I've passed my two week mark now. Strange, my time here seems so much longer than that. And yet at the same time the days have passed very quickly. Perhaps the routine of school has helped with both those impressions. Already I have established somewhat of a routine, so that I feel settled in, and I'm busy enough that the days fade into one another with astonishing rapidity.

I'm still impatient a great deal of the time. I have to force myself to look at the progress I have already made in Arabic... otherwise I tend to feel discouraged that I can't say more to people... or understand more of what they say. Patience. That's a scary thing to ask for. Usually it's taught to me through lessons I would rather not have.

And my impatience is not only with my Arabic. I have yet to find my place here, my place in the work, my place on the team. I came here not knowing, and my two weeks' worth of impressions has certainly not clarified that-- if anything I feel more overwhelmed. But my focus right now really should be on language learning, and that I can handle. And in the meantime-- I have made friends. We slowly and painfully eke out our conversations... very little English, very little Arabic, lots of hand gestures... and with this the relationships grow. Amazing how little common language is needed for friendship.