Blog 21 July 29, 2010
Hi, from 34,000 feet above the Shetland Islands. I tell ya, from this high those ponies are even smaller!
Our last two days in Amman were spent having final experiences, the last lunch, the last dinner, the presentation of gifts for our American leaders and our Jordanian leader, Salaam. I spent a good deal of that time fretting over whether the purchases I made would all fit in my bags and then, if when I sat them down on the scale at the airport, whether or not the scale it would explode. In spite of the fact that I could barely lift my bags they did get through and are checked through to Detroit. Well, at least one of them is. The other one is only checked through to Chicago. Shouldn’t be a problem. I think. There are two other travel-related things I am worrying about. First, we were delayed about an hour leaving Frankfort because they had to find and take baggage off the plane for 14 people who didn’t show up for the flight. What worries me is that we are a group of 14 people. I suspect I’ll be able to update this before I get a chance to post the blog. The other thing I’m worrying about is exactly how the United States Customs Agency defines the word “soil”. Now, in my book, soil would only be materials that you could grow something in. There is no way anything could grow in the chunk of salt I dug out of the bottom of the Dead Sea with my bare hands. Anyway, I’ve been carting this chunk of salt/sand for three weeks. I don’t think I’ll have any luck arguing it is for educational purposes.
Some final thoughts on…
Our group…
• Has done a remarkable job of maintaining itself. Yes, we are a wide range of personalities, interests, and…idiosyncrasies, but in spite of all that, actually maybe because of all that, we’ve had a remarkably smooth time of it. If you’d have bet me we would have had a knock-down-drag-out sometime along the way I would not have taken the bet. Hang on, technically, there is still time.
• Did a nice job of maintaining a positive interest in who we were listening to and what we were looking at.
• Is looking forward to eating some food with a less Middle Eastern vibe going for it.
• Is not, repeat not, a big fan of “meat yoghurt” or as the Jordanians might put it, “Got Jameed?”
• Is profoundly grateful for the opportunity it has had this month. That gratitude has expressed itself in a number of different ways. Last night we presented Patty/Dr. Kubow with a couple books of poetry, one by a Jordanian poet and the other by a Palestinian poet. We also gave her a copy of the same group picture that we had framed for our guide, Salaam.
Our Jordan…
• The constant hospitality and generousness of the Jordanian people in general came as a surprise to me. I wish it hadn’t been a surprise.
• Jordan is a developing country. It is a country of remarkable beauty. The largest contrast to this beauty has to do with Jordanians attitudes towards cleanliness. Most of the areas we visited were to varying degrees coated with refuse. That being said, when its all you can do to provide enough classrooms for your children to learn in, should the garbage problem receive more funding?
Coming Home
• In many ways, I’ve been looking forward to this day for 29 days now. I love my wife, Heidi. I love Matt, Grace, Tim, Bob and Mattie. Each of them made sacrifices big and small that allowed me to take this trip. I especially thank Heidi for making my participation on this trip possible for me. Her patience, perseverance and strength are just a few of the many attributes that I admire about her. I thank you all.
Postscript
It’s Friday morning here in Bowling Green and I’m a happy man sitting here in my kitchen finishing this blog. An amazing experience. Thanks for reading, if you actually are reading this, it musn’t have been too dull!?
Friday, July 30, 2010
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Mr. Hakel Gets Ready to Leave
Blog 20 July 25, 2010
Visited the University of Jordan today and will make a return trip tomorrow morning. The campus was pretty actually. The main roads were lined by a double line of pine trees that were only growing about ten feet apart. The trees were quite mature so it was kind of like walking under a very large hedge. One of the six or so presenters really did a great job and was very interesting. A couple did alright including a Jordanian/American woman from Cleveland. A couple were pretty forgettable. Not really their fault though. I just wasn’t interested in their topic, but a number of a our group did find the possibility of returning for intensive Arabic instruction pretty intriguing.
We ate lunch in the cafeteria that the students eat in. wow. Imagine the worst cafeteria food you ever had in the United States. Now imagine it is that with Middle Eastern food. The lunch lady meets mansaf. I’ll only describe my dessert. It appeared to be a thin layer of cake with maybe a strawberry cool whip on top. Wrong. It tasted like a mild, mild soap. Didn’t eat much of that.
Dinner made up for it all though. We ate at Sara’s Seafood. Our Sara was pretty excited. We sat out on a rickety looking balcony over one of the main shopping streets in Old Amman. The meal started with the traditional first dishes. A plate of hummus, a plate of Baba Gannouj, a bowl of a spicy tomato mixture called Gallia that is similar to salsa, but still pretty different. These three dishes are served with pita before every meal. Three other salads were served, a green salad that is very bitter usually, I discovered last night that squeezing half a lemon over the top helps quite a bit. There was a potato salad that was just flat out weird, and a final salad that looked like chunks of vegetables slathered in a yoghurt sauce of some sort. I’m told that one was good, but I’ve come to fear foods in yoghurt sauce. I also noticed that while some said it was good, almost the entire bowl sat unmolested for the whole night. After awhile fried potato wedges on top of pita chips were served and then the first seafood course came out. Up first were a platter of fried fish with a Jordanian wrinkly to it. At home this kind of platter would have chunks of thick white fish in a shape that bore no relation to what the fish looked like in the first place. No problem with that here. The entire fish from head-to-tail was dipped in the batter and deep-fried. Not much to look at, but that actually was delicious. They were not large, maybe 8 inches all together, so I had two! Next up was a platter of large shrimp. Died and went to heaven. Then it was a platter of calamari a few minutes later. I actually enjoyed that too. Then it was a large platter of broiled fish. Actually I should word that differently. Then it was a large fish on a platter. Yes, the head was present, Zach and Josh ate an eyeball a piece…well, Josh had half an eyeball… And that was all! Between the conversation, the constant din of traffic and a rare chance to watch Jordanians without them doing the same to you, and the sunset, it was quite an evening.
This morning we had our last presentations at the University of Jordan. Dr. Asfour, pronounced with an “ahhh” at the beginning for reasons that should have been obvious to everyone, is the assistant dean of the Faculty of Arts. The doctor had received his training/Phd in Italy and was quite the “italophile”, if I can coin the term. His italianess was quite evident and he gave a rambling/entertaining talk that was fascinating and impossible to understand at the same time. At one point he shared a story about Sophia Loren bringing mortadella, an Italian bologna basically, into the United States. I wish I could tell you more about it, but that’s all I caught. The most interesting outcome of the talk was the varied ways in which our group received it. A couple members of group felt he’d been on the anti-american side, but I and at least one other member didn’t get that vibe at all. It’s always interesting how witnesses to the same event can come away with totally different impressions.
In a couple minutes, I’ll stop typing and leave for…..the Turkish Bath. Almost wimped out, but I’m solid. The next sentence you read of this blog will be post-Turkish Bath.
Well, it was actually pretty nice. The steam room was incredibly hot, the hot tub was almost unbearably hot, and the rest was pleasant. The whole treatment would have been pretty expensive for almost all Jordanians, but pretty darn cheap compared to the same back home. It was about $30 and included a massage and exfoliation. We guys tried to maintain our macho-ness and dignity, but all but one of us ended up liking it quite a bit.
We’re in our last hours and I’m ready to return. As I type today, Tuesday, we are 36 hours away from our departure time. I’m trying to find words to sum up our experience here. I think I’ll need a little time.
And now for something completely different…
• Yesteday’s presentation by an Ohio State Math Education Professor at the University of Jordan brought me a cultural relevation that the more I think about it really does help me understand some of the differences between our cultures. Dr. Halah Shirwa was asked if a Jordanian student would feel free to ask a teacher a question about islam. Her answer was very revealing. She shared that the teacher might reply, “There are some things that just are. Do not always be asking why, why, why. You might as well ask why does the sun come up? Why do I have two hands and not three? It is this way because God wills it.”
I think this is reavealing for a number of reasons, but most important to me is that it helps me understand that what I believe might be a Jordanian/Arabic and maybe even Muslim attitude towards fate, science, authority, innovation and God. While we are taught to always ask, “Why?”, it appears that here at least in Jordan, asking “Why?” is actively discouraged. I believe this would have incredibly wide-ranging consequences for a nation, a region and a culture.
Salaam,
Mr. Hakel/Lane/Dad
Visited the University of Jordan today and will make a return trip tomorrow morning. The campus was pretty actually. The main roads were lined by a double line of pine trees that were only growing about ten feet apart. The trees were quite mature so it was kind of like walking under a very large hedge. One of the six or so presenters really did a great job and was very interesting. A couple did alright including a Jordanian/American woman from Cleveland. A couple were pretty forgettable. Not really their fault though. I just wasn’t interested in their topic, but a number of a our group did find the possibility of returning for intensive Arabic instruction pretty intriguing.
We ate lunch in the cafeteria that the students eat in. wow. Imagine the worst cafeteria food you ever had in the United States. Now imagine it is that with Middle Eastern food. The lunch lady meets mansaf. I’ll only describe my dessert. It appeared to be a thin layer of cake with maybe a strawberry cool whip on top. Wrong. It tasted like a mild, mild soap. Didn’t eat much of that.
Dinner made up for it all though. We ate at Sara’s Seafood. Our Sara was pretty excited. We sat out on a rickety looking balcony over one of the main shopping streets in Old Amman. The meal started with the traditional first dishes. A plate of hummus, a plate of Baba Gannouj, a bowl of a spicy tomato mixture called Gallia that is similar to salsa, but still pretty different. These three dishes are served with pita before every meal. Three other salads were served, a green salad that is very bitter usually, I discovered last night that squeezing half a lemon over the top helps quite a bit. There was a potato salad that was just flat out weird, and a final salad that looked like chunks of vegetables slathered in a yoghurt sauce of some sort. I’m told that one was good, but I’ve come to fear foods in yoghurt sauce. I also noticed that while some said it was good, almost the entire bowl sat unmolested for the whole night. After awhile fried potato wedges on top of pita chips were served and then the first seafood course came out. Up first were a platter of fried fish with a Jordanian wrinkly to it. At home this kind of platter would have chunks of thick white fish in a shape that bore no relation to what the fish looked like in the first place. No problem with that here. The entire fish from head-to-tail was dipped in the batter and deep-fried. Not much to look at, but that actually was delicious. They were not large, maybe 8 inches all together, so I had two! Next up was a platter of large shrimp. Died and went to heaven. Then it was a platter of calamari a few minutes later. I actually enjoyed that too. Then it was a large platter of broiled fish. Actually I should word that differently. Then it was a large fish on a platter. Yes, the head was present, Zach and Josh ate an eyeball a piece…well, Josh had half an eyeball… And that was all! Between the conversation, the constant din of traffic and a rare chance to watch Jordanians without them doing the same to you, and the sunset, it was quite an evening.
This morning we had our last presentations at the University of Jordan. Dr. Asfour, pronounced with an “ahhh” at the beginning for reasons that should have been obvious to everyone, is the assistant dean of the Faculty of Arts. The doctor had received his training/Phd in Italy and was quite the “italophile”, if I can coin the term. His italianess was quite evident and he gave a rambling/entertaining talk that was fascinating and impossible to understand at the same time. At one point he shared a story about Sophia Loren bringing mortadella, an Italian bologna basically, into the United States. I wish I could tell you more about it, but that’s all I caught. The most interesting outcome of the talk was the varied ways in which our group received it. A couple members of group felt he’d been on the anti-american side, but I and at least one other member didn’t get that vibe at all. It’s always interesting how witnesses to the same event can come away with totally different impressions.
In a couple minutes, I’ll stop typing and leave for…..the Turkish Bath. Almost wimped out, but I’m solid. The next sentence you read of this blog will be post-Turkish Bath.
Well, it was actually pretty nice. The steam room was incredibly hot, the hot tub was almost unbearably hot, and the rest was pleasant. The whole treatment would have been pretty expensive for almost all Jordanians, but pretty darn cheap compared to the same back home. It was about $30 and included a massage and exfoliation. We guys tried to maintain our macho-ness and dignity, but all but one of us ended up liking it quite a bit.
We’re in our last hours and I’m ready to return. As I type today, Tuesday, we are 36 hours away from our departure time. I’m trying to find words to sum up our experience here. I think I’ll need a little time.
And now for something completely different…
• Yesteday’s presentation by an Ohio State Math Education Professor at the University of Jordan brought me a cultural relevation that the more I think about it really does help me understand some of the differences between our cultures. Dr. Halah Shirwa was asked if a Jordanian student would feel free to ask a teacher a question about islam. Her answer was very revealing. She shared that the teacher might reply, “There are some things that just are. Do not always be asking why, why, why. You might as well ask why does the sun come up? Why do I have two hands and not three? It is this way because God wills it.”
I think this is reavealing for a number of reasons, but most important to me is that it helps me understand that what I believe might be a Jordanian/Arabic and maybe even Muslim attitude towards fate, science, authority, innovation and God. While we are taught to always ask, “Why?”, it appears that here at least in Jordan, asking “Why?” is actively discouraged. I believe this would have incredibly wide-ranging consequences for a nation, a region and a culture.
Salaam,
Mr. Hakel/Lane/Dad
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Mr. Hakel Gets His Goat
Blog 19 July 24, 2010
Things are showing signs of wrapping up around here. While we have two-and-a-half full days of meetings yet at the University of Jordan, it would appear that most of the heavy lifting is over.
Yesterday was our visit to a Palestinian Refugee Camp. Yes, that was heavy lifting. It had the potential to be our most difficult, yet most rewarding visit, but either by hook or by crook, it didn’t turn out that way. The camp we had permission from his Majesty’s Government to visit was the one we had driven through two weeks before on our way back into Amman from the North. From the road, it looked like pretty much any other neighborhood in Amman. From the inside, elements of that remained, but it was also clear that the population was much denser and the levels of income and employment were significantly lower. The term “camp” will be misleading to you. Remember that the last wave of Palestinian refugees was when I was 4-years old in 1967. Palestinian Refugees have Jordanian citizenship and at least legally enjoy the same rights as any other Jordanian. The camp we visited then is over 40 years old. The tents are long gone, but the conditions remain cramped. At one point in time 130,000 people were living in 2 square km. Houses are 70cm apart from one another. Like all housing they are constructed from poured concrete. Water is delivered to tanks on the roof of their house once a week. This is also how almost all Jordanians receive their water. You do the clothes washing on water delivery day to make sure you have enough water to finish the job.
We had been told that when we arrived at the camp we should go to a certain address and pick up our escorts. Our escorts would show us around and answer questions, but also keep an eye on us and give us the “official” answers to our questions. When we arrived at the address given, it was locked up tight. It was Friday and despite being assured there would be someone waiting there for us, there wasn’t. Our guides, Absalaam and Ibrahim conferred together for awhile, we no longer have a tourist police officer accompanying us, and decided that our best bet was to make an unofficial private visit to a friend of Absalaam’s (Absalaam appears to know everyone in Jordan). I should note that the camp is open. No fences, no checkpoints or anything like that. If I had arrived in a private car and got out and walked around, it would have aroused curiosity, but no official response. On the other hand, a group of 15 westerners arriving in a bus with no escort would have aroused some kind of response and it most likely would have involved our guides being held responsible.
So, we visited Yusef’s home in the camp. Yusef has had an interesting life. He fled the West Bank during the war of 1967 with his family. He was quite young. His father became the head of the communist party in the camp. This allowed Yusef to have the opportunity to be included as a part of a group of Palestinian children that visited East Germany in the early 70s. Yusef became ill during the visit was hospitalized there long after the rest of his group had returned to Jordan. Yusef was eventually adopted and raised in East Berlin. He returned to Jordan something like ten years ago. He renounced his German citizenship and is now married and leads german tour groups through Jordan. His wife is a teacher. Yusef is building his dream house, on a hillside high above the camp in the valley below. We also visited his beautiful house. The contrasts between his home in the camp and his unfinished home on the hill couldn’t be more stark. He hopes to move in in another two years or so. The exterior and structural interior are complete, but he’ll wait to complete the house until the economy improves. He’s out of money.
We had a long talk with Yusef Ibrahim translated his Arabic for us. His final point was asking how the Israelis can do unto them, the Palestinians, what was done unto them, the jews of Europe. I have no answer for that.
The rest of the day was spent having a picnic on a hillside south of Amman. The hillside was tree covered and quite lovely in spite of the trash which littered the ground. The amount of trash left all over the country is quite shocking to those of us who are lucky enough to take a cleaner environment for granted. In spite of the broken glass, empty plastic shopping bags and other we had a lovely time sitting in the shade, watching the Jordanians doing the same watching us. Playing Frisbee, first with each other and later with some children from groups near us. I studied lines for both my upcoming plays. Then we ate a late lunch all off a charcoal grill. We started with lamb chops, then home made kebab, which is kind of like gyro meat patties. The most exotic was the skewered goat. It was also the best tasting. I passed on the kidney though. Ibrahim, the jokester, had brought his entire family with him. It was the first time we’d met his wife. Apparently, it was uncommon enough because Absalaam had shared with one of us that while he and Ibrahim are like brothers, he would not recognize Ibrahim’s wife in a crowd. Even in married life socialization between genders is rare in this traditional society. Ibrahim’s wife greeted the women in our group warmly, but not the rest of us. The men that is. I did work in a smile and a “Salaam” later, and she did address me once to ask if I wanted some watermelon. Otherwise, in spite of being within a few feet of her for an hour, I didn’t exist. I imagine you can tell how unsettling this seemed to me. I suppose it was even more unsettling for her. Ibrahim had said that his wife was much more religious than he was and she did keep her head covered the entire time, but not her face. I am really wrestling with how I feel about these aspects of Arabic culture. I don’t expect I’ll be able to resolve my conflict.
Idle thought of the day
• Jordan is liberally decorated with thousands and thousands and thousand of pictures of the king. His boyish face that looks all the more incongruous with the thin mustache and beard he often sports adorns every hallway and every office in every public building we have been in. Nearly every major intersection in every city and town in the country has a picture of him strategically positioned. Private businesses have his picture hanging on their wall. Sometimes his picture is a part of the sign advertising their business on the street. We have eaten maybe two or three meals in restaurants where the king was not “watching”. It is by far the dominant form of “art” in the country. The pictures frequently repeat, but the number of different pictures is also astonishing. I have been taking pictures of these pictures for awhile now and plan to do a lesson with my students on what the pictures might be trying to show. I see most of these pictures from the windows of our bus, which complicates my ability to collect them. Three photos I saw I really want in my collection, but have not managed to find again. I’ll let you know, if I can find them and snap them. I’ll be pretty excited if I can.
That’s it for today.
Apparently we are going to a Turkish bath this afternoon. I only have a dim understanding of what this means. In any case, if an airline pilot ever asks me if I’ve ever been in a Turkish bath, I’ll have to reply “yes” after this afternoon. (that’s a reference to the movie “Airplane” for those of you too young to know it.) Well, what is it they say? “When in Jordan, do as the Turks”?
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr.Hakel
Things are showing signs of wrapping up around here. While we have two-and-a-half full days of meetings yet at the University of Jordan, it would appear that most of the heavy lifting is over.
Yesterday was our visit to a Palestinian Refugee Camp. Yes, that was heavy lifting. It had the potential to be our most difficult, yet most rewarding visit, but either by hook or by crook, it didn’t turn out that way. The camp we had permission from his Majesty’s Government to visit was the one we had driven through two weeks before on our way back into Amman from the North. From the road, it looked like pretty much any other neighborhood in Amman. From the inside, elements of that remained, but it was also clear that the population was much denser and the levels of income and employment were significantly lower. The term “camp” will be misleading to you. Remember that the last wave of Palestinian refugees was when I was 4-years old in 1967. Palestinian Refugees have Jordanian citizenship and at least legally enjoy the same rights as any other Jordanian. The camp we visited then is over 40 years old. The tents are long gone, but the conditions remain cramped. At one point in time 130,000 people were living in 2 square km. Houses are 70cm apart from one another. Like all housing they are constructed from poured concrete. Water is delivered to tanks on the roof of their house once a week. This is also how almost all Jordanians receive their water. You do the clothes washing on water delivery day to make sure you have enough water to finish the job.
We had been told that when we arrived at the camp we should go to a certain address and pick up our escorts. Our escorts would show us around and answer questions, but also keep an eye on us and give us the “official” answers to our questions. When we arrived at the address given, it was locked up tight. It was Friday and despite being assured there would be someone waiting there for us, there wasn’t. Our guides, Absalaam and Ibrahim conferred together for awhile, we no longer have a tourist police officer accompanying us, and decided that our best bet was to make an unofficial private visit to a friend of Absalaam’s (Absalaam appears to know everyone in Jordan). I should note that the camp is open. No fences, no checkpoints or anything like that. If I had arrived in a private car and got out and walked around, it would have aroused curiosity, but no official response. On the other hand, a group of 15 westerners arriving in a bus with no escort would have aroused some kind of response and it most likely would have involved our guides being held responsible.
So, we visited Yusef’s home in the camp. Yusef has had an interesting life. He fled the West Bank during the war of 1967 with his family. He was quite young. His father became the head of the communist party in the camp. This allowed Yusef to have the opportunity to be included as a part of a group of Palestinian children that visited East Germany in the early 70s. Yusef became ill during the visit was hospitalized there long after the rest of his group had returned to Jordan. Yusef was eventually adopted and raised in East Berlin. He returned to Jordan something like ten years ago. He renounced his German citizenship and is now married and leads german tour groups through Jordan. His wife is a teacher. Yusef is building his dream house, on a hillside high above the camp in the valley below. We also visited his beautiful house. The contrasts between his home in the camp and his unfinished home on the hill couldn’t be more stark. He hopes to move in in another two years or so. The exterior and structural interior are complete, but he’ll wait to complete the house until the economy improves. He’s out of money.
We had a long talk with Yusef Ibrahim translated his Arabic for us. His final point was asking how the Israelis can do unto them, the Palestinians, what was done unto them, the jews of Europe. I have no answer for that.
The rest of the day was spent having a picnic on a hillside south of Amman. The hillside was tree covered and quite lovely in spite of the trash which littered the ground. The amount of trash left all over the country is quite shocking to those of us who are lucky enough to take a cleaner environment for granted. In spite of the broken glass, empty plastic shopping bags and other we had a lovely time sitting in the shade, watching the Jordanians doing the same watching us. Playing Frisbee, first with each other and later with some children from groups near us. I studied lines for both my upcoming plays. Then we ate a late lunch all off a charcoal grill. We started with lamb chops, then home made kebab, which is kind of like gyro meat patties. The most exotic was the skewered goat. It was also the best tasting. I passed on the kidney though. Ibrahim, the jokester, had brought his entire family with him. It was the first time we’d met his wife. Apparently, it was uncommon enough because Absalaam had shared with one of us that while he and Ibrahim are like brothers, he would not recognize Ibrahim’s wife in a crowd. Even in married life socialization between genders is rare in this traditional society. Ibrahim’s wife greeted the women in our group warmly, but not the rest of us. The men that is. I did work in a smile and a “Salaam” later, and she did address me once to ask if I wanted some watermelon. Otherwise, in spite of being within a few feet of her for an hour, I didn’t exist. I imagine you can tell how unsettling this seemed to me. I suppose it was even more unsettling for her. Ibrahim had said that his wife was much more religious than he was and she did keep her head covered the entire time, but not her face. I am really wrestling with how I feel about these aspects of Arabic culture. I don’t expect I’ll be able to resolve my conflict.
Idle thought of the day
• Jordan is liberally decorated with thousands and thousands and thousand of pictures of the king. His boyish face that looks all the more incongruous with the thin mustache and beard he often sports adorns every hallway and every office in every public building we have been in. Nearly every major intersection in every city and town in the country has a picture of him strategically positioned. Private businesses have his picture hanging on their wall. Sometimes his picture is a part of the sign advertising their business on the street. We have eaten maybe two or three meals in restaurants where the king was not “watching”. It is by far the dominant form of “art” in the country. The pictures frequently repeat, but the number of different pictures is also astonishing. I have been taking pictures of these pictures for awhile now and plan to do a lesson with my students on what the pictures might be trying to show. I see most of these pictures from the windows of our bus, which complicates my ability to collect them. Three photos I saw I really want in my collection, but have not managed to find again. I’ll let you know, if I can find them and snap them. I’ll be pretty excited if I can.
That’s it for today.
Apparently we are going to a Turkish bath this afternoon. I only have a dim understanding of what this means. In any case, if an airline pilot ever asks me if I’ve ever been in a Turkish bath, I’ll have to reply “yes” after this afternoon. (that’s a reference to the movie “Airplane” for those of you too young to know it.) Well, what is it they say? “When in Jordan, do as the Turks”?
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr.Hakel
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Mr. Hakel Makes Some Observations
Blog 18 July 22, 2010
Two days in one
We are in the middle of our visits to various locations in Amman listening to various presentations on aspects of Jordanian life. About half of these visits are quite memorable, which isn’t that bad a rate at all actually. It does mean that half of them aren’t memorable, but I won’t burden you, the reader, with anything more than the knowledge that they exist.
Yesterday’s highpoint was a visit to the National Center for Human Rights. This center is one of 110 around the world and is currently the chair of the Asian-Pacific region. They hope to be named world-wide chair this coming spring. The center is funded by the Jordanian government, but there is no oversight of the personnel, the budget, or even government auditing of the center. It is independent. The center receives and investigates reports of human rights violations in Jordan. We met with an exceptionally dignified older man who turned out to be the Director General of the organization. His degree is from Purdue. He taught at University of Wisconsin. He became a dean and then a university president. He served as Jordanian ambassador to several European countries and served as a minister in his Majesty King Abdullah II’s government. I did say “exceptionally dignified”. I’ll go as far as saying he has gravitas, actually… he reminds me of my dad. He discussed the activities of the center and answered questions for an hour and a half. (The Commisioner General, not my dad.)
We’ve discussed the subject of honor crimes with several different people both before and after our arrival in Jordan. He presented to us a wrinkle that had not been mentioned on the subject. Honor killings in Arabic countries are killings made by a father, son, brother of a female family member who is believed to have besmirched the family’s honor by having sexual relations outside of wedlock. In order to restore the family’s honor, the parents may encourage one of the sons to murder his sister. Up until about one year ago in Jordan this crime carried a six-month prison sentence. (You read that right. Six months.) The law has been changed, with the urging of a number of different organizations including the center and our embassy, to a minimum of seven years. It also set up a separate court to deal with these cases so that the law is administered by the same judges in all cases. The wrinkle that the commissioner general added to our knowledge was that many of the dead girls had been proven afterwards, during an autopsy, to be virgins and that the real motivation was to solve what some men saw as inheritance problems. The killer’s sister was going to inherit more than her brother thought she should. Horrifying. This happens in Jordan, but at a lesser rate than any other Arabic country. There had been no claims of honor killings in Jordan in 2010 until three weeks ago. There are now three.
At the conclusion of our session, I talked with the second in command in the office for awhile. I asked him what he attributed Jordan’s relative stability in “a sea of troublemakers”. He replied that the credit belongs to the king and that “he is a wise man.” This is not the first time I’ve heard this sort of comment, but hearing it from this man, in this office and in this position carries a considerable amount of weight for me.
Today’s most highlight was a visit to the Ministry of Political Development. The discussion was in a rather swank conference room on the top floor of the ministry’s headquarters. We learned about Jordan’s efforts to build a functioning democracy within the monarchy in the style of any number of European countries. I honestly believe that these efforts are genuine on the King’s part and are proceeding at a reasonable pace. A major hurdle for Jordan is the relative lack of civic support. The most active, best funded and therefore strongest political party is the Islamic Action Front and just the name tells you all you need to know about this group. The speakers did not pass judgment on any of the parties they discussed, but did say that beyond this one party, the other 17 are far behind in terms of funding/organization. The discussion was interesting, but the fact that the minister himself was giving it. If we had been in the U.S., it would have been the equivalent of having a briefing from the head of the Federal Elections Commission. Way cool.
I’ll update this blog with the names of these people, but my brain is not yet conditioned enough to retain Arabic names for more than an hour or so. To compensate, I’ve been taking notes, but I don’t have my notes with me. Sigh. It’s always something with me. ;)
Just a few side notes…
• David found out the hard way that taking pictures of an ambassador’s residence is frowned upon. After explaining to the seven police officers with machine guns and the Chilean ambassador himself, that he didn’t know he was taking a picture of an ambassador’s house they seemed to feel better. Especially after he deleted the pictures.
• Jordanian Food. The food is almost always very good. There are many, many things I very much like. The problem for me is repetition. The chicken fest continues, the lamb that interrupts from time to time is quite welcome, but is beginning to lose its novelty as well. That being said there are a few things that must, at all costs be avoided. Number one on this list is the yoghurt sauce that is poured over the top of the Jordanian national dish, mansaf. The yoghurt that wasn’t poured over the top was offered to us by the glass one night. Not wishing to be rude, I sampled the yellow-white slightly thick liquid. It was the worst thing I’ve ever voluntarily had in my mouth. Zach coined the term that we all call it to this day. If any Jordanian offers you a glass of meat yoghurt the polite reply is, “La’a Shukraan.”
• Also, at least in Amman, it turns out that an internet café is probably the last place you should try to access the internet. Dave, apparently the most adventurous amongst us, was seeking a place to upload some pictures. After five stops and no internet, but still costing him a few dinar, he visited a café where the internet worked fine, but the price of his milkshake went up as his time on the internet continued. He was eventually able to leave paying around 8 bucks for the milkshake which included an apparently traditional, but heretofore unknown milkshake tableside delivery surcharge.
• Also try to avoid confusing a suspected miniature golf course with a mosque. Sara mistook the bright green carpet on a mosque floor for the first hole of an indoor miniature golf course. Fortunately, she realized her error just before she took her second shot. I mean before she walked in.
• If you forgot something in your hotel room, that you want to retrieve withing say thirty seconds or so of having checked out, it might just be best to forget about it. Josh, my roommate, decided he did in fact want the yoghurt he had just left behind in our room. When he returned to the room the young man from housekeeping had just finished smacking his lips.
• When doing laundry in a hotel room, do not, repeat do not hang it to dry above any electronic devices like say, an Ipod Touch. Don’t ask.
• The most popular spectator/participant sport in Jordan is driving. Accidents are not as common as you’d think though. You drive with the expectation that the truck on your right is about to turn left. That being said I was in a “traffic” accident in Wadi Rum. Wadi Rum you might recall is a huge desert. It turns out the accident was as inevitable as the sun setting at night. If you only have three motor vehicles in say, one hundred square miles, two of the three will collide. It is inevitable.
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
Two days in one
We are in the middle of our visits to various locations in Amman listening to various presentations on aspects of Jordanian life. About half of these visits are quite memorable, which isn’t that bad a rate at all actually. It does mean that half of them aren’t memorable, but I won’t burden you, the reader, with anything more than the knowledge that they exist.
Yesterday’s highpoint was a visit to the National Center for Human Rights. This center is one of 110 around the world and is currently the chair of the Asian-Pacific region. They hope to be named world-wide chair this coming spring. The center is funded by the Jordanian government, but there is no oversight of the personnel, the budget, or even government auditing of the center. It is independent. The center receives and investigates reports of human rights violations in Jordan. We met with an exceptionally dignified older man who turned out to be the Director General of the organization. His degree is from Purdue. He taught at University of Wisconsin. He became a dean and then a university president. He served as Jordanian ambassador to several European countries and served as a minister in his Majesty King Abdullah II’s government. I did say “exceptionally dignified”. I’ll go as far as saying he has gravitas, actually… he reminds me of my dad. He discussed the activities of the center and answered questions for an hour and a half. (The Commisioner General, not my dad.)
We’ve discussed the subject of honor crimes with several different people both before and after our arrival in Jordan. He presented to us a wrinkle that had not been mentioned on the subject. Honor killings in Arabic countries are killings made by a father, son, brother of a female family member who is believed to have besmirched the family’s honor by having sexual relations outside of wedlock. In order to restore the family’s honor, the parents may encourage one of the sons to murder his sister. Up until about one year ago in Jordan this crime carried a six-month prison sentence. (You read that right. Six months.) The law has been changed, with the urging of a number of different organizations including the center and our embassy, to a minimum of seven years. It also set up a separate court to deal with these cases so that the law is administered by the same judges in all cases. The wrinkle that the commissioner general added to our knowledge was that many of the dead girls had been proven afterwards, during an autopsy, to be virgins and that the real motivation was to solve what some men saw as inheritance problems. The killer’s sister was going to inherit more than her brother thought she should. Horrifying. This happens in Jordan, but at a lesser rate than any other Arabic country. There had been no claims of honor killings in Jordan in 2010 until three weeks ago. There are now three.
At the conclusion of our session, I talked with the second in command in the office for awhile. I asked him what he attributed Jordan’s relative stability in “a sea of troublemakers”. He replied that the credit belongs to the king and that “he is a wise man.” This is not the first time I’ve heard this sort of comment, but hearing it from this man, in this office and in this position carries a considerable amount of weight for me.
Today’s most highlight was a visit to the Ministry of Political Development. The discussion was in a rather swank conference room on the top floor of the ministry’s headquarters. We learned about Jordan’s efforts to build a functioning democracy within the monarchy in the style of any number of European countries. I honestly believe that these efforts are genuine on the King’s part and are proceeding at a reasonable pace. A major hurdle for Jordan is the relative lack of civic support. The most active, best funded and therefore strongest political party is the Islamic Action Front and just the name tells you all you need to know about this group. The speakers did not pass judgment on any of the parties they discussed, but did say that beyond this one party, the other 17 are far behind in terms of funding/organization. The discussion was interesting, but the fact that the minister himself was giving it. If we had been in the U.S., it would have been the equivalent of having a briefing from the head of the Federal Elections Commission. Way cool.
I’ll update this blog with the names of these people, but my brain is not yet conditioned enough to retain Arabic names for more than an hour or so. To compensate, I’ve been taking notes, but I don’t have my notes with me. Sigh. It’s always something with me. ;)
Just a few side notes…
• David found out the hard way that taking pictures of an ambassador’s residence is frowned upon. After explaining to the seven police officers with machine guns and the Chilean ambassador himself, that he didn’t know he was taking a picture of an ambassador’s house they seemed to feel better. Especially after he deleted the pictures.
• Jordanian Food. The food is almost always very good. There are many, many things I very much like. The problem for me is repetition. The chicken fest continues, the lamb that interrupts from time to time is quite welcome, but is beginning to lose its novelty as well. That being said there are a few things that must, at all costs be avoided. Number one on this list is the yoghurt sauce that is poured over the top of the Jordanian national dish, mansaf. The yoghurt that wasn’t poured over the top was offered to us by the glass one night. Not wishing to be rude, I sampled the yellow-white slightly thick liquid. It was the worst thing I’ve ever voluntarily had in my mouth. Zach coined the term that we all call it to this day. If any Jordanian offers you a glass of meat yoghurt the polite reply is, “La’a Shukraan.”
• Also, at least in Amman, it turns out that an internet café is probably the last place you should try to access the internet. Dave, apparently the most adventurous amongst us, was seeking a place to upload some pictures. After five stops and no internet, but still costing him a few dinar, he visited a café where the internet worked fine, but the price of his milkshake went up as his time on the internet continued. He was eventually able to leave paying around 8 bucks for the milkshake which included an apparently traditional, but heretofore unknown milkshake tableside delivery surcharge.
• Also try to avoid confusing a suspected miniature golf course with a mosque. Sara mistook the bright green carpet on a mosque floor for the first hole of an indoor miniature golf course. Fortunately, she realized her error just before she took her second shot. I mean before she walked in.
• If you forgot something in your hotel room, that you want to retrieve withing say thirty seconds or so of having checked out, it might just be best to forget about it. Josh, my roommate, decided he did in fact want the yoghurt he had just left behind in our room. When he returned to the room the young man from housekeeping had just finished smacking his lips.
• When doing laundry in a hotel room, do not, repeat do not hang it to dry above any electronic devices like say, an Ipod Touch. Don’t ask.
• The most popular spectator/participant sport in Jordan is driving. Accidents are not as common as you’d think though. You drive with the expectation that the truck on your right is about to turn left. That being said I was in a “traffic” accident in Wadi Rum. Wadi Rum you might recall is a huge desert. It turns out the accident was as inevitable as the sun setting at night. If you only have three motor vehicles in say, one hundred square miles, two of the three will collide. It is inevitable.
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Mr. Hakel Meets Ashraf
Blog 17 July 20, 2010
Happy Barthday to the benefactor of the feast, Dr. Patty Kubow. We’ve just finished celebrating with Patty here on the Jordanian shore of the Dead Sea. Today took me out of my comfort zone. Sure enough, every time you are asked to stretch, you do. Today we visited the SOS Children’s Village of Amman. An orphanage.
A word about how the orphanage is structured and then a word about the people and children we met.
This orphanage is a permanent placement for the children who come here. They are assigned a bed in a three bedroom house with three beds in each room. The people they find there are a family. There is one mother who lives with them full-time 24/7. There may be an auntie who assists. An auntie is a mother-in-training who served a 2-3 year apprenticeship. Brother and sister units are kept together. They attend public schools in the area. Mother’s are paid and given an additional monthly food budget and they do all the traditional work of a stay-at-home mom. Cooking, cleaning, rocking, help with homework and so on…They become a family. The orphans have a mom. After they reach 14 and before they turn 15 they will move to a youth house. The youth house is staffed by a youth leader, an adult that doesn’t assume the title of mom, because they already have one of those. A 22-year old was home for lunch with his mom today. When they turn 18, its off to the real world, but with support, job services, assistance with college tuition and finding scholarships.
Now, the people. The adults we met were kind, committed, generous and smiled a lot. The children we met were polite, clean, generous and smiled a lot. Ashraf, a boy of 11 years was in one of the houses a small group of us visited. While all the children in Jordan begin learning English in first grade, that doesn’t mean there isn’t still shyness. Ashraf does not bear that particular burden and has an unusually strong command of our language. One of the adults was kidding him that he may know more about English than he knows about Arabic. Ashraf became our tour guide as he showed us around his house and the rest of the village. He introduced us to the children in the house next to his and read our larger group a story. “Bacteria” was the only word he got stuck on very long. He received a lot of praise and was just glowing with pride. I would think he’ll remember this day as long as I will.
The second event I would like to tell you about is ourlunch. We were split up into pairs and we were each the guests of one of the houses. Leilani, a group mate, the name is Hawaiian, not Arabic…and I were led by Muhammed to his house. When we arrived, the TV was on in one corner. Several pictures of the King smiling with his family were above the table. The table itself was set with enough plates and food to feed an army. Leilani and I were asked to sit by the Auntie who was in charge while the mother was on vacation visiting her parents. We ate chicken with rice and a cucumber salad. Our early attempts to communicate were halting and wooden, but things gradually loosened. Seated next to me was an irrepressible boy, Samid, who was six. I pulled out my phrase book and started pointing at things and trying to say the Arabic name, which provoked some laughter and then pointed to a glass and said, “Baid” which I knew was egg from my phrase book but provoked a lot more laughter. The oldest girl who is fourteen disappeared for a moment and appeared with an egg, which provoked a great deal more laughter. After that it was magical. No, we never did talk about Jordanian/American relations blah, blah, blah, but we did make connections. Two Americans and nine Jordanians.
Our next stop was one of the youth houses. It turned to be a large apartment in an apartment building. This was a boys house. The youth houses are separated, but the villages are not. It was a nice apartment, both the village and the youth house were considerably more decorated than any of the Jordanian family houses we’ve visited up to this point. We had a nice visit and my group was able to talk with several of the youth. They brought a birthday cake for Patty, we sang, badly.
If you are in a position to be able to donate funds to SOS Children’s Village, I urge you to do so. They are active around the world. The website for Jordan is www.sosjor.org.
By the way, that wasn’t a typo at the beginning, the cake really did say, “Happy Barthday!”
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad
Happy Barthday to the benefactor of the feast, Dr. Patty Kubow. We’ve just finished celebrating with Patty here on the Jordanian shore of the Dead Sea. Today took me out of my comfort zone. Sure enough, every time you are asked to stretch, you do. Today we visited the SOS Children’s Village of Amman. An orphanage.
A word about how the orphanage is structured and then a word about the people and children we met.
This orphanage is a permanent placement for the children who come here. They are assigned a bed in a three bedroom house with three beds in each room. The people they find there are a family. There is one mother who lives with them full-time 24/7. There may be an auntie who assists. An auntie is a mother-in-training who served a 2-3 year apprenticeship. Brother and sister units are kept together. They attend public schools in the area. Mother’s are paid and given an additional monthly food budget and they do all the traditional work of a stay-at-home mom. Cooking, cleaning, rocking, help with homework and so on…They become a family. The orphans have a mom. After they reach 14 and before they turn 15 they will move to a youth house. The youth house is staffed by a youth leader, an adult that doesn’t assume the title of mom, because they already have one of those. A 22-year old was home for lunch with his mom today. When they turn 18, its off to the real world, but with support, job services, assistance with college tuition and finding scholarships.
Now, the people. The adults we met were kind, committed, generous and smiled a lot. The children we met were polite, clean, generous and smiled a lot. Ashraf, a boy of 11 years was in one of the houses a small group of us visited. While all the children in Jordan begin learning English in first grade, that doesn’t mean there isn’t still shyness. Ashraf does not bear that particular burden and has an unusually strong command of our language. One of the adults was kidding him that he may know more about English than he knows about Arabic. Ashraf became our tour guide as he showed us around his house and the rest of the village. He introduced us to the children in the house next to his and read our larger group a story. “Bacteria” was the only word he got stuck on very long. He received a lot of praise and was just glowing with pride. I would think he’ll remember this day as long as I will.
The second event I would like to tell you about is ourlunch. We were split up into pairs and we were each the guests of one of the houses. Leilani, a group mate, the name is Hawaiian, not Arabic…and I were led by Muhammed to his house. When we arrived, the TV was on in one corner. Several pictures of the King smiling with his family were above the table. The table itself was set with enough plates and food to feed an army. Leilani and I were asked to sit by the Auntie who was in charge while the mother was on vacation visiting her parents. We ate chicken with rice and a cucumber salad. Our early attempts to communicate were halting and wooden, but things gradually loosened. Seated next to me was an irrepressible boy, Samid, who was six. I pulled out my phrase book and started pointing at things and trying to say the Arabic name, which provoked some laughter and then pointed to a glass and said, “Baid” which I knew was egg from my phrase book but provoked a lot more laughter. The oldest girl who is fourteen disappeared for a moment and appeared with an egg, which provoked a great deal more laughter. After that it was magical. No, we never did talk about Jordanian/American relations blah, blah, blah, but we did make connections. Two Americans and nine Jordanians.
Our next stop was one of the youth houses. It turned to be a large apartment in an apartment building. This was a boys house. The youth houses are separated, but the villages are not. It was a nice apartment, both the village and the youth house were considerably more decorated than any of the Jordanian family houses we’ve visited up to this point. We had a nice visit and my group was able to talk with several of the youth. They brought a birthday cake for Patty, we sang, badly.
If you are in a position to be able to donate funds to SOS Children’s Village, I urge you to do so. They are active around the world. The website for Jordan is www.sosjor.org.
By the way, that wasn’t a typo at the beginning, the cake really did say, “Happy Barthday!”
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad
Monday, July 19, 2010
Mr. Hakel Visits the Embassy
Blog 16 July 19, 2010
Short entry today. Two visits, one to United States Embassy and the second to the “Fulbright House”.
The visit to the embassy was to meet with representatives of USAID. They are the federal agency that administers programs and funds spent by the United States taxpayers to improve the lives of Jordanians. My impression was very favorable. Our country is doing good work in this country and I’m proud of our work.
The first hour was spent with George Kalal, who is the team leader for USAIDs efforts in political and legal reform. George is Jordanian and did an excellent job of explaining not only the successes of our government here, but also the remaining challenges. He was generally complimentary to the King who appears to be a reform-minded individual. The slow pace of change was laid more at the feet of the bureaucracy and the powerful ministers of this and that. One of the success stories has to do with a request of USAID from the Jordanian Parliament. They asked for assistance in obtaining an electronic voting system for legislative votes. Our country was willing to help grasping the power of such a system to bring more transparency to legislative votes. Prior to the electronic voting system’s implementation votes were held in secret. Imagine the reaction in our country if our legislators’ votes were kept in secret. Members of the Jordanian Parliament wanted to get rid of the system, but the system remains.
Our second speaker was the team leader for USAIDs efforts to aid Jordanian education. These efforts are on as small a level as paying for two bookmobiles to operate in Jordan to large scale efforts such as the building of 28 new schools in different parts of the country.
Before I describe the stop at the Fulbright house I want to mention what a visit to an American Embassy in a Middle Eastern country entails. Our bus first approached the embassy from the West and we were stopped by a Jordanian manned security checkpoint who told us to come from the East. We hopped back on the bus and made our way around. As we stepped off the bus we went through the low concrete barriers we use in construction areas back home. This was the first perimeter. The second perimeter took us through a couple of metal turnstiles. The kind your older brother used to stop with his hand trapping you between the rows of bars. Between the two we went through our first metal detector. As we stepped back outside I managed to snap a picture. As far as I know, it is the only picture of the embassy any of us got, because at the third perimeter our cameras, cell phones etc. were confiscated for the duration of our visit. (My theory on the picture was that since they hadn’t already confiscated my camera or told me not to take pictures, it must be alright…) The third level of security was also interesting because we each entered the building where this was taking place individually. Here our bags were screened with a machine. My watch, which I just bought yesterday, caused some interest because it happened to be lying in my bag in a straight line, which made it look like some kind of stick. They rescanned it at a different angle and let me keep it. All the security was being done by a private security firm. It appeared that even the gray/black camouflaged F-150 truck with the gigantic machine gun, with the soldier standing behind it was a member of this security company. Blackwater comes to mind.
After receiving a ticket to retrieve my cameras, it was through another turnstile and we were through the high wall surrounding the embassy. Only two heavy blast doors and one more metal detector and we were in. Our host welcomed us to “Fortress America”.
In contrast the Fulbright House only had one local police officer with one relatively small submachine gun in front of it. The door was secured, but no security checks. We were ushered downstairs to the library where several hundred well worn paperbacks from fiction to Islamic study were available for checkout. We were immediately served pizza and soda for lunch and spent the next hour and a half talking with the Executive Director of the Jordanian-American Fulbright Commision, Alain McNamara.
He was an absolutely charming man, would have been even without the pizza, he described Fulbright’s mission in Jordan with exchanges going both directions. My trip has been funded by this commission to the tune of the better part of a hundred thousand dollars. Our host continued with an interesting disscussion of other funding possibilities for those interested.
I talked to Heidi on the phone today for the first time. That was great.
I miss you all, too, and can’t wait to be able to share in a more personal fashion some of my experiences. If you are going to be in my Social Studies class this year, you’re going to be my captive audience!
Salaam,
Mr. Hakel/Dad/Lane
Short entry today. Two visits, one to United States Embassy and the second to the “Fulbright House”.
The visit to the embassy was to meet with representatives of USAID. They are the federal agency that administers programs and funds spent by the United States taxpayers to improve the lives of Jordanians. My impression was very favorable. Our country is doing good work in this country and I’m proud of our work.
The first hour was spent with George Kalal, who is the team leader for USAIDs efforts in political and legal reform. George is Jordanian and did an excellent job of explaining not only the successes of our government here, but also the remaining challenges. He was generally complimentary to the King who appears to be a reform-minded individual. The slow pace of change was laid more at the feet of the bureaucracy and the powerful ministers of this and that. One of the success stories has to do with a request of USAID from the Jordanian Parliament. They asked for assistance in obtaining an electronic voting system for legislative votes. Our country was willing to help grasping the power of such a system to bring more transparency to legislative votes. Prior to the electronic voting system’s implementation votes were held in secret. Imagine the reaction in our country if our legislators’ votes were kept in secret. Members of the Jordanian Parliament wanted to get rid of the system, but the system remains.
Our second speaker was the team leader for USAIDs efforts to aid Jordanian education. These efforts are on as small a level as paying for two bookmobiles to operate in Jordan to large scale efforts such as the building of 28 new schools in different parts of the country.
Before I describe the stop at the Fulbright house I want to mention what a visit to an American Embassy in a Middle Eastern country entails. Our bus first approached the embassy from the West and we were stopped by a Jordanian manned security checkpoint who told us to come from the East. We hopped back on the bus and made our way around. As we stepped off the bus we went through the low concrete barriers we use in construction areas back home. This was the first perimeter. The second perimeter took us through a couple of metal turnstiles. The kind your older brother used to stop with his hand trapping you between the rows of bars. Between the two we went through our first metal detector. As we stepped back outside I managed to snap a picture. As far as I know, it is the only picture of the embassy any of us got, because at the third perimeter our cameras, cell phones etc. were confiscated for the duration of our visit. (My theory on the picture was that since they hadn’t already confiscated my camera or told me not to take pictures, it must be alright…) The third level of security was also interesting because we each entered the building where this was taking place individually. Here our bags were screened with a machine. My watch, which I just bought yesterday, caused some interest because it happened to be lying in my bag in a straight line, which made it look like some kind of stick. They rescanned it at a different angle and let me keep it. All the security was being done by a private security firm. It appeared that even the gray/black camouflaged F-150 truck with the gigantic machine gun, with the soldier standing behind it was a member of this security company. Blackwater comes to mind.
After receiving a ticket to retrieve my cameras, it was through another turnstile and we were through the high wall surrounding the embassy. Only two heavy blast doors and one more metal detector and we were in. Our host welcomed us to “Fortress America”.
In contrast the Fulbright House only had one local police officer with one relatively small submachine gun in front of it. The door was secured, but no security checks. We were ushered downstairs to the library where several hundred well worn paperbacks from fiction to Islamic study were available for checkout. We were immediately served pizza and soda for lunch and spent the next hour and a half talking with the Executive Director of the Jordanian-American Fulbright Commision, Alain McNamara.
He was an absolutely charming man, would have been even without the pizza, he described Fulbright’s mission in Jordan with exchanges going both directions. My trip has been funded by this commission to the tune of the better part of a hundred thousand dollars. Our host continued with an interesting disscussion of other funding possibilities for those interested.
I talked to Heidi on the phone today for the first time. That was great.
I miss you all, too, and can’t wait to be able to share in a more personal fashion some of my experiences. If you are going to be in my Social Studies class this year, you’re going to be my captive audience!
Salaam,
Mr. Hakel/Dad/Lane
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Mr. Hakel Goes to Market
NOTE: Our schedule hasn't allowed me much time so all grammatical/spelling/typos are intact. I think it lends to the authenticity of the recollections, don't you? You're right, I'm lazy. Anyway, sorry about that.
Blog 15 July 19, 2010
Hello from Amman, Jordan’s capital city. In about an hour our group will be heading to the United States for the morning. Technically, when you visit any country’s embassy you are legally in that country while on the grounds and in the building. So, for a few hours anyway, we’ll be back home. Sort of.
The sight-seeing portion of our trip has for the most part been completed. Two days ago, we drove up from Aqaba along the Jordanian-Israeli border to the south end of the Dead Sea. I was curious to see the differences between this shared border and the border to the North of the Dea Sea because the only difference would be the lack of the Jordan River, which flows from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea. This country side while decidedly in a valley was amongst the most desolate I’ve ever seen. The road crossed several large dune fields. One area looked like stepping off the road meant instant death, but nevertheless the bus slowed to allow a shepherd to finish crossing the road with his flock of goats. I can’t imagine what the goats were grazing on. The only vegetation was the occasional bush the size a medium-sized pumpkin. I guess that’s what they ate then.
When we reached the south end of the Dead Sea we were able to see one of Jordan’s lone industrial pursuits. The Dead Sea on this end has dried to the point that it has become separated from the main body of “water”. It has been further segmented into what looks like large fields and the salt, along with other chemicals, is being harvested from the water.
At one point along the Sea we stopped for a close look at a pull out. Along the shore were large outcroppings of white salt. These were amazing to look at because of the crystalline structure that made it very interesting to see. I hope the pictures turn out, but we were a little far away.
A few minutes later, we were in familiar territory as we drove past the area we swam in last week.
Yesterday in Amman, we visited the Roman citadel that has been preserved and partially reconstructed. The most fascinating activity yesterday though was visiting the market area in the old city. There were plenty of tourists wondering in and around the streets, but this was by no means a tourist set up. This was discount stalls next to high fashion and a gold store next to a shop selling freshly crushed sugar cane juice. This stall had a line waiting for service. The vegetable and fruit market was piled high with items both familiar and exotic. From the largest watermelon I’ve ever seen to cactus fruit being sold in piles on the side walk. An old woman selling cigarettes from a blanket arranged on the ground. You could buy the pack or just one at a time. A butcher shop with half goats hanging in the windows and two severed cow heads complete with tongues hanging out. I was surprised the cows were able to maintain that contented look giving their current circumstances. Fresher meat was available as well. A cage full of relatively peaceful chickens sat next to a cage full of decidedly unhappy ducks. The people wore a mixture of western and eastern clothing. The greatest variety was amongst the women. A large minority wore western dress, most wore the full length robes, most black. Occasionally, robes of different colors appeared. The most variety was seen in the types of head covering. The women who stood out the most wore a black head-covering that exposed only their eyes. In Jordan I have not seen any women wearing a full face covering, or burka. Common in Amman are the white coverings that seem to make a women’s face look like a full moon. I did not see this covering much in the rest of the country. Finally a large segment of women use colorful scarves in a variety of styles to stay in tune with the customs of this country.
Most conspicuous of all in this cacophony of color, smells, and car horns was the 46 year old foreigner walking down the street with his camera in hand and fanny pack on his waist. I suppose I was stared at some, but I did feel very, very obvious. Sometimes that’s a good feeling, but here I wished I could have blended in a little better. The black shorts I was wearing were a dead give away. My ball cap and shirt were ok, but I didn’t see another man besides members of our group wearing shorts. I did make a couple purchases. I got a watch for 12 JD when he opened for 22. I bought a couple of books for school. One is about the Islamic holiday of Ramadan and it is written in Arabic, English and Spanish. The second is a Harry Potter, or as it would be pronounced in Arabic, “’arry Botter”, book in Arabic.
I also bought a traditional Bedouin Men’s robe that is bright white, long-sleeved and hangs to the ground. I’ll be purchasing some other items for my students that will have them dressing the part as well.
Finally today we visited three different museums. In one of them I was able to see, with my own eyes, several large fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls. We also visited the Jordan Musueum of Fine Art, which was interesting because art is not a part of Islam. Dinner was in an old, old residence that was built of stone vaults that gave us the feeling of being far underground in a cavern. It was a lavish buffet with maybe a hundred different items on it. We ate very well and the company was good. We also said “Good bye” to our friend, Ibrahim, who had been our in-bus guide for the last ten days. Ibrahim also brought two of his children to the meal, which made it more special.
Off to the Embassy.
Salaam,
Lane/Dad/The Sheikh;)
Blog 15 July 19, 2010
Hello from Amman, Jordan’s capital city. In about an hour our group will be heading to the United States for the morning. Technically, when you visit any country’s embassy you are legally in that country while on the grounds and in the building. So, for a few hours anyway, we’ll be back home. Sort of.
The sight-seeing portion of our trip has for the most part been completed. Two days ago, we drove up from Aqaba along the Jordanian-Israeli border to the south end of the Dead Sea. I was curious to see the differences between this shared border and the border to the North of the Dea Sea because the only difference would be the lack of the Jordan River, which flows from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea. This country side while decidedly in a valley was amongst the most desolate I’ve ever seen. The road crossed several large dune fields. One area looked like stepping off the road meant instant death, but nevertheless the bus slowed to allow a shepherd to finish crossing the road with his flock of goats. I can’t imagine what the goats were grazing on. The only vegetation was the occasional bush the size a medium-sized pumpkin. I guess that’s what they ate then.
When we reached the south end of the Dead Sea we were able to see one of Jordan’s lone industrial pursuits. The Dead Sea on this end has dried to the point that it has become separated from the main body of “water”. It has been further segmented into what looks like large fields and the salt, along with other chemicals, is being harvested from the water.
At one point along the Sea we stopped for a close look at a pull out. Along the shore were large outcroppings of white salt. These were amazing to look at because of the crystalline structure that made it very interesting to see. I hope the pictures turn out, but we were a little far away.
A few minutes later, we were in familiar territory as we drove past the area we swam in last week.
Yesterday in Amman, we visited the Roman citadel that has been preserved and partially reconstructed. The most fascinating activity yesterday though was visiting the market area in the old city. There were plenty of tourists wondering in and around the streets, but this was by no means a tourist set up. This was discount stalls next to high fashion and a gold store next to a shop selling freshly crushed sugar cane juice. This stall had a line waiting for service. The vegetable and fruit market was piled high with items both familiar and exotic. From the largest watermelon I’ve ever seen to cactus fruit being sold in piles on the side walk. An old woman selling cigarettes from a blanket arranged on the ground. You could buy the pack or just one at a time. A butcher shop with half goats hanging in the windows and two severed cow heads complete with tongues hanging out. I was surprised the cows were able to maintain that contented look giving their current circumstances. Fresher meat was available as well. A cage full of relatively peaceful chickens sat next to a cage full of decidedly unhappy ducks. The people wore a mixture of western and eastern clothing. The greatest variety was amongst the women. A large minority wore western dress, most wore the full length robes, most black. Occasionally, robes of different colors appeared. The most variety was seen in the types of head covering. The women who stood out the most wore a black head-covering that exposed only their eyes. In Jordan I have not seen any women wearing a full face covering, or burka. Common in Amman are the white coverings that seem to make a women’s face look like a full moon. I did not see this covering much in the rest of the country. Finally a large segment of women use colorful scarves in a variety of styles to stay in tune with the customs of this country.
Most conspicuous of all in this cacophony of color, smells, and car horns was the 46 year old foreigner walking down the street with his camera in hand and fanny pack on his waist. I suppose I was stared at some, but I did feel very, very obvious. Sometimes that’s a good feeling, but here I wished I could have blended in a little better. The black shorts I was wearing were a dead give away. My ball cap and shirt were ok, but I didn’t see another man besides members of our group wearing shorts. I did make a couple purchases. I got a watch for 12 JD when he opened for 22. I bought a couple of books for school. One is about the Islamic holiday of Ramadan and it is written in Arabic, English and Spanish. The second is a Harry Potter, or as it would be pronounced in Arabic, “’arry Botter”, book in Arabic.
I also bought a traditional Bedouin Men’s robe that is bright white, long-sleeved and hangs to the ground. I’ll be purchasing some other items for my students that will have them dressing the part as well.
Finally today we visited three different museums. In one of them I was able to see, with my own eyes, several large fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls. We also visited the Jordan Musueum of Fine Art, which was interesting because art is not a part of Islam. Dinner was in an old, old residence that was built of stone vaults that gave us the feeling of being far underground in a cavern. It was a lavish buffet with maybe a hundred different items on it. We ate very well and the company was good. We also said “Good bye” to our friend, Ibrahim, who had been our in-bus guide for the last ten days. Ibrahim also brought two of his children to the meal, which made it more special.
Off to the Embassy.
Salaam,
Lane/Dad/The Sheikh;)
Friday, July 16, 2010
Sheikh Hakel Swims with the Fishes
Blog 14 July 16, 2010
A day that began soaring soundlessly over the desert continues with a snorkeling trip on the most gorgeous reef I’ve ever seen. The skeptics out there will ask how many reefs I’ve seen, and the answer is now two, but I’m counting all the reefs on the Jacques Cousteau specials I was addicted to when I was a kid. So there.
We drove right through the city of Aqaba and up the coast. For those of you familiar with the political boundaries in the area you already know that the Northern end of the Red Sea hosts the borders of four countries in an area small enough that I was able to see Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel in the same place. Jordan only has about 24km of coastline on the Red Sea, but they make the most of what they have. Israel has even less with around 15km. We drove up to a rickety old wharf and saw out to sea a bit a rather nice looking boat that was supposed to be ours was sitting motionless in the calm sea. The water is impossibly blue. So blue the tidy bowl man came to mind, but fortunately it isn’t that kind of blue. One problem. It was about 200 yards away from the end of the dock. Shortly a much smaller boat showed up that the 14 of us barely fit on together. It did have a glass window in the bottom, but still, this was not going to be as cool as I thought in this overstuffed dinghy. Well, this little boat took us out to the big boat and the next adventure began.
I quickly changed in the hold and donned my flippers, snorkel and mask and set out. My one and only previous snorkeling experience was in the Keys and I was disappointed. The rest of the family was more than disappointed, they were ill from the choppy conditions. Today was the opposite, my expectations were more than exceeded. I’ll spare you the details for now, and no, I don’t own a waterproof camera so I can’t show you 300 pictures. The highlight for me came on my third trip out when I spotted not one, but three Lion Fish. This fish makes it self look larger than life by the extended fins it deploys as it swims. I’d always wanted to see one in the ocean, heck I’d have settled for seeing one in aquarium, but today I saw three at once. When I first saw it, it was tough to spot because its colorings help it blend with the coral so well. I got really excited when I realized there was a second one right next to it and giddy when I saw the third below. I then spent 20 minutes hovering above one of them as it hunted a school of fish that managed to hover just out of striking distance. I finally began to realize how tired I was getting and headed for the boat.
I’m sitting now in the Captain Hotel in Aqaba knowing that days like this don’t come very often in a lifetime. The afterglow will last long after we have returned to Amman tomorrow; it will last long after I’ve told you all about it in person and it will last long after I’ve told the same story to my class year after year after year.
It’s six o’clock here. I can’t imagine I’ll need to write another episode today, so “Salaam” from Aqaba, Jordan on the Red Sea.
Lane/Dad/Sheikh Hakel
A day that began soaring soundlessly over the desert continues with a snorkeling trip on the most gorgeous reef I’ve ever seen. The skeptics out there will ask how many reefs I’ve seen, and the answer is now two, but I’m counting all the reefs on the Jacques Cousteau specials I was addicted to when I was a kid. So there.
We drove right through the city of Aqaba and up the coast. For those of you familiar with the political boundaries in the area you already know that the Northern end of the Red Sea hosts the borders of four countries in an area small enough that I was able to see Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel in the same place. Jordan only has about 24km of coastline on the Red Sea, but they make the most of what they have. Israel has even less with around 15km. We drove up to a rickety old wharf and saw out to sea a bit a rather nice looking boat that was supposed to be ours was sitting motionless in the calm sea. The water is impossibly blue. So blue the tidy bowl man came to mind, but fortunately it isn’t that kind of blue. One problem. It was about 200 yards away from the end of the dock. Shortly a much smaller boat showed up that the 14 of us barely fit on together. It did have a glass window in the bottom, but still, this was not going to be as cool as I thought in this overstuffed dinghy. Well, this little boat took us out to the big boat and the next adventure began.
I quickly changed in the hold and donned my flippers, snorkel and mask and set out. My one and only previous snorkeling experience was in the Keys and I was disappointed. The rest of the family was more than disappointed, they were ill from the choppy conditions. Today was the opposite, my expectations were more than exceeded. I’ll spare you the details for now, and no, I don’t own a waterproof camera so I can’t show you 300 pictures. The highlight for me came on my third trip out when I spotted not one, but three Lion Fish. This fish makes it self look larger than life by the extended fins it deploys as it swims. I’d always wanted to see one in the ocean, heck I’d have settled for seeing one in aquarium, but today I saw three at once. When I first saw it, it was tough to spot because its colorings help it blend with the coral so well. I got really excited when I realized there was a second one right next to it and giddy when I saw the third below. I then spent 20 minutes hovering above one of them as it hunted a school of fish that managed to hover just out of striking distance. I finally began to realize how tired I was getting and headed for the boat.
I’m sitting now in the Captain Hotel in Aqaba knowing that days like this don’t come very often in a lifetime. The afterglow will last long after we have returned to Amman tomorrow; it will last long after I’ve told you all about it in person and it will last long after I’ve told the same story to my class year after year after year.
It’s six o’clock here. I can’t imagine I’ll need to write another episode today, so “Salaam” from Aqaba, Jordan on the Red Sea.
Lane/Dad/Sheikh Hakel
Mr. Hakel and the Hot Air
Blog 13 July 16, 2010
Big day today, I’m gettin’ started early. Currently riding in our minibus to Aqaba where we will immediately board our charter and head out for a snorkeling adventure on one of the world’s greatest reefs.
Woke up at 5 this morning to make our early trip. Hot air ballooning over Wadi Rum. I guess I could give you a blow by blow description of the set-up of the balloon, the different steps, safety checks etc. but that would just be torture for you. I’ve spent so much of this trip seeing indescribable things. I took 300 pictures today alone and it isn’t noon yet. (Yep, some of you are in store for a seriously long slide show!) The balloon was everything I thought it would be. Smooth, peaceful, awe-inspiring are just a couple of the inadequate words I can think of. Lift off was so smooth that if I had not been looking I would never have known we’d left the earth. This is such a different sensation than any other way I’ve ever flown before. Yes, the burners were roaring from time to time, but otherwise there was no sensation of lift or movement at all. None. We were up to 3,000 feet of elevation in no time at all. We also didn’t seem to be moving over the ground at all either. At least until I watched the shadow of the balloon on the ground carefully. Then our speed seemed to rapidly increase. Our Captain took us high initially and then brought us down low over Al Jebel, or a mountain. It turned out to be the mountain that some of us had raced up a dune besides two days ago. It was amazing to see things we could recognize from up there. All too soon our trip came to a smooth, no bump landing. We watched the take down of the balloon for awhile and then mounted our trucks for the next new experience of the day. This one was pretty much the antithesis of the previous. Camel riding. Now, I’m not much of one to throw my weight around, but it occasionally can come in handy as I was assigned the largest of the camels. I was literally towering over most of the other people in our group and since I was wearing a turban with my new sunglasses, I was in fact given the title, Sheikh. As I understand it, I am able to retain that title when I return home. I believe I shall only use it professionally. So, if any colleagues or students of mine happen to read this, please remember to refer to me as Sheikh Hakel. Thank you for your consideration.
The only similiarity I can think of in comparing a hot air balloon ride to a ride on a camel is the relative height at which one views one’s surroundings. The sounds, the temperature, the speed, and most definitely the smells are very different. Our ride lasted about an hour. The best piece of advice we were given was to get on fast, you never know when a camel is going to stand up and to cross your legs in front of its hump. Now, those of you keeping score at home, will want to ask if I am riding a camel or a dromedary. In fact I and everyone else in Jordan are riding dromedaries. I am going to call them camels. If you can’t deal with it go ride a bison. I mentioned the camel ride was about an hour long. For me that was about fifty minutes longer than necessary. The most fun/alarming moments were when the camel stood and when the camel sat. Besides that? I sang cowboy songs to stay interested and match the sway of the camel. We’ve just arrived in Aqaba, type at you later!
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Sheikh Hakel
Big day today, I’m gettin’ started early. Currently riding in our minibus to Aqaba where we will immediately board our charter and head out for a snorkeling adventure on one of the world’s greatest reefs.
Woke up at 5 this morning to make our early trip. Hot air ballooning over Wadi Rum. I guess I could give you a blow by blow description of the set-up of the balloon, the different steps, safety checks etc. but that would just be torture for you. I’ve spent so much of this trip seeing indescribable things. I took 300 pictures today alone and it isn’t noon yet. (Yep, some of you are in store for a seriously long slide show!) The balloon was everything I thought it would be. Smooth, peaceful, awe-inspiring are just a couple of the inadequate words I can think of. Lift off was so smooth that if I had not been looking I would never have known we’d left the earth. This is such a different sensation than any other way I’ve ever flown before. Yes, the burners were roaring from time to time, but otherwise there was no sensation of lift or movement at all. None. We were up to 3,000 feet of elevation in no time at all. We also didn’t seem to be moving over the ground at all either. At least until I watched the shadow of the balloon on the ground carefully. Then our speed seemed to rapidly increase. Our Captain took us high initially and then brought us down low over Al Jebel, or a mountain. It turned out to be the mountain that some of us had raced up a dune besides two days ago. It was amazing to see things we could recognize from up there. All too soon our trip came to a smooth, no bump landing. We watched the take down of the balloon for awhile and then mounted our trucks for the next new experience of the day. This one was pretty much the antithesis of the previous. Camel riding. Now, I’m not much of one to throw my weight around, but it occasionally can come in handy as I was assigned the largest of the camels. I was literally towering over most of the other people in our group and since I was wearing a turban with my new sunglasses, I was in fact given the title, Sheikh. As I understand it, I am able to retain that title when I return home. I believe I shall only use it professionally. So, if any colleagues or students of mine happen to read this, please remember to refer to me as Sheikh Hakel. Thank you for your consideration.
The only similiarity I can think of in comparing a hot air balloon ride to a ride on a camel is the relative height at which one views one’s surroundings. The sounds, the temperature, the speed, and most definitely the smells are very different. Our ride lasted about an hour. The best piece of advice we were given was to get on fast, you never know when a camel is going to stand up and to cross your legs in front of its hump. Now, those of you keeping score at home, will want to ask if I am riding a camel or a dromedary. In fact I and everyone else in Jordan are riding dromedaries. I am going to call them camels. If you can’t deal with it go ride a bison. I mentioned the camel ride was about an hour long. For me that was about fifty minutes longer than necessary. The most fun/alarming moments were when the camel stood and when the camel sat. Besides that? I sang cowboy songs to stay interested and match the sway of the camel. We’ve just arrived in Aqaba, type at you later!
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Sheikh Hakel
Mr. Hakel Goes Dancing With The Stars
Blog 12 July 15, 2010
I’m sitting under the stars. I’m listening to a Bedouin man whose name I cannot pronounce, let alone spell, playing the traditional music on the lute. I’m going to stop blogging now, but I’ll tell you the rest when he’s done. I promise.
Ok, he’s done but nowthey are passing around the fresh camel’s milk. I’ll be back. I promise.
Alright. Yes, I drank the camel’s milk. It tasted like…well…milk. I was prepared for worse. For far worse, actually.
So, back to business. The Milky Way is pretty bright tonight. The stars are twinkling. No shooting stars tonight yet, or should I say “Shouting Stars” as our guide, Ibrahim, calls them. Somebody is seeing one and is shouting, “I see one!” and everybody is looking at him instead of the stars. Anyway, there are a lot of stars.
This morning we visited with the Ma’an Education Directorate, which is the equivalent of a county board of education. I wish I could tell you it was fascinating, but to be completely honest…it was occasionally mildly interesting. Good enough.
We returned to our campsite here in the desert. The idea was to eat a quick lunch and then take cover in the shade to let the worst of the heat go past. I stopped by my wool-sided tent to change out of my slacks and walked into what could charitably be called an incinerator. Then it was off to the “shade”. Technically I was in fact out of the sun, and it did help, but not a lot. The heat is just brutal.
At 4:00 we loaded up the trucks and headed out into the desert. The features here are just amazing. Craggy red rocks that appear to be growing out of the desert. The rocks can be large enough to be considered a mountain. They can also be quite small. Even more interesting is that as you descend from one area to another the whole desert changes color. We started in an area where all the mountains were red; therefore, all the sand was red. As we descended the mountains turned from sandstone to limestone and the sand went from red to a lighter tan. We descended again and it went from a light tan to an off white. It was pretty stinkin’ cool.
Two incidents worth reporting on the jeep ride. First, our jeep would not get out of gear, for about a half hour. This left it stranded on a dune side for a time. The other two drivers walked back and we eventually got it going. A few minutes later, in a wide open desert, mind you, we got rear ended by another jeep. Those of us sitting in the back all saw the collision coming and were braced for it. Both jeeps were able to continue and we headed back to the campsite.
When we got back it was finally time for the football game of the ages. Jordan vs. USA. We played in the hard-packed sand and rocks in the enclosure of our campsite. We knew we were out of our league, but I can report that you can be proud of the effort, grit, resilience and gusto with which your country’s representatives played with. You may have noticed I did not include the final score in that list. I quickly appointed myself goalkeeper, because I know how to play the postion and I am still, after all, the oldest person in this place. (Which is kind of a bummer, because that includes the Jordanians here too.) The Jordanians first goal was an own goal on our part, but we could tell that our otherwise stifling defense was bothering the opposition as the Arabic got louder and more insistent. It was a blast, but we fell 4-1.
Dinner was pretty amazing too. We had pretty much the standard side dishes, but the main course was chicken(again), potatoes and onions. The cool part was when the cooks started clearing sand from a pile and then lifted out a three-tiered rack with the main dish arranged on each shelf. The onions were amazing as was the rest. It had been baking under the sand for one and a half hours, maybe two.
The last portion of the evening was spent listening and dancing to Matab play the lute with accompaniment by the trabokka, or drums. The music was amazing as I said at the beginning.
Big day tomorrow, we start early, we must leave here at 5:30 to go catch our hot air balloon. Scratch one item from the bucket list!
Salaam,
Mr. Hakel/Dad/Lane
I’m sitting under the stars. I’m listening to a Bedouin man whose name I cannot pronounce, let alone spell, playing the traditional music on the lute. I’m going to stop blogging now, but I’ll tell you the rest when he’s done. I promise.
Ok, he’s done but nowthey are passing around the fresh camel’s milk. I’ll be back. I promise.
Alright. Yes, I drank the camel’s milk. It tasted like…well…milk. I was prepared for worse. For far worse, actually.
So, back to business. The Milky Way is pretty bright tonight. The stars are twinkling. No shooting stars tonight yet, or should I say “Shouting Stars” as our guide, Ibrahim, calls them. Somebody is seeing one and is shouting, “I see one!” and everybody is looking at him instead of the stars. Anyway, there are a lot of stars.
This morning we visited with the Ma’an Education Directorate, which is the equivalent of a county board of education. I wish I could tell you it was fascinating, but to be completely honest…it was occasionally mildly interesting. Good enough.
We returned to our campsite here in the desert. The idea was to eat a quick lunch and then take cover in the shade to let the worst of the heat go past. I stopped by my wool-sided tent to change out of my slacks and walked into what could charitably be called an incinerator. Then it was off to the “shade”. Technically I was in fact out of the sun, and it did help, but not a lot. The heat is just brutal.
At 4:00 we loaded up the trucks and headed out into the desert. The features here are just amazing. Craggy red rocks that appear to be growing out of the desert. The rocks can be large enough to be considered a mountain. They can also be quite small. Even more interesting is that as you descend from one area to another the whole desert changes color. We started in an area where all the mountains were red; therefore, all the sand was red. As we descended the mountains turned from sandstone to limestone and the sand went from red to a lighter tan. We descended again and it went from a light tan to an off white. It was pretty stinkin’ cool.
Two incidents worth reporting on the jeep ride. First, our jeep would not get out of gear, for about a half hour. This left it stranded on a dune side for a time. The other two drivers walked back and we eventually got it going. A few minutes later, in a wide open desert, mind you, we got rear ended by another jeep. Those of us sitting in the back all saw the collision coming and were braced for it. Both jeeps were able to continue and we headed back to the campsite.
When we got back it was finally time for the football game of the ages. Jordan vs. USA. We played in the hard-packed sand and rocks in the enclosure of our campsite. We knew we were out of our league, but I can report that you can be proud of the effort, grit, resilience and gusto with which your country’s representatives played with. You may have noticed I did not include the final score in that list. I quickly appointed myself goalkeeper, because I know how to play the postion and I am still, after all, the oldest person in this place. (Which is kind of a bummer, because that includes the Jordanians here too.) The Jordanians first goal was an own goal on our part, but we could tell that our otherwise stifling defense was bothering the opposition as the Arabic got louder and more insistent. It was a blast, but we fell 4-1.
Dinner was pretty amazing too. We had pretty much the standard side dishes, but the main course was chicken(again), potatoes and onions. The cool part was when the cooks started clearing sand from a pile and then lifted out a three-tiered rack with the main dish arranged on each shelf. The onions were amazing as was the rest. It had been baking under the sand for one and a half hours, maybe two.
The last portion of the evening was spent listening and dancing to Matab play the lute with accompaniment by the trabokka, or drums. The music was amazing as I said at the beginning.
Big day tomorrow, we start early, we must leave here at 5:30 to go catch our hot air balloon. Scratch one item from the bucket list!
Salaam,
Mr. Hakel/Dad/Lane
Mr. Hakel Watches the Sun Go Down
Blog 10 July 14, 2010
Different sort of day today with a spectacular ending.
The lion’s share of the day was spent at the Al Hussein Bin Talal University, Jordan’s newest public university. Part of the reason for the trip turns out to be for something else other showing me really cool stuff. Turns out you can listen to some pretty cool stuff too.
We had three lectures about Jordan beginning with the President of the University and ending with a professor of English Literature discussing Jordanian literature.
The university was created only eleven years ago as the first royal decree from the then newly coronated King Abdullah II. The King honored his recently deceased father by naming the university after him. It sits like an island in a vast desert. It is several miles outside the city of Ma’an. I am not aware of the reason that it sits so alone, but it is a headscratcher. I’ll have to ask about that one. Everyone we’ve talked to here has been open to questions. While the university visit was interesting, it was not, repeat not the highlight of the day.
We left the university, stopped along the road at a viewpoint of the Wadi Rum area and changed clothes. We had dressed well for the university visit. Then we drove down and down and down into the wadi. This is true desert. After ten minutes more driving in the bus we pulled off the road where two battered pick-ups were waiting to whisk us off into the desert. This was an exhilarating ride. At times we were moving at a pretty good clip. We stopped at two separate locations to have a closer look and take pictures. Alas, we did not stop next to the camel skeleton laying in the sand beside our track. The first location was a massive natural bridge that several of us scrambled up the side of for photographs. Being the good Buckeye fan that I am, I found some willing accomplices and we spelled out O-H-I-O on top of the bridge. At least I hope we did, I have this nagging feeling that we spelled O-I-H-O. The second stop was below a large dune. Several of our group raced to the top. Having been to Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes with my wife and friends recently, I knew far better than to join in. I am happy to report that Bruce, also known as Dr. Collett was by a considerable distance the winner. Score one for the old guys.
Now the day’s highlight. We arrived at our camp and were told to get our bags into our Bedouin style tents quickly as the sun was setting. We hurried up onto a large rock outcropping in a sea of sand. At the urging of Absalaam, we sat in silence, some of us until long after the sunset. Being 46 I have, in fact, seen quite a few spectacular sunsets, but sometimes the setting and the sunset itself merge to make a moving experience. Sitting on this rock with my newest friends was an emotional experience. We lingered on the rock for quite sometime after the big red ball disappeared behind the mountain before us. The colors dimmed, but then flared again as the sunset a second time behind the horizon. As I descended the rock outcropping I experienced a brief sensation of movement. The outcropping descended to the desert in a shape resembling the bow of a ship. The wind-shaped sand formed a bow wave around the prow of the “ship”. It looked for all the world like we were on a ship hurtling forward through the water. Cool stuff.
Health-wise our group is now in the best shape its been in since we arrived and that goes for me as well. I believe we are down to 4 out of the 14 who have not experienced symptoms of something.
Spirits are good and for those of you keeping score at home, I’m half-way home. (Yes, I am keeping score.)
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
Different sort of day today with a spectacular ending.
The lion’s share of the day was spent at the Al Hussein Bin Talal University, Jordan’s newest public university. Part of the reason for the trip turns out to be for something else other showing me really cool stuff. Turns out you can listen to some pretty cool stuff too.
We had three lectures about Jordan beginning with the President of the University and ending with a professor of English Literature discussing Jordanian literature.
The university was created only eleven years ago as the first royal decree from the then newly coronated King Abdullah II. The King honored his recently deceased father by naming the university after him. It sits like an island in a vast desert. It is several miles outside the city of Ma’an. I am not aware of the reason that it sits so alone, but it is a headscratcher. I’ll have to ask about that one. Everyone we’ve talked to here has been open to questions. While the university visit was interesting, it was not, repeat not the highlight of the day.
We left the university, stopped along the road at a viewpoint of the Wadi Rum area and changed clothes. We had dressed well for the university visit. Then we drove down and down and down into the wadi. This is true desert. After ten minutes more driving in the bus we pulled off the road where two battered pick-ups were waiting to whisk us off into the desert. This was an exhilarating ride. At times we were moving at a pretty good clip. We stopped at two separate locations to have a closer look and take pictures. Alas, we did not stop next to the camel skeleton laying in the sand beside our track. The first location was a massive natural bridge that several of us scrambled up the side of for photographs. Being the good Buckeye fan that I am, I found some willing accomplices and we spelled out O-H-I-O on top of the bridge. At least I hope we did, I have this nagging feeling that we spelled O-I-H-O. The second stop was below a large dune. Several of our group raced to the top. Having been to Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes with my wife and friends recently, I knew far better than to join in. I am happy to report that Bruce, also known as Dr. Collett was by a considerable distance the winner. Score one for the old guys.
Now the day’s highlight. We arrived at our camp and were told to get our bags into our Bedouin style tents quickly as the sun was setting. We hurried up onto a large rock outcropping in a sea of sand. At the urging of Absalaam, we sat in silence, some of us until long after the sunset. Being 46 I have, in fact, seen quite a few spectacular sunsets, but sometimes the setting and the sunset itself merge to make a moving experience. Sitting on this rock with my newest friends was an emotional experience. We lingered on the rock for quite sometime after the big red ball disappeared behind the mountain before us. The colors dimmed, but then flared again as the sunset a second time behind the horizon. As I descended the rock outcropping I experienced a brief sensation of movement. The outcropping descended to the desert in a shape resembling the bow of a ship. The wind-shaped sand formed a bow wave around the prow of the “ship”. It looked for all the world like we were on a ship hurtling forward through the water. Cool stuff.
Health-wise our group is now in the best shape its been in since we arrived and that goes for me as well. I believe we are down to 4 out of the 14 who have not experienced symptoms of something.
Spirits are good and for those of you keeping score at home, I’m half-way home. (Yes, I am keeping score.)
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Mr. Hakel Gets Petra-fried
Blog 9 July 13, 2010
Hi all, it is 3:15pm our time and we are basically done for the day. Thank goodness. We think it was topping 105 degrees again today. It made for an exceedingly hot hike. I just took my first shower in three days and that felt pretty exquisite. The hotel we are staying in, is quite nice. It is the first time we’ve had a bed any larger than a generous cot. The shower was wonderful…I keep going back to that, don’t I? But there is one drawback. Construction of homes in Jordan is a one story at a time process. That also appears to be the case with at least one hotel. Yippee. At the moment, immediately over my head runs a jackhammer. Let’s hope they don’t work all night. Let’s pray they don’t work all night. I’ll let you know.
Yesterday I tried to describe at least in some small way what Petra is like. Today we hiked probably around 5-6 miles with a pretty decent elevation shift. Petra is spread out in a way that confounds my expectations of what ancient life was like. This place is huge. We finished our visit to Petra by viewing its most famous individual site, the Treasury. It is in fact actually a tomb, but early explorers believed that the huge column and urn on the top was full of treasure. So, naturally, they shot at it. You can see the bullet divots on the façade. The usual tour of Petra begins at this location and you approach it the same way people have approached it for 2000 years. You walk through a mile long Siq. A Sig is a very narrow, very deep canyon in the rock. Once you arrive, you are facing the Monastery. One difficulty for the usual visitor then is that everything else after that doesn’t look as good. Our tour company arranged things so that we’d build up to the piece d’ resistance, the Monastery. Their plan worked to perfection. The Monastery is around 150 feet high and is awe-inspiring.
The walk through the Siq was really amazing. Both sides of the canyon, about as wide for the most part, as your average two-lane road in BG, were lined with water channels lining the side that brought water from a reservoir into the city. Everywhere you look in Petra you can find ancient water cisterns, dams, water channels that made it possible for so many people to live in one place. Estimates range from 30 to 40 thousand people by the way.
Now the walk out of the Petra area would have been a lot more amazing if it had been at least fifty degrees cooler. Very little shade. It was so hot, that when I stopped to read an informational plaque, which is an activity those of you who know me I do with gusto, I was unable to process any of the English words I was looking at. Interestingly, the Arabic was a little more comprehensible. ;)
Dinner tonight will be at the Sheiks and tomorrow we are into Wadi Rum for two more nights in the desert. Then one night on the Red Sea in Aqaba and then back to Amman for the remainder of our visit. After tomorrow I’ll be half-way home! (Yes, I am a little on the lonesome side...;)
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad/He Who Sweats
Hi all, it is 3:15pm our time and we are basically done for the day. Thank goodness. We think it was topping 105 degrees again today. It made for an exceedingly hot hike. I just took my first shower in three days and that felt pretty exquisite. The hotel we are staying in, is quite nice. It is the first time we’ve had a bed any larger than a generous cot. The shower was wonderful…I keep going back to that, don’t I? But there is one drawback. Construction of homes in Jordan is a one story at a time process. That also appears to be the case with at least one hotel. Yippee. At the moment, immediately over my head runs a jackhammer. Let’s hope they don’t work all night. Let’s pray they don’t work all night. I’ll let you know.
Yesterday I tried to describe at least in some small way what Petra is like. Today we hiked probably around 5-6 miles with a pretty decent elevation shift. Petra is spread out in a way that confounds my expectations of what ancient life was like. This place is huge. We finished our visit to Petra by viewing its most famous individual site, the Treasury. It is in fact actually a tomb, but early explorers believed that the huge column and urn on the top was full of treasure. So, naturally, they shot at it. You can see the bullet divots on the façade. The usual tour of Petra begins at this location and you approach it the same way people have approached it for 2000 years. You walk through a mile long Siq. A Sig is a very narrow, very deep canyon in the rock. Once you arrive, you are facing the Monastery. One difficulty for the usual visitor then is that everything else after that doesn’t look as good. Our tour company arranged things so that we’d build up to the piece d’ resistance, the Monastery. Their plan worked to perfection. The Monastery is around 150 feet high and is awe-inspiring.
The walk through the Siq was really amazing. Both sides of the canyon, about as wide for the most part, as your average two-lane road in BG, were lined with water channels lining the side that brought water from a reservoir into the city. Everywhere you look in Petra you can find ancient water cisterns, dams, water channels that made it possible for so many people to live in one place. Estimates range from 30 to 40 thousand people by the way.
Now the walk out of the Petra area would have been a lot more amazing if it had been at least fifty degrees cooler. Very little shade. It was so hot, that when I stopped to read an informational plaque, which is an activity those of you who know me I do with gusto, I was unable to process any of the English words I was looking at. Interestingly, the Arabic was a little more comprehensible. ;)
Dinner tonight will be at the Sheiks and tomorrow we are into Wadi Rum for two more nights in the desert. Then one night on the Red Sea in Aqaba and then back to Amman for the remainder of our visit. After tomorrow I’ll be half-way home! (Yes, I am a little on the lonesome side...;)
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad/He Who Sweats
Blog 8… July 12, 2010
Ok, this might top everything that has come before. I am sitting and typing while still trying to catch my breath from having walked from the main tombs of Petra up through a wadi where we will be camping tonight. I took a picture of the Grand Tombs below, with my laptop in the foreground and I shall try again, to get some pictures up.
I slept surprisingly well in our tent last night. The strenuous hike beforehand probably had a lot to do with that. I got up and sat and worked on yesterday’s blog. As I was typing, out of the middle of nowhere, a young man on a donkey with a boom box blaring Arabic music. Breakfast was moved into the shade. The tents got really hot when the sun got to them. Then it was time to break camp and take a remarkable hike.
It started out normally enough, and then on a really well made path that pretty much headed up. Our plan was to arrive at the “Monastery” of Petra before the main body of tourists arrived. While they would have to climb a series of 800 steps to get to the “Monastery”, we would come at it from behind. Our plan worked well, we hiked through amazing country and on the side of a pretty darn high cliff. The only fault I could find with the plan was that we arrived at the monastery from above. Therefore; we climbed more than 800 steps, I think I’m right on this…
It is difficult to describe Petra. Think the scale of Mt. Rushmore, the colors (and heat) of Sedona, Arizona, and the artistry of Versailles. The buildings are carved into the face of the cliffs and are breathtaking. One surprise was that they do not extend into the cliffs as far as I’d thought. They are really, for the most part, incredibly impressive facades. I’d imagined whole networks of tunnels that people lived in. In fact, the Nabateans, who built this city on rock and….sand, it turns out, lived between the cliffs on the sand.
After resting for awhile and exploring the immediate vicinity, we headed down the 800 steps seeing some mighty tired looking tourists from all over the world. (Ok, they were looking at a mighty tired, unshowered, tourist themselves.) We ate a pretty decent lunch in a cafeteria whose inside temperature had to a balmy ninety degrees and then chilled out for three hours to let the worst of the heat go by. As we sat and talked, we watched the activity around the area. We were in the kind of base camp area for Petra which is pretty spread out. People were pretty eager to offer us, for a price, a donkey ride to the next stop, or perhaps for the more adventurous, a camel. One boy’s donkey seemed to get away from him. He seemed to remind it who was boss with a rock the size of a head of lettuce on the backside. A disconcerting difference between an experience with a historical location here and in the U.S. is that Bedouins are selling mostly jewelry and interesting rocks seemingly every 100 yards along the canyon walls. It was generally, a pretty soft sell, but it was alarming to see this, because of the conditions in which they were doing it. It was unbearably hot.
For the evening hike we walked over to a different cliff face on the other side of the valley. About a half mile walking and entered what are believed to be the richest tombs of the Nabateans. One tomb we stood in had then been used by the Romans as a court, the Christians as a church and finally as ahome for a number of Bedouin families. From there we had about an hour hike up another wadi to our current location. Sitting high above Petra.
We’ve just finished our dinner now. I’m back sitting in my spot over the valley, but I can hear the conversations of my fellow travelers from the dinner nook where we ate a fire grilled meal, chicken, potatoes and tomatoes.
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
I slept surprisingly well in our tent last night. The strenuous hike beforehand probably had a lot to do with that. I got up and sat and worked on yesterday’s blog. As I was typing, out of the middle of nowhere, a young man on a donkey with a boom box blaring Arabic music. Breakfast was moved into the shade. The tents got really hot when the sun got to them. Then it was time to break camp and take a remarkable hike.
It started out normally enough, and then on a really well made path that pretty much headed up. Our plan was to arrive at the “Monastery” of Petra before the main body of tourists arrived. While they would have to climb a series of 800 steps to get to the “Monastery”, we would come at it from behind. Our plan worked well, we hiked through amazing country and on the side of a pretty darn high cliff. The only fault I could find with the plan was that we arrived at the monastery from above. Therefore; we climbed more than 800 steps, I think I’m right on this…
It is difficult to describe Petra. Think the scale of Mt. Rushmore, the colors (and heat) of Sedona, Arizona, and the artistry of Versailles. The buildings are carved into the face of the cliffs and are breathtaking. One surprise was that they do not extend into the cliffs as far as I’d thought. They are really, for the most part, incredibly impressive facades. I’d imagined whole networks of tunnels that people lived in. In fact, the Nabateans, who built this city on rock and….sand, it turns out, lived between the cliffs on the sand.
After resting for awhile and exploring the immediate vicinity, we headed down the 800 steps seeing some mighty tired looking tourists from all over the world. (Ok, they were looking at a mighty tired, unshowered, tourist themselves.) We ate a pretty decent lunch in a cafeteria whose inside temperature had to a balmy ninety degrees and then chilled out for three hours to let the worst of the heat go by. As we sat and talked, we watched the activity around the area. We were in the kind of base camp area for Petra which is pretty spread out. People were pretty eager to offer us, for a price, a donkey ride to the next stop, or perhaps for the more adventurous, a camel. One boy’s donkey seemed to get away from him. He seemed to remind it who was boss with a rock the size of a head of lettuce on the backside. A disconcerting difference between an experience with a historical location here and in the U.S. is that Bedouins are selling mostly jewelry and interesting rocks seemingly every 100 yards along the canyon walls. It was generally, a pretty soft sell, but it was alarming to see this, because of the conditions in which they were doing it. It was unbearably hot.
For the evening hike we walked over to a different cliff face on the other side of the valley. About a half mile walking and entered what are believed to be the richest tombs of the Nabateans. One tomb we stood in had then been used by the Romans as a court, the Christians as a church and finally as ahome for a number of Bedouin families. From there we had about an hour hike up another wadi to our current location. Sitting high above Petra.
We’ve just finished our dinner now. I’m back sitting in my spot over the valley, but I can hear the conversations of my fellow travelers from the dinner nook where we ate a fire grilled meal, chicken, potatoes and tomatoes.
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
Mr. Hakel Goes Camping and Watches the World Cup Final
Blog 7 July 12, 2010
Hi, everybody. I am seated less than a thousand yards from the World Heritage Site, Petra. Yesterday, we saw Little Petra, an outlying caravan route that was just a teaser for what we will see today. We took about a three hour hike that took us from Little Petra to our campsite which is at the base of a 500 foot cliff. I’m about 30 feet above our campsite on the opposite side on a rock outcropping overlooking our site. Below me are 9 two-person tents. Our cook is preparing breakfast on a stove. Three pick-up trucks, which figure more in the narrative in a bit, brought our gear and those of us who didn’t hike in. On a huge stone slab besides the tents, which are in the sand, three very large mats are side-by-side forming a rectangle. Upon these mats on the same cushions we had to sleep on in the tents lies three of our guides still sleeping. The site is beginning to wake and I’m now sitting in the sun which has climbed above the shoulder of the cliff we sit below.
It had been a rather leisurely day up until it was time to hike. We’d awoken in our lovely hotel, had breakfast and had a look at the Dana Nature Reserve’s museum, gift shop and workshop for women. We rather casually loaded the bus and began driving through the rugged terrain to which we’ve become accustomed. We stopped at Qasr Shobak. Another crusader castle built on top of a hill which commanded the trade routes below. The most interesting feature of this castle were the secret passages that led down through the mountain to the springs below that made life on this rock possible. We were able to descend partially down one of these passages, we are told the route is still open, but that it now requires some climbing skills, so we stopped when the stairs did. Below us yawned this black hole with no bottom that appeared to drop vertically through the mountain. This castle was built before Karak from the day before, but after awhile Karak supplanted Shobak in size and importance.
Lunch was eaten on a hillcrest high, high above the Petra region/valley. It was a picnic in an “oak” “forest”. I put both words in quotes because both would have misled you in your understanding of what it looked like. The main benefit of the location was the minimal breeze and minimal shade the trees provided our meal.
Perhaps a word, a more honest, on my part word, about food. I have eaten some wonderful food, but I’ve eaten a few things that were pretty foul too. Most of the worst for me have had yoghurt as an ingredient. I’m thinking of a particularly nasty yoghurt sauce that sure looked good. But I digress….
We had intended to begin our hike in Little Petra then, but our guides determined it was unusually hot (105?) and we should take cover for a couple of hours to let the worst go by. We took cover in the home of the owner of our caravan company, which turns out not to have been our guide, Absalaam, as I had been saying it was. This home was the largest in this village of 43,000. Here we were granted the gift of internet access.
Then it was off again. Off to Little Petra. This location stands outside the Petra proper and it was where caravans moving through the area stopped for rest. Here we saw the first of the huge facades carved into the face of the sandstone. It was deeply impressing to see, yes, it looked like the pictures, but unfortunately pictures always put something in a box. Seeing it with your own eyes, makes a difference.
We walked straight through Little Petra and began a long steady climb up and through a crack through the bare rock. At the top a mother and daughter were selling their wares. These were the first of many such people lining the trails to the sights of Petra. It is difficult to believe any of them are able to make much of a living, but I suppose it must work, at least enough.
We finally arrived at our campsite which was situated in a sandy area between two large rock outcroppings. Most of the pup tents, for protection from scorpions, were already set up and dinner was being prepared. When it was time to eat, we sat on cushions arranged in a rectangular shape and were served Mensa from the largest single platter of food I have ever seen. It had to way at least fifty pounds and it did take two people to carry it from the cooking area into our rectangle. We ate from plates and used spoons. It was tasty, but my appetite had been sapped from the heat, but knew better than to eat nothing.
After that it was time for the day’s final act. Time to go watch the World Cup final. Because the town was too far away to walk, we piled into or on the back of the three pick up trucks that were hauling our stuff around. Thus proceeded a half hour ride from hell. The track we were driving on was bone jarring.
When we finally hit the main road the race was on. Nothing like sitting in the back of a pick up truck screaming downhill while passing two other trucks on the outside of a blind curve! Enjoyment of the game was, of course, tempered by the knowledge that we had to drive back. The game was exciting, I could have personally done without the overtime because here it started at 9:30, so it didn’t end tell midnight our time.
Obviously, since you are reading this, the return trip was safely made.
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad!
Hi, everybody. I am seated less than a thousand yards from the World Heritage Site, Petra. Yesterday, we saw Little Petra, an outlying caravan route that was just a teaser for what we will see today. We took about a three hour hike that took us from Little Petra to our campsite which is at the base of a 500 foot cliff. I’m about 30 feet above our campsite on the opposite side on a rock outcropping overlooking our site. Below me are 9 two-person tents. Our cook is preparing breakfast on a stove. Three pick-up trucks, which figure more in the narrative in a bit, brought our gear and those of us who didn’t hike in. On a huge stone slab besides the tents, which are in the sand, three very large mats are side-by-side forming a rectangle. Upon these mats on the same cushions we had to sleep on in the tents lies three of our guides still sleeping. The site is beginning to wake and I’m now sitting in the sun which has climbed above the shoulder of the cliff we sit below.
It had been a rather leisurely day up until it was time to hike. We’d awoken in our lovely hotel, had breakfast and had a look at the Dana Nature Reserve’s museum, gift shop and workshop for women. We rather casually loaded the bus and began driving through the rugged terrain to which we’ve become accustomed. We stopped at Qasr Shobak. Another crusader castle built on top of a hill which commanded the trade routes below. The most interesting feature of this castle were the secret passages that led down through the mountain to the springs below that made life on this rock possible. We were able to descend partially down one of these passages, we are told the route is still open, but that it now requires some climbing skills, so we stopped when the stairs did. Below us yawned this black hole with no bottom that appeared to drop vertically through the mountain. This castle was built before Karak from the day before, but after awhile Karak supplanted Shobak in size and importance.
Lunch was eaten on a hillcrest high, high above the Petra region/valley. It was a picnic in an “oak” “forest”. I put both words in quotes because both would have misled you in your understanding of what it looked like. The main benefit of the location was the minimal breeze and minimal shade the trees provided our meal.
Perhaps a word, a more honest, on my part word, about food. I have eaten some wonderful food, but I’ve eaten a few things that were pretty foul too. Most of the worst for me have had yoghurt as an ingredient. I’m thinking of a particularly nasty yoghurt sauce that sure looked good. But I digress….
We had intended to begin our hike in Little Petra then, but our guides determined it was unusually hot (105?) and we should take cover for a couple of hours to let the worst go by. We took cover in the home of the owner of our caravan company, which turns out not to have been our guide, Absalaam, as I had been saying it was. This home was the largest in this village of 43,000. Here we were granted the gift of internet access.
Then it was off again. Off to Little Petra. This location stands outside the Petra proper and it was where caravans moving through the area stopped for rest. Here we saw the first of the huge facades carved into the face of the sandstone. It was deeply impressing to see, yes, it looked like the pictures, but unfortunately pictures always put something in a box. Seeing it with your own eyes, makes a difference.
We walked straight through Little Petra and began a long steady climb up and through a crack through the bare rock. At the top a mother and daughter were selling their wares. These were the first of many such people lining the trails to the sights of Petra. It is difficult to believe any of them are able to make much of a living, but I suppose it must work, at least enough.
We finally arrived at our campsite which was situated in a sandy area between two large rock outcroppings. Most of the pup tents, for protection from scorpions, were already set up and dinner was being prepared. When it was time to eat, we sat on cushions arranged in a rectangular shape and were served Mensa from the largest single platter of food I have ever seen. It had to way at least fifty pounds and it did take two people to carry it from the cooking area into our rectangle. We ate from plates and used spoons. It was tasty, but my appetite had been sapped from the heat, but knew better than to eat nothing.
After that it was time for the day’s final act. Time to go watch the World Cup final. Because the town was too far away to walk, we piled into or on the back of the three pick up trucks that were hauling our stuff around. Thus proceeded a half hour ride from hell. The track we were driving on was bone jarring.
When we finally hit the main road the race was on. Nothing like sitting in the back of a pick up truck screaming downhill while passing two other trucks on the outside of a blind curve! Enjoyment of the game was, of course, tempered by the knowledge that we had to drive back. The game was exciting, I could have personally done without the overtime because here it started at 9:30, so it didn’t end tell midnight our time.
Obviously, since you are reading this, the return trip was safely made.
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad!
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Lane Asks a Favor
Hi all, I'm wondering if anybody is reading...I can't figure out yet how to do a hit counter on this thing, so I'm wondering if you'd take a moment to say "Hi" in the comment thingy if you'd be so kind?
Just curious...
Lane/Dad/Mr. Hakel
Just curious...
Lane/Dad/Mr. Hakel
Mr. Hakel Watches The Sun Set
Blog 6 Day 10 July 10, 2010
I’m writing unusually early during the day today. We visited the castle we slept next to in the morning (Karak). The castle has had a really interesting history. It appears the Nabateans were the first to have built a fortress at the location. Through hundreds of years it hosted a number of other landlords. Then it became a crusader castle. Saladin, who ultimately sent the crusaders into retreat, laid siege to the castle on two different occasions, but failed both times. If you recall the movie “Kingdom of Heaven” those events were supposed to have taken place in this castle. The movie was filmed in a desert in Morocco though, not in the mountains of Jordan where they actually took place. The castle has been restored in some areas. It was pretty cool to walk around in these passages that felt more like you were walking through tunnels underground. There is an interpretive museum on site that was interesting as well.
This morning we were up to two people who were too ill to participate, but they are both on the path to recovery. I’m taking the afternoon off because of mild illness that I can’t shake. The afternoon activity is a three-hour hike around the wadi we are currently perched above. We are in the equivalent of a National Park in this country. It is the Dana Wildlife Refuge. We are staying in a guest house that is pretty amazing. Josh and I have a small room, with the customary two smallish twin beds in it. Everything is gratifyingly tidy. The best feature is a large balcony that overlooks the wadi. I can’t wait for the sunset. It will be beautiful.
Lunch today was in an interesting spot. The village of Dana where we are staying tonight is an ancient location. It had been entirely abandoned until the park was created and the guest house we are staying in was built. Now, about 15 families have moved back into Dana with the assistance of the Dana cooperative, which we were told consists of around 100 families who used to live here that have contributed money to help continue basic services. Lunch was in the Dana Hotel which the cooperative owns. We were served lunch in a glass-walled tent on the roof top of the main hotel building. The staircase was made, rather ingeniously I thought, of bent rebar. The food was again delicious, particularly a potato dish that reminds me of camp breakfast back home. The temp. was hotter than hell, but it was good.
Smoking is quite common in this culture, I have seen women smoking, but this is less common in public, but perhaps not in private. Our bus stopped before we got here so the driver could pick up cigarettes for instance. What seems to be even more popular than cigarettes is the water pipe, or hookah. They are smoking an interesting slightly apple smelling mixture that is slangily known as “Hubbly Bubbly”. I have not tried it, but several of our group have. If I can ever get my stomach to stop hating me, I may give it a shot too.
After last night’s hotel in the wedding zone this is so peaceful and restful. It is a couple hours later and I’ve had a nap. I’m sitting with my feet up on the lower rail of our balcony enclosure. Between my feet I can see a drop of at least a thousand feet down the boulder strewn slope dotted with dusty green shrubs and occasional tufts of grasses dried in the blazing sun. Unexpectedly the sun is still shining, but it does not blaze. The haze is so thick that it has sapped the sun of most of its power. A cool breeze tousles my hair occasionally and makes the white curtains behind me flutter into our room. As Emily said a minute ago. “It is phenomenal!” I’ve run out of adjectives to describe the country I’m seeing. After I exhaust the adjectives of others, I’ll get back to my Arabic study.
I’m writing unusually early during the day today. We visited the castle we slept next to in the morning (Karak). The castle has had a really interesting history. It appears the Nabateans were the first to have built a fortress at the location. Through hundreds of years it hosted a number of other landlords. Then it became a crusader castle. Saladin, who ultimately sent the crusaders into retreat, laid siege to the castle on two different occasions, but failed both times. If you recall the movie “Kingdom of Heaven” those events were supposed to have taken place in this castle. The movie was filmed in a desert in Morocco though, not in the mountains of Jordan where they actually took place. The castle has been restored in some areas. It was pretty cool to walk around in these passages that felt more like you were walking through tunnels underground. There is an interpretive museum on site that was interesting as well.
This morning we were up to two people who were too ill to participate, but they are both on the path to recovery. I’m taking the afternoon off because of mild illness that I can’t shake. The afternoon activity is a three-hour hike around the wadi we are currently perched above. We are in the equivalent of a National Park in this country. It is the Dana Wildlife Refuge. We are staying in a guest house that is pretty amazing. Josh and I have a small room, with the customary two smallish twin beds in it. Everything is gratifyingly tidy. The best feature is a large balcony that overlooks the wadi. I can’t wait for the sunset. It will be beautiful.
Lunch today was in an interesting spot. The village of Dana where we are staying tonight is an ancient location. It had been entirely abandoned until the park was created and the guest house we are staying in was built. Now, about 15 families have moved back into Dana with the assistance of the Dana cooperative, which we were told consists of around 100 families who used to live here that have contributed money to help continue basic services. Lunch was in the Dana Hotel which the cooperative owns. We were served lunch in a glass-walled tent on the roof top of the main hotel building. The staircase was made, rather ingeniously I thought, of bent rebar. The food was again delicious, particularly a potato dish that reminds me of camp breakfast back home. The temp. was hotter than hell, but it was good.
Smoking is quite common in this culture, I have seen women smoking, but this is less common in public, but perhaps not in private. Our bus stopped before we got here so the driver could pick up cigarettes for instance. What seems to be even more popular than cigarettes is the water pipe, or hookah. They are smoking an interesting slightly apple smelling mixture that is slangily known as “Hubbly Bubbly”. I have not tried it, but several of our group have. If I can ever get my stomach to stop hating me, I may give it a shot too.
After last night’s hotel in the wedding zone this is so peaceful and restful. It is a couple hours later and I’ve had a nap. I’m sitting with my feet up on the lower rail of our balcony enclosure. Between my feet I can see a drop of at least a thousand feet down the boulder strewn slope dotted with dusty green shrubs and occasional tufts of grasses dried in the blazing sun. Unexpectedly the sun is still shining, but it does not blaze. The haze is so thick that it has sapped the sun of most of its power. A cool breeze tousles my hair occasionally and makes the white curtains behind me flutter into our room. As Emily said a minute ago. “It is phenomenal!” I’ve run out of adjectives to describe the country I’m seeing. After I exhaust the adjectives of others, I’ll get back to my Arabic study.
Mr. Hakel Walks On Water....well in water.
Blog 5
Today we made two stops. The first was the palace of Herodatus the Great and is believed to be the location at which John the Baptist was first held and then beheaded. The villa sits high atop an isolated hill/mountain and the walk up was pretty strenuous. At the top were a few reconstructed pillars, but everything else appeared to be natural. (As I am typing tonight I can look out the window to my left and see the ancient crusader castle at Al Karak. Since this is the weekend and the wedding season we can hear sporadic gunfire coming from the valley below…ahhh;) The view from this location was incredible. I really did not realize before I came just how mountainous Jordan is. We are overlooking the hot spring we visited yesterday. The temperature was reasonably moderate, but the sun was howling. On the way down we met three people who work at the U.S. Embassy.
Then we had probably our longest single drive of our trip so far. We had planned to have a picnic lunch on a hike we took this afternoon, but the timing was off so we ate it instead in a Bedouin tent high above a reservoir just above a wadi that has been given the English name “Grand Canyon of Jordan”. The name does in fact apply. It was majestic.
Then back in the minibus for awhile longer, worked on lines for a play I’m in for awhile. Up until now I’ve had my eyes pretty much glued to the scenery, but I did keep glancing up. I quit working on lines when I glanced out the opposite side of the bus and saw an awe inspiring drop off just outside the window. In a moment I was envisioning the headline of tomorrow’s newspapers around the globe…well, around somewhere. TOURING TEACHERS TOPPLE or something like that. Obviously we did make it down this goat path of a road safely. (If any goats were offended by my applying the term “goat” to that road, I apologize. Quit reading my blog.) At the bottom, which was an incredibly long way down, there was a parking lot scarcely bigger than our bus, that nevertheless has several vehicles in it. After all were ready, which generally takes (Hey, that’s a wrinkle…machine gun fire! And no, I’m not making this up. Josh and I decided the heavy metal shutters on our windows are meant to be bullet proof….) Back to the hike. As we began we descended to a stream bed, with actual running water in it. It is spring fed, by the way, but interestingly it is fed by both cold and hot springs, so the water would not be an unpleasant bath. In fact I did see a bottle of shampoo on a rock. We waded in, for the most part, ankle deep water for about a kilometer. It was perhaps the most amazing hike I’ve ever made and I have been on some amazing hikes. As we walked the canyon walls grew both higher and narrower until the 8 foot wide stream was touching both walls. The slope was quite gradual until we came to the site of a small cave-in. At that point we had to scramble down a rope ladder that was there for the purpose. The walls of the canyon finally closed to the point that we could not see sunlight above us. The presence of water meant the presence of plant life. This canyon is known in English as “The Hanging Gardens of Jordan”. The name does in fact apply. It was beautiful. Ferns, palm trees, flowering trees all growing out of the sides of the canyon next to and above us lined the stream. Occasionally another spring joined from above. Remember, minutes ago in the bus we were in parched, arid land where it was impossible to believe it had ever rained.
When we reached the end of the canyon, it widened out some and Absalaam, our head guide, built a small fire and prepared us some Bedouin tea. He insists that hot drinks are best on hot days, but I just can’t quite get my way around that. Several of us spent some time diverting the main channel of the stream in a slightly different direction by building a dam. Readers who knew me when I was a child will not be surprised. We returned by the same route of course and it was just as impressive. We were frequently surrounded by these large bee-like lethal looking insects that really liked to buzz around us, but left us alone. No one was stung, gut they took a little getting used too. Our guides thought it was pretty funny…. I suppose it was.
Last thing…dinner tonight was outdoors watching the sun set over a valley full of the city of Al Karak adjacent to castle walls with a gentle breeze blowing over us. Over and over and over this first week of touring in Jordan, I’ve wondered if everything I was seeing and experiencing was real.
Salaam,
Lane/Dad/Mr. Hakel
Today we made two stops. The first was the palace of Herodatus the Great and is believed to be the location at which John the Baptist was first held and then beheaded. The villa sits high atop an isolated hill/mountain and the walk up was pretty strenuous. At the top were a few reconstructed pillars, but everything else appeared to be natural. (As I am typing tonight I can look out the window to my left and see the ancient crusader castle at Al Karak. Since this is the weekend and the wedding season we can hear sporadic gunfire coming from the valley below…ahhh;) The view from this location was incredible. I really did not realize before I came just how mountainous Jordan is. We are overlooking the hot spring we visited yesterday. The temperature was reasonably moderate, but the sun was howling. On the way down we met three people who work at the U.S. Embassy.
Then we had probably our longest single drive of our trip so far. We had planned to have a picnic lunch on a hike we took this afternoon, but the timing was off so we ate it instead in a Bedouin tent high above a reservoir just above a wadi that has been given the English name “Grand Canyon of Jordan”. The name does in fact apply. It was majestic.
Then back in the minibus for awhile longer, worked on lines for a play I’m in for awhile. Up until now I’ve had my eyes pretty much glued to the scenery, but I did keep glancing up. I quit working on lines when I glanced out the opposite side of the bus and saw an awe inspiring drop off just outside the window. In a moment I was envisioning the headline of tomorrow’s newspapers around the globe…well, around somewhere. TOURING TEACHERS TOPPLE or something like that. Obviously we did make it down this goat path of a road safely. (If any goats were offended by my applying the term “goat” to that road, I apologize. Quit reading my blog.) At the bottom, which was an incredibly long way down, there was a parking lot scarcely bigger than our bus, that nevertheless has several vehicles in it. After all were ready, which generally takes (Hey, that’s a wrinkle…machine gun fire! And no, I’m not making this up. Josh and I decided the heavy metal shutters on our windows are meant to be bullet proof….) Back to the hike. As we began we descended to a stream bed, with actual running water in it. It is spring fed, by the way, but interestingly it is fed by both cold and hot springs, so the water would not be an unpleasant bath. In fact I did see a bottle of shampoo on a rock. We waded in, for the most part, ankle deep water for about a kilometer. It was perhaps the most amazing hike I’ve ever made and I have been on some amazing hikes. As we walked the canyon walls grew both higher and narrower until the 8 foot wide stream was touching both walls. The slope was quite gradual until we came to the site of a small cave-in. At that point we had to scramble down a rope ladder that was there for the purpose. The walls of the canyon finally closed to the point that we could not see sunlight above us. The presence of water meant the presence of plant life. This canyon is known in English as “The Hanging Gardens of Jordan”. The name does in fact apply. It was beautiful. Ferns, palm trees, flowering trees all growing out of the sides of the canyon next to and above us lined the stream. Occasionally another spring joined from above. Remember, minutes ago in the bus we were in parched, arid land where it was impossible to believe it had ever rained.
When we reached the end of the canyon, it widened out some and Absalaam, our head guide, built a small fire and prepared us some Bedouin tea. He insists that hot drinks are best on hot days, but I just can’t quite get my way around that. Several of us spent some time diverting the main channel of the stream in a slightly different direction by building a dam. Readers who knew me when I was a child will not be surprised. We returned by the same route of course and it was just as impressive. We were frequently surrounded by these large bee-like lethal looking insects that really liked to buzz around us, but left us alone. No one was stung, gut they took a little getting used too. Our guides thought it was pretty funny…. I suppose it was.
Last thing…dinner tonight was outdoors watching the sun set over a valley full of the city of Al Karak adjacent to castle walls with a gentle breeze blowing over us. Over and over and over this first week of touring in Jordan, I’ve wondered if everything I was seeing and experiencing was real.
Salaam,
Lane/Dad/Mr. Hakel
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Mr. Hakel gets behind in his blogging and then catches up.
Blog 4
Ok, a little catching up to do. I’ve been a little under the weather and the timing of a night without internet have conspired…is that a convincing excuse?
The last three days have been very different from one another and I’ll do my level-best to give you highlights and observations in a concise manner. Do you believe me?
First day… Ajlun Castle was our first stop after eating breakfast on top of a mountain with a view of Israel or the West Bank as it is more often referred to here. The castle was an Ummayad structure t hat was built to command the Jordan River Valley and balance a French Crusader castle built on the other side of the valley. It was magnificent. Largely intact, it was more like walking up through a natural cavern than a manmade structure. The views on top were spectacular.
Then it was a long descent into the Jordan Valley where we drove to Pella, greek ruins that I observed from above, but did not wonder through…too hot…too tired….way too hot. Then it was off to a fortress location overlooking the Golan Heights and the Sea of Gallilee/Tiberias Lake. Lunch here was like being perched on the side of a cliff. The ruins were magnificent as well and featured another large theater.
Finally we drove back to Amman where I forsook my oath to eat only Middle Eastern food and eagerly consumed a partial order of McDonalds fries and half a “pepperoni” pizza. Pepperoni was in quotes to the fact that pork is not eaten in this country, hence the beef salami on the pizza. Both were wonderful. (I’ve concluded that half my intestinal problems are because I had quit eating junk food cold turkey. So, I am going through a corollary of withdrawal. I have reintroduced small amounts of Pringles and Bugles to my diet and I feel better. Conincidence? I think not.)
Second day… This was our water day. Water? I was surprised too. Our first stop was the site of the baptism of Jesus. I was wondering which side of the Jordan River Jesus had actually been baptized on, but I became less concerned when I saw the Jordan River. I had seen pictures of this site before and they showed what could be generously called a typical Wood County ditch, but I figured it was just a side channel of the greater river. I was wrong. The Jordan River is small. After gazing at Israel from afar, I was now literally within spittin’ distance. (My choice of metaphor in no way should be taken as choosing sides in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Nor does it reflect the views of Toshiba the manufacturer of my laptop) I commented on the bus that it was hard to imagine such a small river was cutting such a large, deep valley/canyon. I was then told two things. The Jordan River was much larger in Jesus’s lifetime and we were in the Great Rift Valley that stretches a 1000 miles from Turkey into SubSaharan Africa. The rift is where two continental plates are passing each other. Amman will eventually move considerably north of Jerusalem. This causes frequent earthquakes in the area which accounts for the poor state of early buildings.
Just a few miles down the road is the Dead Sea. Swimming time. Well, I say swimming in a bizarre form of the activity. Can you really be said to be swimming if you can’t sink. I don’t mean you can float really easily, I mean you cannot sink. I know, I tried! Do not, I repeat do not put your head under. While I managed to miss the experience myself I’m told that getting it in your eyes pretty much ruins your day. I got a drop or two on my lips and they burned until I rinsed off. It also has curative properties. It ate through a scab I had on my hand from a project back home. I also for 3JD took a mud bath, which was a new experience. (I have velvety soft skin now!) It was amazing and as close an experience to weightlessness as you can have on Earth. Or should I say under Earth? At this point we were 1200 feet below sea level! (yes, that is the lowest point on Earth that is dry. The Dead Sea is receding one meter every year. Evaporation and the lack of water from the Sea of Gallilee/Tiberias Lake. The salt is so thick that you can see it in the water. At one point I was floating in just 8 inches of water. Way Cool!
Final water stop of the day was on the Zarka Cliff. We drove up a road Lance Armstrong would rather retire from racing than climb. Near the top we took a side road that led to Ma’in Hot Spring. The most unusual feature here was the 100 degree waterfall you could stand under. It was a new experience and a relaxing one.
Third day… Today was mosaic day. It was fascinating. We visited a number of different sites and the unifying theme was mosaic floors. Our first visit was to Mt. Nebo, that should sound familiar to any Christians and Jews out there, but also to fans of Cecil B. DeMille. For those of you who do not know, this is the mountain top upon which Charlton Heston looked proudly out toward the promised land and mercifully brought the world’s longest movie to an anticlimactic ending. Also at this location Moses learned from the Lord that he was looking upon the promised land and that he, Moses, would not be able to get there. The location itself was quite beautiful. The main church with accompanying mosaic, was, alas, closed for restoration/protection efforts. (By the way, my efforts to post pictures with the blog have been stymied by the internet connections I am working with. Also, never hang laundry to dry right above an Ipod Touch…the touch doesn’t like it and gets its revenge by killing itself. Sigh.)
After Mt. Nebo, we visited a small house with an amazing mosaic floor. The detail on the animals was really interesting. One vignette had a man shooting an arrow at a tiger, but the tiger just catches the arrow in its mouth and plays with it. Each mosaic in every location has a prominently displayed appreciation of the person who paid for the mosaic. I suppose that’s the equivalent of corporate sponsorship today.
Next stop was billed as a mosaic workshop. Jordanians have taken up mosaic again as a cottage industry. The workshop we visited employs women who have some sort of disability. Two of the women we watched were in wheel chairs. They receive a monthly wage and a payment per piece completed and for piece sold. The work they were doing was incredibly detailed and precise. Very beautiful and expensive. I made my first school money purchase here. I bought a small completed piece and a bag of uncut stone so my students and I can try our hands at the job this fall.
Last stop that I’ll note today was a World Heritage Site. I’ll have to look up the name. it is an unimproved fortress whose walls are gone, but a number of churches still have walls and occasional arches. It is most famous, of course, for the mosaics in Saint Stephens Church. The mosaic was a complete map of the Holy Land or Terrasancta in Latin.
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad/He Who Runs
Ok, a little catching up to do. I’ve been a little under the weather and the timing of a night without internet have conspired…is that a convincing excuse?
The last three days have been very different from one another and I’ll do my level-best to give you highlights and observations in a concise manner. Do you believe me?
First day… Ajlun Castle was our first stop after eating breakfast on top of a mountain with a view of Israel or the West Bank as it is more often referred to here. The castle was an Ummayad structure t hat was built to command the Jordan River Valley and balance a French Crusader castle built on the other side of the valley. It was magnificent. Largely intact, it was more like walking up through a natural cavern than a manmade structure. The views on top were spectacular.
Then it was a long descent into the Jordan Valley where we drove to Pella, greek ruins that I observed from above, but did not wonder through…too hot…too tired….way too hot. Then it was off to a fortress location overlooking the Golan Heights and the Sea of Gallilee/Tiberias Lake. Lunch here was like being perched on the side of a cliff. The ruins were magnificent as well and featured another large theater.
Finally we drove back to Amman where I forsook my oath to eat only Middle Eastern food and eagerly consumed a partial order of McDonalds fries and half a “pepperoni” pizza. Pepperoni was in quotes to the fact that pork is not eaten in this country, hence the beef salami on the pizza. Both were wonderful. (I’ve concluded that half my intestinal problems are because I had quit eating junk food cold turkey. So, I am going through a corollary of withdrawal. I have reintroduced small amounts of Pringles and Bugles to my diet and I feel better. Conincidence? I think not.)
Second day… This was our water day. Water? I was surprised too. Our first stop was the site of the baptism of Jesus. I was wondering which side of the Jordan River Jesus had actually been baptized on, but I became less concerned when I saw the Jordan River. I had seen pictures of this site before and they showed what could be generously called a typical Wood County ditch, but I figured it was just a side channel of the greater river. I was wrong. The Jordan River is small. After gazing at Israel from afar, I was now literally within spittin’ distance. (My choice of metaphor in no way should be taken as choosing sides in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Nor does it reflect the views of Toshiba the manufacturer of my laptop) I commented on the bus that it was hard to imagine such a small river was cutting such a large, deep valley/canyon. I was then told two things. The Jordan River was much larger in Jesus’s lifetime and we were in the Great Rift Valley that stretches a 1000 miles from Turkey into SubSaharan Africa. The rift is where two continental plates are passing each other. Amman will eventually move considerably north of Jerusalem. This causes frequent earthquakes in the area which accounts for the poor state of early buildings.
Just a few miles down the road is the Dead Sea. Swimming time. Well, I say swimming in a bizarre form of the activity. Can you really be said to be swimming if you can’t sink. I don’t mean you can float really easily, I mean you cannot sink. I know, I tried! Do not, I repeat do not put your head under. While I managed to miss the experience myself I’m told that getting it in your eyes pretty much ruins your day. I got a drop or two on my lips and they burned until I rinsed off. It also has curative properties. It ate through a scab I had on my hand from a project back home. I also for 3JD took a mud bath, which was a new experience. (I have velvety soft skin now!) It was amazing and as close an experience to weightlessness as you can have on Earth. Or should I say under Earth? At this point we were 1200 feet below sea level! (yes, that is the lowest point on Earth that is dry. The Dead Sea is receding one meter every year. Evaporation and the lack of water from the Sea of Gallilee/Tiberias Lake. The salt is so thick that you can see it in the water. At one point I was floating in just 8 inches of water. Way Cool!
Final water stop of the day was on the Zarka Cliff. We drove up a road Lance Armstrong would rather retire from racing than climb. Near the top we took a side road that led to Ma’in Hot Spring. The most unusual feature here was the 100 degree waterfall you could stand under. It was a new experience and a relaxing one.
Third day… Today was mosaic day. It was fascinating. We visited a number of different sites and the unifying theme was mosaic floors. Our first visit was to Mt. Nebo, that should sound familiar to any Christians and Jews out there, but also to fans of Cecil B. DeMille. For those of you who do not know, this is the mountain top upon which Charlton Heston looked proudly out toward the promised land and mercifully brought the world’s longest movie to an anticlimactic ending. Also at this location Moses learned from the Lord that he was looking upon the promised land and that he, Moses, would not be able to get there. The location itself was quite beautiful. The main church with accompanying mosaic, was, alas, closed for restoration/protection efforts. (By the way, my efforts to post pictures with the blog have been stymied by the internet connections I am working with. Also, never hang laundry to dry right above an Ipod Touch…the touch doesn’t like it and gets its revenge by killing itself. Sigh.)
After Mt. Nebo, we visited a small house with an amazing mosaic floor. The detail on the animals was really interesting. One vignette had a man shooting an arrow at a tiger, but the tiger just catches the arrow in its mouth and plays with it. Each mosaic in every location has a prominently displayed appreciation of the person who paid for the mosaic. I suppose that’s the equivalent of corporate sponsorship today.
Next stop was billed as a mosaic workshop. Jordanians have taken up mosaic again as a cottage industry. The workshop we visited employs women who have some sort of disability. Two of the women we watched were in wheel chairs. They receive a monthly wage and a payment per piece completed and for piece sold. The work they were doing was incredibly detailed and precise. Very beautiful and expensive. I made my first school money purchase here. I bought a small completed piece and a bag of uncut stone so my students and I can try our hands at the job this fall.
Last stop that I’ll note today was a World Heritage Site. I’ll have to look up the name. it is an unimproved fortress whose walls are gone, but a number of churches still have walls and occasional arches. It is most famous, of course, for the mosaics in Saint Stephens Church. The mosaic was a complete map of the Holy Land or Terrasancta in Latin.
Salaam,
Lane/Mr. Hakel/Dad/He Who Runs
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Two blogs for the price of one...
Blog 3
Mr. Hakel gets Jaras(ed)
(Too tired to edit properly, sorry.)
What a day. Awoke this morning to the news that one of our intrepid bunch had been taken to the hospital with Patty and Absalaam along as escorts. Sara is fine now, still kind of weak, but recovering from what was most likely a case of dehydration. It may not have been, because a few more of us did not feel well too. Zach was hurling pretty regularly until after we stopped at a clinic, which actually appeared to be a women’s clinic, by the way. Zach received what he described as a rather painful shot in the but-tocks. I had some dicey times myself, but my mild illness expressed itself in the opposite direction. ‘Nuff Said!
Three stops today, two of them worth your time. The first was Qasr Al Halabatt. It was a Roman construction. It was amazing. It sits upon a bleak, desolate hill overlooking Syria. This place was built as a fortress overlooking trade routes the Romans and others later wished to control. The two most amazing things at this site, and I really should figure out how to add pictures to this thing, shouldn’t I? Anyway, the first were the mosaic floors that were uncovered just two years ago. These were large floors with intricate designs. The tiles were no larger than a chicklet. The second was a sideroom that was described as a bedroom. It still had three complete arches crossing the span, and while I can tend to let my imagination run away from me, it was pretty easy to imagine/feel the presence….the history, the sounds, the voices that kind of thing…
The bedroom at Qasr Hallabat
The second stop is the second most famous ancient ruin in Jordan and that is Jaras. Jaras was a Roman city that I[m told here was second to Rome in size. It was simply amazing. A favorite moment…we are on a hillside above most the ruinsj when the afternoon call to worship began. Every mosque issues this call at basically the sametime. I could hear at least three different imams calling the faithful to prayer. The sounds were echoing all around me off the ruins of a great Roman city. Magical. I have an audio recording of it.
Another favorite moment…walking through the dark hallways at the top of the Southern theater and emerging into the reconstructed amphitheater high above the stage. Being the diva I am I, of course, went down to center stage and took a bow. Again, it was a moment of sharing experience with people who lived long, long ago.
Were I to try to do this site justice, I’d fail.
I leave you today with two other observations from the mini-bus window. First, I have seen poverty today. A number of little villages in the desert had families living in tents. The tents are large low-walled and normally black, which puzzles me a little. Even those not living in tents seem to be barely better off for the majority. I saw a number of houses only nominally larger than a jail cell. These are flat-topped, concrete slab structures. Some with windows, some not. Most have exposed rebar sticking out of their roofs. We were told that the reason for this was so that a second story could be added should the family be able to afford it at some point. Each village would normally have a couple of houses that did have a second story, but most not. The second floor would be added because of the need for space. Jordanian families stay close and the average housing unit will have many generations living there.
The last observation is this. Jordan is a monarchy. There is a constitution and a parliament meants in Amman, but the king has considerably more power in this country than say the Queen does in England. Jordan’s monarchy began only 62 years ago. Hence the legitimacy of the King’s claim to rule is somewhat suspect. The current King, Abdullah II is the son of Hussein and grandson of Abdullah I. What interested me today is the number of pictures of the King that I saw. Every government building, every single one, has an image of the King on it. These images seem to carry different messages in different places. In Amman we saw a smiling benevolent leader. In Al Azraq the images tended to be sterner. Not smiling, while wearing a military uniform. Even in our restaurant today there was a large stylized portrait that actually reminded me of the Obama campaign poster.
King Abdullah II the Nice Guy
King Abdullah II the stern
Mr. Hakel Goes to Dinner at Uncle Abdullah’s
It is several hours later and I honestly believe we just experienced the high point of our trip. Emjab’s Uncle Abdullah lives in Al Masra, which as it happens is near the nature preserve that we are staying in. Emjjab’s Uncle invited us all to have dinner with him. It was magical. Al Masra was described as a small village, but its population was given as 43,000. More than Bowling Green. We are in the mountains of the North, not far from the Jordan river and the West Bank. The village and his Uncle’s house is perched on the hillside. We arrived and the excitement of our host and his large extended family was obvious. We shook hands with the men, the women with the women and they exchanged a French style kiss on each cheek. Men do that with men here too, but we did not. Then we went to the back of their property where we watched the sun set, presumably over the West Bank. As we took pictures of the view and each other. Some of the neighbors who were all out of their houses looking at the newcomers took pictures of us. Then it was time to go sit. A corner of their house was a porch much like ours in the U.S. Thick cushions lined all the wall space and this was the sum of the furniture. We removed our shoes and sat on the porch and were served a wonderful meal. The main dish was masra, which has repeatedly been described as the national dish of Jordan. In this part of the country masra is made with boiled chicken. The chicken sits on a huge mound of rice. Roasted almonds were liberally strewn over everything. Finally, a yogurt sauce was poured over all of that. Four huge platters, I mean gigantic were served to our group. Jordanians would normally gather around this bowl and scoop the food with the fingers of their right hand. In deference to our customs we were given bowls and spoons. While we accepted the bowls most of us forsook the spoon and dug in. After trying to do this daintily for awhile I gave in and did it the way I saw Emjab doing and scooped a large portion of rice into my four fingers and sliding it in. It was mess y, but kind of fun. It was delicious, particularly the roasted almonds. I couldn’t get enough of those. This was served with stuffed grape leaves, which I really didn’t think I’d like, but ate 7 of and something I’d never heard of. Zucchini stuffed with rice in tomato sauce. The zucchini was amazing because it had been hollowed out almost completely. Then they were stuffed with white rice. Very tasty.
Desert came in between waves of Arabic coffee which is flavored with cardamom and with a stomach settling tea. Desert was cake for Jill’s birthday.
Abdullah was encouraged to tell several stories of his youth and farming experiences that Emjab translated. Jill, Dani and Emily went with the women, none of whom ate with us, but Emjab’s aunt did sit with us. A lot of laughing could be heard coming from the women’s room as they had the girls try on their outfits and so forth.
Their were a number of children in the house. The oldest girls who wer around 12 never did come out into the public room. I inadvertently saw one of them without her head covered as she went from one room to another. When she returned she picked up the youngest child, Yusef, who is absolutely adorable, and covered her head with him as she walked by.
At the end of the evening, about three hours all told, we took a group picture of all of us. There generosity and hospitality was very touching. To be honest, it brought tears to my eyes on a couple occasions. We were asked to spend the night, as they waited for an answer, I managed to look sleepy and say, “I soon will be.” Which got a big laugh. Bruce came up with a better answer. “Your home is Jordan and tonight we sleep there.”
We are driving back to the tents on the reserve right now. The bus is full of happy sounds.
By the way, Zach is back and Sarah has improved greatly, but is still on the warn out side.
This is a land of great beauty. This is a land of great troubles. This is a land full of people like Emjab and his Uncle Abdullah. My understanding of Arab culture has been changed forever. I hope yours has too, if it hasn’t I haven’t been able to tell you enough about our evening.
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
Mr. Hakel gets Jaras(ed)
(Too tired to edit properly, sorry.)
What a day. Awoke this morning to the news that one of our intrepid bunch had been taken to the hospital with Patty and Absalaam along as escorts. Sara is fine now, still kind of weak, but recovering from what was most likely a case of dehydration. It may not have been, because a few more of us did not feel well too. Zach was hurling pretty regularly until after we stopped at a clinic, which actually appeared to be a women’s clinic, by the way. Zach received what he described as a rather painful shot in the but-tocks. I had some dicey times myself, but my mild illness expressed itself in the opposite direction. ‘Nuff Said!
Three stops today, two of them worth your time. The first was Qasr Al Halabatt. It was a Roman construction. It was amazing. It sits upon a bleak, desolate hill overlooking Syria. This place was built as a fortress overlooking trade routes the Romans and others later wished to control. The two most amazing things at this site, and I really should figure out how to add pictures to this thing, shouldn’t I? Anyway, the first were the mosaic floors that were uncovered just two years ago. These were large floors with intricate designs. The tiles were no larger than a chicklet. The second was a sideroom that was described as a bedroom. It still had three complete arches crossing the span, and while I can tend to let my imagination run away from me, it was pretty easy to imagine/feel the presence….the history, the sounds, the voices that kind of thing…
The bedroom at Qasr Hallabat
The second stop is the second most famous ancient ruin in Jordan and that is Jaras. Jaras was a Roman city that I[m told here was second to Rome in size. It was simply amazing. A favorite moment…we are on a hillside above most the ruinsj when the afternoon call to worship began. Every mosque issues this call at basically the sametime. I could hear at least three different imams calling the faithful to prayer. The sounds were echoing all around me off the ruins of a great Roman city. Magical. I have an audio recording of it.
Another favorite moment…walking through the dark hallways at the top of the Southern theater and emerging into the reconstructed amphitheater high above the stage. Being the diva I am I, of course, went down to center stage and took a bow. Again, it was a moment of sharing experience with people who lived long, long ago.
Were I to try to do this site justice, I’d fail.
I leave you today with two other observations from the mini-bus window. First, I have seen poverty today. A number of little villages in the desert had families living in tents. The tents are large low-walled and normally black, which puzzles me a little. Even those not living in tents seem to be barely better off for the majority. I saw a number of houses only nominally larger than a jail cell. These are flat-topped, concrete slab structures. Some with windows, some not. Most have exposed rebar sticking out of their roofs. We were told that the reason for this was so that a second story could be added should the family be able to afford it at some point. Each village would normally have a couple of houses that did have a second story, but most not. The second floor would be added because of the need for space. Jordanian families stay close and the average housing unit will have many generations living there.
The last observation is this. Jordan is a monarchy. There is a constitution and a parliament meants in Amman, but the king has considerably more power in this country than say the Queen does in England. Jordan’s monarchy began only 62 years ago. Hence the legitimacy of the King’s claim to rule is somewhat suspect. The current King, Abdullah II is the son of Hussein and grandson of Abdullah I. What interested me today is the number of pictures of the King that I saw. Every government building, every single one, has an image of the King on it. These images seem to carry different messages in different places. In Amman we saw a smiling benevolent leader. In Al Azraq the images tended to be sterner. Not smiling, while wearing a military uniform. Even in our restaurant today there was a large stylized portrait that actually reminded me of the Obama campaign poster.
King Abdullah II the Nice Guy
King Abdullah II the stern
Mr. Hakel Goes to Dinner at Uncle Abdullah’s
It is several hours later and I honestly believe we just experienced the high point of our trip. Emjab’s Uncle Abdullah lives in Al Masra, which as it happens is near the nature preserve that we are staying in. Emjjab’s Uncle invited us all to have dinner with him. It was magical. Al Masra was described as a small village, but its population was given as 43,000. More than Bowling Green. We are in the mountains of the North, not far from the Jordan river and the West Bank. The village and his Uncle’s house is perched on the hillside. We arrived and the excitement of our host and his large extended family was obvious. We shook hands with the men, the women with the women and they exchanged a French style kiss on each cheek. Men do that with men here too, but we did not. Then we went to the back of their property where we watched the sun set, presumably over the West Bank. As we took pictures of the view and each other. Some of the neighbors who were all out of their houses looking at the newcomers took pictures of us. Then it was time to go sit. A corner of their house was a porch much like ours in the U.S. Thick cushions lined all the wall space and this was the sum of the furniture. We removed our shoes and sat on the porch and were served a wonderful meal. The main dish was masra, which has repeatedly been described as the national dish of Jordan. In this part of the country masra is made with boiled chicken. The chicken sits on a huge mound of rice. Roasted almonds were liberally strewn over everything. Finally, a yogurt sauce was poured over all of that. Four huge platters, I mean gigantic were served to our group. Jordanians would normally gather around this bowl and scoop the food with the fingers of their right hand. In deference to our customs we were given bowls and spoons. While we accepted the bowls most of us forsook the spoon and dug in. After trying to do this daintily for awhile I gave in and did it the way I saw Emjab doing and scooped a large portion of rice into my four fingers and sliding it in. It was mess y, but kind of fun. It was delicious, particularly the roasted almonds. I couldn’t get enough of those. This was served with stuffed grape leaves, which I really didn’t think I’d like, but ate 7 of and something I’d never heard of. Zucchini stuffed with rice in tomato sauce. The zucchini was amazing because it had been hollowed out almost completely. Then they were stuffed with white rice. Very tasty.
Desert came in between waves of Arabic coffee which is flavored with cardamom and with a stomach settling tea. Desert was cake for Jill’s birthday.
Abdullah was encouraged to tell several stories of his youth and farming experiences that Emjab translated. Jill, Dani and Emily went with the women, none of whom ate with us, but Emjab’s aunt did sit with us. A lot of laughing could be heard coming from the women’s room as they had the girls try on their outfits and so forth.
Their were a number of children in the house. The oldest girls who wer around 12 never did come out into the public room. I inadvertently saw one of them without her head covered as she went from one room to another. When she returned she picked up the youngest child, Yusef, who is absolutely adorable, and covered her head with him as she walked by.
At the end of the evening, about three hours all told, we took a group picture of all of us. There generosity and hospitality was very touching. To be honest, it brought tears to my eyes on a couple occasions. We were asked to spend the night, as they waited for an answer, I managed to look sleepy and say, “I soon will be.” Which got a big laugh. Bruce came up with a better answer. “Your home is Jordan and tonight we sleep there.”
We are driving back to the tents on the reserve right now. The bus is full of happy sounds.
By the way, Zach is back and Sarah has improved greatly, but is still on the warn out side.
This is a land of great beauty. This is a land of great troubles. This is a land full of people like Emjab and his Uncle Abdullah. My understanding of Arab culture has been changed forever. I hope yours has too, if it hasn’t I haven’t been able to tell you enough about our evening.
Salaam,
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Mr. Hakel Gets Very, Very Hot
Day 2 blog 2
This afternoon I am sitting in my upstairs hotel room in the Azraq Lodge, which at one point in time was a military hospital. In the back there is still a Jordanian Air Force Base. There are signs at the back of the hotel informing us, politely, that pictures may not be taken of the base. So far, I’ve managed to comply. I could see a half dozen or so jet fighters sitting out in the sun. Before I go into the impressive sights we’ve seen today, I must comment on the heat. In Amman yesterday, I thought a number of different times that it was pretty darn hot out, but it wasn’t actually. This is hot. It is 101 degrees outside the window I’m looking through and it looks it. If you are a person who understands the beauty of the American Southwest then you would marvel at what I am looking at right now. We are in Al Azraq, an oasis. We are 20 miles north of the border with Saudi Arabia and I am looking in the direction of Iraq, which is a comforting 160 miles or so off. The map indicates no other settlements between here and Iraq. This is the closest we will come to that troubled land.
Today, after picking up our “Tourist Police” officer who will ride with us, we visited three different Qasr. The easiest translation would be castle, but I found that a little misleading. The first was Al Alhareena. This castle was perched besides the road in the middle of the desert. It is quite large and features something like 63 rooms. The purpose of the structure is still in dispute, but the literature inside the structure has settled on the Qasr being an “inn” of sorts. And in fact the size of the rooms does indeed seem to back up that idea. The slits in the walls that appear from the outside to be for shooting turn out to be impossibly high above the floor on the inside. So their purpose would be for ventilation and in fact most of them had a decent breeze flowing through them. Desert, in at least this part of Jordan, does not mean sand. It means small rocks compacted by time and wind into the ground. Around this castle that left very little room even for scrubby plants.
This was not quite as true at our second Qasr of the day, actually this one was considerably smaller earning it the title “Qasrya”. This was Qasrya Amar. It was built in 7th century as a hunting lodge for the Caliph. The Caliph would visit to escape the hustle and bustle of court life in Damascus. The Qasrya is situated beside a dry wadi that occasionally in the springtime has water in it. Most distinctive at this site were the frescoed walls and ceilings of the buildings. The paintings were designed to be welcoming and happy, which I suppose explains the number of naked women in the frescoes.
For reasons not understood, these frescroes escaped destruction when the following caliph ordered all such images to be destroyed. Also at this site was a deep well that we could just barely see the bottom of. Water was fetched up by an ingenious spoke and axle crank that looked remarkably like giant tinker toys. Towards the end of our visit I wandered to the back of the property to see what I could of the wadi. It turned out It was still far from me, but not so far from a couple of dogs that they didn’t give me an earful for wondering too close.
The third castle, Al Azraq Castle, was built for defensive purposes. It was originally built by the Romans and then rebuilt by the Ummayads in the 700s. The castle is constructed of black basaltic stone and was clearly intended for defensive purposes. The most interesting thing to me was the ceilings of therooms that still have ceilings. One of these ceilings, by the way, is believed to have been the room that Lawrence of Arabia and Sharif al Faad planned the defeat of the Ottomans during the Arab revolution in 1915ish. In any case, the lack of wood in this area necessitated the use of roughly hewn stone girders that overlap each other to create the skeleton of the roof. Other rocks are then carefully placed between these girders to fill in the holes. It’s fascinating to look at, but even more so to realize that it has lasted 700 years plus.
I’ll stop a moment to describe the scene I am looking at out the window. We are on top of a small hill overlooking the junction of two highways. If you turn right, you wind up in Saudi Arabia in short order. If you turn left you have a long haul to Iraq. From that direction, at the momen,t a convoy of trucks is coming through that has already been coming by for several minutes now. Our guide, Emjab, tells us that this is in fact a convoy coming from Iraq. There have been several buses mixed in with the trucks. Jordan, pretty much alone amongst countries in this area has maintained itself as a haven for refugees. The two largest refugee groups would, of course, be from Palestine and Iraq. Asalaam, the owner of our tour company, Petracaravan, described this as both a blessing and a curse as Jordan’s population went from two to six million in just twenty years. The caravan is still coming by and I am not a fast typist.
Two more stops to describe today. Our very first stop this morning was at the Cave of the Seven Sleepers. What’s that you ask? Were they still asleep? Did I get any zzzzs in? I shall try to answer. During the period of persecution of Christians by the Romans, seven slaves/Christians escaped the city known as Amman today. They were pursued by the Romans. Thus, they took cover in this cave. Alas, I didn’t catch the rest of the story, but it is mentioned in the Quran if you want to look it up. Above the cave are the ruins of an ancient chapel. Next to the site a mosque was built by King Abdullah II just two years ago. We were able to visit the mosque. This was an interesting experience by itself. We had dressed with respect in the morning. For me, that meant wearing long pants. For the women in our group it meant wearing skirts, long-sleeve shirts and a head scarf. This turned out to be not quite sufficient and they were asked to wear full-length robes with hoods that were helpfully located at the gate. They looked tremendously hot to me. (The caravan is still passing btw….) the women reported that it wasn’t that bad. Everyone seemed to take it in stride, but I have to say that I am still having a very difficult time seeing at as anything other than a wrong-headed idea. As much as we scoff at political correctness in our country I say that it is considerably more good than stupid.
The final stop before arriving at our lodge was visiting the Al Azraq Wetland Preserve. Al Azraq is an oasis, which is why it is such a crossroads. Before me I see trees and even a green field. The wetlands are very small, but there are three ponds. Within these ponds swim killifish, the only killifish of their particular species in the world. (No, I can’t tell you what’s special about a killifish) We also observed a herd of grazing water buffalo. The water buffalo are not native to the oasis, but have been around for the better part of a thousand years and besides they eat enough that water doesn’t get completely choked with vegetation. A visitor’s center ably described in Arabic and English the perils the wetlands face in a country that is the tenth most water poor in the world.
That’s gonna be a rap for now. More later if it is worth noting!
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
This afternoon I am sitting in my upstairs hotel room in the Azraq Lodge, which at one point in time was a military hospital. In the back there is still a Jordanian Air Force Base. There are signs at the back of the hotel informing us, politely, that pictures may not be taken of the base. So far, I’ve managed to comply. I could see a half dozen or so jet fighters sitting out in the sun. Before I go into the impressive sights we’ve seen today, I must comment on the heat. In Amman yesterday, I thought a number of different times that it was pretty darn hot out, but it wasn’t actually. This is hot. It is 101 degrees outside the window I’m looking through and it looks it. If you are a person who understands the beauty of the American Southwest then you would marvel at what I am looking at right now. We are in Al Azraq, an oasis. We are 20 miles north of the border with Saudi Arabia and I am looking in the direction of Iraq, which is a comforting 160 miles or so off. The map indicates no other settlements between here and Iraq. This is the closest we will come to that troubled land.
Today, after picking up our “Tourist Police” officer who will ride with us, we visited three different Qasr. The easiest translation would be castle, but I found that a little misleading. The first was Al Alhareena. This castle was perched besides the road in the middle of the desert. It is quite large and features something like 63 rooms. The purpose of the structure is still in dispute, but the literature inside the structure has settled on the Qasr being an “inn” of sorts. And in fact the size of the rooms does indeed seem to back up that idea. The slits in the walls that appear from the outside to be for shooting turn out to be impossibly high above the floor on the inside. So their purpose would be for ventilation and in fact most of them had a decent breeze flowing through them. Desert, in at least this part of Jordan, does not mean sand. It means small rocks compacted by time and wind into the ground. Around this castle that left very little room even for scrubby plants.
This was not quite as true at our second Qasr of the day, actually this one was considerably smaller earning it the title “Qasrya”. This was Qasrya Amar. It was built in 7th century as a hunting lodge for the Caliph. The Caliph would visit to escape the hustle and bustle of court life in Damascus. The Qasrya is situated beside a dry wadi that occasionally in the springtime has water in it. Most distinctive at this site were the frescoed walls and ceilings of the buildings. The paintings were designed to be welcoming and happy, which I suppose explains the number of naked women in the frescoes.
For reasons not understood, these frescroes escaped destruction when the following caliph ordered all such images to be destroyed. Also at this site was a deep well that we could just barely see the bottom of. Water was fetched up by an ingenious spoke and axle crank that looked remarkably like giant tinker toys. Towards the end of our visit I wandered to the back of the property to see what I could of the wadi. It turned out It was still far from me, but not so far from a couple of dogs that they didn’t give me an earful for wondering too close.
The third castle, Al Azraq Castle, was built for defensive purposes. It was originally built by the Romans and then rebuilt by the Ummayads in the 700s. The castle is constructed of black basaltic stone and was clearly intended for defensive purposes. The most interesting thing to me was the ceilings of therooms that still have ceilings. One of these ceilings, by the way, is believed to have been the room that Lawrence of Arabia and Sharif al Faad planned the defeat of the Ottomans during the Arab revolution in 1915ish. In any case, the lack of wood in this area necessitated the use of roughly hewn stone girders that overlap each other to create the skeleton of the roof. Other rocks are then carefully placed between these girders to fill in the holes. It’s fascinating to look at, but even more so to realize that it has lasted 700 years plus.
I’ll stop a moment to describe the scene I am looking at out the window. We are on top of a small hill overlooking the junction of two highways. If you turn right, you wind up in Saudi Arabia in short order. If you turn left you have a long haul to Iraq. From that direction, at the momen,t a convoy of trucks is coming through that has already been coming by for several minutes now. Our guide, Emjab, tells us that this is in fact a convoy coming from Iraq. There have been several buses mixed in with the trucks. Jordan, pretty much alone amongst countries in this area has maintained itself as a haven for refugees. The two largest refugee groups would, of course, be from Palestine and Iraq. Asalaam, the owner of our tour company, Petracaravan, described this as both a blessing and a curse as Jordan’s population went from two to six million in just twenty years. The caravan is still coming by and I am not a fast typist.
Two more stops to describe today. Our very first stop this morning was at the Cave of the Seven Sleepers. What’s that you ask? Were they still asleep? Did I get any zzzzs in? I shall try to answer. During the period of persecution of Christians by the Romans, seven slaves/Christians escaped the city known as Amman today. They were pursued by the Romans. Thus, they took cover in this cave. Alas, I didn’t catch the rest of the story, but it is mentioned in the Quran if you want to look it up. Above the cave are the ruins of an ancient chapel. Next to the site a mosque was built by King Abdullah II just two years ago. We were able to visit the mosque. This was an interesting experience by itself. We had dressed with respect in the morning. For me, that meant wearing long pants. For the women in our group it meant wearing skirts, long-sleeve shirts and a head scarf. This turned out to be not quite sufficient and they were asked to wear full-length robes with hoods that were helpfully located at the gate. They looked tremendously hot to me. (The caravan is still passing btw….) the women reported that it wasn’t that bad. Everyone seemed to take it in stride, but I have to say that I am still having a very difficult time seeing at as anything other than a wrong-headed idea. As much as we scoff at political correctness in our country I say that it is considerably more good than stupid.
The final stop before arriving at our lodge was visiting the Al Azraq Wetland Preserve. Al Azraq is an oasis, which is why it is such a crossroads. Before me I see trees and even a green field. The wetlands are very small, but there are three ponds. Within these ponds swim killifish, the only killifish of their particular species in the world. (No, I can’t tell you what’s special about a killifish) We also observed a herd of grazing water buffalo. The water buffalo are not native to the oasis, but have been around for the better part of a thousand years and besides they eat enough that water doesn’t get completely choked with vegetation. A visitor’s center ably described in Arabic and English the perils the wetlands face in a country that is the tenth most water poor in the world.
That’s gonna be a rap for now. More later if it is worth noting!
Dad/Lane/Mr. Hakel
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