amman tour - august 2007

back in august
ishaq and i decided to do a tour of amman
for our anniversary.

bonnie and ahmed watched sanaa and rahmah
and we took aya with us.
our guide picked us up in front of the khawaja
and we headed downtown through
the stores of jabal hussein,
past the cluster of apartments that make up
a palestinian refugee camp to
jebel al-qala’a (hill of the castle)
where the amman citadel and umayyad palace
sit overlooking the city.

jordan archaeological museum

afterwards we headed to the
roman theatre,
from the times when amman was called philadelphia.
the ancient theatre is cut into a hill.
next to the huge roman theatre is
a smaller theatre called odean.

housed inside the theatre are the
jordan folklore museum
describing the traditional life of local people,
and the museum of popular traditions
depicting various forms of traditional jordanian dress
as well as ancient mosaics from around the county.

after these historic areas
we saw some recent history.
our guide took us to see the mansions in the upscale abdoun area.
one mansion was modeled on the treasury building at petra.
he told us that during one tour,
he was stopped outside of the petra-look-alike mansion
and the owner invited him and the tourists in for tea.

our guide also told us a story of a person that was so rich
that they put gold foil in their food.
supposedly it made them strong.

our guide had an interesting story himself.
he had lived in the US going to college at virginia tech, i believe,
studying engineering.
he came back during one break
and his parents refused to let him return to school
unless he got married.
they were afraid, he said, that he would never come back.
so he got married,
finished school,
came back to jordan
and became an engineer.
he soon found his work repetitive
and decided to shake things up and become a tour guide.
he said that he’s made friends from all over the world.

he dropped us off at mecca mall so we could finish of the tour
doing something very american:
we ate at t.g.i friday’s.
before coming to amman
i had never been to
and never had the desire to go to t.g.i friday’s.
but after living in amman for a little less than a year,
i had the craving for american food.
i had the grilled salmon
and surprised myself
when i didn’t have to ask for a to-go tray.

unfortunately mecca mall has yet to build a prayer room
– i guess they’ll wait until they can’t rent a piece of mall real estate
and turn that into a prayer area –
but the mall guest services guy gave us a couple of prayer rugs
and showed us to a dusty, cigarette-butt-filled corner
next to where mall security were lolly-gagging.
he even helled aya while we made salat.

after praying, we headed downtown to the balad
to do a bit of shopping.
we ended up not buying anything,
but a glass
– communally shared by anyone walking down the street
with 25 qirsh to spare –
of fresh sugar cane juice.