Sites of Jordan II: Wadi Rum

After over two years of living in Jordan, last week we finally visited one of the most famous places in the country--the desert of Wadi Rum. As soon as we entered it, I wondered why it took that long.

Located in the very south of Jordan, Wadi Rum is a unique desert wilderness of about 420 square miles. Wadi means "valley" in Arabic, and the wide and flat desert of fine, red sand is surrounded on each side by tall, mountainous outcrops, many shooting straight up to the sky. There are also many places where the wind has created large sand dunes that rest like giant waves, frozen against these rocky walls. Amazingly, until recently the desert was home to seven nomadic tribes--Bedouins--who lived off of and roamed the area with their goat herds, living in huge tents made of goat hair. There is even a phrase in Arabic for this type of tent--beit shar--which literally means house of hair.

We drove out in a jeep and spent the night with a local guide who said there were about 20 families who still lived in the desert. He was 28 years old, and said his family came in from the desert to live in the small village of about 1000 people on the western edge when he was 20. He said he didn't like the village as much as the desert, though. Too noisy. Click on this link to find out more about Wadi Rum. It's difficult to describe how truly beautiful and different it is, so here are some pictures of our trip.

From the bottom of a sand dune, and the next two are from the top.

Carvings of camels, said to be about 3,000 years old.



Some Saudi Arabian friends and relatives of our guide arriving to spend the night at our campsite.

They eventually brought out the biggest argileh we had ever seen.

What Happens When Genders Mix

Last month we posted a story about gender mixing in Jordan. However, a few days ago an article in the Jordan Times that shows what happens sometimes when the genders do mix--women get harassed--caught my attention. In this case, it seems that in Jordan there is an epidemic of assaults on female nurses, with 86 reported assaults since the middle of 2007 and 6 last weekend alone. What's more--according to the article--the government seems ambivalent enough about the problem that the Jordan Nurses and Midwives Association is suing the Ministry of Health for their alleged unwillingness to deal with the problem.

Obviously Jordan is not the only country where women are harassed and assaulted. Sadly, that is not unusual in the world. However, I did produce an audible exclamation of shock to myself when I read about this problem. Anyway, I didn't want to say too much really; I just wanted to set up the article and link to it. Here it is. Read it.

Rachel Ray: Terrorist Sympathizer?

A few days ago I heard some rumblings about Food Network star Rachel Ray causing some controversy for sporting a black and white Palestinian head-dress--called a kaffiyeh--in an online advertisement for Dunkin' Donuts that began running at the beginning of May. So, as I do, I went online and looked it up.

I discovered that several weeks after the ad first ran, she and Dunkin' Donuts were heavily criticized in a conservative blog called Little Green Footballs for using the kaffiyeh, saying the ad was "casually promot[ing] the symbol of Palestinian terrorism." Also, conservative blogger and Fox News contributor Michelle Malkin condemned Ray in her blog for donning "a jihadi chic kaffiyeh." According to this article from The New York Times, a firestorm then erupted online--I saw hundreds of references to the ad in just a few minutes of searching--and finally Dunkin Donuts pulled the ad on May 7. Another article on the controversy can be found here on the website of MSNBC.

I spent some time on the Little Green Footballs blog and sifted through a couple hundred of the mostly very angry 493 comments that people left in response to the kaffiyeh controversy. I was surprised by the sheer passion that the respondents had for the issue. They were were quite serious in their disgust, many taking the opportunity to blame the nebulous "left-wing" for the appearance of the kaffiyeh and calling for boycotts of Dunkin' Donuts and discussing writing letters to the company too. Some even sincerely debated whether Ray knew about the symbology of the kaffiyeh or if she was just "clueless" or ignorant" and wore it because it looked nice. Someone even casually wondered if perhaps Ray was "of Muslim heritage." I did not share their passion, though, and to me, it seemed that such anger over a wardrobe accessory meant that these people were just waiting to get mad about something. So they did.

One of many reasons I don't share their passion is that I have a much different view about the meaning of kaffiyehs. Here, I see them almost every day, and mostly on the heads of old men who used to live in Jerusalem or Jaffa or some other city or village in what is now Israel. The kaffiyeh is just their traditional head-dress, and nothing more. It doesn't mean terrorism just because some people or groups who commit acts of terror also happen to wear it too. That's like calling, for instance, the cowboy hat the "symbol of bank robbery" just because Jesse James used to wear a cowboy hat when robbing banks.

Of course, the simplest reason I don't share their passion on this issue is this: what Rachel Ray is wearing in that ad is NOT a kaffiyeh. This was clearly evident to me not after careful scrutiny or meticulous examination of the above picture, but literally after looking at it for a half second. Yes, what she is wearing around her neck is indeed black and white--the traditional colors of the Palestinian kaffiyeh--and there are tassels on the edges. However, the design of what she is wearing--the arrangement of the black and white colors--is not the same as the design of a traditional kaffiyeh. No kaffiyeh looks like this, or would ever look like this. Instead, a traditional kaffiyeh--as worn here by the deceased Yasser Arafat--looks like this.


Yes, there is a certain similarity between what Ray is wearing around her neck and what Arafat is wearing on his head. Both items are scarf-like, and as mentioned above both are black and white. However, all black and white scarves are not kaffiyehs, and what Ray is wearing is not a kaffiyeh. It's unfortunate that so many people got so bothered and that so much angst was spent and wasted over Rachel Ray's scarf. Just a little research and open mindedness would have shown that there was no reason to be so irate, but unfortunately--and ironically--so many people chose to remain "clueless" and "ignorant", and thus they became upset.

Gender Mixing

Recently the two of us spent some time in the company of a Jordanian man and woman who were not related to each other in any way. This may sound unremarkable to you, but as far as I can remember, this was just the second time in our two years here that we have spent time in a mixed gender social setting in which the mixed genders present were not related. This is indicative of the segregated nature of Jordanian society. Men and women don't mix much, and when they do, often times they are related.

It is this segregation of the sexes that creates vexing problems for me sometimes. For instance, even after two years in our apartment building, I still would not recognize two out of the three Jordanian women who live here if I ran into them on the street. I've had conversations with them, but only through the closed doors of their apartments when I've come to ask a question of their husbands. Hence, I have no idea what they look like.

A further issue occurs when I see women on our street that I have seen outside before and know live nearby. My instinct is to be friendly, to say a simple hello, perhaps engage in small talk, and move on. This is what I would do at home, and perhaps after a time we would move on from small talk to something more meaningful. Here, though, such friendliness would be considered somewhat forward, and who knows who might be looking down on me from their upstairs window? As a result, if I happen to cross paths with a women, usually I just put my head down and keep walking. This even troubles me, though, when I come across women I do know. Recently I happened to be at the falafal shop nearby when a women from church came in. I talk to her at church, and she has been to our home more than once. However, because of the stigma that surrounds gender mixing here, I was unsure of how to acknowledge her presence. I wanted to greet her, but I didn't want to appear too friendly in front of all the guys at the falafal shop. So, we did speak for a minute, but it was an awkward conversation during which I wondered the whole time what everyone else was thinking.

Of course men and women do mix here--there is no 100 percent adherence to any cultural norm--and Jordan is not Saudi Arabia, where gender segregation is so strong that women make up only 5 percent of the workforce. However, since I am a foreigner transplanted into a different culture half-way around the world I do not always know which women I am allowed to talk to, and when and where I can talk to them.

Interestingly, though, when I expressed this frustration to a Jordanian friend of mine, to my great surprise, he said he that he had the same problem! He also did not always know with whom it was appropriate to speak, and when and where it was appropriate. He was born here, raised here and lives here still, but the question of gender mixing--and more simply, of the basic friendly greeting on the street--was still difficult for him. He said if he came across the wife of one of his friends outside, he would feel comfortable greeting them. However, that is about all he felt reasonably comfortable with. Instead, the best thing, he said, was just to wait and see if you are greeted first. So, I am trying to do that. I am waiting, and looking forward to one day putting a face to those voices behind the doors.

Planning

Recently online I came across a couple of interesting items from the past that relate to current events in the Middle East and to current American politics. They also have to do with words matching actions, and with planning.

The first item concerns the rising gas prices, which makes headline news nearly every day now and which often is mentioned in emails we receive from home. Gas is, by the way, still cheaper in the United States than it is here. Anyway, a week or so ago President Bush was in Saudi Arabia to commemorate 75 years of US-Saudi relations, and while there he politely asked the Saudis to increase output in order to facilitate lower prices. The Saudis, however, as you may know, declined his request. You can read about it here.

I found this to be interesting because I happened to discover online the other day that asking the Saudis for a break is exactly what Bush said he would do while on the campaign trail in 2000. If gas got too expensive, he said, he would talk to the Saudis or Kuwaitis "and convince them to open up the spigot." You can read about that here. So, here is an example of a presidential candidate doing exactly what he said he would do, even eight years after his statement was made. Unfortunately, though, it didn't work. So I wonder, was that his plan for dealing with energy related issues from the beginning? And, if so, what's Plan B?

The second item concerns the war in Iraq, and the issue of giving American troops and the American people a timetable for American withdrawal. This is a hot issue because Bush is steadfastly opposed to such a timetable, while many in the Democratic Party support the idea, and presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have both discussed what their timetables might be if elected. Although I was steadfastly opposed to making war with Iraq--complete with protesting in anti-war marches, peace buttons, a sign in our front yard and plenty of conversations with people about war not being the answer--I haven't totally made up my mind on the merits of a timetable or early withdrawal. After all, it is possible that pulling out early may unleash even more chaos on Iraq if the instability created by the war isn't cleaned up. All that said, though, also as I happened to discover online the other day, then candidate Bush actually supported setting a timetable for American involvement in Kosovo when on the campaign trail in 1999. At that time, during the campaign designed to protect Albanians from being attacked by Serbians in what was then Yugoslavia, he said that it was "important" for then President Bill Clinton "to lay out a timetable as to how long [the troops] will be involved and when they will be withdrawn." You can read about it here.

So, here is an example of a presidential candidate seemingly at odds with a previous statement regarding a similar situation. Yes, it is true that the two wars aren't totally analogous--and people and situations change--but his current rhetoric in which he deplores the very idea of a timetable as "defeatist" language seems out of step with his earlier rhetoric. So, again I wonder about the plans he had from the beginning. Since he seemed to have believed a timetable was appropriate for his predecessor, why was and is it not appropriate for him? What was his plan for leaving Iraq at the start of the war? After five years, are we on Plan B, C? It just seems that whether the early rhetoric of President Bush matched his later actions or not, it appears obvious--as the price of gas continues to rise and the violence rages on in Iraq--that better plans were needed.

Twins

While walking through the old city of Damascus one time we came upon a row of portraits tacked on to an old stone wall near some even older Roman columns, in the square just outside the most famous section of the market. Although the portraits were of the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, I couldn't help but think that they bore an uncanny resemblance to a basketball player I grew watching in the 1980s. What do you think?

Bashar al-Assad

His NBA Look-alike

One day in Syria

This week we took a quick trip north up to Syria. After an eight hour wait at the border and catching a new taxi about a half hour later after a collision with a wild dog on the dark night road rendered our original car undriveable, we made it to Damascus and pleasantly found our room at the convent where we were staying to still be reserved for us. Here are a few random pictures of our time.

I am in Jordan

Our neighborhood here in Amman is in an area roughly between west and east Amman. In west Amman--which also happens to be the more "western" part of the city--there are large, single family homes mixed in with newer apartment buildings of shiny glass and clean white stone. The streets are wider and quieter, and there is a possibility of being surprised by small patches of green grass at random locations. In the business areas many of the buildings look like smaller versions of those downtown at home, with large glass facades, less stone and more color, and if the business is selling clothes--with giant advertisements featuring white people. In these areas it is also possible to find one of the nine Starbucks that have recently cropped up here and be surrounded by an interior that mirrors exactly the interior of every Starbucks at home. In east Amman--which also happens to be the more "traditional" part of the city--there are no single family homes, just older apartment buildings in various stages of dirty brown. The streets are narrower and loud, and seeing patches of green grass definitely would be a surprise. The businesses look much like the apartment buildings--mostly dusty stone--and there are no Starbucks.

The point of describing all of this is to say that there are places in Amman where an American can go and--if you want to--be surrounded by home, and almost forget you are in Jordan. However, if I ever do forget where I am--which will mean I am spending way too much time in west Amman--it is conversations like the following that will snap me back to my reality.

One day a friend of mine whom I visit two or three times per week asked me if I wanted to go out to a coffee shop on a particular night. I said that would be great, but before I gave a final answer I would just have to check to make sure with my wife first. At this statement he furrowed his brow and cocked his head to one side, betraying noticeable, genuine confusion.

"Why?" he said. There was no malice or contention in his voice; he was actually, sincerely curious as to the answer.

"Because she's my wife, and I need to check with her," I said. "I am not the lord of the house."

He said nothing, as if he was still pondering what I had said and letting the words swim around in his head.

"Is this strange?" I said.

"Yes. This is the Middle East," he finally responded. "We don't need to ask."

"You are the lord of the house?"

"Yes, we are the lord of the house."

A few days later he was discussing a trip he might take to Egypt, and he asked me if I wanted to come with. Now, a trip to Egypt would be no small endeavor, and of course much bigger than a trip to a coffee shop, so I gave him the only answer I could at that time. "Maybe," I said. "But first--" and then he stopped me.

"You have to ask your wife?" he said.

"Yes," I replied with a smile, knowing full well his exasperation with such an answer. "I have to ask my wife."

With that, he smiled, chuckled gently and shook his head. This business of asking my wife was indeed a bizarre, humorous thing to him, and I think as much of an interesting cultural experience for him as it was for me. His reaction and our ensuing conversation also served to remind me that I am, indeed, in Jordan.

Sites of Jordan: The Dead Sea

Part of the reason we do this blog and live in Jordan is to help people get to know Jordan and the Middle East a little better. We haven't blogged much about the sites and attractions of the country during our two years here but there are many, and we have decided to start drawing some attention to them here. Just call it our small part in helping to boost tourism in Jordan, which is the number one industry of the country and somewhat of a lifeline for the economy.

Seriously--although we do not love everything about living here--we do think there are many things to like about Jordan and many great things to see and experience for a traveller. So, expect periodic entries from now on dealing with the touristic possibilities of Jordan.

The first site we want to highlight is the Dead Sea, since we were just there recently with our friends Erin and Neeraj and their son Ezra who were kind enough to visit us from the States. The Dead Sea--known as the "Salt Sea" and the "Sea of Arabah" in the Bible--is located in the Jordan Valley and is the lowest place on earth, about 1300 feet or 400 meters below sea level. It is referred to as dead because there is nothing that lives or can live in it, due to the high salt content of the water, which is around 30 percent. This is about ten times as much as the salt content of the oceans of the world, and about twice much as the Great Salt Lake in Utah.

Such high salt content means that the Dead Sea is not where you want to go for a refreshing dip to escape the heat of a summer's day in the valley. Dunking your head into the water will cause debilitating, paralyzing pain when you open your eyes. Also, any major or minor cut on your body will be brought to your attention immediately when your body hits the water, and you will at once totally understand the significance and meaning of pouring salt in someones wounds.

However, such high salt content does mean that the Dead Sea is where you want to go if you just want a carefree, relaxing, and one of a kind float atop the water. The Dead Sea is unique because you cannot sink in it; the salt keeps you afloat in any position. It is because of this that I love going there, as to me you cannot beat the feeling of near weightlessness you experience while floating effortlessly over the sea. In fact, when we went last time I spent an hour alone just drifting--hands behind my head and feet pointing out of the water in front of me--not just physically on top of the water, but also mentally between a quiet pondering of the intricacies of life and a state of semi-conscious napping. I recommend trying it, but don't forget your sunblock. Here are some pictures of our time there.

A word of caution on the way to the Dead Sea.

Neeraj and I floating.

Israel/Palestine in the background.

Near the shore.

Somebody enjoying a smoke while encased in Dead Sea mud, which is good for the skin.

Sunset, with the buildings of Jerusalem becoming visible on top of the mountain in the distance.

Easter in Jordan Part II, or Happy Egg

Writing about Easter the other day reminded me of a story a friend of mine told me last year. It's not a long story, but to me quite funny, and also indicative of how little many Muslims here know about the Christians who live amongst them.

According to my friend, two years ago on Easter he wanted to wish his Christian friend a good Easter. Being a Muslim, however, he was apparently unsure of exactly how to do that, as he proceeded to say to his friend not "Happy Easter," or "Have a good Easter"--or something along those lines--but instead, "Happy Egg." He said after this his friend had a good laugh at him. I didn't catch if his friend then took the opportunity to tell him what Easter is all about, but I do know that he at least found out from him that "Happy Egg" is a dubious Easter salutation. It is, however, the thought that counts.

Easter in Jordan

Yesterday was Easter here in Jordan. Since Easter occurred a month ago at home, this may surprise a lot of people who read this, but we celebrate Easter here according to the Orthodox calendar, which is different from the western calendar. Since Sunday is the first day of the work week here, Easter Sunday is, of course, different from Easter Sunday at home. Christians may have the day off--although not necessarily--but everyone else is working, or does whatever else they do on a regular day of the week. Also, at the most the population of Jordan is around 5 percent Christian, so very few people were actually celebrating the holiday.

Still, there were signs that Easter was being celebrated here. At 11 o'clock the night before we could hear the bells from a church ringing in the distance, calling worshippers to a pre-Easter, midnight service. As I sat in the windowsill, taking in the cool night air and enjoying the absence of almost any other sound, it was a simple, beautiful reminder of the coming of the day. Also, it is traditional here for Christians to visit their friends and family on Sunday after the Easter service and for one or two days afterwards, like Muslims do during their two Eids. We have several Christian families on our street, and as a result on Sunday we saw a steady stream of people outside our apartment making the rounds in their best clothes. At times we could hear them laughing or just talking loudly--cheerful sounds that we don't always hear on our street. This helped--along with the church bells--in a small way to give the day a festive, holiday atmosphere, at least in the area around our apartment.

Happy Easter From Jordan!

Mapping Amman

Among the many things about Amman that struck me when we first moved here was a simple, yet extremely noticeable detail: the city had few street names and few actual addresses. This seemed strange to me--especially for a city of several million people--since I was coming from a city like Minneapolis, where every kind of street is named and which runs on a straight and easy grid pattern, making any destination easy to find if you just know the address. Because of the lack of street names and building numbers here, however, most destinations are not always so easy to find. Instead, if you want someone to find your home, for instance, you end up pointing people to the nearest large landmark, then to a certain falafal shop, then a certain number of streets, and so on. Or, to find someones home you have to navigate directions like those we were given below (some details have been taken out):

From _____ go under the tunnel toward _____. Continue straight through _____.
Take the first right (at a toy store).
Go through two stop signs. After the second, turn left at the next street.
Go until the road T's. Turn right.
Take the second left.
This is a dead end street--they are at the end--#____ on the right.
Their apartment is on the ____ floor--use the middle set of doors and head up the stairs.

Recently Annamarie ran into some German tourists near our apartment who asked her for directions to a certain restaurant. They were frustrated, as they couldn't find any reliable maps, and even if they could, they said, nobody they asked could tell them where the street was that they were looking for.

Perhaps, however, this is changing, as a few months ago big, blue numbers like this began appearing on buildings in many parts of Amman.


Then, new street signs like this one began appearing at intersections throughout Amman.


I don't know if these streets already had names but just weren't signed, or if they got names and signs at the same time. Whatever the case, it appears that in the future, navigating the city will be easier for me--and for German tourists.

Living Overseas 101

"WE DO NOT NEED TO UNDERSTAND OTHER PEOPLE AND THEIR CUSTOMS FULLY TO INTERACT WITH THEM AND LEARN IN THE PROCESS; IT IS MAKING THE EFFORT TO INTERACT WITHOUT KNOWING ALL THE RULES, IMPROVISING CERTAIN SITUATIONS THAT ALLOW US TO GROW."
Mary Catherine Bateson, writer and cultural anthropologist

Presidential Politics in Jordan

A few days ago I saw a short report on CNN discussing the views on the presidential race in the United States from people in various countries around the world. I can't remember all the countries from which CNN reported, but the theme was the same in each: the reporters believed most of the people in the country wanted either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama to win, and they also didn't really know who John McCain was.

I found this report interesting because it exactly mirrored the opinions of everyone--and I do mean everyone--I know or have discussed the election with here. All of these people want Clinton to win--although they would accept an Obama victory--and very few know much about the Republican nominee or even know his name.

From the conversations I have had, this overwhelming affinity for Hillary Clinton and the Democrats in general seems to stem from two reasons. First, most of the people here really like Hillary's husband, Bill Clinton. Exactly why this is I am not sure, but it probably has something to do with his push to find a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Most of this occurred late in his presidency, but I think most people here believe that his approach to the issue was more evenhanded than is George Bush's approach. Although one can debate the specifics of this point, it is at least a reasonable position to hold, unlike the position of one particular friend of mine, who told me he likes Bill Clinton because when he was president, "there were no wars in the world." Of course this position is not just debatable, it is not true.

This does bring me, though, to the second reason that Jordanians support Hillary Clinton for president, would accept an Obama victory and know next to nothing about John McCain. They know that Clinton is a Democrat, and that her main challenger in the general election will be a Republican, the same party as George W. Bush, whom they do not like. Most Jordanians see Bush as one who has created chaos in their part of the world with invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, supported oppression by maintaining strong ties with Israel and yet is still perhaps willing to cause more chaos in the general region by invading Iran. He does not have a good name here, and as a result neither does his party. I supported decisions other than what the president made and continues to make regarding these issues, so I can agree with a lot of what people say here and believe that many of their opinions are again at least reasonable, debatable positions to hold. However, people here can be lead by their dislike of the president to hold some unreasonable and irrational positions and attribute too many of the problems in the world to him, such as my same friend, who believes all of the wars and war-like violent conflicts in the world currently being waged are the fault of the president--somehow even, he said, the war in Darfur, Sudan in which a Muslim government is fighting Muslim rebels and killing Muslim civilians.

Whatever their reasons--reasonable to me or not--the Jordanians I know hope Hillary Clinton is the next President of the United States. If she loses the Democratic nomination to Barack Obama, though, I'm sure they will then hope for an Obama victory. I'm also sure that over these next few months as election day in the United States nears, a lot of Jordanians will be almost as interested as I am to see what the outcome will be, and what that means for American policy in this part of the world.

Spring is Near

Days here in Amman are starting to be longer and warmer. You can feel a change is coming and we are ready. Winters in Amman may not be as severe or long as they are in Minnesota but we find them harder somehow. Maybe because there are no outdoor activities here like cross-country skiing, quiet walks in Powderhorn Park after a fresh snowfall, sledding or broomball. Or it could be because the heating systems in most houses in Minnesota provide relief from the cold, which the heating systems here don't always do. This is especially noticeable on those days here when we can see our breath inside!



Spring in Jordan is my favorite season as the country that is normally dusty and brown blooms in color for a few weeks. The weather is nearly perfect--warm enough to relax in the sun but cool enough so that you aren't ready to run for shade after 10 minutes. Over the weekend the weather was warm and sunny--the beginning of spring in Amman--so we decided to go for a picnic. We packed a bag of warm pita and fresh hummus and went up to the Citadel, the site of the biblical city of Rabboth Ammon and the Greek and Roman city of Philadelphia which is located on a hill overlooking downtown Amman. We were greeted by some new friends who sat and talked with us and shared our food.

A Final Sudan Post

While in Sudan we stayed with some friends in Um Durman, a city north of Khartoum just across the Nile River. All the homes there--and throughout the Khartoum area--had high mud walls all around them like the one behind the girl in this picture.

Two girls near our friends' house.



Annamarie washing her feet at the basin in our friends' courtyard. Many homes in the Khartoum area have basins like this in the area in front of the door to the house.



Matt pretending to help clean up the kitchen after lunch. Like all homes we saw, this kitchen was located in a separate area outside of the main part of the house.



The neighborhood dry cleaner.



Two men in a busy market in Um Durman.



We had the opportunity to visit several friends during our time in Sudan. After about an hour on the bus, this three-wheeled vehicle--the driver is inside--took us the rest of the way to the home of one friend in an area just south of Khartoum. We were told this particular town was the last place in the Khartoum area that had electricity.



Annamarie with another friend and her children at their home in another area outside of Khartoum.



A soccer match outside their house.



A woman selling Sudanese coffee and tea on the street in Khartoum. These women were everywhere, and we stopped every day for a drink.