Aqaba

It's short drive from Wadi Rum to Aqaba.  It’s Jordan’s only contact with the sea and right next to Eilat, Israel.  Also a few km. from Saudi Arabia and across the water from Egypt.  Two days ago, rockets were fired from somewhere in Egypt into the city of Eilat, no one was killed, but I’m sure it’s cause for increased security in Israel.  Also, yesterday, someone in Jordan had unkind things to say about the US bombings in Boston and made some kind of threat, so the US embassy—close to our hotel in Amman—has beefed up security.  It looks pretty secure to me

 

—all it’s missing is a moat!  It’s a big place with a high, solid stone fence around the perimeter.  Several large black SUVs with guns mounted on top stand guard along with Jordanian soldiers.  Back to Aqaba—

It’s a 4 hour drive from Amman to Aqaba and trucks go back and forth with supplies for Jordan and goods to export.  Phosphate is the main commodity and there is even a narrow gauge railroad from the desert where the phosphate is collected to the port of Aqaba.  This railroad is left over from when the British were here.  It’s a tax free city and that’s quite something in a country where tax is 26%.  As we entered and left the municipality, it was necessary to stop at a police check station.  Apparently, this tax free status is to encourage Jordanians to live in Aqaba, not for a shopping mecca for the rest of Jordan.  Nabil said it is possible to buy small items, like electronics or a shaver, but big items like TVs can’t be taken back to other municipalities.  As foreigners, we can buy anything, but it needs to leave the country with us.

Our hotel was on a bay south of town and could have easily been a Hawaiian or Mexican resort.  Great pool, restaurants, gift shop, and pool bar.

Our guide rented us a glass bottom boat from one of the locals. 

 Just the five of us spent 3 hours cruising on the Gulf of Aqaba looking at one of the best coral reefs in the world.  The crystal clear, variegated turquoise colored water full of coral and brightly colored fish was quite a contrast to the barren, brown hills surrounding us.  Schools of fish darted in and out of the coral and a couple old, sunken ships.  The coral varies from a small bright blue patch to a massive grey coral that looked like a brain, some look very solid and others are feathery and move back and forth with the water movement.  It was like being in a fish tank full of tropical fish.  Mustafa, our “captain”, is 22 and from a tourist-business family and has been on the water since he was 10. 

As we were in the boat, Jordanian Air Force planes were doing fly overs.  I don’t know if this is a show of force to whoever is bombing or if it was a scheduled event.

There is a private aquarium along the coast.  It looks like there’s a lot of research going on.  Tanks have pieces of coral and sea grasses tied to small clay pieces that look like they’re trying to grow and reintroduce to the Gulf.  Recognizable fish like clown fish, royal angel fish, sea turtles, moray eels share tanks with fish that I’ve never seen or heard of like spotted sweetlips and humphead wrasses and a couple other bizarre fish that look like rocks.   

 

Back to Amman for our last night in Jordan.  What a wonderful place it is!

A ride in the desert at Wadi Rum

Wadi Rum is a desert inhabited by Bedouins.  Our jeep tour--actually a Nissan Backroad tour-- took us into the desert with our Bedouin driver, Omar, for three hours.

  Lawrence of Arabia is it's most famous visitor.  The British helped the Arabs kick the Turks out of Jordan in 1916 and Lawrence was the commander of the British army.  He united the Bedouins and conquered Aqaba coming overland from the desert at Wadi Rum instead of attacking from the sea at Aqaba, which is what the Turks expected.  Remember Omar Shariff as Sheik Ali in Lawrence of Arabia?  Well, lots of Bedouin men look like him or Johnny Depp.  Dark, kohl outlined eyes and extremely handsome men! 

The desert landscape of Wadi Rum is like nothing I've ever seen.  Huge ochre color rock formations loom everywhere and all kinds of other-worldly rocks rise from the desert floor like islands in a sea of sand--as someone else said--wish I were so imaginative!

 

Erosion has created some sites similar to what we see at places likes Arches National Park in Utah.

 

There is an annual horse race in the desert next week and the markers are out and men are practicing already.  There are also camel races.  These markers are all over the area we toured.

 

A long time ago, it was under the sea, and early history saw it as an oasis on the caravan routes with the rock carvings detailing where water and food can be found.

 

A large aquifer was discovered under Wadi Rum several years ago and water is now piped to Amman.  At the current rate there is enough water to last for 30 years.There are building cranes all over Amman and new building everywhere so I would guess their predictions might be a bit off.  Does this sound like a familiar story?  We all have the same difficult problems to try and solve! 

A wonderful place we've never heard of--

We've travelled for 6 days now seeing all the wonderful places that we've read about and seen pictures of most of our lives.  But yesterday we stopped at a place that I have never read about, heard of and can find no information on the Internet.  That may be related to my spelling, but I've tried it many ways.  Arabic is nothing like English and words are spelled different ways--think Gadaffi, Kadaffi etc.  Phonetically, I spell it al Makelat.  There are great advantages to being 4 people in a private van with a driver. One of them is that we can go places that tour buses can't.  Anyway, our guide drove to a place high up in the mountains close to the famous site where Moses viewed the promised land and later died. Nabil, our guide, told us he had a surprise for us.  We drove up a dirt road, passing sheep and goat herds to a cinder block building at the top of a hill overlooking the Jordan valley.

Very unimpressive until we went inside.  The distinct outline of a small church with broken columns on each side leading to an elevated altar and the floor was covered with the mosaics of early Christian themes.  This is the original old city of Nebo.

Bedouins had been living here for many years and the dark spot on the mosaics is where their cooking fire was!  They didn't realize that their camp was on the ruins of an ancient church that dates to the approximately 350 AD and that a few inches below their cooking fire was a priceless treasure.  This is definitely one of the first churches in the world. Christians were persecuted and their religion was illegal until 313 AD when Roman Emperor Constantine issued the Edict of Milan that legalized Christian worship.

The detail of the mosaics are exquisite and my pictures just don't do them justice!

The site is guarded by a middle aged Bedouin man whose grandmother as the matriarch of the family in the 1920s sold the land to the Franciscans for 50 gold dinar--an enormous amount of money at the time.  He now watches over the site for tips from the few people like us who brave this road off the beaten tourist path to visit the church. The Franciscans also own the tourist site of Mt Nebo where we also visited.

His grandmothers still watches over the site from her grave close by.

One other impressively located castle that was not on the tourist itinerary that we were lucky enouugh to visit is Shobak.  It is over 4000 feet above sea level and from it's hilltop perch can view the surrounding countryside for invaders from any side.  Didn't help in the long run because in 1189 Saladin troops conquered this Christian stronghold and added it to the growing Muslim world. 

 

 

Bzyantine Castles, Crusader Forts, Roman Cities

Jordan is part of the "Holy Land" with sites associated with historical figures that we've all heard about, from Moses to Jesus. It's also crammed full of ancient cities, forts and castles where significant historical events took place.  We've done all the highlights of Jordan, plus more.  Our start was at Umm Qais, site of the ancient Greek/Roman city where Jesus' miracle of casting out demon into a pig took place.  Close to the ancient city is a cave where Jesus hid.  On our way to visit, we were stopped by a police road block and turned back because of too much military activity in the area and a prominent American was expected so the border area was closed.  Just in back of the fort stand guard posts on stilts watching over the borders between Syria, Jordan and the disputed Golan Heights.  As we toured the city an American helicopter flew over.

 

The market town of Ajlun is dominated by an early Arab military fort built in part to resist the Crusader incursions into the area in 1184-85.

Outside the gate a Bedouin sells coffee, Bedouin tea--thick tea with sugar and cardamon

 

 

 

Jerash is the best preserved Roman city in the Middle East.  Like many, it started out as a Greek city and under the Romans was prestigious as a semi-independent status within the Roman province of Syria.  Jerash became rich off the  incense and spice trade.  Very long and interesting story if you're interested, but a massive earthquake in the 8th century destroyed much of the town.

 Our guide's house, inherited from his grandfather, is inside the old city walls. Before excavation part of the old site was buried under 3 feet of dirt and his grandfather's wheat field was planted in the Oval Plaza.  Below is the Oval Plaza. You can see the level of the dirt by the discoloration on the bottom of the columns.

 
Mount Nebo is the site from which Moses saw the promised land and Moses died on Mt. Nebo.  The Byzantine church is being remodeled and was  built over an even earlier construction.  There are beautiful mosaics depicting farmers, hunters, and animals. Mostly the site has a fabulous view back to the promised land.  That's me looking at the camera and Chris looking at the promised land--just like Moses did, except she only has to wait a week not 40 years

 

 

 

The magnificent crusader fort of Kerak

 

The fabulous mosaics of St. George's church in Madaba, an old testament city conquered by the Israelites.  Below is the mosaic map of Jerusalem  done in the 6th c. when Jerusalem was still a Roman town with many identifiable landmarks.

All of these sites are so much more than I can present here.  The Internet has lots of information on all of them.  Please forgive any errors of my memory!!!

 

 

A Day at the Dead Sea

After a visit to the Citadel in Amman,

 

A visit to the Jordan Archaeological Museum

a little shopping on al Hashemi  street where the shopkeeper, I hope jokingly said, "Ok, now don't come back"

kunafa, a sweet with cheese, honey and fried rice noodles at Habibah,

New friends who wanted their  pictures taken with the Americans

visit a Roman theater still being used in central Amman,

 a tour of the early Christian site, Cave of the Seven sleeper, where we all had to wear a robe to cover ourselves,

  We drove from Amman at 2300 feet to the Dead Sea, the lowest place on Earth at 1300 feet below sea level.  Much warmer and the big thing to do here is swim in the Dea Sea.  You really can't call it swimming because the water is 10% salt and all you can do is float. I accicentally flipped myself over on my stomach--it feels like someone is pushing you down in the very salty water and the life guard yelled at me to turn back to my back! 

There are big pots of mud on the beach that I slathered all over my body, let dry for 20 mins and back in the water to wash off.

 

The evening was completed with a crisp glass of white wine and grilled Dennis fish.

It was a fabulous day!!!  I am so lucky. 

Refugees

Jordan is a country full of refugees, old and new.  The newest refugees are Syrians who are escaping the civil war in Syria.  We are very close to the Syrian border and several times have come close to the check point into Syria.  Don't really know what is going on with the fighting, but a cave on our agenda was closed because of heightened military activity and we saw a large helicopter land.  Our guide told us it had something to do with arrival of some hi ranking American.Refugees have very distinct problems, besides losing their homes and probably everything they own.  We met Abdul in a Sweets Shop in Ajlun where he was working. 

He crossed the border through a check point, had his passport stamped, and is working legally.   His passport is good for 2 more months.  He wants to go to a brother's home in Lebanon, but since his passport isn't good for 6 months, he can't go to Lebanon or pretty much anywhere else.  He can't go back to Syria now because of the political situation.  So he's stuck in Jordan and in 2 months his passport will expire and then he'll have even more issues to deal with.  Jordan doesn't want to give Jordanian citizenship to people like Abdul.  He is luckier than most--he has a job.  There are 1.5 million Syrian refugees in Jordan and it's taxing their resources!  The same scenario applied to many of the Palestinian refugees, some who have been in Jordan since the 1967 war.  By not giving them rights and citizenship, the Jordanian government hopes to keep this issue of refugees alive and force the world to deal with the Palestinian/Israeli situation.  Doesn't seem to be working too well.  And the expense of maintaining refugee camps close to the Syrian border is helped by the US Government, but it's Jordan's territory and responsibility ultimately.

People We've Met

The people in Jordan have been warm, inviting, and eager to meet Americans.  Women and men unselfconsciously come up to us and want to talk.  Young people learn English in school from primary school, but it’s not common to meet people who are fluent in English, even in tourist places. Our guide Nabil took us to his house to meet his wife, Rayda and she needed to be dropped off at an engagement party. 

Their home was spotless and very ornate.  She was gracious and offered us tea and cookies and she spoke no English. I was also quite surprised when she lit up a cigarette!   As we dropped off Rayda  at  the engagement party, we passed the tent where the men were gathering.  The house was a villa with a bright balloon wreath on the door.  Nabill explained the engagement process to us.  When a young couple decides they want to marry, the young woman talks to her mother, who arranges coffee with the mother of the young man.  If all is well and the bride’s mother thinks he’s “a good guy”, plans for the engagement move forward.  The engagement party has the men from both the bride and groom’s families meeting in a large tent that is set up for the occasion to get to know each other.  The women of both families meet in a family member’s house. 

The women were walking into the party with long black robes and hajabs (the scarf head covering).  As one woman walked by, her robe opened to reveal—momentarily—a very short skirt and spike heels.  As the women enter the house away from the men, they are free to remove their robes and wear anything from tight jeans, mini skirts, or in the case of Rayda, a form fitting long black rhinestone studded dress with a plunging neckline.  This is a whole family affair, children are everywhere. 

 

 

Yesterday, during our sight seeing to various Crusader castles and Roman cities, Nabil took us to a former co-worker’s house for coffee.  It was a family house of a mother and her two unmarried daughters.  Next door lived her sister-in-law and on the other side, her cousin, who joined us.  First we had a minted lemonade, then were each presented with a plate with a banana, an apple, an orange and a kiwi.  Next Turkish coffee and cookies.  We left with a 5 gallon jug full of home made olives and kumquats from their tree.  These women were friendly, outgoing, and smoke almost no English.  The younger woman who was Nabil’s friend worked as a waitress in one of the hotels in Amman.  Her mother and cousin  thought she was an accountant, and being a waitress would bring shame on her family.