Jordan!: Days 1 & 2

So as many of you are aware, I traveled to Jordan over the Eid al-Fitr break. Although the entire weekend is colloquially referred to as Eid, or eegazat al-Eid, the term technically refers to the day when a specific phase of the crescent moon is spotted and religious authorities (in Egypt, al-Azhar) declare the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. For most Egyptian Muslims, however, Eid means a few extra days off of school or work, time to spend with family. And also to go shopping - the biggest retail days in Egypt are the days immediately before and after Eid, much like Black Friday in the United States.

Our adventure began on Thursday, October 11, which was coincidentally Stephanie's 22nd and Amanda's 21st birthday. Caprill, Stephanie, Jessamyn and I caught a cab to Zamalek around 6:15 and arrived just after 6:30 in front of the dorms. Outside, many of our fellow travelers and classmates embarking on their own weekend adventures congregated; the Red Sea was another popular destination, as many study abroad students have taken advantage of comparatively inexpensive diving courses in Cairo. Just after 7 PM, the shuttle to the airport arrived, and we discovered that Abierd, who works in the counseling department at AUC and was one of the organizers of the Alexandria trip, was coming with us.

We enjoyed coffee and Cinnabon in one of the airport lounges during the downtime between our arrival at the airport and departure for Jordan, and arrived in Amman just before midnight following a relatively uneventful flight. After receiving our visas and changing our money (ouch - JD1 = USD1.50 = LE8) we headed for the hotel and went to sleep almost immediately upon arrival.

After breakfast the next morning - cheese, eggs, tomatoes, foul, pretty standard fare around here - we boarded the bus for a quick turn around Amman. Jordan, along with the majority of the Muslim world, began Eid al-Fitr on Friday (10/12), but Egypt didn't start until the following day (we were all hoping for an extra day off when we returned, but no such luck!), so the streets and sidewalks of Amman were nearly deserted, and we had to drive for almost an hour before locating an open currency exchange store.

Afterwords, we drove to Ajlun Castle, a fortress built by the nephew of Salah al-Din (better known as Saladin in the English-speaking world) in a strategic and resource-rich location near present-day Amman. Our tour guide for the site left a lot to be desired - I think I learned more reading the Wikipedia entry on Ajlun than I did listening to him - but the castle itself was a blast and a half, with plenty of collapsed walls to climb and few notions about safety to impede our explorations. At one point, Jessamyn jumped about six feet into a pitch-black room; we were all set to follow before realizing that there was no way out except the way in. On a clear day, you can see all the way to the Golan Heights and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem; unfortunately that day, as for most of our trip, the weather was moderately overcast.

On the way from Ajlun back to Amman and the ruins of Jerash, our bus broke down. Someone up front suggested that with 26 people, we could probably get out and push it a la Little Miss Sunshine; instead, our guide opted for having us walk the rest of the way to Jerash, maybe three-quarters of a mile, tops. We ate lunch at a restaurant near the ruins, an excellent meal of chicken, rice with lamb and pine nuts, salads, and fruit. Jessamyn met the proprietor, the man who intends to be her husband; I told her that between him and the teenaged boys at Ajlun, she'd probably be better off starting a fan website and having business cards printed up with the URL.

Jerash was fantastic, definitely one of my favorite stops of the weekend. Although most of the ruins are distinctly Roman, the city was first built by the Greeks, and so in some places you find the remains of Greek temples and architecture covered in the (relatively) more recent Roman construction. I think that I took some of my best photos of this entire study abroad at Jerash...too bad it's in Jordan, or I'd be sweeping the study abroad photo contest. Our evening in Amman was fairly low-key, dinner and a brief bus tour of the city, where we got to see the second-largest U.S. Embassy in the world (the largest, of course, is in Baghdad) which was guarded by (among other things) a tank topped by enough guns to take down all the armies of Mordor, for example, with plenty to spare.

The next morning, we got up at a ridiculous hour to drive to the site of all my childhood dreams: Petra. Stay tuned for Part 2...