Confusing!
I've been trying to figure out what to say about my impressions of Tunis thus far. Many of you know that I haven't had the easiest transition to life here. All of my energy over the past month has been divided between planning and delivering my lessons and trying to learn to navigate life in Tunis-and neither has been easy! After more than a month here, I finally feel like I have a handle on my classes. Don't get me wrong, I'm still spending a lot of time and effort to figure out lesson plans, but at least my classes seem to run in a somewhat predictable pattern. But as for navigating life here in Tunis, that is a completely different story! After more than a month, I still feel as clueless about life here as when I stepped off the plane. There's a pattern to life here that I just can't seem to see, much less understand and try to fit into. And it stresses me out-I think, "What's wrong with me, I've lived abroad before, why can't I just adjust to life here?"
I've been talking to some of the other teachers here and most have expressed similar feelings, though there seems to be a wide variety of theories as to why this is. One teacher suggested that after you've taught in the Far East, Tunis, by comparison, just doesn't really seem that exotic-it's more westernized. While I think this might be partly true, I find that Tunis doesn't quite fit completely into the westernized mode. But yet it doesn't quite fit into the eastern mentality either. It's very confusing.
Of course this is all on top of the language barrier, which some days can be challenging enough. I knew I would have difficulty with this from the beginning, knowing no French and very little Arabic (which doesn't matter since Tunisian Arabic is quite different from the little bit of Egyptian Arabic that I learned!) But my experience with Tunisians so far has generally been that, if you don't speak the languages, they're not so inclined to be helpful. Not that they're rude, just more...indifferent. (Though I know a few of the other teachers would beg to differ.) But that's my experience thus far. I don't know-maybe my "diva moments" in India have spoiled me too much and I expect too much special treatment as a foreigner. (Though I must admit that it's nice to have some anonymity and not be constantly stared at when walking down the street!)
Anyway, those are my mussings after a little over a month. Who knows? Maybe (hopefully?) by the end of this contract I'll have figured out the pattern of life here and won't even recall feeling this way!
I've been trying to figure out what to say about my impressions of Tunis thus far. Many of you know that I haven't had the easiest transition to life here. All of my energy over the past month has been divided between planning and delivering my lessons and trying to learn to navigate life in Tunis-and neither has been easy! After more than a month here, I finally feel like I have a handle on my classes. Don't get me wrong, I'm still spending a lot of time and effort to figure out lesson plans, but at least my classes seem to run in a somewhat predictable pattern. But as for navigating life here in Tunis, that is a completely different story! After more than a month, I still feel as clueless about life here as when I stepped off the plane. There's a pattern to life here that I just can't seem to see, much less understand and try to fit into. And it stresses me out-I think, "What's wrong with me, I've lived abroad before, why can't I just adjust to life here?"
I've been talking to some of the other teachers here and most have expressed similar feelings, though there seems to be a wide variety of theories as to why this is. One teacher suggested that after you've taught in the Far East, Tunis, by comparison, just doesn't really seem that exotic-it's more westernized. While I think this might be partly true, I find that Tunis doesn't quite fit completely into the westernized mode. But yet it doesn't quite fit into the eastern mentality either. It's very confusing.
Of course this is all on top of the language barrier, which some days can be challenging enough. I knew I would have difficulty with this from the beginning, knowing no French and very little Arabic (which doesn't matter since Tunisian Arabic is quite different from the little bit of Egyptian Arabic that I learned!) But my experience with Tunisians so far has generally been that, if you don't speak the languages, they're not so inclined to be helpful. Not that they're rude, just more...indifferent. (Though I know a few of the other teachers would beg to differ.) But that's my experience thus far. I don't know-maybe my "diva moments" in India have spoiled me too much and I expect too much special treatment as a foreigner. (Though I must admit that it's nice to have some anonymity and not be constantly stared at when walking down the street!)
Anyway, those are my mussings after a little over a month. Who knows? Maybe (hopefully?) by the end of this contract I'll have figured out the pattern of life here and won't even recall feeling this way!
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