The Ten Worst Airport Terminals

Recently I came across this list on the travel website frommers.com of "The Ten Worst Airport Terminals" in the world, and was not surprised to find our airport here in Amman--the Queen Alia International Airport--on it. The short write-up is pasted below, and the full story on all the airports--which includes some in the United States--can be found here.

I was also not surprised at one of the reasons for inclusion--"bathroom cleanliness." From personal experience I can attest that you may want to avoid the bathrooms there; one of our friends even told us when he came to visit a few years ago that he walked in one, and then walked right back out, preferring to wait the 45 minute drive to our apartment, rather than braving the unseemly bathroom he had encountered. It's possible Amman will get off this list soon. A new terminal has been under construction for some time, and it is slated for completion by the end of this year. I'm no expert, but it looks nice on the outside. As far as the inside is concerned, I would assume the bathrooms will be great, at least in the beginning. Until then, if you're flying in to or out of Amman, it's probably best--as Frommers's advises--To "hold it" until you get home.

Amman Queen Alia Airport

One of the two airports rated "two stars" by global consulting firm Skytrax, Amman gets lousy ratings for services that might be useful if you're hanging around -- bathroom cleanliness, places to rest, childrens' play facilities, and service counters.

Reviews on the Skytrax website make it clear that you may just want to "hold it" in this airport: they're almost universally appalled at the state of the bathrooms. Those reviewers have probably never been to JFK Terminal 3, but still, that isn't good.

Merry Christmas!

Since arriving back in North America two weeks ago we have been greeted in Minnesota by temperatures 70 to 80 degrees Fahrenheit colder (about 21 to 26 degrees Celsius) than what we had been experiencing in Amman and in Vancouver where we now are with Annamarie's parents by a once in a lifetime snowfall for the area of almost two feet (around 60 centimeters) on Christmas Eve. For two people who have been living in a fairly dry, desert environment for the past 2 1/2 years, the Christmas trip home couldn't have been scripted any better! Merry Christmas everyone!

Gone Home, or Garbage Plane

A few days ago we flew back to the United States for Christmas, to introduce our new baby to friends and family and to just take a bit of a break from life in Jordan. We'll return to Jordan after a few months. Our direct flight on Royal Jordanian Airlines from Amman to Chicago was fairly uneventful, except for the man who shocked all of the stewards by emerging from the bathroom in the back of the plane and began casually meandering to his seat in the front of the plane literally as the wheels of the plane were touching down. In all the flying I have done, in many parts of the world and on many different airlines, this is something I have never seen before. The capper to it was his seeming unawareness--when screamed at to sit down by a stewardess--that he was doing something that in general the airlines quite frown upon. He just walked by her in no particular hurry and pointed towards the front, as if to mean that it was impossible for him to sit down at that time--no matter the position of the plane or the relative state of his safety--because he hadn't yet reached his seat.

Only after we had finally come to a complete stop and were allowed to exit, though, did we realize the carnage that had taken place on our 13 hour and 17 minute flight to Chicago. It dawned on us slowly at first as we struggled through the narrow aisle with our bags and our baby, but once we lifted our heads to observe our surroundings we could see that we were leaving behind an airplane drenched in garbage. There were newspapers strewn about everywhere, as if every passenger had one, and then deposited it on the floor not all put back together but as if each individual section was discarded separately after it had been read. Those in-flight magazines were scattered around as well, their readers apparently unable to slide them back into the pockets in front of them from where they came. There was food spilt on the floor and the seats, along with food wrappers and the plastic cups of a hundred different water requests, all of which somehow missed the post-meal pick-up and the last chance, pre-landing pick-up. There was paper thrown about, as if it had blown in with the wind. Row after row after row was coated with a jaw dropping amount of trash. "Do they treat their homes like this? I don't think so," a steward said to me.

Of course the steward was right. I have been in a number of homes in Jordan, and no, they do not treat them like a garbage dump. Hospitality is an important aspect of Jordanian culture, and a clean house is part of being a good host. Many do, however, treat the streets outside their homes like that. In fact, sometimes littering just seems to be a normal part of every day life. Kids and adults alike are always tossing what they don't need or want to use--be it pop cans, candy wrappers, styrofoam takeaway food containers or the ever popular plastic bags--on to the street. The garbage collectors in our neighborhood spend 10 to 12 hours each day just walking back and forth along the same small route, because once they've cleaned up an area, no doubt someone will have come by in the meantime and thrown to the street something they didn't want.

So it is this culture of littering that reared its head on board the plane with us, with every square inch of the plane taking the place of the streets of Amman and the airline stewards taking the place of our poor, overworked garbage collectors. The flight itself, as I said, was uneventful, which is good for a flight to be. But the site of our garbage plane, along with the brazen last minute bathroom user, made exiting the plane an event I'll not soon forget.

Back from Cyprus

Recently we returned to Jordan after a nine day trip to the Mediterranean island of Cyprus; hence the long silence on this blog. We've been to Cyprus several times now, although not because we especially love it there or find it to be a particularly special place; we go there because it's close, we know people and can usually stay for quite cheap, there are beaches and it is out of the Middle East. Here are a few pictures of our time.

The beach in Larnaca, the southern coastal city where we stayed.

McDonald's, obviously, where we ate for the first time in about seven years, since for our first night we had no food in the house where we were staying. I wouldn't say we were missing much.

Our neighbors at the house where we stayed grilled chicken one night. They were kind enough to bring us a plate.

A sign in Larnaca.

A door in downtown Larnaca.

Drinking Cypriot coffee in a little cafe in Nicosia--the capital city located in the middle of the island.

Some kind of construction was going on in Nicosia at the church behind this green fence.

Lebanon: Outside Beirut

Here are some pictures of our travels outside of Beirut.

Jounieh, north of Beirut.

The small port of Byblos, about 45 minutes north of Beirut, where we saw...

pomegranate trees...

backgammon played in the market area by some small Roman ruins...

beautiful gardens...

flowers...

and churches.

A stream south of Beirut.

The city of Sidon, about 25 minutes south of Beirut, where we saw...

the old souq, or market...

a jumble of wires...

and watermelons overflowing.

Lebanon: Beirut

Yesterday we returned home to Jordan after spending about one month in Beirut. We really enjoyed enjoyed our time in another Middle Eastern capital, and came away with two big impressions of the city.

For one, from both the 23rd floor of the apartment where we were staying and from street level too, the buildings of Beirut shows the scars of violence and civil war it has suffered over the last several decades. After a 15 year civil war that ended in 1990, heavy bombardment by Israel in 2006, and sporadic bouts of unrest and fighting between and since--including skirmishes downtown and in other areas just before we arrived--the city probably has not been able to revamp its infrastructure and keep up with general maintenance the way other cities can. For example, many buildings are still pocked with bullet holes from the civil war, with occasional severely damaged buildings still holding residents in the units that are still somewhat liveable. Although much of the damage has been cleaned up, the 2006 bombing campaign of Israel left empty lots where buildings once stood, the result of vacuum bombs that--after impact--created a hole in the ground and then sucked their target down into it. Also, the paint or stucco of many buildings is peeling or falling off, leaving the brick underneath exposed. Combined with the pollution that had turned many of the buildings a dirty black or grey, parts of the city just looked in need of a 2008 makeover.

One shouldn't have the impression that the whole city was like this, though. A lot of work has been done and is being done in the city, and many new buildings have been erected and others have been restored. We are just not used to seeing bullet riddled buildings and the like, so such images tend to stay with us.

Also, Beirut is also a much more liberal city than Amman, or perhaps it is better to say it is much less conservative. It was rare to see a woman wearing the hijab, and many women were wearing the same kinds of outfits one might see women wearing on hot summer days in Minneapolis. Matt wore shorts every day--men rarely wear shorts in Jordan--and Annamarie wore tank tops and skirts. Also, it was common to see men and women hanging out together, which--as we wrote in a previous post--does not happen much here. To us, this liberalism gave the city a more relaxed feel, and because the atmosphere was so different from Amman, gave our time a vacation-like feel. Here are some pictures.

Looking out from the 23rd floor.

From the boardwalk.

Translation: America is the head of terrorism.

The former Holiday Inn, used as a sniper position in the civil war.

Construction near the waterfront.

A restored building.

Restored area of downtown.

In the neighborhood where we stayed.

A mosque.

A Needed Break in the Mediterranean

Last week we finally took a break from the Middle East and travelled to Cyprus, an island nation in the Mediterranean Sea just 45 minutes by plane from Jordan. It was our first foray out of the Middle East/North Africa region in our year here. Cyprus is a break from the Middle East because it is a European nation, and as such it is a tiny bit more like home and has a much less conservative culture than Jordan. For one week we wiped the dust off of our shorts and Annamarie's skirts and tank tops, relaxed on the beach, held hands in public, interacted with members of the opposite sex and were the focus of no one's attention because of our blond hair, white skin, nationality or Matt's beard. It was quite noticeable that no one paid any attention to us on the street, and when one becomes accustomed to being the daily object of much attention, the lack of any attention is striking. We were just tourists in a place filled with tourists.


Cyprus is not all European, though; it is a little Middle Eastern as well. Although southern Cyprus is Greek speaking, the northern half of the island is Turkish speaking, the result of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974. As a result, the capital of Cyprus--Nicosia--is the only remaining divided capital in the world. We visited Nicosia several years ago and there is a wall right down the center of the city. This division of the island is of course still being disputed today. For more information about this history, click here.


We were too busy relaxing to take many pictures, but here's us relaxing at a cafe in Cyprus.

Why I love flying!

One of my favorite things to do is to travel--well, besides sleeping and drinking good coffee (as many of you who know me well can attest to!) Over the years we have been able to travel to many amazing places around the world. Just like life, sometimes the journey is just as interesting and eventful as getting to the destination. For example, we get to sit and talk for hours to intriguing people from around the world, experience collective stress and relief with our fellow passengers when the pilot announces there is going to be an emergency landing because something is wrong with the plane or of course learn patience when our flight is delayed--for the third time that day. But the one thing I have grown to love when flying--especially outside of the United States of America--is the moment RIGHT AFTER the plane descends and the back wheels are done bumping up and down on the runway. The engines have stopped roaring like a pack of lions and the front wheels once again become connected to the earth. It is at this moment that the applause starts from the passenger cabin.

I Love THIS! For some it is an applause of relief and for others it is praise for the flight crew and the good job they have done. For me it is both of these things, but I like to think of it as a time of collective thanks to God from all the passengers that we have arrived safely. It is appreciating for just a moment before chaos ensues and we are all pushing to get our luggage from the overhead compartment or calling our ride on our cell phones, that we were in it together--not just defying gravity while flying 30,000 feet above this earth--but in life as well, and that we are experiencing community, if just for that short time.