Thursday

Hospitals

Okay, so I am not a fan of going to hospitals or doctors appointments in general. Mainly because I am not adult enough to make my own appointments. Unfortunately I was injured not too long ago when I messed up my meniscus. Luckily, going to the doctors/hospital was very easy and cheap compared to the US. 

One thing that helped is that a friend gave me a ride and handled all the insurance stuff. It was just more efficient and they were trying to be nice/hospitable. In the end, I got everything I needed relatively quickly. This is after I went to the quack doctor in our neighborhood who wanted to give me a Benadryl and call it a day. I would have never gone to such a shady place but my friend insisted that she knew him.


Random wall art outside of British council, rainbow St
because I didnt take any pics of the hospital lol
In general, the hospitals and doctors in Amman are good. This is from friends' combined experiences (I've only gone for my knee). There are specialty hospitals like private hospitals and general ones. I went to the one in the Gardens but they didn't take my type of insurance. However, I really liked my doctor so I decided to pay for his consultations out of pocket (it was cheap). However, for the expensive stuff I went to a hospital further away that took my insurance. I forgot the name. Anyway, both were good. The main point, any routine healthcare that you need you will be able to find it easily in Amman.

If you don't speak much Arabic don't worry because its not a problem. One thing worth mentioning is that you will need to take your passport with you. Also, if you're on birth control and coming to study in Jordan for a short time, it may just be easier to bring enough with you for the time. Also, inhalers can be found for cheap in a pharmacy. Its not necessary to schedule a doctor's appointment to get a prescription for one like many places in the US. So that's nice, saves some money and time. Anyway, this is all I can think of for this post. Hopefully, you will not need a hospital during your stay in Amman.

Tuesday

Finding Apartments

Hello again,


View of the main street 
on my way to class
Flashback to my first time coming to Amman. I had arranged to meet a guy from the expatriates website to rent a room in an apartment from him. We agreed that I was going to give him the money when I arrived. So I thought everything was good. Then while I was on the plane to Amman, he sends me an email saying he changed his mind.
I was thinking I should probably be freaking out because I have no clue where I'm gonna go or live 
My first neighborhood 
pic taken on a walk to class
or anything, and I'm here alone. However, I'm usually not into freaking out about important things. I have slept in airports before so worst case scenario I'd still be fine. Yet, the prospect of  sleeping on an airport floor is more intimidating when its in a county you have never been to before. This isn't just Chicago where if anything went wrong my family could just drive a few hours then come pick me up from the airport. Nonetheless, I took it in stride. Luckily, I had met a Jordanian girl on the layover in New York, when I landed she helped me get it all figured out. She was very kind, and also a Uni student in the US.  That's how I ended up in Qasid student housing for one semester.


The living room of my 2nd apartment.
 smaller and older but a lot of character
Okay so now I am living in an apartment (also found it on expatriate site). I have lived in a few like maybe 4 apartments in Amman - two of them I found on the expatriate site and two I found on Facebook. I definitely prefer using Facebook because its easier to communicate and to send pictures of the apartment. I've stayed in a few different apartments in such a short time for mainly two reasons 1) I wanted to get to know different parts of the city and 2) Moving is easy to do when all of your stuff can fit into a single suitcase.

My current house is my favorite, I am living with my friend from back home. This is the first time I have lived with one of my friends here. Our landlords are also so nice. They treat us like family, we get tea with them and the mom even cooks dinners for us. Last week they took us grocery shopping. It is very nice practicing arabic with them too. The rent here is also a decent price for such a nice apartment.
Qasid apartment in Amman

Many landlords want people to agree to rent for at least three months at a time, some prefer longer. Some accepted monthly rent payments, and others wanted lump sum payments. It really just depends. I prefer to pay in lump sum because its easier for my budgeting purposes, I only had two landlords that wouldn't accept that. My current landlord is one of them. I think its because he lives in the same building, so its easy to just do monthly payments. Its not like hes coming across town to meet us. The only other landlord that wanted monthly payments rather than lump sums also happened to live in the same building as me. My previous roommate and I knew that each month we would need to plan a few hours for paying the rent. It was always a big event of having to get tea and talk and whatnot.

Another benefit of living here is that its easy to find people that will clean your apartment for a decent price. In the US, it can be expensive to find someone that will clean well at a decent price (on a college student's budget). On the other hand there are some people willing to clean the apartment for 5JD, however my roommate and I feel like that's too little (unfair) of an amount to pay someone. At the same time, you don't want to offer to overpay someone because that could be offensive. Luckily, there's a place between exploitation and charity in this case.


room in qasid apartment
Another benefit of arranging your own apartment rather than relying on student housing is that you get to practice Arabic more. For example, talking to landlords to find the apartment, talking to people when something needs maintenance, getting services like wifi, gas, water etc. Additionally, if you live outside of student hosing you can find roommates that speak Arabic. Then you will use more Arabic at home too. One time I had a roommate who was Tunisian. She knew French and Arabic, no English. So we used Arabic to communicate. This worked well to improve my arabic skills. However, the downside to renting with nonstudent roommates or from a landlord is that your roommates may not pay their rent. This happened at one of my houses. It was a big issue. At first, I would cover the girls rent that wasn't paying. However, It was going on too long and she hadn't paid me back. My roommate and I talked to the landlord and told her which girl wasn't paying. The landlord already didn't like her for other reasons so she was eager to make her leave. Then, somehow she came up with the money in time. While handling this situation was good for improving my level 2 Arabic it was not fun at the time.
Kitchen of my 2nd place
One thing that I encountered at some of my apartments but did not encounter at others is nosy neighbors. I think this could potentially change a lot depending on the neighborhood in which you live. However, I will give one example of a nosy neighbor we had. This was in a separate apartment. I lived with two female roommates. My landlord came to talk to us about getting sort of a "complaint" from a neighbor lady. She said we were having a man in our house and that he would come at night and hes come like a few times. My roommates and I had not had any men over because the landlord told us ahead of time that the neighbors wouldn't like this.


A bedroom in my 2nd apartment
We were racking our brains trying to figure out what "man" she was talking about. She said a tall man. Then we realized the only men we have had over were the short maintenance man and our tall
landlord. We realized she was talking about him. This was more hilarious to us than anything. He came three times to collect the rent and to show the apartment to other girls. He lived out of town so sometimes he would come around or after Maghrib. In some neighborhoods having mixed company over would be an issue, in other neighborhoods you can get away with a lot more. Either way, doesnt bother me.

Qasid Arabic Institute



I started studying Arabic in the Fall of 2013 as a freshman at Michigan State University. In the Fall of 2015, I studied abroad for the first time. One of my Arabic professors at MSU encouraged me to go to a place named Qasid. At first I was planning to study for 6 months, but then it turned into 9 months abroad.  Upon returning home I missed Qasid and Jordan. So when it came time for me to study Arabic again in 2017, I knew I wanted to return to Qasid.

Qasid is located in Sport's City in Amman. It is in a pretty convenient location. Many students like to go next door to Mukhtar mall, Qasr al Mandi, or Haboob to grab a quick lunch or dinner. The Hamada across the street is also a popular choice. Qasid's teaching methods are great, and the overall environment of the school is enjoyable. The teachers and administration play an important role in making students feel welcome and well connected at Qasid. Additionally, they have improved their efforts to provide students with opportunities to take excursions to explore the rest of Jordan. 

Celebrating the end of 
the semester at Jafra
Qasid helps students get connected with the community by giving them some cultural tips and connecting them to events, internships, and volunteer opportunities. Qasid organizes events within the school for students.They organize debates, jeopardy-like 
quizzes, and other game type competitions. These allow the students to practice the language and get to know other students and staff. 

Entrance into Qasid
Generally, the class sizes are small in Qasid. This is great for learning and for getting to know your classmates and teacher. The furniture in the classrooms are also set up a nice way to foster conversation and keep people engaged. I studied at two other schools in Amman, and I found this one to be my favorite. Qasid offers a variety of courses such as Modern Standard Arabic, Classical, Dialect, Calligraphy, Tajwid, and more. 

The classes go from beginner to advanced and beyond. Additionally, classes can be tailed for a specific group of people or a person looking for their own program. Usually, Qasid uses their own books or authentic materials for teaching. This is a good alternative for people looking to get away from the Al-kitaab series.

Anyway, when studying abroad choosing the right institute can be difficult. However, hopefully this post can benefit someone. Amman is a great place to study Arabic, and Qasid is too. 

bitofeek,

Surayya/Thurayya