Communication

One of the biggest struggles that I have had here is communication. Sometimes it's language, like when people follow a sentence of mine with "Okay" and nothing else, a sign that is usually used by native English speakers to indicate the conversation is over. Sometimes it's cultural, like when I am standing near Zoughbi waiting for him to be done a conversation - a clear sign to me that I need to talk to him - only to have him finish one conversation and walk right by me (I'm assume that he thinks that I'm just hanging around being relational with people). Sometimes it's a little more complicated. Yesterday and today is a good example of that.

To help you understand this scene I need to go back a few days. One day I was in the office when one of the staff asked if I was going to Jericho. I had heard about the trip a while ago but had forgot about it. I went to the guy that was organizing the trip and asked him about it. I quickly realized that something was wrong and excused myself from the conversation. I then was taken off to the side by the first coworker and told not to tell people that I heard about the trip from him. There are two ways to take this information. First, I accidentally went through the wrong channels. I should have asked Zoughbi first and then went to the staff who was organizing the trip. This is a mistake that I have made before. The culture of the office is very similar to clan society: any significant conversations need to happen with the head first. Second, I was not supposed to know about the trip at all. I went with this option, because I figured it was safest. I also knew that it was Wi'am's womens group that would be going, and while I have traveled with them before this was going to be a multiday retreat. I decided not to talk to Zoughbi about it, in case that might get the first coworker in trouble, and the topic never came up again.

That conversation happened sometime last week. I showed up to work on Monday and quickly realized that the trip was that day. The strange thing was that when I saw these two coworkers and Zoughbi, they all asked if I was going on the trip. When I said no, they said "that's too bad." This was a little frustrating. It was now that I realized that the office was going to be mostly empty for the day, because almost everyone else went on the retreat. I worked until lunch on an assignment that I did not understand, but had no one that I could talk to about it.

At lunch time Zoughbi showed up. He asked me if I wanted to go swimming in the afternoon. I said yes, and started to pack my things because we were leaving "in 5 minutes." Twenty minutes later we were driving home. We got home and I asked if I had enough time to eat lunch. I was then told that we would be only leaving at 8pm. I went home and ate some lunch and at 1:30 I was told that we would be leaving in an hour. At 2:30 we went to Jericho, by taxi - luckily I had brought some money - and arrived at the same retreat that the rest of Wi'am was at. I ended up swimming in the pool at the retreat hotel.

The story continues in the morning, when on Tuesday I was told to meet Zoughbi at 8am. When I arrived at 8:05 he looked up from his work and said, "O you are awake."

This story is not indicative of my overall experience here, but it is a condensed highlight of the biggest issue that I have faced here. It has been frustrating but I hope that this story is illuminating, not ranting.