Biography/Introduction Before Traveling to Jordan

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Hello, and my name is Chloe Colbert.  I would like to take this time to formally introduce myself.  I am a junior here at The George Washington University, and I am majoring international affairs and minoring in economics.  I am studying abroad in Amman, Jordan during the spring semester of my junior year, and I cannot wait to go!
           
I initially considered studying abroad in Jordan during my second semester of Arabic in 2011.  My professor was Jordanian, and she commented on all of the great aspects of Jordan and including King Abdullah II and politics in the Middle East.  Then the Arab Spring broke out in February in Tunisia, and I immediately became enraptured by the multiple protests in the Islamic world: Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Jordan and Bahrain.  Even Saudi Arabia and Iran were experiencing protests within their countries, which were quickly subdued.  I revisited the question I was asked in my freshman Politics and Values class: was democracy really possible in the Middle East?  I knew I wanted an answer but wanted to be safe while doing it.  My Jordanian Arabic professor’s encouragement towards visiting Jordan was my final decision-maker, and when fall semester came around, I already knew my location of my study-abroad experience.
           
What do I hope to do in Jordan when I get there?  Well, I will definitely intensify my Arabic language studies.  I hope to have a study aide to help me practice my Arabic grammatical and conversational skills, especially the Jordanian colloquial dialect.  I have heard that the Jordanian colloquial dialect is very different from the formal modern standard Arabic that students are taught in university.  I also hope to travel within the country to cities like Petra and and possibly outside the country to Turkey and Israel. 
           
I also am excited to taste Middle Eastern food, particularly Jordanian food.  I already enjoy delicious pita chips and hummus here in Washington, D.C., but sometimes Americanized dishes of Middle Eastern food can misrepresent the true origin and tastes of food.  If I am participating with a home stay in Jordan, I only hope that I can learn from my homestay family on how to cook or at least watch them in the kitchen to see how they make traditional Jordanian dishes.  Americans experience many different forms of international cuisine, but I really hope to experience authentic Jordanian cuisine while I am abroad.  Food is an inherent part of any culture.
           
Just like how American music (R&B, country, hip-hop) has evolved over the last several decades, so has Arabic music.  Jordanian artists are currently producing modern pop culture music   There are music videos of famous Jordanian and Arabic-language singers on YouTube, and I only hope to experience more of that music as well as the traditional music of the Islamic world.  I hope to understand some of the cultural taboos through the Arabic music as well as what many people of the Islamic culture consider sacred. 

That brings me to my last great expectation for my study-abroad experience in Jordan.  I hope to develop a deep appreciation and understanding of the religion and history of Islam.  I will be taking an Islam religion course while abroad, but I hope to also see it practiced in an Islamic state.  Having fought in multiple wars in the Middle East, we as Americans sometimes have a misconception of how Islam is practiced and what it truly represents.  I hope to discover the root of this misconception and then reeducate myself on the true practice. 

I have so many hopes and wishes for my study-abroad experience in Jordan, including making lots of friends.  I know that Jordan cannot disappoint especially with all the great reports that I hear from those who have returned from there. 
Location: St Louis, MO, USA

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