(no subject)
So I'm in Pittsburgh for a month. I'm at this summer program that's super conventional and has lots of ridiculous rules like "you must wear shoes" and "no jaywalking" etc. However, some of the classes are dammed cool: Societies and cultures with a fantabulous teacher, Intercultural communications with another good teacher, etc. I have mixed feelings about my experience. Anyway, here's an only slightly incoherent ramble that I wrote to my parents the other night:
It poured here. It was really nice because I was sitting outside eating seaweed salad from Lulus and reading when it started to spatter, so I moved over to a foot or two so I was under a cute little grove of trees, put my reading away and sat and watched a downpour from my little dry patch while eating my seaweed with chopsticks. It was exciting.
I am so inspired and bubbly right now: this afternoon has been really great. First of all, we collected recycling from the whole dorm (can you believe Pitt does not recycle? They even have nice little recycling containers, but it's all for PR and goes right in with the rest of the trash!) We sorted it all out and stored it on the 4th floor. Yasmine and Joe are taking it to the recycling center tomorrow morning. So I feel very productive from that; it was actually a lot of fun!
PLUS, (okay, here comes the ubercool part) we got falafel at this little place called Leenas, right? And I've had it once there before, and the old man that runs was really nice, but we didn't have lots of time to talk. Today however, a group of us (Summer, Phil, Yasmine, Shannon, Jules, Olivia, Cassy, and I) went in because I wanted to get falafel and Shannon had never had it before-- and we did have time to talk. So I order my falafel and a couple other people order some stuff. I have to scrounge around and pay with change- I become officially broke (cash wise anyway). We're sharing a Baklava between three of us and he calls me over and gives us two more for free (He is so sweet, let me tell you, this is just the beginning. I love this guy.) Then he's in the back making our food and the phone rings. He calls up to see if one of us can answer it, so I answer the phone for him “Hello, Leenas���” It's his daughter and she sounds upset so I put him on the phone. It turns out she's fine, he'll call her back later. So then when he comes back out he tells us his life story. He's from Palestine, he has six kids, was married before that but she left him, he was hit by a car and had to have his arm bones fused back together. We all go around and tell him our names (he is Muhammad, “the most famous name��� the second most famous is john.”) and if we're from Pitt or not. THEN he decides to make us Palestinian tea(which, by the way is not on the menue at all)! He asks us how much time we have. We have 20 minutes before curfew so he goes to make the tea. He comes back out and we talk some more'we all (including Muhammad) forget about the tea until we realize we have to leave. He also almost forgets someone���s food. So we have our tea party “to go", but first he explains to us that he likes to keep the kettle “like this" (pointing to the burn marks all over it). He tells us it's not dirty, it's clean, but he likes to keep the burns on, because it adds to the tea “like at home". And he has us guess what is in the tea (well, he hints that “it starts with S and ends with E���…sage) We feel really bad for having to run out, but we have to be in by curfew. We���re totally going to go back and give him more business; and he is going to teach us some Arabic. When I asked what he used to make the falafel spicy, he told me that he makes his own hot peppers. He said he takes a red pepper and jalapenos and blends them with salt, pepper, lemon, and a little olive oil. He said that his mom from Palestine loves them so much that she took some jars of it back with her all the way from Pittsburgh to Palestine. I want to ask him how he wound up here in Pittsburgh. And what else was in that tea besides sage and honey (tasted like rosemary).
And now I'm drinking water from a glass bottle (finally my water will cease to taste like plastic!) that I got from our neighbors before it got recycled. And I washed out our trashcan so it no longer smells like curry soup and coffee. And I'm going to go do homework and make 1:30 my target bedtime���no later. I feel accomplished and inspired. Oh, and I went running last night too���that felt good, finally getting some exercise. Okay, I'll stop writing and start homework. Talk to you soon!
So I was feeling apathetic for a while about this program I'm doing here, but tonight I came across the words: "anything worth doing at all is worth doing well" in a fortune cookie. It was good timing for me to come across that phrase-- I'll keep plodding on.
Oh, and by the way, I love having roommates. I'm in a suite that's two doubles connected to each other with a common room. We are such a family-- it's wonderful.
Adios! Shalom.
It poured here. It was really nice because I was sitting outside eating seaweed salad from Lulus and reading when it started to spatter, so I moved over to a foot or two so I was under a cute little grove of trees, put my reading away and sat and watched a downpour from my little dry patch while eating my seaweed with chopsticks. It was exciting.
I am so inspired and bubbly right now: this afternoon has been really great. First of all, we collected recycling from the whole dorm (can you believe Pitt does not recycle? They even have nice little recycling containers, but it's all for PR and goes right in with the rest of the trash!) We sorted it all out and stored it on the 4th floor. Yasmine and Joe are taking it to the recycling center tomorrow morning. So I feel very productive from that; it was actually a lot of fun!
PLUS, (okay, here comes the ubercool part) we got falafel at this little place called Leenas, right? And I've had it once there before, and the old man that runs was really nice, but we didn't have lots of time to talk. Today however, a group of us (Summer, Phil, Yasmine, Shannon, Jules, Olivia, Cassy, and I) went in because I wanted to get falafel and Shannon had never had it before-- and we did have time to talk. So I order my falafel and a couple other people order some stuff. I have to scrounge around and pay with change- I become officially broke (cash wise anyway). We're sharing a Baklava between three of us and he calls me over and gives us two more for free (He is so sweet, let me tell you, this is just the beginning. I love this guy.) Then he's in the back making our food and the phone rings. He calls up to see if one of us can answer it, so I answer the phone for him “Hello, Leenas���” It's his daughter and she sounds upset so I put him on the phone. It turns out she's fine, he'll call her back later. So then when he comes back out he tells us his life story. He's from Palestine, he has six kids, was married before that but she left him, he was hit by a car and had to have his arm bones fused back together. We all go around and tell him our names (he is Muhammad, “the most famous name��� the second most famous is john.”) and if we're from Pitt or not. THEN he decides to make us Palestinian tea(which, by the way is not on the menue at all)! He asks us how much time we have. We have 20 minutes before curfew so he goes to make the tea. He comes back out and we talk some more'we all (including Muhammad) forget about the tea until we realize we have to leave. He also almost forgets someone���s food. So we have our tea party “to go", but first he explains to us that he likes to keep the kettle “like this" (pointing to the burn marks all over it). He tells us it's not dirty, it's clean, but he likes to keep the burns on, because it adds to the tea “like at home". And he has us guess what is in the tea (well, he hints that “it starts with S and ends with E���…sage) We feel really bad for having to run out, but we have to be in by curfew. We���re totally going to go back and give him more business; and he is going to teach us some Arabic. When I asked what he used to make the falafel spicy, he told me that he makes his own hot peppers. He said he takes a red pepper and jalapenos and blends them with salt, pepper, lemon, and a little olive oil. He said that his mom from Palestine loves them so much that she took some jars of it back with her all the way from Pittsburgh to Palestine. I want to ask him how he wound up here in Pittsburgh. And what else was in that tea besides sage and honey (tasted like rosemary).
And now I'm drinking water from a glass bottle (finally my water will cease to taste like plastic!) that I got from our neighbors before it got recycled. And I washed out our trashcan so it no longer smells like curry soup and coffee. And I'm going to go do homework and make 1:30 my target bedtime���no later. I feel accomplished and inspired. Oh, and I went running last night too���that felt good, finally getting some exercise. Okay, I'll stop writing and start homework. Talk to you soon!
So I was feeling apathetic for a while about this program I'm doing here, but tonight I came across the words: "anything worth doing at all is worth doing well" in a fortune cookie. It was good timing for me to come across that phrase-- I'll keep plodding on.
Oh, and by the way, I love having roommates. I'm in a suite that's two doubles connected to each other with a common room. We are such a family-- it's wonderful.
Adios! Shalom.