Anna Harvey ’18 shares an exciting first day of classes at King’s Academy, exploring the city of Amman, and a “football” match!
My morning started out with panic. I woke with a bolt at 6:15 a.m., thinking I had slept through breakfast and morning classes (thank you, jetlag). However, I woke up with plenty of time to get to the dining hall to try out the Jordanian breakfast (including fantastic American oatmeal) before heading off to classes with my host student, Rand.
As a humanities person, starting off my first day in a very different time zone with macroeconomics and honors biology was mind-numbing, but the class dynamics were hilarious to experience from an outside point-of-view, and bio really challenged my knowledge from sophomore year.
After classes, we headed off to Amman to explore. Our first stop was an ancient Roman amphitheater with rather frightening stairs where we took a moment to sing our very own Evensong before hiking up to the top to see the city from what felt like the clouds. We then headed to a second ancient Roman site (did you know there were so many in Jordan?). At the Amman Citadel, we climbed through pillars and walked through ancient holy sites and markets, stopping along the way to snap some photos in the fantastic lighting provided by this country. By the time 1:30 rolled around, I was ready to eat a whole horse. Luckily, lunch at Wild Jordan was next, and the curry chicken I ordered was strangely reminiscent of a certain Deerfield meal.
Heading back to King’s, most of us fell into a sort of food coma and napped all the way back, but that just meant we were well-rested for our pre-dinner soccer—sorry, football—match. Anna, Erin, Nailah, and Michael against Niki, Khalyse, Gabriella, and Mr. Jan. Obviously, my team won (what more can be expected from the captain of thirds soccer?). Afterwards, we showered and headed to dinner where we were met with a surprise: The King’s Academy version of berry crisp.
