Hello,
First, I have to make a confession, I did sing "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue" at Karaoke last night with John and Max. It was wrong of me to do it especially in a public Jordanian space. But let me explain.
Yesterday I found out that I cannot get permission from the University of Jordan to hand out my surveys for my research in their classes. Gettysburg College wants me to get a letter of approval from a Dean of the University, but that is not possible. I could do the surveys in Amman with SIT, but due to the lack of permission, Gettysburg College would not let me use the surveys for my thesis. Poop.
"Natalie, why can't you get a letter from a dean? Your research is about how people talk and has nothing to do with politics?"
That is a fantastic question! It all comes down to a small word: wasta. Wasta is a word that essentially sums up how business is done in the Middle East. You need connections to get anything done. If you want your license renewed, you use your connections to get your license renewed. Without wasta, you would be waiting months to get your license renewed. As you can imagine, the American chick has no wasta. Due to the lack of wasta, I cannot get the University of Jordan to notice me at all and thus things will never move forward. I am depended on the wasta of the people around me. This makes things move slower. I wish there was a fairy who give me wasta!
This realization made me cry. Why couldn't it just be simple? At Gettysburg College I could go see a head of a department and just hand out surveys all around campus. There would be no problem. In the United States, my thoughts are my thoughts and I can share them with whomever I damn well please. In Jordanian Universities, you need to get permission from a specific professor and hand out the surveys in their class. If you go around handing out surveys, you will be arrested. The students are not able to freely share their thoughts. Also, the professor of the class is held responsible if things go bad. Ahmed had to go bail some kids out a couple years ago after they handed out surveys at the University of Jordan. So this is a legit issue. While the University of Jordan has thousands of students, the odd American would always stick out. I felt really frustrated. I just want to ask people what dialects of Arabic they like! I'm not trying to bring down the man! I literally found out the survey rule as I was about to leave SIT to hand out Surveys at JU. I happened to be talking to Dr. Raed about it. He looked at me like I was crazy and explained the rules. I was pissed off. I asked him when he was planning on sharing this important information with us. He said he thought everyone knew. I recommended that he send out an email. He did. Turns out all the students were as surprised as I was. A couple of other students had to stop what they were doing as well.
I went to go talk to Jumana about my situation and how I needed permission from a dean. I was really frustrated and she helped me a lot. Turns out a professor was in the office today. He works at a smaller university, Hashamite University. He told me I could survey his class and could get a dean, one of his best friends, to write a letter for me. He even promised me official looking letterhead. I really appreciated this. He will use his wasta to help me out. This is really nice of him and I really appreciate it. He fixed all my problems.
At Middlebury last summer, our teacher kept trying to explain wasta. However, I did not fully understand how wasta works until this week. It is everything. Connections are everything. Favoritism is everything. Wasta is used to get your child into school. Without wasta, you will never be able to enroll in the University of Jordan, even if you are a genius. While this is a great system if you have wasta, it stinks at the same time. Not efficient, not fair and often corrupt.
When I got home, I took a nap then talked to my host sister, Mayas. Mayas was like "Oh yea, Wasta is totally everything". We made a bunch of wasta jokes. I kept asking if you needed wasta to put a commercial for your business on TV. She laughed and said no. I said thank God. I think even she finds wasta frustrating. That was nice to hear.
After this day, when the two guys called me up to sing with them, I could not resist. I wanted to belt a song about American freedom. Murica!
Talk to you later,
Natalie
First, I have to make a confession, I did sing "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue" at Karaoke last night with John and Max. It was wrong of me to do it especially in a public Jordanian space. But let me explain.
Yesterday I found out that I cannot get permission from the University of Jordan to hand out my surveys for my research in their classes. Gettysburg College wants me to get a letter of approval from a Dean of the University, but that is not possible. I could do the surveys in Amman with SIT, but due to the lack of permission, Gettysburg College would not let me use the surveys for my thesis. Poop.
"Natalie, why can't you get a letter from a dean? Your research is about how people talk and has nothing to do with politics?"
That is a fantastic question! It all comes down to a small word: wasta. Wasta is a word that essentially sums up how business is done in the Middle East. You need connections to get anything done. If you want your license renewed, you use your connections to get your license renewed. Without wasta, you would be waiting months to get your license renewed. As you can imagine, the American chick has no wasta. Due to the lack of wasta, I cannot get the University of Jordan to notice me at all and thus things will never move forward. I am depended on the wasta of the people around me. This makes things move slower. I wish there was a fairy who give me wasta!
This realization made me cry. Why couldn't it just be simple? At Gettysburg College I could go see a head of a department and just hand out surveys all around campus. There would be no problem. In the United States, my thoughts are my thoughts and I can share them with whomever I damn well please. In Jordanian Universities, you need to get permission from a specific professor and hand out the surveys in their class. If you go around handing out surveys, you will be arrested. The students are not able to freely share their thoughts. Also, the professor of the class is held responsible if things go bad. Ahmed had to go bail some kids out a couple years ago after they handed out surveys at the University of Jordan. So this is a legit issue. While the University of Jordan has thousands of students, the odd American would always stick out. I felt really frustrated. I just want to ask people what dialects of Arabic they like! I'm not trying to bring down the man! I literally found out the survey rule as I was about to leave SIT to hand out Surveys at JU. I happened to be talking to Dr. Raed about it. He looked at me like I was crazy and explained the rules. I was pissed off. I asked him when he was planning on sharing this important information with us. He said he thought everyone knew. I recommended that he send out an email. He did. Turns out all the students were as surprised as I was. A couple of other students had to stop what they were doing as well.
I went to go talk to Jumana about my situation and how I needed permission from a dean. I was really frustrated and she helped me a lot. Turns out a professor was in the office today. He works at a smaller university, Hashamite University. He told me I could survey his class and could get a dean, one of his best friends, to write a letter for me. He even promised me official looking letterhead. I really appreciated this. He will use his wasta to help me out. This is really nice of him and I really appreciate it. He fixed all my problems.
At Middlebury last summer, our teacher kept trying to explain wasta. However, I did not fully understand how wasta works until this week. It is everything. Connections are everything. Favoritism is everything. Wasta is used to get your child into school. Without wasta, you will never be able to enroll in the University of Jordan, even if you are a genius. While this is a great system if you have wasta, it stinks at the same time. Not efficient, not fair and often corrupt.
When I got home, I took a nap then talked to my host sister, Mayas. Mayas was like "Oh yea, Wasta is totally everything". We made a bunch of wasta jokes. I kept asking if you needed wasta to put a commercial for your business on TV. She laughed and said no. I said thank God. I think even she finds wasta frustrating. That was nice to hear.
After this day, when the two guys called me up to sing with them, I could not resist. I wanted to belt a song about American freedom. Murica!
Talk to you later,
Natalie
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