Days 7 & 8: Desert Life and Arriving at Our Homestays

Day 7- Wadi Rum

We arrived in Wadi Rum from Petra around midday and piled into the backs of 2 jeeps that would take us through the desert. The red sand and strange, stunning rock formations made it easy to see why this place often serves as the set for movies about Mars. The ride itself was fun, but we also enjoyed stopping periodically to climb interesting rocks, look at ancient inscriptions, hike through passageways carved through rock, and, of course, sand board. Our jeeps delivered us to our camp just in time to see the sun set over the desert.

Later, we would gather in the impressive meetinghouse for tea and dinner and listen to Suleiman, who owns the camp along with his brother, talk about what it’s like to be a Bedouin in 2019. He made us laugh and also challenged many of our assumptions about Bedouin life today.


Day 8- Arriving in Tweisi

We spent the morning preparing for our homestays experience in the town of Tweisi. We gathered at Khoula, the homestay coordinator’s house (and mine and Alina’s host mom), where our families came to pick us up. We ate lunch and then spent the rest of the day getting to know our families and trying to communicate with them the best we could. Dave, Kevin, Mohammad and I visited all the students in their homestays to check in and make sure all was well. Everyone’s family seems very different, and I’m looking forward to hearing initial reactions tomorrow and to having further discussions throughout the experience.

-Allie Pistolessi