Whatdjasay?

Ah Maha.... her style, her attitude, her pronunciation... from the very first day we were wowed, and when we remembered that "wow" was the second to last letter of the alphabet, we were wowed again. While politically-personal agendas weren't on the syllabus, she embodied all of ours. For CIA girl, Maha was a witty Arab who might need her help one day, since wit and aggression go hand in hand in the eyes of the law. Maha also subverted all the stereotypes CIA girl had studied for her upcoming classified exam. This Arab showed some leg, and her necklines lowered at the same steady rate as my graded exams. But I was also intrigued by her. At first, it was her changing nail color that always matched her outfits. Later, it was the Lebanese music videos she brought for us to watch during the breaks. But by the third week, it was a few words she let slip.

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Those few words, if only I understood what they meant... probably only some synonyms to clarify some of the words on our list of vocab. But those words most definitely were not in Arabic, nor English, nor a bunch of other languages. Were they in the language my parents used as a secret code? the language I stored in my arsenal in an attempt to decipher that code? the language of people who aren't the most likeable in the Arab world? Were those Semitic sounds emanating from Maha's mouth, in fact, Hebrew?

After that day, the day that Maha whispered those words into Tamar's ear, we progressed from "wow" (letter #27) to "yeah" (letter #28). Maha was a Palestinian, my enemy, as some might say. I was excited about this, but I wasn't sure why. Maybe this was my chance to learn something new about the conflict I think so much about. Or perhaps I thought she would have the latest Diana Haddad CDs. Or maybe I thought she could hook me up with some swell greetings or "what's ups" in the Acre dialect. Regardless, once I found out she was no ordinary Iraqi or Omani, the gossip began.