Amman

Tucker, Rikke and I combined for another weekend adventure to Amman a few weeks ago. Rikke, my Danish friend, in case you don't read every one of these, went on an organized tour of Jordan several years ago to visit NGOs working towards peace in the Middle East. While there, she met a young man named Mohammed (go figure). They became quick friends and so she had wanted to visit him this year and used Tucker and I's enthusiasm for visiting Amman as a good excuse. On the plus side for us, we got a free place to stay and a great tour guide in Mohammed. Tucker and I left Haifa at noon on Thursday, arrived to the border around 330 though it is only about 50 kilometers from Haifa. This is due to the fact that there is not one direct way to cross the border. No buses even go to the border crossing. It is incredible that two countries that share so much border have so few opportunities for interaction. Neither Jordanians nor Israelis are very keen on travel to the "other" side. Both have fears of violence directed at them and feelings of discomfort which might be well founded across that imaginary line. It took a couple of hours to go through the border crossing itself which included an hour to wait for a bus to drive us literally 100 yards across a bridge. They will not allow you to walk. We then hired a cab once in Jordan to drive us the two hours to the capital city if Amman, population 2 million.

Immediately upon entering the Jordanian countryside and the small towns there, a distinct difference is apparent. The first thing noted is the poverty and neglect of the Jordan Valley. The infrastructure is not nearly the standard that we are used to in Israel and then the dress and architecture also set this place off from only a few hundred yards across the Jordan River. The taxi driver, though, had blue tooth in his car and a flat screen dvd player for a rearview mirror. Not something that we have ever found in Israel. The driver told us that he was a language teacher and a college graduate but that he couldn't provide for his family that way and decided to become a cab driver instead. We took a short cut through the large hills that line the valley and riding up and down the steep one lane road at much too fast a speed was making us all a little queasy until Rikke demanded that he slow down. He laughed and gave Rikke a hard time for much of the rest of the trip.

We arrived to Amman around 8 pm (an 8 hour trip that only took us about 100 miles as the crow flies). We met Mohammed and his friend Mohammed. Not joking. We went to a restaurant in one of the very modern neighborhoods that has a pedestrian mall where a lot of the more affluent crowd likes to spend their evenings. We ate a very large meal at one of Mohammed's favorite restaurants which only cost about $30 for all five of us. We then walked around the corner to a coffee shop and smoked hookah/nargila/shisha (pretty much the national past-time in Arab countries), talked and sipped Arabic coffee (where the grounds remain in your cup and you let the coffee sit for a few minutes to allow the grounds to settle at the bottom, making for very strong coffee). We returned to Mohammed's 3 bedroom apartment in which his family used to live. He is the only one that still remains in Amman as his brother has moved to Portland, Oregon, his father to the south of the country while his mother has moved to Syria to live with her new Iraqi husband who cannot get a visa to live in Jordan. Mohammed comes from an upper middle class family, is a 26 year-old computer engineer working for an international company and speaks perfect English which he apparently learned entirely from movies.

We fell quickly asleep even with all of the caffeine after such a long day of travel. In the morning, we ate a small breakfast and quickly headed toward the Old City where we hoped to do some shopping in the large bazaar. We walked around all day, stopping into a variety of stores and restaurants and coffee shops. The whole day we didn't see one tourist, which is a strange thing being so used to tourists in this part of the world. We got lots of strange looks and a lot of smiles. The market was mainly populated by men and the women that were there were covered much more fully than the women we had seen elsewhere in the city. Mohammed told us that this area was one of the poorest areas and consequently one of the most religious. For dinner, we had the pleasure of dining at a restaurant built during the height of the Pan-Arab movement which still retains some of this influence until today. The decor seemed an idealized version of the Arabia of old and thus is frequented by many tourists though the business continued to attract customers from all aspects of the city. We ate another huge meal for far too cheap and headed back to Mohammed's.

On Saturday, Mohammed took us around Amman to see some of the landmarks, one of which was the new Mosque built in memory of the late King Hussein. The mosque was immaculate and whiter and cleaner than any mosque I have ever seen though I feel like it is underused because of its location so far away from residential neighborhoods. But the view from the top of the hill on which it is built is breathtaking. We got our own private tour from a couple of custodial staff, but before we were allowed in, Rikke had to wrap a black shawl around her head which she didn't like considering Tucker and I needed to extra clothing thrust upon us but she bore her indignation silently. Later that night we went and smoked hookah/shisha/nargila again and spoke with Mohammed about the politics of the Middle East and especially the Arab-Israeli conflict for a long time. It was kind of refreshing to hear the completely opposite perspective from what I get in Israel and found myself agreeing with him on several important points though obviously not everything. It is amazing how dominant the competing arguments are in this dialectic. I find it is very difficult to argue with either side on the basic tenets of their arguments as they are each very well versed in their own particular argument. The difference mainly comes down to history and morality and within each viewpoint, everything they argue makes sense. As I have said in other posts, it is difficult to share some common ground here, to walk the tight rope between the two because this is a much more ideologically tenuous place where one must be critical of each and accept that the starting point for one might be invalid or inconsequential for the other.

Yet, I also find that simplistic explanations such as that two opposing sides have been polarized and are unwilling to find some common ground, captures very little of the truth and complexity of this region and conflict. Truly, it is hard to distinguish between what is a consequence of the conflict and its causes because so often they are the same after more than 60 years of violence and antagonism. And yet, sometimes I think we see the conflict and division where it does not exist in the first place and thus it is conjured and reinforced where it is other factors like culture, history, or socioeconomics at work. So maybe the mere fact that I stress this conflict in these postings and in how I view this region, I am calling up division and conflict in many places where it does not exist or not to such a high degree, thereby reinforcing such notions in the minds of many. Sorry if that was a bit obscure but I thought I should try to get some of my thoughts or fragments of thoughts down.

Next time... Cairo.

Amman Old City

Balcony Coffee Shop

Lunch Restaurant where the second floor was 4 feet tall

Rikke

Mohammed

King Hussein Mosque

Reading the Koran in the mosque (they had English translations)

Hussein Mosque at sunset