life is good

Hello again - so the ‘i’ is back, as well as the apostrophe. as well as many many
arabic symbols that i don’t understand. i hate going to countries and not even being able
to say basic things in their language. it makes really little difference here though, b/c
in beirut EVERYONE speaks english. well, it’s like frenglarabic. the most common greeting
goes something like this: “hello, kifak, ca va?” - but i get to use french lot’s during
the day which i am loving.

i’ve read half of my new textbook so far - NOT the russia one, that one’s still somewhere
around chapter one. but the “among nations” book is really interesting. 

..how do you make “Russia in the 21st century” sound interesting to
kids who have less interest in that part of the world than most other things in life? -it’s not that though, it’s the writing. so densely academic. pedantic. BORING. wow i hope professor rosefielde never reads this, b/c he also wrote all of 4 of our textbooks for next semester.

anyway, so there’s been progress on both of those fronts and it’s only day 2. i was so
tired yesterday though that i slept through most of it and therefore also appreciated the
forced chinese language lessons that much less. but i do appreciate.

in an hour i meet with editor #2. i just left the office - i came early and read today’s
paper, to familiarize a bit. i’ve read articles before but it was good to read through the whole thing. in print.

i’m feeling really intimidated, but i think things will go really well. i’m going to
apply to work as a photographer - for many reasons - and also suggest that i could work
in the archives - going through past papers and picking out articles from that same day
in history - as well as filing and whatever dirty work they may have. they compensate -
well.. they recompensate - for transportation costs and very little more, but i’m not
going to ask for any money (pretty ballsy if i did) but i am asking that if i do a good
job that they allow me to put them as references - the main editor - and possibly be
willing to write a letter of recommendation should i need one for future work. i’ll see
how confident i feel about my work first though.

and the apt is amazing! it’s really nice w/ an outdoor terrace and bianca - a german muslim
roomate who speaks no english and seems very conservative. it’s located in a german
church - in manara, a muslim district. and in the same apt, on tuesdays, there is a
german child psychologist who rents the room right next to the bedroom i stay in, and
apparently random ppl come in and out. i find all of this to be hilarious.

there’s even a cleaning lady - she comes on tuesdays also and is apparently really nice.
i feel like she might like me least though b/c before i came the whole place was
spotless. it still is minus some clothes and books scattered about. nothing like the
messes i am capable of.

i’ll write more later. lot’s more. but if i don’t get off the compute now i’ll get
charged another 2,000. au revoir pour maintenant..