dust. dust. dust.

Here in Amman there are a few things I will never get used to.. and one of them is the honking. The constant honking on the streets for no particular reason. They literally drive with one hand on the wheel and one hand on their horn. I can never tell if taxis' or people in general are honking because A. They are telling me to get out of the way B. letting me know their taxi is available C. honking at the cars around them to tell them they need to get over 3 lanes of traffic because they need to turn, after which the other cars lay on their horn because they're mad that this person is slowing traffic.. D. they just want to honk because I'm american .. and blond..and usually follow the honk with a "hey baby!" out the window... creeps. or E. They're just in a hurry and think that if they lay on their horn everyone will get out of their way. It's very very confusing and still makes me go from happy to furious in .01 seconds when someone honks right as I'm walking in front of them to cross the street. THERE IS NOTHING SCARIER. Or maybe i'm just jumpy.. I don't know.



SO much dust this week I can't even begin to describe it.. there is a layer of dust covering my entire apartment and every single window is shut.

Last Tuesday afternoon we decided to try and battle the dust storm and venture our way over to fruit salad. I had an instant headache and felt like my chest was going to explode, it was horrible! We take clean amazing air so for granted each day. There are multiple  news report talking about the dozens of people in the hospital.. and how some parts of Jordan got up to 107 degrees this week! GAH! people are literally walking around town with those hospital face mask things on.

Okay wait let me back up, FRUIT SALAD. you guys this place is the nectar of life. So the one I ordered was basically 5 different kind of ice cream with, I kid you not, 10 different delicious fruits all over. Papaya, mango, cantelope, strawberries, oranges, grapes, apples.. I could go on and on.  It was pretty enough to be a wedding cake. (these pictures don't do it justice) I felt really bad for complaining to Jordan that my ice cream took 20 minutes to  come out because when it did it was seriously a masterpiece. I guarantee the people who make those do not get paid enough.

Okay on to the next thing we did.. OH! So I guess I should tell more about what I do everyday.. Most days I get up, pick up the apartment, eat breakfast, listen to a couple conference talks and get together with the other wives and either have cooking classes/ Arabic lessons/ go shopping/ make a big breakfast together/ watch movies or just hang out, but lately I've been trying to try a few new things. (Pause for dramatic effect...)  I've started trying to do family history!!!! I don't know why I've put it off so long.. but my mom could tell you, I've been avoiding it like the plague! and I don't even know why! Its like you hear all of these stories about the amazing feeling you get while your doing it, and the way it brings you closer to family and the blessings it brings, and in my head i'm thinking.. "wow that sounds great, but no thanks i'm fine." RIDICULOUS!  I think its because I was just overwhelmed at where to start.. but one day this thought popped into my mind. I can spend 4 hrs trying to figure out how to set up a stupid blog, but I can't spend even 1 hr helping to save souls!?!? There's just no excuse for that. So I popped my self a bag of popcorn and a large glass of my favorite juice with sprite mixed together, played some Mo-Tab on my phone quietly,  and sat down to change my ways. I'm still trying to figure out how to set everything up, and it took me about a week to find my membership number, but a start is a start! So, if you are like me and can think of every reason in the book NOT to start... stop making excuses and just DO IT.

In other news..I've started gettin' my craft on! Check out these hats I've been making for the orphanage when winter comes! so exciting.

Okay I've stepped off my soap box and will now continue to tell you about my week.

I learned something very important this week.. apparently I've been lied to my entire life because I just found out that when someone says "here eat this appetizer to tie you over until dinner" It's actually "to TIDE" ... WHAT? my whole life I've been saying "TIE" which I feel like makes way more sense.. because tie means to hold or keep together right? Am I the only one that thinks this is bonkers?!

Other than the things I've mentioned above Jord and I also love adventuring together. We went to King Husseins car museum last week and it was LEGIT. We posed in this really awesome tent in the mueseum.

Moving on to more important things..


Here in Amman things are going fantastic. We are currently sitting in a sweet hotel after a large delicious dinner in the city of Petra. yes you heard me PETRA like where they filmed Indiana Jones and where Moses is said to have walked... "said to have". Not to mention it is currently the 2nd wonder of the 7 wonders of the world.

We left early Saturday morning and stopped  at 2 crusader castles on the way, they were INCREDIBLE. We sang hymns in huge tunnels and explored deep dark ones that seemed to go on for miles and just expolored like little kids in a candy store. I am in awe of the humans who made them with the limited resources they had. Everything was absolutely incredible. After both of the castles we stopped at "little petra" which itself was magnificent. I'm not sure I know an adjective good enough to describe it, so you will just have to look at the pictures.

This is where people would shoot arrows out of to protect intruders. 

Jord and his friend Vaughn

We got to our Hotel and had an awesome dinner before we hit the hay to rest for the big day. We got up at 530 am after not getting any sleep (stupid barking dogs outside) and packed our 4 liters of water in a backpack and started walking to Petra. I had ZERO idea what to expect in Petra besides the awesome rock sculpture thing that everyone knows about from Indiana Jones. Little did I know, that was just this beginning. Petra goes on for miles and miles and miles. There are 3 different main hikes that take you to other awesome views.. the high point.. the monastery, and where they did sacrifices. Again, there is no way to describe the magnificence of what we were able to see. I kept trying to make myself soak everything in more because I knew how amazing and lucky I was to be there. I wish walls could speak because I can't imagine the things they have seen dating back to even before Christ.  I was in awe.

The Monastery

This view was so beautiful Jord and I sat down alone and sang "For the Beauty of the Earth" together. A moment I will never forget. 

Okay, another thing I've learned is that the country Jordan is home to the CREEPIEST cats evah. They look like kittens but are in fact full grown and just starved. They also live in dumpsters and are everywhere. They creep me out so bad. Every time I walk by them i'm scared they will go crazy and jump on me and start eating me. So so so creepy. 

Anyway. That's about the adventures we've had so far this week. We have a few awesome things planned for the rest of the weekend so I will be posting again soon!

LOVE AND MISS YOU ALL.

Masalema!

The Adventures Continue!!..

OH my goodness I fell in love with Amman, AGAIN this week. Rainbow street, church, the food, the shops! Okay I'm getting ahead of myself.. I'll start from the beginning.

Friday we had church again, but Jord and I are no longer going to the same branch, he was asked to serve up in the Al-Husn branch which is about an hour from home, and they only speak Arabic there.. so I don't go. The branch is SUPER close to the Syrian border, so we don't really see each other until about 3 pm on Sundays, oh, I mean Friday's.. I don't think i'll ever get used to that.

Church was fantastic as usual, it was fast and testimony meeting, and there were about 6 kids that went up and bore their testimonies. After the meeting was over the branch president stood up and said, "I think we heard from the entire primary today!" ha ha. So awesome.

After church we rode home in a packed taxi. They don't believe in car seats here..

The back of the taxi..

The front... :) such good times.

That night the Adam's came over for dinner and a little texas sheet cake dessert before we called it a night.

Saturday was FULL of adventure.

Jord woke up early and studied for a while

This is what he is doing.. ALWAYS. 

and then we headed to the market to grab a few things... We took our own bags so we didn't look like a circus coming out of the store like we did last time..

Story time..
Last time we ran to the store we came out holding like 30 plastic bags and this guy came up to us and said.. Taxi? Jord replies "nam" (yes) and he helped carry our bags to his car. After getting to his car we realized he wasn't an actual taxi and was just trying to make a few bucks, Jord asked how much it would be to get to our destination and he said 4 JD. SERIOUSLY a rip off.. we can usually get home for like basically 40 cents. But all of our food was already in the back of the car and we were afraid he'd drive off with our stuff so we just had to pay him more.. LAME. We learned our lesson! In fact, this time around when we came out of the store we had a gentleman ask if we needed a taxi, and Jord said are you a real taxi? He replied with a sneaky grin and just laughed.. we just kept walking.. ha

Anywho. We got home and made some french toast with my homemade bread for lunch and headed out for the night with our good friends the Adams. We got a taxi to Rainbow Street which is downtown Amman. When I saw downtown I literally mean DOWN. It is basically a valley with a lot of super steep hills leading down to it.
It was so beautiful! We had a blast looking in little shops and craft stores and then stopped for a little cold treat.

I  made him put on this hat... and then I found out it said Sara on it.. whoops 

Most confusing road signs EVERRR. 

Mr. Lollies did NOT disappoint, it consisted of  Popsicles dipped into the flavoring you wanted with a topping of your choice. We got a lemon popsicle with strawberry flavoring and sprinkles. :)
You could say we will be going back VERY soon.

After dessert we headed out to find a good place for dinner.. because you always have dessert before dinner. (that's not a culture thing here, it's just my rule of thumb)

We found this awesome place in kind of a ghetto area of town, we walked up 2 flights of stairs and ate on the balcony of this adorable restaurant.

 The only thing not very adorable was the hookah(??) smoke inhaled with every breath. But hey, at least it smelled like cotton candy.


I really stepped out of my comfort zone and ordered an authentic dish.... pffft not. cheese pizza..no regrets. It was DELICIOUS.

We had a beautiful view and fantastic company, which makes it very easy to love this place <3

Sunday was MAGNIFICENT. Sunday is our orphanage day.

My heart grew 13 sizes. We pulled up to the all girls orphanage ages 3-19 and they were so excited to see us. All of them were peeking out the windows waiting for us to arrive and jumping up and down. It moved me to tears, and continued to move me to tears as we hugged and kissed each girl on the cheeks as we met them. I fell in love with every single one of them. The Jordanian people are incredible, but there is a very distinct light in the eyes of the young Christian girls at this orphanage. We got to spend the next two hours getting to know them, playing with them and teaching them English. My teaching partner Heidi and I have the older group, there are four 12 year olds and two sixteen year old girls. They are absolutely beautiful, and every time they phrase a sentence correctly I just want to wrap my arms around them and tell them how fantastic I think they are.  I didn't want to leave. My team teacher told me it was time to go and I replied that no one had come to get us yet so we could probably just stay.. ha ha. 45 minutes later we were in trouble for being late back out to the taxi's ha ha. WORTH IT. The nuns gave us cookies and popcorn on our way out, I took a generous helping and they were very pleased that I did. :)

I would have pictures but we aren't supposed to post pictures of the girls.. so I will post a few of the classroom and my teaching partner and I next week :)
Thanks for reading! I love and miss you all!


Masalema!!

Our new home

Soooo.... we made it!!! We are now living in Amman, Jordan. (I realize its confusing that my husbands name is Jordan.. so from here on I will refer to him as Jord... :)

WE LIVE HERE. !!! still trying to wrap my mind around it.. :)

We got to Amman on Thursday on a delayed flight at about 1:00 am. Before we got here we had a raffle with all of the other couples to see who would get the nicest biggest apartment, for some reason I thought we were supposed to guess a number between 1-100 so i guessed 26 when in reality it was 1-1000... haha so yeah, we didn't win.. Anyway! We arrived at our apartment and it was honestly a lot nicer then I had anticipated. 2 bedroom, marble floors, and even a TV! We were so exhausted we threw the sheets on our bed that we brought and passed out at about 3 am. Without a chance to sleep in we were up at 7:30 to get ready for church Friday morning. Church is on Fridays in Amman. We survived our first taxi ride on the way to church, and when I say survived, I mean BARELY survived. Seriously, there are absolutely no rules while driving in Amman. People are weaving in and out of lanes laying on their horns, there could be three lanes merging into one lane at 40 miles an hour while turning onto another street. It gives me a panic attack every. single. time.

Church felt like home. There is incredible leadership and members here in the Amman branch. The BYU students were more than half of the congregation, we felt that everyone was really excited that we were there. We had English sacrament meeting and then Jord got asked to go participate in the Arabic Sunday school while I stayed in the English one, and then we had priesthood and relief society. After that we all went to the Arabic sacrament meeting and then had a fireside, orientation, and a shwarma lunch provided by the branch. It made for a spiritual, exhausting Sabbath.

We went back home and got a little more settled in our apartment, unpacked, cleaned a little, and got used to some of the changes from American apartments. The water for each apartment is kept in a tank on the roof of each building. So if you run out then you have to have water delivered and have your tank refilled, which is really expensive. Because of this we are not allowed to drink tap water as it is sitting under the sun all day, and we have to use water VERY sparingly.. I'm talkin like.. in the shower get wet, turn the water off, soap up, turn the water on, rinse off, turn the water back off.. etc. There is a small water heater in the bathroom that we turn on to get hot water and then turn it off right after you shower.
Also the plumbing is a little different here.. we are not allowed to flush toilet paper, so ill let you do the math on that one.. 
Overall its actually super great here, and SO beautiful. All of the buildings are sandstone and seem to go on for miles and miles.

On Saturday there was a barbecue at one of the foreign service officers house for the branch at the US embassy. We had HAMBURGERS. It was the first time I actually felt full in 3 days. It was really fun because Jord and I got to pick the brains of people with jobs that we are interested in. We had a great time.

Sunday was the first day of Jords classes. He left early and then all the wives of the program came over and we planned what we are going to do while our husbands are in school and studying all semester. Orphanage trips every Sunday afternoon.. cooking classes on Tuesdays.. book club, Arabic classes, bible study with the branch, and gardening with handicap children. 😊 Seriously the best  vacation I could ask for!

Overall I feel pretty safe here in Jordan, I can tell people are staring at me a lot, especially when all of us wives go out to the market together, but I've never felt legitimately scared. (that was for you mom)
As a woman in Jordan, you aren't supposed to make eye contact or smile or shake hands with a man. That goes against everything I know, so in taxis I have to literally concentrate on not looking into the rear view mirror at the same time the driver does. ha ha ha

Last night we had the opportunity to visit one of Jord's families good friends that lives here in Amman. The dad actually lived with Jord's dads parents as a foreign exchange student for years and years in California. Such a small world!  They were incredible hosts, and treated us like family. I couldn't count how many times he said "My home is your home". We had SO much food, I've never been so full in my entire life. Meat kabobs in pita bread, hamburgers, salads, and juice. And then we had chocolates and cookies, and THEN they served us cake and herbal tea. I could hardly breathe by the end. After we visited for awhile we went upstairs and met his mother, she remembered Kurt's family (Jords dad) very well and is very Facebook savvy so she snapped a few pictures of us all together:)

We've almost been here a week now and I'm starting to get used to the constant honking, the call to prayer that blares through the streets and the beauty of this country.I can't WAIT for the adventures that await us here.

Thanks for reading! Until next time!