Just about the future.

I just wanted to make a quick write-up about what I'm planning to do after this semester, for those interested. I've been throwing a wide variety of options around in my mind, as some of you know. I came here with my life savings and a prayer that everything would work out if I were meant to stay here. Unfortunately, those said savings are just about gone, so I am definitely making my way back to the States early next year. That said, I do hope to return to Jerusalem as soon as I am financially able.
As I focused on 20th Century history during my undergrad, I am pretty much out of my element here! I am surrounded by ridiculously intelligent people. Most of the other students here already have backgrounds in ancient history, languages, or Judaic studies, which means I have a lot of catching up to do. One thing I was hoping to accomplish here was to start learning Koine Greek, Latin, and get a working knowledge of ancient Hebrew. The school I am enrolled in currently is very weak when it comes to teaching languages, period. I greatly struggled with their modern Hebrew course, and I thought it was my problem, but almost every classmate I have struggles with it as well. It definitely put me off from focusing on languages here. Fortunately, in Jerusalem I found a facility that teaches ancient languages as if they are living languages, the goal being that you can internalize the language so you don't simply translate the texts into your native tongue, but you can think and communicate in, say, Latin. Going to this language school would let me to put off committing to any one school, allow me to live in this region, and facilitate learning the languages that would greatly help in future studies. I am disappointed that I will be needing to put that off for probably a year or so, but I enjoy self-study(it's been hard trying to re-acclimate being at the will of profs) so my time in the States will not be in vain!

I am set to head to Amman, Jordan at the end of January to spend the month of February working for 3rd Person (http://www.3rdpersoninc.org/). I'm excited to experience an Arab culture outside the influence of Israel, and do something productive outside a library! In a fantastic turn of events, I found out I am able to fly to the US via Southeast Asia for the same cost as flying straight back from either Amman or Tel-Aviv. Thus, I will be visiting friends in Thailand and Vietnam for a short time before finally getting to the US. If you have a suggestion for employment, or potential sugar-mamas, I'd be grateful. I'm already thankful to many of you who played a part in getting me here, and I've done my best to not waste the time. I'm very excited to continue building on what I've learned, refine my study goals, and to pass on what I learn.

Until next time.