Her Side of the World

Prologue

Tony and I were supposed to be here together now. But Tony's grades did not allow him to secure a place in the exchange program.

I tried my best to help him out throughout the last semester, but Tony simply does not care about doing good in college. He regrets it now, I am sure. Only because I am here and he is back home. And we could have been starting this new experience together. But we are not.

Tony and I have been best friends since high school. There are many things about him that irritate me, like in any friendship. His carelessness, for example. His laziness, too. I admit; I am afraid to go through this experience alone and would have loved it if he cared enough to get good grades and be here now.

But I should not be thinking about this.

I should look around. Watch everything. I should seize this opportunity.

The weather is nice, a little breezy. Probably because of the closeness to the sea. The beautiful sea. The sun is up and shining.

I manage to get to the correct area with the help of the map. I stand confused for a few seconds before I notice the name of the building I am standing next to. "The Raymond Ghosn Building". That is not it. I walk a little more.

"The Irani Oxy Engineering Complex". I look at my schedule; IOEC. This should be the one.

I look up the building. It is like it was engineered in a way that yells Tech. So modern, a lot of glass, so unique. No wonder this is part of the engineering faculty.

I enter. There is a lounge right in front of the door. A beautiful lounge. The couches look so comfortable. I directly think about napping here someday. I definitely should. The front wall is all glass and overlooks the sea. What kind of a place is this?

You missed on so much already, Tony.

I go to the left and read the numbers on the room doors. 210, 212, 214. That is it. 214. My semester, along with this whole experience, starts right here, in this class.

I go in, choose a seat at the back end of the room, put my backpack next to me and take out my notebook and pen.

Everyone is talking to each other. I have my earphones in, but I can still hear them. Their voices quite loud. I catch a few English words here and there. The rest is a completely alien language. It is not even the Arabic I had started to learn before I came here.

A month before my travel, I had started learning Arabic on Duolingo -the phone application. I wanted to be ready for anything. But a few days afterwards, I decided it was simply too hard. And I convinced myself I will not need it. Now that I am listening to the students speak, I feel like I made the right choice. There is no way I would be understanding now what they are saying no matter how hard I studied Arabic before.

It is 7:50am. The class will start in ten minutes. I do not know how to spend these ten minutes. I feel a little out of place. I want to look at everyone around me. I want to see how different they look. What they are wearing. How they are talking. What kind of energy there is in the room. But I am afraid to look like the weirdo who stares at everyone.

Not that anyone would have noticed. They all seem too busy with themselves. Except for me and another guy sitting at the front row, all the others are in groups of three or more, chatting a little too loud and laughing. Every minute or two, a person leaves a group and joins another, like switching partners while doing a dance.

It is 8:00am, for God's sake. I would not talk to someone at this hour even if I had to.

"Good morning."

The professor comes in. All the students start taking their seats. Some of them continue hissing and whispering.

"I believe most of you already know me. But just in case, my name is Farid Hashem." His accent is good. Not natively good, but good. Completely understandable. He clears his throat and starts the LCD.