying. Back home where the air is thick and clean I can take three stories no problem thanks to the steps at the Alkek building. Here I'm winded going to the third floor (technically its the second floor cause they label by ground first then second which actually makes a lot of sense, its european too). Huffing and puffing up the stairs is really annoying because I can do it no problemo at work and school and home. I LOVE STAIRS. I hate elevation. It just makes me feel week so I just save the huffing and puffing for when I get into my room to show as little weakness as possible. I'm not sick from the elevation just lacking in general O2 molecules.
So the drive from the airport is crazy, taxis harass me everywhere i go, poor people are everywhere, and I saw a hooker the very first 10 minutes im in the country. No hookers during the day time though. Everybody tries to dress super classy, but I like to look at the TShirts everybody wears under their button downs. You can tell they were donated cause its super american stuff.
Apparently they have a KFC and a Dominos out here. I wont cave to american food for a while. Not til the last week when I'm dying for something from home.
So when I got to breakfast the very first time, they had some weird grains out and eggs and the weird bread called Ingera (tastes like sourdough, looks like a melted gray crayon) and a few other things like rolls and weird things that ive tried and can choke down pretty easy. I've been drinking my coffee black LOADED with crap tons of sugar because thats the only way I can do it. But hey, I don't make a face and insult them and their #1 product. I'm a badass now. I can drink black coffee with sugar. HOLLA!
I saw a giant tortoise when i went to lunch with my prof yesterday. It startled me when it moved, and i jumped. you know how I like to jump when things scare me. My prof laughed super hard at me. So we stopped and took some photos and the guard was just laughing at us. Who sees tortoises just chillin eatin some grass in america? NOWHERE BUT THE ZOO. This was just hanging out no pen or nothing. Super awesome.
So I've done lots of sleeping and LOTS of reading. I've almost finished the Hunger Games series, and I think they did a good job with the movie. I don't know why everybodies panties were in a bunch. OH WELL.
I'm signing off, Ill update with some new pics latas! Love you all and I hope all is well with you. I can't wait to see you all again.
PS, thanks for the supportive emails! and keep em coming!
~Alyssa, The Travelling Fool
Glad you made it there! And you have your own room. Nice!
ReplyDeleteThe tortoise made me LOL & congrats on your own room!
ReplyDelete