Friday, December 28, 2012

Big Jump

These past two months have been quite a whirlwind of change for me. I should start this entry by first announcing the most important decision I have made since I chose to join the Peace Corps.

I left.

I could go into every little detail that led me to my ultimate decision of leaving the Peace Corps after spending 13 months as a volunteer but then this entry would turn into a boring, negative, diary-like form of venting. Instead I am choosing to talk about what I've gained from this experience. Even the challenges have been an indispensable part of my journey. I am leaving a better, stronger, and more motivated and compassionate person than I was one year ago. And I am so incredibly grateful for that.

I will love this country forever. I will never forget the people here who I've come to love and who have touched my soul. I will never forget the joyful smiles on my students' faces. I will never forget the moment I began to understand and find true beauty in Islam. I will never forget the immeasurable kindness I have been treated with by the Jordanian people and others I've met from Iraq, Syria, and Egypt.

I have struggled and faced so many obstacles, I have laughed and cried, I have doubted myself and all the things I thought I knew about who I am. All of which have shaped me profoundly and I hope I will never let go of the remarkable changes that have occurred within my heart.

I was afraid that I would regret my decision because I was giving up. But I realized I wasn't giving up. I gave of myself, I took a chance, I contributed, but my time in the village was at its end. I couldn't justify staying there when there was nothing more I could do. Staying just to gain the recognition of completing the Peace Corps was not an acceptable excuse. What would that really do for me? I would spend a full year of my life doing something that would eventually make me unhappy and bitter towards a beautiful experience I've had.

It may come as a surprise that even though I left the Peace Corps I did not leave Jordan. I had my reasons for quitting the PC but I was not yet ready to leave this beautiful country.

In the end I will always follow my heart and this is where it's led me. I took a major leap of faith. I quit the PC and moved to Amman without guarantee of work, with complete chance of failure and it was one of the most exciting things I've ever done. Immediately I found a job teaching dance at a studio.

I've been living independently in Amman now for a little over a month. I love where I am living, I love my roommates, I love that I can dance again, I love speaking in arabic. I am happy here. For how long I wish to stay, I don't know. I just need to leave Jordan on my own terms and not be rushed out and practically deported with in 48 hours of my resignation like Peace Corps staff would have it. I still go back to my village to visit and I'm welcomed warmly. Volunteering will always be important to me and I'm looking forward to the next volunteer mission I can find and where it will lead me.

Since I left the PC I've been able to travel and do and see so many things in Jordan I never had the permission or time to do while being a volunteer. It feels absolutely amazing to be in control of my own life again. Another blog post to come about  my incredible adventures in Petra, Wadi Rum, Jerusalem, Bethleham and Tel Aviv.

I also got my first visitor! My friend Jana from college stopped over in Jordan while on her very own backpacking adventure. I couldn't have had a better travel buddy. 

Some pictures from this past month:





 Operation Smile Mission in Amman


This sweet little girl wanted her nails painted after she came out of surgery.

                                                                  Exploring Petra





Petra By Night






                                                                       Wadi Rum








            Road trip to the Desert Castles in the East

My little host brothers trying to give me a massage. (aka get me into a good tickling position)

Jerusalem

The spot where baby Jesus was claimed to have been born in Bethlehem (before this church was built around it of course)

Bethlehem


And more MANSAF!!