Arabic and Mormons: Why the Arabic Language is Amazing

Want to know something cool about Arabic? Arabic is a language where words are based off of roots, typically with just three letters. These three letters are then the base for what it is used for. For example كتب

(those are three letters( ك - ت - ب ), pronounced katiba) means books. But if you add one letter before it مكتب (maktab) it means "office." Or if you change it even a little bit more (keeping the root) مكتبة (maktaba)  it means "library." You can do this for several other words. Did you notice a pattern? They all are related to each other: books, office, library. This pattern is all over the Arabic language.

The Arabic word قلب (kalb) means "heart." The root letters are ق - ل - ب . Or in English sounds, k - l -b. The other day I was noticing a similarity between قلب (kalb) to a pretty well known LDS word, Kolob. Did you already notice the connection? K-l-b is the Arabic root of heart and the "roots" of Kolob are k-l-b, signifying that Kolob is related to the heart or center of something important, fantastic, and beautiful. For LDS members, this should be very significant.

There is your little Arabic lesson of the day :) 

Coptic Church in Amman

An account while I was in Jordan in October 2012

                The other night a group of me and a few other BYU students decided to go to a Coptic church. There was a rumor that they were having a service on Thursday night. Fridays are the day for Sabbath day worship so I thought this was a bit odd but I decided to go either way.

I had ever been to a Coptic church before but I have heard much and studied very little about them. As one of my bosses is Coptic, I hear things periodically but she is not a strong Coptic in the sense of actual practice. I also had read much about them in the news regarding Egypt. Often times it is about the Coptic’s events dealing with Muslims in Egypt; most of the time they are not good events. The Coptic religion originates and is mostly found in Egypt.  Regarding the Arab Spring, Christians and Muslims united together to overthrow the Mubarak Regime. There was peace and alliance but just a few weeks prior to the beginning of the Arab Spring there were bombings in Coptic churches to probably incite revolts and a battle for a sense of control. Now, almost 2 years after the fall of Mubarak, Christians and Muslims are back at it with each other. The Coptic Church has many similarities with other churches. It has its own pope, the Coptic language is used during services and they can claim origin to the early apostles of the New Testament.

As we arrived to the Coptic church building I noticed that it was near the brand new, almost multiplex style, mosque. The mosque was beautiful, across the street from it was a large but simple church. The church building stood about 40-50 feet tall with a Christmas light lit up cross on the top of its highest point. We walked around the street trying to find a gate to get into the church grounds. I thought it was odd the church had walls around it but then I realized the mosque across the street had walls and that most of my own church buildings in the in the States had walls. It took a few Muslims who were crossing the street from the mosque to tell us where the gate was to get in. Turned out there was a little slot you can put your hand in to pull the lever to open the door but we didn’t realize this until after we had to call over for a person to open the door for us. This individual that opened the door was fully robed in priest clothes and had salt and pepper colored beard. The beard probably was a foot long and a half foot cap topped his head. He didn’t seem to want to say much to us at this time because he pointed us in the direction where we should go and then went back to sit on his chair. On our way out, we saw him sitting next to a younger male member and seemed to be speaking Coptic to him, almost like bestowing a blessing upon the young man.

As we walked closer to the main door, you could look inside and see lights and even candles lit inside. We were pretty nervous at first, we weren’t sure if we should knock or just open the door. Out of our group I decided to just open the door and walk in. As soon as I opened the door you could feel like you stepped back about 1000 years. The church, though had modern paintings, it was filled with cascade windows and arches. The doors were of the finest large wood carvings I have ever seen. The pews of the church were more modern, you could see scriptures written in Arabic from the New Testament written on the back side. Each pew had its own scripture.  There was about a group of 20 people listening to a man sit in the front dressed in business casual. It seemed all of the others there were dressed in business casual attire, including the women. The women were not veiled and even spoke more openly than I’ve seen Muslim women in social settings. The person giving the sermon we later found out was a visitor from Egypt, we could tell he was from Egypt because of his Egyptian Arabic dialect. It was kind of refreshing to hear it because that was the dialect I was taught in school. I sat down behind the others listening in and I found myself not paying too much attention to the sermon being given but more rather to the art work. It seemed that there were pictures of many of the notable prophets in the bible everywhere they could find a place to paint. Each prophet seemed to look about the same, white beards, old looking (some young), and carrying a scroll (probably scripture). A few had certain key symbols with them, for example, Moses was carrying a staff and two tablets. In the front, there was a pew and a wood wall that didn’t reach the top (the vaulted ceilings were about 40-50 feet high). On this wood wall was a spot for each of the twelve apostles and in the center top was a large wooden statue of Jesus Christ. There also was a miniature statue of Jesus Christ in the center of the priest’s area and then on the left side of the wood wall. Overall, the church was very beautiful with amazing artwork all around.

We were obviously late to the sermon but we weren’t the only ones. Two young Arabs came walking in down one of the aisles between the pews. They walked up where the priest’s area begins and took their sandals off where the step begins. They stepped up and began to cross themselves which I thought was the normal but then they knelt and began to pray similar to how a Muslims prays in the mosque. I was really confused because I thought for a moment that these were Muslims coming to pray in the church, almost to make a point against the Christians but this was not the case at all. After kneeling and putting their heads to ground for a few seconds, they got back up and crossed themselves again. Then they went and kissed both of the smaller statues of Jesus Christ and then each chose a picture of an apostle and kissed that. I think one kissed Paul and the other kissed Thomas. They then went near the entrance and each lit a candle and placed it in the appropriate spot of sand located at just below eye level in a circular tub.

Another member who was observing the sermon then handed us envelopes with the church’s name on the envelope. We of course took them but then after it was handed to us, we noticed that this was for the sake of paying offerings. One of the military guys with us paid five dinar but the rest of us did not.

The sermon was done (finally), it seemed to have lasted a total of two hours, an hour before and after we arrived. After the sermon, each of the members there were so anxious to speak to us! They wanted to ask us where we were from, why we’re in Jordan, and most importantly, to have us over for coffee and tea for next week’s sermon. The fellowship they were lending us reminded me of the type of fellowship we as Latter-day Saints had done. It was quite interesting to see how much they similar to us in this aspect. Coptics are primarily from Egypt so most of the people there were from Egypt but a small hand few were from Armenia. Most Armenians will say they go to the Armenian Church and never anything else so it makes me wonder if these Armenians were going for another reason.

This was my first experience with a Christian church in the Middle East. It was interesting to see another Christian church in a different culture where Christianity isn’t the most practiced religion. The Christians seemed to mix a lot of their practices with the Muslims. The act of prayer that the two young Arab men did at the beginning seemed too similar to what a Muslim would do when he first enters a mosque and begins to pray. Christianity was fairly established in the Holy Land when Islam came around and I wonder if maybe Islam took similar practices from Christianity. The idea of respect for the sacred area seems to be universal between the two religions. It also seemed that being a Christian, no matter what sect you were, was just as good as any other sect.

Taxi Drivers In Amman

                I’ve been in Jordan for over a month now. It hasn't been until I got to Amman that I took my first taxi. Growing up in the area as to which taxis were only for those that seemed to be only for business travelers or people that had not much money but used it as a way to get around when they absolutely needed it.  Taxis have always seemed very foreign to me so coming to Amman it’s been a real cultural experience.  Not so much the crazy driving, but more so the type of people that drive these taxis.

                My first experience in Amman dealt my friend Keith and I’s first morning in Amman. We were in a hotel for the night and getting ready to meet with our professor at the school which we would be attending. The hotel’s son recommended that we take a bus but we wanted a quick and direct way to the place. We must have seemed like a “Welcome to Las Vegas” sign because literally four taxis lined up along the street waiting for us to choose one of them. We started talking to the first taxi driver in line, he spoke English fairly well, while we were talking to them, two of the three other taxi drivers got out of their car and started talking to the taxi driver we were speaking to. Their conversation was in all Arabic and I had no clue what they were saying. It seemed like they were chatting simply to catch up with one another. They ended with the other two walking away upset at our driver. Reluctantly, it seemed we were stuck with this taxi driver as the other three taxis left.  He agreed to do the drive for three dinar, we knew we could pay it for less but we just wanted to get to where we were going. We didn't know there were meters, thought that maybe we were just paying a little bit extra, we later learned that if we were going off of the meter, it would have only cost a little over one dinar. One other aspect about taxis in Amman is that you need to tell them the general area that you want to go to. In this case, we didn’t know anything except that it was south of University of Jordan and on Queen Rania Street. Most Jordanians, especially taxi drivers do not know street names. So this didn’t help too much. Luckily, we knew the street number and the taxi driver asked other drivers through his window while we were in traffic where Queen Rania Street was, miraculously we found it.

                In taxis, if there are girls, they sit in the back seat. If it is girls and one guy, the guy sits in the front seat. This is cultural with the Islamic state that we live in. Women don’t talk to men in public. So later in our first week, we as a BYU group were heading to downtown Amman to get some delicious Hashem’s hummus. I went with a roommate and two other girls and I sat in the front street because I knew what to tell the taxi driver since I had been there before. What I didn’t know at that point is that you don’t take set prices; you always go with the meter. This taxi driver wanted three dinars and knowing that it was much farther than Keith and I’s distance from the hotel to our school, I figured it was reasonable. He was a big burly man, spoke English fairly well and had a sense of humor because he just laughed at all my Arabic attempts. He was pretty rude and didn’t seem to like us. We finally get to Hashem’s where I hand him a ten dinar bill, he puts it in his little stash on his side of the car and says goodbye. I am stunned, he just took my ten dinars without giving me change. I told him that we agreed to three dinars, he then says ok. He reaches into his stash, grabs a one dinar bill and hands it to me.  I had learned from a roommate that was in Jordan the summer beforehand that you needed to be stern with taxi drivers. So I sat in the charge telling him that he agreed to three dinars. He sat with a sly smirk on his face and didn’t seem to want to budge because he kept saying thank you and good bye. The girls and my roommate in the back seat didn’t know what to do. I encouraged them to get out and then I got out.  Before I got out, I told him that he was a very bad man (in my broken Arabic) and he laughed and said that he knew he was.

                I learned a few lessons about taxis thus far. Always have them restart the meter when you get into the car. Always have exact change for the payment. Never agree to a set amount. Don’t forget to talk to them and loosen them up, sometimes this will get them to be more kind to you.

                I have had many great experiences with taxi drivers. In fact, the taxi is where I feel most comfortable to practice my Arabic with. We had one that I remember understanding everything he was talking about and he seemed to understand me the whole time, it was a great feeling. Another older taxi driver was listening to older Arabic music, he began to dance with his arms held out in the air as if they were floating, turning his hands at his wrists like they belonged in a jet stream and his fingers rolled along. He then encouraged us to dance like him, mostly my roommate who was in the front seat. When we did it, he thought it was the greatest thing. Taxi drivers love to smoke (like most Jordanians), it was a little weird at first, but with the windows down and going as fast as they tend to do, it’s not a problem with the smoke and smell. Ironically, my first cigarette ever offered to me was here in Jordan while in a taxi. It seems to be the acceptable offer here.

                My roommates have a very different schedule than I do so they often get to the school before me. Because we live somewhat close and I need to save money, I walk to campus. Only twice have I needed to take a taxi on my own to get to campus in time of a class or a students’ appointment that I needed to record.  I get a taxi and proceed to tell them Mukhtar Mall (this is right next to our school, everyone seems to know where this little mall is located). We begin to talk, and I inquire about their family, work, and what they want to do in the future. To my surprise, when it comes time to drop me off, they offer the drive for free! Free!! Can you imagine that? Each ride is about a dinar’s worth and they offered it to me. I don’t want to risk my luck but it seemed to be a good thing when I take the taxi on my own.

                Taxis are great, they are fairly cheap and I feel most comfortable to practice my Arabic with the drivers. Maybe it’s because they can’t get away from me but they seem to enjoy it. It seems to be a lower end job, probably right above that of what the Egyptians get around here which is the dirty trash and service type of jobs. In short, be smart about the taxi you take, don’t let them cheat you out and talk about their lives and likely you’ll enjoy your experience with them. 

Welcome to Jordan

                                                                                                                                                                

Ahlan Wasahlan

                “Welcome to Jordan” are the first words I heard when I arrived to the Queen Rania Airport in Amman, Jordan.  These words were said in English. It seems that everyone wants to welcome me to Jordan once they find out I am from America, even after two weeks. I imagine it will be like this the rest of my time here, a period of four months. After working with many Arabs in the United States, I have come to learn a different culture but a culture I felt was subdued by the Western Culture in which they were present in. These are the people I study for school and my impressions I felt were altered a little bit. Maybe the Arabs I met were accustomed to Western thought and experience has transformed them. I knew I had to get to the Middle East for myself to see what the Arab was like; in his atmosphere, in his realm, and in his own home.  Jordanians are interesting folk, if you can even use the term folk. They are loud, thoughtful, deceitful, kind, helpful, ambitious, talkative, deceived, and patient. Now not all Jordanians are each characteristic I just mentioned, not at all. I feel those characteristics I feel can describe almost any society in the world. For my first assignment of writing about the culture, I’d like to explain my first 24 hours, my first welcome from the country, and my first impression of finally being in the Arab world.

First views of Jordan

               Air France. Don’t ever fly with them. Their customer service while on the plane is fantastic but their luggage transfers are subpar. This was their second time losing my luggage in Paris in less than a week. While at the airport I had my friend’s cousin, Hashem Al Nasser, waiting for me. He waited patiently, without smoking a cigarette for one whole hour in the airport, as I got my luggage situation taken care of. Hashem Al Nasser and I first met on Facebook (Most Arabs love Facebook); we hadn’t met in person prior to the airport. I was impressed with his ability to be patient with my luggage situation. He then drove towards Amman. Along the road, I saw families huddled around a small tent and camp fire (it was at night), probably cooking something with meat. I asked Hashem if this is where they lived, he said no, it was their way of getting out of the city and enjoying time with their family. We then went to dilwar ilbalad, or downtown of Amman. It was crowded and so bright with lights. We went to his favorite restaurant, Hashem’s. No it wasn’t his favorite place because of the name; I quickly learned it was because of the pita and hummus that was served. Just thinking of it makes my mouth water. Then he drove us around the city, demanding that we see at least one of the hills. You see, Jordan is built on many hills (or mountains), much of the old city falls between these hills where the water would run down. Now the city is much bigger and each area has its name. We drove down Rainbow Street, which is supposed to be where most foreigners were. We didn’t get out of the car, simply drove through the rigged traffic in a maybe two lane road. As we slowly drove down this street, we saw many cafes and restaurants, many of them with hookahs—an instrument to smoke basically anything you put into it. We then saw many women that were outside of what the media typically shows, they were unveiled, immodestly dressed and plastered in makeup. These women were surprisingly looked more like Arabs than foreigners. This is where Hashem invited me to get a girlfriend. The Arabs I saw were fairly attractive, much more in person than I expected, but a girlfriend was not an option because I already had one. He let me and my friend, Keith, use his cell phone to call our mothers back in the United States. He dropped us off at our hotel; it was a grand first night. We were ecstatic to be in Jordan and had a great introduction. Thank you to a new friend in a foreign land.

View of Amman from Rainbow street

Sun Rise Hotel was very interesting. It apparently is the oldest hotel in Amman, which I am sure it is one of the older hotels in Amman. It was run down, but it did have wireless internet. I found myself going down to the lobby asking for the password for the wireless internet so I could contact family and find the address to the place we needed to be the next day. It was no sooner found myself sitting down with the foondook owner and his friend helping them find companies that insure the oil rigs in the Persian Gulf. They later told me they wanted to buy stock in these companies because they thought they will become very rich if they did. I thought to myself why would they get rich from them? But I didn’t let it bother me too much. They then noticed my iPhone and asked if I was going to get the iPhone 5. They asked if it was really see-through, or transparent. I laughed and said there is no way they would do that. They must have seen the same predictions/fake photos of the iPhone 5 I saw on the internet. They then started to speak to me in Arabic—about politics. They asked me if I liked Obama and Bush. They began to state how profoundly they hated Bush because of the wars which he brought to the Middle East all for oil. They stated they didn’t like Obama but they also didn’t like Romney. They muttered that he wasn’t even a Christian, that America should have an American president.  “Mormons, don’t believe in Christ,” one said. “Why would America ever have a non-believing Christian?” “He is a Mormon and must be magnuun (crazy).” Even though their words were filled with disgust about this topic, I looked at them with some excitement. I said, “Ana mormonee zay Romney (I am a Mormon like Romney). “  I explained to them that I believe in Jesus Christ. They questioned all different aspects of how I believed in Christ. They then seemed to have run out of complaints about Romney and the Mormons. I knew at least one of them was Muslim because I had to wait for him to finish praying before I could check in.

They then went back into the topic of stocks for the oil insurance companies. It finally bugged me enough to ask them why they wanted to invest in these companies.

“Because we will get rich.”

“Why?”

“Because Israel and America will be at war with Iran very soon.”

“Why would you want war?”

“So we can get rich, very very rich.”

“I hope they don’t go to war. In fact, I don’t think there will be a war at all.”

One stood up and said, “I hope there is a war! I want to be a rich man.”

                This logic made great sense. Hate President Bush for bringing wars to the Middle East, say it was for his own personal gain for oil, etc. but then want a war just so you can get rich off of stock from insurance companies that we weren’t even able to find for the last hour. I wish I had known better Arabic at this moment because my response of why there probably won’t be a war and how they shouldn’t want for a war didn’t seem to reach them.  I encouraged them to invest in Google, Macintosh, or something they use. They didn’t want to do that. I went back to the hotel room, told Keith about the conversation and then realized I had lost my iPhone.

Our Sun Rise Hotel room

                That next morning, I prayed I would find my iPhone. It was my future lifeline for Amman let alone worth hundreds of dollars. Shortly after taking a cold shower, I got a knock on the door; it was the owner of the foondook which I spoke with last night. He pulled something out of his pocket and asked, “Is this yours?” It was my iPhone! I could tell from the case it was in but now it was all scratched up. “Yes! It is mine, where did you get it?!” “Come, follow me,” he said. I followed him all the way down the stairs and into the street. He said, “Hunna (here) my son found it at 2am in the morning.” He pointed at a spot on the street near the curb. It must have fallen out of my pocket or my lap when I got out of Hashem's car the night before. He knew it was mine from the photos on the phone (I always knew it was good to not put a passcode on the iPhone!) and he made something very clear to me. He said, “Here at my hotel, I don’t lie or cheat. In America, someone would have taken it. Now write a good review of my hotel on the internet.” I nodded my head, said several thank you’s in Arabic and went back to my hotel room. Wow, what an amazing man and son for not taking my phone, a very expensive one, too. He was honest and wanted to get rich through a war, what a great introduction to Jordan! And a prayer answered most certainly. 

                Keith and I soon after took a taxi to our next meeting place, charged us four dinars (about $7) which should have really been half a dinar (about $1). Yep, ahlan wasahlan to Jordan.

Lessons Learned in 2011 - What Is Really Important?

The year 2011 was an amazing year. I turned a quarter century, began BYU's second year of Arabic, gained everything that life had to offer for me at the time. It was full of scary, sad, and happy moments. I learned more of myself and how others feel and work. It seems the more I learn the more I realize how much I do not know and how everything is in God's hands. I met many great new people and built better relations with those I already knew. I hopefully didn't harm friendships and if I did, I am sorry for anything I have done wrong. I thought I'd put out a list of things I learned this year.

1. Buying a used laptop on eBay can be cheaper money wise but so is your experience with the item.

2. When I am home and the whole family gathers together in my parent's home, it is so loud! I now have 5 nephews and 2 nieces under the age of 7. I think my parent's need a bigger house. 

3. I learned how to appreciate the great weather of San Diego just a little bit more. It was sure warm this Christmas break and my few trips during the summer were great. 

4. I learned how much I appreciate my brothers and family. Click here

5. Money isn't everything and we must be wise about it. We get sucked up into how much money we are going to make and pleasing others that we forget have faith that all will be okay after we do all that we can. I also learned that I can be more frugal with my money and make better choices on what I do with it. 

6. I learned how hard Arabic really is. It is a beast and I will conquer this beast.

7. I learned what it would be like in graduate school and that I will survive it. I had an upper level class with the topics on contemporary Islamic issues (I will post my findings on here someday). There were only two of us in the class and as me and the other student turned in our final paper on the very last day of finals week, I couldn't be more proud of how we worked together so well and learned in a setting that I loved. Our professor was very happy with our efforts. It was a great a great boost after a time of lack of confidence in myself. Probably my happiest moment in my academic life. It told me I can do it, I can accomplish my academic goals. 

8. I never loved anyone more than I have than this last year. I never felt so high on life and the gospel. I learned a new level of being closer to my Father in Heaven. I learned how happy and confident I could be in life. I was the best man I had ever felt like I had ever been, even better then how I felt on my mission (which says a lot). I felt indefinitely in debt to her and the Lord because of how she made me feel. For the first time, I felt I had a purpose with another individual that I had been yearning for. What a miraculous feeling! I learned more than ever what a best friend meant and how happy a relationship could be. To me, no one was more of a princess than she was. 

9. In contrast, I learned what depression and heartache was. I felt more lonely than ever before. I felt a strong sense of loss of confidence and happiness. It taught me what others may feel, those that didn't have friends or something missing in their life that stopped them from doing their best. It was really helpful to have these feelings because I now can see a little better the life of those who struggle with sadness and depression. It is not a fun experience and I hope to be a better support for those that are struggling.

10. I learned that even though things may seem lost, we can still pick up and do better than what we think we can do. I can do anything and I will accomplish more than what others think I ever will.

Those are just a few, there are many many more lessons I have learned that I do not want to bore you with. But I'd like to share one last one that I learned more of this year and that is the reliance upon the atonement of Jesus Christ. I am nothing and He is everything. Heavenly Father loves me so much that he would give up His only Begotten Son for everyone that has and will live here in this beautiful world. I learned a little more what the power of prayer can be. I learned a little more of what it means to serve those around you. I learned a little more of how precious others are to God. My testimony is stronger, my ability to discern right from wrong is clearer, the spirit speaks a bit more sharper, and my love for my Savior has reached a new level. I got to do what I am commanded to do. I must keep breathing. I must keep myself clean from the stains of the world. I must keep the commandments. I must give more of myself into the hands of the Lord and trust that will all work out. 

What Is Deep Practice?

As I was cleaning my cluttered desk off so I could write some checks for my enormous bills, I found this marvelous hand written list from my Euphonium coach that he gave me years ago. I strongly believe in the principles and their ability to be applied to all aspects. As I study Arabic, I wish there were an easier way. I think this list may make it easier as I apply these principles.


What Is Deep Practice?
1. It's designed to specifically improve a person's own performance. Usually a teacher or coach is involved.

2. It can be repeated over and over but not sloppily or mindlessly

3. It must be scheduled into the day and planned out ahead of time (no "spur of the moment" or "I'll do it when I feel like it" stuff!).

4. There's feedback on how you're doing - lesson, video or audio record yourself  practicing.

5. It is highly mentally and/or physically demanding. It's not for "sissies."

6. It must be done on a regular daily basis with appropriate breaks built in.

7. It must be broken into small chunks which are thoroughly learned and then strung together to see or get "the whole picture."

8. It isn't very entertaining BUT the payoffs are enormous

9. You must make mistakes and correct them immediately to grow and progress.

10. It requires you to stretch and reach high but not to set goals that are currently out of your reach!

11. Natural talent can be a help, but any person of any ability level can become very successful in any area by using these principles!!!

Dr. Steve Call, Tuba/Euphonium Professor at Brigham Young University