I feel pretty, oh so pretty.....

Hey there li'l cowboys, hang on for the emotional ride of your lifetime!

I exaggerate, as always.

Picture me, demure (ha!) little American girl, sitting attentively in Arabic class oh so many days in a row. I listen hard, and occasionally I even understand what's going on. Scratch that, mostly I understand what's going on, and occasionaly I can even answer questions, particularly when it comes to grammar (can I get a high five!). Then I go home and, when I am not busy being a professional lazy bum (something I got quite good at in the past two months, although I like to blame it on depression and culture shock and say it will be gone now), I sit with my Arabic notes and translate what she has said. Thankfully, we have a couple of books and other written resources (like the lecture notes) that I can work off of, because of course I don't write fast enough to really catch much of what she says on paper.

So, what we have here is a mildly diligent certainly eager-to-learn student of language who starts off with an incredible handicap (ie I don't speak it).

Fast-forward to our quiz/fake test. This was intended to be a practice for the midterm. I went in, I took it without dictionary or aides of any kind, and as you may remember I was rather proud of myself for understanding all the questions and being able to answer some of them. Yes, folks, I took an Arabic test Arab-style and still managed to answer some questions. I thought this was quite the victory, and patted myself on the back quite vigorously.

Fast-forward to today. Mrs. S, our Arabic teacher, says she has the tests and we can come to her office later to get them back. She then pulls me aside after class to say (I think) "Why didn't you ever come to see me? Did they teach you to write in Arabic? I want you to get a better grade! You should be asking me for help!" I was, needless to say, rather deflated, and I agreed brokenly that I would come see her later that afternoon to get my test and talk it over with her. Remember, this woman speaks no English (which is actually great for me in terms of making me try to speak, but terrible in terms of Fear Factor).

So I spent the next hour and a bit hyperventilating. Was all of that semi-coherent Arabic that I had thought I'd written merely complete gibberish? Were all of the things I thought I understood in fact about something completely different? Had I gotten something appalling like a zero!?! Worse, had I accidentally managed to convince Mrs. S that I had excellent Arabic skills, and she was now appalled and betrayed to discover that I had been leading her on and should never have been in the Arabic for Native Speakers class in the first place?!!?!

You can see how it went. I even called a friend in London, woke him up in the middle of the night, and begged him to tell me I wasn't stupid. Thankfully, he did.

Mona eventually got tired of me sitting at the table like a possessed Energizer Bunny with no self esteem, ranting about how of COURSE I can't speak Arabic but I had thought she understood that and could I really have done that badly and in any case how am I going to explain things to her when I can't speak Arabic and I only sound like a demented infant and don't even know the proper words and I hate thinking I did okay and then discovering I did miserably and I'm really here to learn the Arabic but I'm just an idiot and it's impossible and why can't it just all be in French, that would be so much easier, because French at least makes vague sense and I can babble more convincingly and at least sound like I'm almost functioning at normal speed whereas with Arabic I just stare at people and say "uhhhhhhhhhhh" a lot.

Breathe here.

By the way, I'm giving Team Fabulous special super powers. I have no idea what they are yet, except that Mona is the gender-confused forest fairy Melvianna/Andrew. This makes sense if you accept that every time I try to speak Arabic to her I mix up the genders and say something masculine. She finally got tired of it and started calling herself Andrew, and at that point I finally got it figured out and started using feminine.

Anyway, so Mona agreed to come with me to act as buffer and translator, and wanted to see her own grade anywho, so we wandered over, me still ranting. It's amazing how much babbling I can do without breathing - perhaps I could turn it into a money-making talent somehow. Join the circus. The amazing breathless wonder. Listen to her Rant on the State of the World until she Turns Blue!

Aaaaaaand long story short, we discovered to my joy and disbelief that I had, in fact, PASSED my Arabic test, even by normal standards! Yes, I got a D, but it was a HIGH D (67.5%, I am proud to say). And this without any external aids beyond my own fabulous cerebrum! And she sounded a lot less shocked and dismayed when I actually showed up. She explained to me how it was clear I understood what the questions were asking but I wasn't good at expressing myself in Arabic. I agreed wholeheartedly. After all, I could talk about Jahiliyyah for hours in English, it's the translation and the description that escape my miraculous abilities.

So she gave me some pointers, and I'm going in tomorrow to get her to help me with writing. She's also said I can use my dictionary and even take extra time if I want on the midterm on Tuesday. This is very kind of her.

So now here it is, 8pm, and I have an Arabic exam to study for, but I feel much less fear. Maybe I'll even ask her to meet with me once a week or something for extra help. I have proven I can simulate a stupid Arabic student, and I have nowhere to go but up!

Oh, but I am tired.

No sleep for the intellectual!