The beginning: or, when I realized I didn't know anything

I threw open the heavy curtains of my hotel room window as the call to prayer rose like a foghorn from the silence, looked out over the endless stretch of sand-colored buildings and green-lit mosques that dawn was beginning to reveal to my anxious eyes, and said out loud to myself, "Roggemann, what have you done this time".

This is a true story.

I fell into a love affair with the Arab world by accident. Columbia made all its undergrads take a course in a non-Western civilization, and Intro to Islamic Civ fit my schedule. I loved it. I loved the passion-filled history, the rise and fall of dynasties, the fact that giant cultural shifts and societal breaks often sprung from personal vendettas and love affairs. This was a culture I could get down with. Long story short, I ended up choosing to study abroad in Amman, Jordan my Spring semester of Junior year, the first Columbia student to do so, and found myself at 4 am staring out, misery and fear painful in my throat, at a vista fundamentally foreign and threatening.

This was 2004-- the second Intifada was in full swing on one side of me, the Iraq war still in success mode on the other. The terminal Royal Jordanian flew out of at JFK was in a part of the airport I'd never been to, where they wouldn't even let you in the door without a ticket and the people waiting inside looked like the people I saw on the news in the 'America at War' segment. I'd said goodbye to my boyfriend outside the airport, sitting in the freezing February 14th air sobbing as he left, in his tux, to go to a Valentine's Day dance at his fraternity. Without me.

Self-hatred ran deep at that moment when I stared out for the first time into Said's great Other. Why couldn't I just study abroad in Spain like a normal person???

Later that same day, after a full schedule of study abroad rules, regulations, and 'welcome to Jordan' sessions in the hotel for myself and my fellow 11 intrepid American 20 year olds, we were dropped off at our host families' homes.

This was the big make or break moment. Who would my family be?? I was incredibly nervous as I got dropped off outside an apartment building. Our study abroad director quickly introduced me to my new host mom, Susan, and my new brother, Noor, who huffed and muttered words I couldn't understand as he dragged my giant duffel bag down the stairs to the basement apartment. I honestly don't remember much from that night-- I know I was freaked out because Noor was a giant Arab 20-something dude, and Jesus, isn't that exactly who you don't want around you?! I was shown my bedroom and fell into an exhausted sleep.

The next morning I came out of my room in my PJs, not knowing what to expect but figuring I'd have to emerge at some point, so why not just get it over with.

The sight I saw still brings a grin to my face: Noor, my 6 foot 4, 250 pound, Dick Cheney's terrorist fantasy-looking host brother lying on the couch, with his head in my host mom's lap. She was brandishing q-tips and popping his zits. Susan looked up, smiling, and said (her English was good), "Come here, it's a good one!". Noor looked over at me and grinned sheepishly.

I felt every single stereotype I held inside me fall apart and realized everything I thought I knew was completely wrong. The Terrorist was getting his zits popped by Mom.

I trotted over smiling as Susan, indeed, popped a good one. We all cheered as Noor grimaced. Yup. Home.