Geography and Avatar

Yesterday I had my Selected Topics in the Geography of the Middle East class. It's focusing almost exclusively on the land of Israel and I think it's headed for being my favorite class. Pretty clear why I think. During our break (it's a 4 hour class) I ran over to the MAPMES office with Loren to register for classes.

These are the classes I'm actually taking this semester:

Selected Topics in the Geography of the Middle East

Palestinian Society

International Conflict Resolution

Studying the Modern Middle East: A Historiographic Review B

Middle Eastern Oil Politics, Economics, and Culture

Translation and Expression in the Arabic Language

I stayed on campus last night with Hannah and finally saw Avatar with her, Samara, Ian and Aaron. It was awesome visually and a really fun movie, but I'm glad it didn't win best picture. The story wasn't new at all (Pocahontas anyone?). The idea of an Avatar, while cool, seems to just be the Matrix with nature replacing machines. Though I do hope this means more movies will start coming out in 3-D, because that was amazing.

Here are some more pictures from Spain:




This is me standing next to the national animal of Spain




This is where we spent most of our time, the bus




Me partying it up with some Israelis




This is what happens when I don't get my hair cut and go someplace windy




Here I am explaining to the director of the Science Museum that saying it's ok to leave Israel off the map since it isn't a "political map" doesn't make it right and wasn't consistent with the rest of the map




Having fun at a hotel




Me and Yezvey trying to find something we can eat on the menu