! الحمد الله

al-Hamd Allah! It means 'thanks be to God.' People say it all the time here for good things that have happened, someone sneezing, burping, being sated, etc. You say in sha' Allah 'God willing' for anything taking place in the future.

I just took my Arabic mid term. That thing is one-third of my grade here. I knew all of the vocabulary and all of the grammar but it set me ill-at-ease. Maybe I knew things so well that it just seemed easy. The essay was on the differences between Maghribi women and American women, which is easy enough normally but we just do not have that sort of vocabulary.

I was trying to speak to my teacher in Arabic (from here on out, Arabic refers exclusively to the standard dialect fusHa فصحى) but I kept breaking into French and darija. I speak to Amanda G almost exclusively in ASL now. So much is going on!

A boy on the street had just bought a sweet as I was approaching where he was standing unwrapping it on my walk back to the center. With no ceremony the boy handed it to me and said, "tiens." He could not have been more than eight years old, and I had to insist for an entire minute before he would take it back without my having any.

I have no more class until after spring break. I leave Sunday and return Friday, and I shan't be taking Blanchette with me. It seems like we just got back from the excursion in February, but no. That was a month ago! Ahh! Too fast!