Ever since I moved to Denver, I have had the most interesting and often quite bizarre encounters on the public transportation system. I once overheard a drug deal going on in the seat behind me. And I can't even count the times I overhear people talking about their time or their friends' time in the penitentiary. (Don't worry, there are also more stable people who ride the bus.) But yesterday I met a friendly Libyan family on the bus. It was a very pleasant surprise. After I frightened them with my broken Arabic (although they kept insisting that they understood me), we had a nice conversation about their move to America. They've only been here for 3 days and she quickly asked me if we could be friends. Well, of course we can. Seriously, how many American women will she meet that speak Arabic? What she doesn't realize is that I feel much more at home with her than I do most Americans my age. I first thought they might be from Egypt due to her style of dress, however, I quickly noticed they were using certain words that are more commonly used in the Levant (Jordan, Palestine, Syria, etc.). I reluctantly admitted to myself that I did not understand everything they were saying which affirmed my assertion that I am, in fact, losing my Arabic, which almost makes me sick to my stomach (because I so clearly remember all of those long days of hard work in language class and all the unnecessary pressure placed on me by my supervisors), BUT when she told me she was from Libya my disappointments waned slightly because I actually don't speak any Libyan Arabic at all, or that I know of at least. All of this to say...you just never know who you might meet in the most random of circumstances. I recently had lunch with the man who translated the Bible into spoken Arabic (the same Bible we used in Egypt) and I had no idea who he was or why we were living minutes from each other in America. I was walking around the lake near our house and saw a covered woman wearing a Moroccan jalaba sitting along the shore...what?! And I'm not too proud to follow someone around Forever 21 just because I hear her speaking Arabic on her mobile. Oh Arabs, I love you so...