Tunis is a really beautiful city. I've been here since Saturday morning and I feel as though I am settling into the pattern of class. I go to class for about 4.5 hours a day and have an additional 2 hours of informal tutoring time. Hopefully by the end of the 7 weeks, I'll be able to say "hello, my name is Andrea" in Arabic. Right now I am struggling with the new sounds - the Urdu and Arabic alphabets are similar (but Urdu has more letters), but the sounds are very different. To me, Urdu uses softer and more beautiful sounds. Right now, I think I can say good morning (SabaaH il-Kheer) with relative competency and most people even seem to understand me, but then I totally mess up on asking how people are..... but, its fun to learn a new language and quite exciting too.
We don't have classes on weekends, so last Sunday we took the metro north a few stops (maybe 15 minutes) and visited a small town overlooking the Bay of Tunis called Sidi Bou Said. It was a beautifully painted blue and white. We walked around the town and I had a cup of tea in the harbor area. Below are pictures from Sidi Bou Said:
This weekend, I think I'll go to the beach and swim. It gives me a thrill to think that I'll be swimming in the Mediterranean off the coast of the African continent!
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