On the first foot of immersion
As for my current semester, I’ve changed programs and am now in an immersion program for which I have a homestay with a Jordanian family, classes and excursions in only Arabic and a language pledge to converse only in Arabic (only mildly breaking that one currently). I’ve moved in withContinue Reading
On Filustine
Following the New Year, spent in a small café drinking coffee with Egyptians and missing the countdown because the Hijri calendar New Year falls on a different date than the Gregorian one, I made my way through Israel. I spent two days in al-Quds (aka Jerusalem) during which I walkedContinue Reading
On Cups of Tea
After a little bit of travel in Jordan at the conclusion of last semester, I packed up and headed down to the land of the Pharaohs, or as I am more concerned with, the home of the Fatimid Empire; I truly lament not having a better background in pharaonic historyContinue Reading
The Perks of Crusading
So while looking through the texts I hadn’t yet hit for my thesis, I found a commentary on the “ships of women” who followed the Crusaders in the late 12th C, written by a Syrian chronicler. Reminded me of going to Manzy… “There arrived by ship three hundred lovely FrankishContinue Reading