Winter Sunset

Pretty winter sunset view from my apartment tonight. Was at the big dining room table studying and chatting with my roommate Karen, when I turned to look at her and saw the pretty colors shinning behind her.

Last week was a rough week, but not bad. Just tough and exhausting.

My boss returned from his holiday break and immediately wanted to see what myself and Melissa (the volunteer at MC that is helping me a bit on this project) had achieved over the break and how far we were on our project.

Well, lots of things (out of our control and he is aware of that) happened over the break and so not much had been done. While my boss understood, he has a HUGE amount of pressure on him all the time b/c of the Syrian influx and constant increase of projects and beneficiaries at MC Jordan, but he was essentially not very happy with the fact that little had been done...no matter what the reason.

He was very calm and nice about it, but made it clear that he was disappointed in the lack of progress that had been made. I completely understood and honestly, felt a bit like he did, frustrated and not really sure how to fix it, but Melissa and I tried. We worked so much last week. About 30 hours in 4 days, which is not too bad for a work week, except I still had Arabic for 3 hours every morning and homework, so it was a crazy and hectic week.

However, it paid off. Melissa and I got more assertive with others and helped everyone understand exactly what needed to be focused on and the priority issues. I think it helped a lot that the holidays were behind us, so people were able to focus more and were in their office. BIG help on that front. By the every end of the week (Thursday) after a Skype call to Portland, Oregon (where MC Main HQ are) my boss came back from the field and we were able to show him what we had gotten accomplished and how we delegated and organized future needs with HQ in Portland...we were back on track and he was happy.

Got back to my old responses from him, "good job Emily" or "well done ladies." I was pretty bummed after our meeting earlier in the week, so it was great to end on a good note with him and feel like things were back as they should be. I'm a bit of a perfectionist, so even though the not so great meeting early in the week was not a bad "you're doing awful" kind of a meeting or anything related to that...I like to always be on track with "good jobs....keep it up" perspectives from those I work for.

Anyways, work is going to be more hectic in following weeks as lots of things are coming up and my boos is expecting this new fast pace to become the regular...but I think I can hack it. Arabic class so far is going great.

Still on the pace of 1 chapter per week, which is really helping me actually understand the material rather than just memorize it to try to get a good grade on a test. Also, my two professors, Ustaddah (Means professor in Arabic; Transliteration: oos-sta-duh) Hadeel (female) and Ustaddah Asem (male). Professors here go by their first names, so Hadeel and Asem are their first names.

Anyways, off track, but my two professors teach things very simply, which is how I learn...so that has a been great and a huge help. We have had two small test so far and on the first one I got 15/15 and on the second I got 13/15. So I'm pretty happy. Never have I gotten 100% on an Arabic test before...so its good new territory for me!