The Middle East and Me!

My flight to Jordan had a layover in Cairo and being one of the only women on the plane and the vibe of the male passengers made me glad for the short stop. A female solo traveller isn't that common from what I can tell....though I've met a few. We landed in Amman and the clock on the plane said we were an hour and a half early.  I thought this was mighty strange but was glad to have arrived. As I walked towards the visa line I could overhear a conversation between a woman and her driver and she kept going on about the exursions they were doing before going to Amman in a couple of days. Well, I looked around and saw "Welcome to Jordan" signs but not a single one of them actually told me what city I was in. OMG, I thought, I've landed in the wrong place! I knew I was in the right country and figured I'd sort it out later. I received my visa, got my passport stamped and headed out to retrieve my bag. The airport seemed OK, nothing overwhelming. I headed through the X-ray machine to exit the terminal (yep, guess they want to know what you're bringing in). I searched for the driver that was meant to pick me up but couldn't see much through the crowd if eager relatives. I walked outside searching for a car. Nothing. I walked around inside before asking information to call my hostel. They seemed to have forgotten about me but were on their way. I took a seat in the terminal, in the stiffling heat of high 20'slow 30's. I watched the people coming through and realized that when a relative returned home, the whole family came to pick them up. I wonder what kind of vehicles they drive? One family had 6 kids plus about 4 adults....not including the person arriving and their luggage, which seemed to be plentiful judging by the piles of bags I saw on carts. Just when I thought I wouldn't be able to handle the heat blowing into the arrivals hall, my driver arrived. Just a side note, wouldn't it cost a fortune to heat a whole airport to that temperature? Afterwards, I learned that Jordan had decided not to do daylight savings this year and computers are still catching up. So the time on my plane was wrong and we were only 20 minutes early.

Unfortunately my drive to the hostel was done in darkness so there wasn't much to see. Arriving at my hostel, I was happy to see it was in pretty good shape. The bathroom is a wet room, which is always fun but other than that it appeared clean and warm. It was only a slight disturbance to be woken at 6 am by the call to prayer.....besides I fell right back asleep. Breakfast was amazing. Coffee or tea, bread, lubna, olives, hummus, jam, a choice of 3 plates, and cake. I ate away and after a lazy morning decided to see some sights in Amman. I was a bit nervous to go out as I didn't know what to expect. A girl in my room studying here from Austria assured me it was quite safe. So off I went. They have 2 tourist sights; the Citadel and a Roman amphitheatre. I got my directions and was on my way. I had been told the Jordinian people were really kind and it's true. On the way people redirected me without me even asking. So kind.

The citadel are ruins built on the top of a hill overlooking the city. The area is beautiful. I took my time and then wandered down to see the amphitheatre. It is so amazing what they were able to build these massive structures without machinery and engineers. The area was filled with local people and I stuck out but had no problems with anyone. One tourvguide tried to convince me to hire him for the rest of the day but he was a little too slick for my liking. My hostel has a cafe downstairs and you can order food for so cheap. My tummy had been acting up so I ordered roast quarter chicken and rice, figuring the simpler the better. It came with its roasted neck still in tact as well as some spinal bones. It took a minute to look past that but when I did, it was delicious.

The next day I went on a dead sea tour. We started by going to Madaba where there is a church (Greek Orthodox), which contains an old map. They found the mosaic map in the ruins of an old church and built a new one on top.  It was a piece of the floor of the original church. It's still part of the floor but gets covered during mass. Next stop was Mount Nebo. This is where Moses went and saw the promised land before dying and being buried somewhere on it. The top gives a beautiful view. After that we drove to the dead sea. As the road climbed upwards the driver stopped and put the car in neutral and low and behold the car continued to move up. It's a magnetic spot! Next we changed a flat tire. The driver asked the guy sitting in the passenger seat how much he weighed and then said ok we need to sit the heaviest person in the front to balance the tires, "Kirsty, you sit up front". I wasn't sure whether to be offended or not. After some discussion later the others in the group decided he really just wanted me to sit beside him....I think I'm still a bit offended by his comment!  Once the spare was on we went up up up to a lovely panoramic of the dead sea before heading down to swim. I've never been able to float so I figured I'd try it but didn't have any expectations. We changed into our swimsuits and walked down to the beach. Our guide had to pick a spot directly in front of a group of 3 fully covered Muslim women. I felt so awkward undressing to my bikini in front of them! The water was warm as we put our feet in. Us girls were last in and I took my time walking deeper. Finally I took the plunge and released my feet from the earth. I was floating, and in fact I had a hard time getting into any other position. Trying to get my feet back on the sand was a bit tricky because my body was so buoyant. And if you did stand up but the water was too deep, chances are you'd end up floating on your tummy, whcich is bad news as you don't want water in your mouth or eyes. We floated for half an hour showing off our floaty moves. Finally we decided to get some mud. Since we were all being cheap we dug some up ourselves instead of buying it from the beach area. As we stood there covered in mud we looked around and noticed we were a different color. Everyone else was covered in black mud while ours was green. Oops. Rinsing off created another dilemma. How to get the mud off your face without getting water in your eyes or mouth. It was tricky. By now our guide had gone off to shower and change so we decided to do the same. We went to the outdoor showers to rinse off the salt but they were freezing. We did the best we could. Sonya wanted to jump in the pool to clean off as we already knew the showers in the change rooms were unheated as well. Sonya and Peter jumped in first and warned that it was probably colder than the showers. I am such a chicken when it comes to cold water but I knew a quick dunk would be much easier than trying to stand under an icy spray. So.....I jumped.....and I screamed! It was freezing! Dave jumped in after me and screamed like a girl....we got a lot of weird looks. Haha. We were all ready for lunch so we went off to change and get dressed. We headed to the restaurant beside the pool. While our guide went off to fill his plate the rest of us dropped off our stuff and asked about the price of the buffet....14 Dinar. Which is about 20$. No way. We all decided to just order a drink and when our guide sat down he was a little annoyed. He probably should have asked where we wanted to go first! We waited while he ate and then drove back to Amman while he gave us the cold shoulder. On the way we stopped for a new tire and to pick up his 3 1/2 year old daughter who sat on the console in the front seat. The laws for car seats is very different. We all ordered food as soon as we got back and sat chatting the evening away. Sonya and Peter are going to India too, and South East Asia, so I hope to run into them again! They are the sweetest Irish couple! By the way, I told them I know lots of places across Canada where they can stay when they travel there.....right guys! :-)