The Beginning of the End

My last weekend in Jordan was filled with sun, beaches, coral, beautiful sunsets, jellyfish, racy romance novels, price-gouging taxi drivers, awfully awesome restaurant soundtracks, and some entirely lovely people.  I finally got to swim in the Red Sea and did little to no studying for my impending finals.  Nothing like going out Aqaba-style.

Now I just have to survive an Arabic language post-test, two finals, a "reorientation" session, and a good amount of packing and then in just over 48 hours I will be on my way to Hamburg.  I can't believe how quickly this snuck up on me.  I'm beyond excited to visit Europe for the first time, to see five of my favorite people in the world, to be back in my beautiful DC, but I'm so sad to leave the amazing community I've found here.  I love looking around at my fusha class and thinking that I'm surrounded by the group of people that one day may solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or broker a momentous peace treaty.  I love it when my host mom says that she'll miss me (even though I'm sure I'm just another in the litany of American girls that sleep in their spare bedroom).  I love cab rides with the neighborhood girls, strawberry-banana-milk smoothies for 1JD, silly evenings in Amigos, long bus trips, and the Jebal Amman rooftop at midnight.  Sup feelings, you make these things hard.

Jesus Christ, Superstar

My weekend in Israel was much like a white bread sandwich.  The beginning and the end (aka the border crossings) weren't so great on their own, but the middle was full of good stuff.  My first moments in Israel were entirely composed of waiting in lines, waiting in more lines, and waiting in chairs.  My last moments involved shelling out a 172 shekel exit tax to the Israeli government.  Also, we somehow managed to get stuck with the least amicable border guards ever, so we all ended up with Israeli passport stamps.  While this is normally a pretty cool memento, the proof in my passport that I've been to Israel means that any future travel plans to basically everywhere in the Middle East save Jordan and Egypt are off until 2019 or I "lose" my passport.  Such is life.

Paul and Lura demonstrate their satisfaction with their Israeli passport stamps.

I've never been more aware of my blond-haired, blue-eyed, white-skinned appearance than at the Israeli border crossing.  Our group was composed of four of the whitest people on the planet and a friend who is half American and half Algerian.  It made me really uncomfortable that he was treated so differently from the rest of us.  No one was mean to him, but he was questioned fairly extensively while no one even gave my passport a second look despite the Syrian visa and Lebanese stamps contained therein. 

The rest of the weekend was a considerable improvement on its somewhat rocky beginning.  Our hostel was smack dab in the middle of Old City Jerusalem for maximum exploring potential.  I loved hearing the beautiful mangle of shofars, calls to prayer, and church bells wafting from their respective quarters.  I loved watching the sunset reflect across the Dome of the Rock from our hostel's roof.  I loved walking around the walls of the Old City with its amazing vistas and glimpses into random backyards.  I loved learning that, at least where I was, Arabic was a much more useful language than Hebrew.  I loved seeing the graffiti that graces walls everywhere.  I loved hearing a group of religious tourists spontaneously begin singing a hymn in the Room of the Last Supper.  And, perhaps most of all, I loved eating bagels. Nomnomnom.

Tamara and I trying to win the AU
Abroad Photo Contest at the Dome of the Rock.

Old City Jerusalem
.

GODZILLA BIRD
Model of Jerusalem at the time of the Second Temple at the Israel Museum.

Despite all these amazing things, the best part of the weekend was hiking up the Mount of Olives, where God will start to redeem the dead on the Day of Judgment, so the story goes.  At the base of the mountain was probably my favorite place in Jerusalem--the Church of Nations and the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus was supposedly arrested.  Nothing beats the combination of beautiful mosaics, 2000-year-old olive trees, and a location a little off the beaten path.  At the top of the mountain, we had the most amazing view of the Jerusalem.  Perfection.

View of the cemetery and the Dome of the Rock
from the Mount of Olives.

Church of Nations
.

Adam, Paul, me, Tommy, and Lura on the Mount of Olives

And in conclusion, I saw this:

Really.

"A Rose-Red City Half as Old as Time"

No joke.  Petra was amazing--very hot, very sunny, LOTS of stairs--but amazing. There are no words; pictures will have to suffice.

Paul and Rachel + Petra.

The Treasury of Indiana Jones fame.
Yes, those are real-sized people at the bottom.

The Urn Tomb circa 6th century BC. 
The Nabateans were clearly on their game.

Some lazy people (aka my friends) napping on the
High Point of Sacrifice.

(

Best view in Petra. 
Off the beaten path is the best way to be.

How do rocks look this cool?

I wish every weekend could involve this many pretty rocks, Harry Potter references, and bad tourist outfits.  Additionally, laying on our hostel's roof under a nearly full moon looking out at the city lights was one of my favorite moments of life, period.  On a scale of innocuous to ferocious, Petra ranks somewhere in the "I must come back here" zone.

Gobble Gobble Part II

The second half of my Turkish journey was spent mostly on planes and buses and more buses, but the in-between was entirely worth it. On Tuesday, we flew from Istanbul to Antalya, a town on the southern coast of Turkey, and then took series of three different buses through gorgeous mountain roads with occasional views of the sea before finally arriving at our destination--the Bayram's Treehouses in the tiny village of Olympos.

Our stay in Olympos could not have been more different than our experiences in Istanbul. The mere 36 hours that we spent there were filled with exploring 2nd century BC ruins, lounging on the beach in the sun, night swimming, playing with the stray dog that adopted us, chatting by the fire with the myriad other interesting travelers, and, best of all, sleeping in a TREE HOUSE. If this isn't paradise, I don't know what is.

Our distinguished tree house.

Gabby and our adopted stray dog, Qirsh. He was very
concerned for our safety and barked incessantly anytime a
stranger tried to come anywhere near us.

Lura and I on the beach.
(Courtesy of Gabby Arens)

Gabby and I climbed to the top of the ruins aka up a
mountain (in skirts and sandals no less). 
Greatest view on earth. 
(Courtesy of Gabby Arens)

Gabby, exploring the ruins of Olympos.

After our brief stay in Olympos, we headed back to Istanbul for one last night of whirlwind adventure. Gabby's family friend's sister-in-law, Akca, had graciously insisted that we spend our last night with her and her boyfriend Ercan in their apartment in Chihagir (Istanbul's equivalent of Greenwich village) instead of in a hostel. We had the greatest time with them--we drank tea at an itty bitty cafe overlooking the water, ate a delicious kebab dinner in Taksim and dessert right next to the Gallata Tower (so beautiful at night!), and went dancing until the wee hours of the morning.

View from Akca's living room window!
.

Sunset tea overlooking the Bosphorus?
Yes, please!

Ercan, Akca, Lura, me, and Gabby in Taksim. 
They have a silly device on the side of the street that
takes your picture and then emails it to you!

The next morning, we awoke to the only sunny day in Istanbul of our entire trip. After some exploring of Chihagir and Taksim, we went back to the Grand Bazaar to visit our shopkeeper friend "Dennis" (I don't know what his name really is, but it sounded kind of like Dennis) who calls us his angels and then hopped on a plane back to Amman. 

It was so weird to go to Turkey after being in Jordan for two months. Men and women hold hands in the street. People go from bar to bar with open beer bottles in hand. I even saw women's shoulders and collar bones, ya haram! But at the same time, it felt familiarly Middle Eastern. It was such an amazing intersection of cultures that I could have spent weeks wrapping my mind around it all.

The other thing that really hit me while I was there is how unbelievably lucky I am to have learned English as my first language. All four of us were a little shell-shocked when we got off of the plane and realized that we didn't know a single word of Turkish. But just about everyone we met could speak at least a couple words of English and many signs had English translations, so we were able to get by. I can't imagine trying to do everything we did if no one spoke our language. Needless to say, I was very happy to return to Amman where I can carry on a decent conversation with a taxi driver and say "thank you" without a 15 second struggle...

Gobble Gobble Part I

My epic Turkish spring break began with a very, very early morning flight to Istanbul and ended with a very, very late night flight back to Amman eight days later. Everything in between was magical. My three travel companions (Gabby, Lauren, and Lura) and I somehow managed to score a week of being spoiled by Gabby's Turkish Microsoft executive family friend. Really. We led charmed lives. For four days, we lived by ourselves in his gorgeous house outside of Istanbul with a trusty private driver to take us wherever we pleased; took long, warm, glorious showers; and had a housekeeper that fed us breakfast every morning complete with the most delicious homemade sour cherry jam on earth. Then, on his recommendation, we spent two nights in a TREE HOUSE on the southern Mediterranean coast, followed by a final night in his sister-in-law's apartment overlooking the Bosphorus and located in what can only be described as Istanbul's answer to Greenwich Village. I still can't figure out how this was my life.

Luckily, our first hour in Turkey did not end up setting the tone for the rest of the trip or prove to be an accurate first impression of our driver, Oral. After he picked us up at the airport, we arrived at a nice-looking house with an adorable garden, piled out of the car, and were ushered inside by a housekeeper-looking woman who didn't speak a word of English. The four of us, exhausted, had collapsed on various pieces of furniture in the living room when the woman suddenly thrust a phone at Gabby. On the other end, a very confused woman demanded to know who we were and what we were doing there, awkward. Oral had misunderstood the directions and brought us to the wrong house. Fortunately, despite the initial snafu, we eventually located the correct residence, were fed many delicious things, and discovered that Oral is in fact an excellent, good-humored, patient, guitar-playing, cupcake-providing driver that just happens to have a somewhat problematic sense of direction leading him to frequently solicit the advice of random taxi drivers.

And now, some photographs (many taken by the lovely Gabby Arens, because her photography skills are far superior to my own):

A rainy day at the Blue Mosque.

A very small Meredith in a very large Hagia Sofia.
  (Courtesy of Gabby Arens)

Our trusty private driver and model, Oral.
.

Gabby in a shop near the Grand Bazaar.

The Agora Cafe, in Taksim--Istanbul's
version of Times Square, where we listened to
amazing live Turkish music and every person
in the crowded bar sang along to each song.
(Courtesy of Gabby Arens)

Ferocious at the Dolmabahce Palace, home of Ataturk.

Lauren, Lura, and I eating the most delicious breakfast at
Assk Cafe (love in Turkish) overlooking the Bosphorus.
(Courtesy of Gabby Arens)

Ortakoy, a neighborhood of streetside
jewelry vendors, amazing street food,
and beautiful dusk views of the Straits.

Me plus street waffle covered in chocolate
chips/Nutella/strawberries/pistachios
equals heaven. Concurrent to
Gabby's marriage proposal.

The crew--Lauren, Gabby, Lura, and I--in Ortakoy. 
After the baked potatoes, before the waffles,
both with more toppings than food.

Boat cruise on the Bosphorus! (Courtesy of Gabby Arens)

Other Istanbul Take I highlights not captured on film:
-Steaming hot tea in top-floor cafes overlooking different parts of the city
-Oral keeping track of the number of times I tripped over uneven pavement/my own feet/other obstacles (approximately 7 after four days)
-Going to a real (not touristy!) Turkish hammam (bath) and getting soaped up with a Power Rangers magic pillowcase
-Playing games with the housekeeper's granddaughters
-Trying to negotiate the purchase of a bouquet of flowers via charades and a calculator
-Visiting Istanbul's Microsoft headquarters (twice!)
-Being serenaded by Oral's guitar on our last night
-Lauren accidentally setting off the house alarm trying to get a glass of water in the middle of the night
-Running into other groups of CIEE students all over the place!

Stay tuned for the next part of the trilogy--Olympos and the Litany of Bus Rides!

"Why is the rum gone!?"--Captain Jack Sparrow

Wadi Rum, that is! (Haha, I am so clever.)

Wadi Rum

Last weekend, I went on an overnight trip to southern Jordan to explore Wadi Rum--the desert valley made famous by the film Lawrence of Arabia.  It amazes me that a place with so little flora and fauna can be so unbelievably gorgeous.  We were there for a mere 24 hours, which was just enough time to get a taste of the area's beauty before being whisked back to the hustle and bustle of Amman (and midterms, yuck).  The most surprising part of the trip for me was realizing that the term "desert" can indicate quite a wide array of landscapes.  Last summer in Egypt, I went on a trip to Siwa (a small oasis town near the Libyan border in the middle of the Sahara) where the desert takes the form of vast, sweeping sand dunes for miles and miles all around.  Wadi Rum looks absolutely nothing like that.  Instead, it consists of flat, packed earth stretching as far as the eye can see dotted with areas of loose, drifting sand and enormous, wind-withered rock formations.  It was simply stunning.

The first afternoon in Wadi Rum, we all piled into the beds of old, rickety pick-up trucks and zoomed around the desert in a generally unsafe but very entertaining fashion.  We stopped at various points to clamber all over the aforementioned rock formations and drink in the expansive views from the higher vantage point and, later, to watch the sun set behind the distant mountains.  After it got dark, the old, rickety pick-ups dropped us off in a "Bedouin camp" (aka a super touristy, super cliche, not at all realistic recreation of a real Bedouin camp with a full buffet) for the night.  The high point of evening was not the camp itself, but walking out into the desert to lay under the stars and contemplate life.  Perfection.

Clambering on rock formations in an unsafe manner.

Me and some desert.

Sunset

The next day, after waking up to the sun streaming into my Bedouin tent, the moment came that I have been anxiously awaiting since the minute I first considered traveling to the Middle East.  I RODE A CAMEL.  Her name in Arabic was something that sounded sort of like "Gouda"... you know, like the cheese.  I felt a little weird about that, so I renamed her Eleanor.  She was perfect (and pregnant!!).

My partner-on-camel, Gabby, with Titan, Eleanor's esteemed husband.

I loved absolutely everything about camel-riding--the sun on my back, the slow lurching movement, the faint sound of Arabic music emanating from our guide's cell phone.  Throughout the ride, I was alternatively reminded of the McKinley Middle School rafting trip (?!) and concerned that the sand people (a la Star Wars) might stage an ambush as any moment.  Without dispute, it was one of the most beautiful, peaceful, self-contemplative experiences of my life (which is probably why it reminded me of the rafting trip).  It only fell short of perfection because I felt a little awkward that our guides walked along next to us for three hours while 85 American college students rode their camels.  Womp womp.

Ahmed and Ibrahim (our guides), Eleanor, and I
after the arduous journey.

And now a brief round-up of other news:
-If you've been following the news coming out of the Middle East at all, you may have seen that the protests in Amman became violent for the first time last Friday, resulting in one death and approximately 100 injuries.  Never fear, I was in the middle of the desert when all of this was going down and am perfectly safe.  If you are interested, I recommend this post from my friend Betsy's blog for a fair, straightforward account of what happened.
-Yesterday was my 21st birthday!  It was pretty low-key because we're in the middle of midterms, but it was still lovely because my host mom made me a delicious chocolate cake, the whole family sang me "Happy Birthday" in French and English (but strangely enough, not Arabic?!), and a couple of the neighborhood CIEE girls showed up to study for our Islam in the Modern Context midterm toting a box of my new favorite Jordanian desert--ma'amoul. 
-Next week is my spring break and in just over 24 hours I will be on my way to Turkey!  We're going to hang out in Istanbul for a couple of days and then head south to Olympos to stay in TREE HOUSES.  I had been planning to go to Syria and Lebanon, but recent developments caused me to scrap that plan.  Safety first and all that jazz.  I'm disappointed, but the tree houses will undoubtedly make up for it.  Stay tuned!

Night & Day

This weekend, while my nights were spent slogging away at a god-awful paper instead of sleeping, I spent my glorious daylight hours gallivanting around the northern part of Jordan.  On Friday, my Islam and the Modern Context class went on a field trip to visit a number of holy sites in Salt (Jordan's oldest continuously inhabited city) and the Jordan Valley.  While it was kind of cool to see shrines for various prophets and companions of Muhammed, the best part of the day was chatting with our professor, Dr. Samira.  In class, she comes off as very knowledgeable and as sweet as can be, but talking with her in an informal setting was truly a phenomenal experience.  She studied in Britain (and has two PhD's!) but is a fairly conservative Muslim, so she has a very interesting perspective on the world.  I feel like I could sit and chat with her for hours and learn something new every single moment.  Also, she made us maklouba for lunch... mmmmmm.

Mosque housing a shrine for one of the
Prophet's companions in the Jordan Valley.
.

I don't normally cover my hair, but you have to
if you want to enter a mosque. 
(We even got yelled at once by a sheik's son!)

Margot and Aliya in the garden
at one of the mosques.
.

Mosque housing a shrine for another
prophet in Salt... and the back of
my professor's head.

 After we got back to Amman, we stopped by the King Hussein Mosque.  It is brand new (just finished in 2006) and easily one of the most beautiful locations I have ever seen in real life.  We were there right at sunset and it could not have been more perfect.  At one point, the muezzin (the guy who does the call to prayer) stopped to talk to us.  He went on a short rant about how important it is for Americans to learn about the real Islam (translated via our professor) and he said, "We honor women.  I am only 29 and I have two wives!"  It was awkward and he looked kind of like Professor Snape, but it was all worth if after he left and our professor whispered to us, "I do not think he meant he honors women, I think he meant that he loves them!"  This from an adorable, 70-year-old woman in a hijab.

Then, on Saturday, I went on a trip to Ajloun, another city north of Amman.  We went hiking in the Dana Nature Reserve, were welcomed into the home of a random family in a random village in the valley for lunch, and then visited Ajloun Castle (a crusader castle like Karak, only much better preserved). 

Wild strawberry tree in the Dana Nature Reserve.

Hiking.

Ajloun Castle!

Chillin' on a castle, no big deal.

نهاية الاسبوع الجميلة (a beautiful weekend), indeed.

This entry was also posted to the AU Ambassadors blog for prospective American University students.

Salt, Mud, and Crusaders

My house has been quite chaotic for the last several days.  My host brother, Najib, who works as a lawyer in Saudi Arabia, came home for the weekend.  In honor of his visit, we had the whole extended family over for brunch.  There was a plethora of food involved:  zaatar bread, hummus, falafel, something resembling an omelet, a cheese-walnut-olive oil mixture whose name I do not recall, all the Jordanian standard dishes.  I wish I had taken a photo of the spread before it was demolished, but suffice to say that is was absolutely delicious and I ate far too much.

It surprised me how the atmosphere of the big family gathering transcended cultural idiosyncrasies.  I felt like I could have been at any Morrison or Frey family event (with the small exception that I didn't actually know anyone or understand what they were talking about).  At one point, I could tell that there was a heated political discussion occurring about Mubarak and Qaddafi and I wish so much that I could have understood better what people's views were.  Short of my professors, I know so little about what ordinary Jordanians think about what is going on in the region.  The one thing everyone does seem to agree on is that Qaddafi is majnoon (crazy).  Additionally, I met an Arab with a Wisconsin accent!  One of the cousins that was there actually lives in the Chicago area and was just in Amman visiting family for a few days.  As it turns out, he got his masters from the University of Wisconsin, is a die-hard Packers fan, and I have probably driven by his house dozens of times. I'm learning quickly that it really truly is a small world.


On Saturday, I went on a CIEE-sponsored day trip to Karak and the Dead Sea.  Karak is a huge Crusader castle a couple hours south of Amman.  According to my trusty guidebook, it's one of the most well-preserved and easily explorable fortresses of its kind. The castle itself was enormous and it was tons of fun to wander around--I probably could have spent a whole extra hour poking about and trying to locate the "suitably dank" dungeons--but it was the view from the top that was truly spectacular.  As in Jerash, there was no one of authority around except for a couple police officers at the front gate. Consequently, we were able to clamber all over everything in what was most certainly an unsafe manner including climbing to the top of one of the walls.  Amazing.  Now I just need to find somewhere to buy an illegal copy of Kingdom of Heaven so I can see what happened there (or at least Hollywood's interpretation thereof).

Karak Castle

Lovely Lura at Karak

After exploring Karak in the morning, we drove through more of the breathtakingly beautiful scenery that I saw last weekend between Madaba and Ma'in to the Dead Sea.  I've seen a partially obstructed view of the sea from afar on several occasions since I arrived in Jordan, but this was the first time that I really got to see it, touch it, and (unfortunately) taste it.  I did all the typical touristy things--slathered mysef in mud, almost got cut up on the salt formations, floated around, tried not to get salt in my eyes--and had a marvelous time doing so. 

Dead Sea mud!  Erika, Jessica, me, and Gabby

Mike and I demonstrating our floating abilities.

I had really been expecting that the whole floating thing wouldn't really live up to the hype... but oh was I wrong.  It was amazing to feel completely weightless, to "stand" upright in the water without sinking, to be in kilometers-deep water without exerting any effort whatsoever.  I can't wait to go back!