All around Amman

Day 30 Damascus to Amman
I’ve just been told there’s been a bomb in Damascus, which is apparently being blamed on Israel as the victim was a member of the Hezbollah hierarchy. This may have been a good day to leave Syria and decide not to go to Israel (I was doing some planning on the bus and I don’t want to give up bits of Egypt or Jordan for Israel; also I’m simply not sure I’m comfortable with giving Israel the legitimacy of tourism).

The bus to Amman leaves at 7.30 a.m. or 3 p.m. I persisted with my early approach and was looking for a taxi at 6.45. There’d been more rain and as the taxi moved through the largely empty streets, everything took on a Shed Seven feel as we chased rainbows. Although the kilometres between central Damascus and the Al Soumarya bus station are only categorised by concrete ordinariness, I felt a certain wistfulness. I’m going to miss Syria; I’m glad it sits between Turkey and Jordan, as that’s how I ended up coming here.

I soon understood why there are only 2 buses a day to Amman. I started wondering why there wasn’t just one as I set off with just 7 travelling companions. Much of the route looked familiar as I think we largely went the same way as to Bosra, so I got stuck into reading about Jordan.

After we’d got our Syrian exit stamps, I got back on the bus, but soon noticed everyone else was standing around outside looking at the luggage compartments. Rather than appear like a disinterested foreigner, I went out to join in the staring. Turned out there were a couple of Syrian officials going through some bags: I think they were both official-one was in uniform and the other, who was bent over into the luggage compartment, had an automatic tucked in the waistband at the back of his jeans. I was sorely tempted to lift it; on balance I figured stealing a gun at a border post, which had a number of armed men, might end badly. Still, I’ve seen movies and it was asking for it. At the very least if he carries on like that, he’ll end up with a bullet in a buttock.

I met the nicest old chap from Syria. Our communication was pretty feeble on a verbal level, but they were much smiling and hand on heart. He even rubbed my head when I did my favourite bus trick and tried to brain myself on the overhead luggage racks. Twice.

Bus time is good musing time, and I was daydreaming about mosques and remembered some of the things I’d seen in mosques. I think it’s fair to say they’re used by the community in a lot more general ways than churches. I wrote previously about my photo shoot in a mosque, I’ve seen plenty of picnics, lots of kids playing, one running round in borrowed high heals, people chilling and, best of all, one guy cutting his fingernails. Try that in Canterbury cathedral. There’s a noticeable less commercial feel than many European churches give off.

I thought about starting with this next bit, but I thought it wouldn’t be good to start with a bummer (so I chose to talk about a bomb instead). I have some really disappointing news from Jordan. It has certainly shocked me. A few years back John A and I received a Stanford postcard of King Abdullah of Jordan, noting (somewhat unnecessarily) that he had a doppelganger. Now King Abdullah may still be on the throne, but he’s clearly gone astray somehow as he no longer looks like Adams Junior. I don’t know how this terrible circumstance has come about, but it’s certainly not a result of Abdullah being put on a pie free diet.



I guess it’ll save me some money on postcards and fridge magnets. I think I may need less time actually in Amman than I had envisaged. A quick stroll this afternoon took in several of the sights, including a funky little art gallery with this installation.



I don’t know what it means either. I have plenty to organise as I hope to do 3 day trips from Amman (including the old chariot racing) and hire a car so I can make a number of cool stops on the way to Petra, which public transport just wouldn’t work for.

Did I mention I was going to Petra?

Day 31 Dead Sea
America’s bible belt may be an area populated by a large number of folk whose favourite hobby is thumping, but this is the real deal. Here they have the actual places from the bible-Jericho, Mt Nebo, the Jordan river, the East bank where Jesus was baptised, Jerusalem, Bethlehem. John the Baptist, Jesus and Moses were all in action. Trumpets blared and walls fell down. It certainly gives things some context. 4 of us set out from the hostel this morning to see some of these places and end up floating in the Dead Sea. Shame the weather was crappy.

We started at St George’s chapel in Madaba, which contains an extraordinary mosaic from 560 A.D. Only about a third remains of what was once a regional map of 2 million pieces. I like the way there are fish in the rivers, boats on the dead sea and Jerusalem is blown up so that you can see a limited plan of the town.



It is surprising just how disorientating a map becomes when it is the opposite way up to what you expect. The fact that the writing on the map was in Greek indicated an influence from a country that would have arrived in the region from the Med; therefore from that angle, Egypt was to the right and modern day Jordan to the top. We got there in the end.

Madaba even has a mosaic school, they take this stuff seriously. Sadly mosaics are a bugger to photograph and this wasn’t helped by the fact that the old ones all looked in need of a good clean. I guess this takes more than a bucket and some soapy water, as when we got to Mount Nebo I read about a mosaic that took 30 years to restore. With that level of commitment, I’d be tempted to say a little dirt never hurt anyone.

Mount Nebo is where Moses saw the promised land for the first time. The Good Lord had told Moses that he would ascend a mountain and look out over the promised land and on seeing it would die. When Moses finally got up Mount Nebo he supposedly was still sprightly and had all his faculties, but was 120. Personally, I think he knew where the promised land was all along, he just led everyone else round in circles so he could rack up a really large age. Sadly there was some restoration happening on the mosaics here so we couldn’t see much: I hope that piling up 4 foot square block of mosaic outside the chapel is standard practice in the mosaic restoration world. The low clouds put pay to any sweeping panoramas, but you certainly got a sense of how much could be seen-we could see Jericho and the Dead Sea clearly. I’m sure after following Moses all the way from, the ancients were more than happy with what they saw.

Bethany Beyond the Jordan is the location of the baptism site. You can only go accompanied by a guide, who was at pains to stress that we were in a military zone. He was less impressed when I enquired why so many churches were being built in said military zone: it turns out that Jordan is making religious tourism one its targets ad the churches are being built for pilgrimage.

There is some disagreement over the location of the spot where John splashed Jesus with water, but comment consent now has it in a place 60m from the Jordan, which is now a muddy streamlike thing. The Israelis diverting the water is apparently the cause of this. I wasn’t entirely convinced as the reasoning seem to be based on the supposition that 3 churches built and destroyed within the space of 100 years were an attempt to mark the baptism spot. Seeing as this was in the 6th century, I feel it left plenty of time for rumour, myth and legend to have comment consent building churches in the wrong place. Anyway, a mosaic marks the spot



ever seen a web address in mosaic before?

Then we headed down to a wooden landing area where you could actually get in contact with the Jordan. I dipped by finger in and placed a spot on my forehead (and no I don’t know why), but felt it was a little cold for swim. When I turned round I was doubly surprised: a soldier had emerged to keep an eye on us (he had enough ammo to shoot us all up several times over). Perhaps more surprisingly was the Russian ladies who had changed and were emerging in a variety of gowns (and a nightdress for Granny). This is when the significance of the spot really struck me, and as a mere tourist I began to feel a little intrusive. On a chilly, dank day with rain coming and going, these ladies were going to indulge in a spot of self baptism in a muddy river. Good on them. It was so brown I thought they’d emerge like they’d been in Willy Wonka’s river. Two of them bobbed down to the shoulders 3 times; the other two totally submerged 3 times. Bizarrely the soldier followed them down to the water.

While all this was going on a large bus load arrived at the equivalent Israeli site across the river-so an easy stone’s throw. They applauded the attempted drowning with great enthusiasm. I noticed they had two soldiers, fully body armoured and the rest, who were happily having their photos taken with tourists. It seems the Jordanian army isn’t so keen on showing its softer side.



When I took this, with Nicole snapping in sync, we got properly told no.

Then it was Dead Sea time and the weather got properly biblical. Filthy black clouds blocked out the sun, while the staff tried to sweep the rain off all the paved areas. As we walked across the sand towards the water lightning crashed into the sea, the rain intensified and the wind blew all the signs over. These had concrete bases. We retired indoors for a while before trying a second assault. It was really only the photo op that got us in there at all and while the water wasn’t hot, at 400m below sea level, it was manageable. I was a bit gutted I forgot to take my book out, but it was an extraordinary feeling, half your leg from your knee down was thrust out of the water. Going on your front was brave as you became very unstable and it tasted foul: the one drop that went in my eye stung like hell. I’m sure if this wasn’t natural it would be described as an environmental disaster.

I think it was worth it.




That’s no more effort than lifting up your arms.

On the way back I felt sporadically itchy and if I ran my hand across my skin I get mineral deposits on my hand. I stupidly didn’t wash my shorts, which dried with a cardboard like stiffness. Which was nice.

Day 32 Desert Castles
Another day, another day trip. Steve, Nicole and I were back and were joined by Jay and Garrick from New York.

First up was Qasr Kharana, which illustrated one of the issues of fortifying in Jordan’s Eastern desert.



It’s flat as a pancake. In fact this is most likely an early conference centre; it lies on the trade routes and has about 60 rooms, some of which are very out of the way. Driving on, there were frequent reminders of the neighbours.



So the world heritage listed Qusayr Amra. LP had promised that the visitor centre displays included this text ‘None of the painting of Qusayr Amra portray scenes of unbridled loose living or carryings-on.’ Well no one could find it, though there was general agreement to try and get more unbridled loose living and carrying on into our own lives. Perhaps the museum changed their text after seeing the book. They’d have been kidding no one after all.



There were a number of painted ladies, who were perhaps a little less than decent. No one knows quite what this small fortification was for, but the baths and decoration rather suggest it was used by the boys for weekend getaways. I thought it a little like some nuclear power installations.



So onto the last stop Qasr Al-Azraq. We probably had the most fun here as this was a real scrambling around kind of castle. Lawrence was here, the man really did get around, I must find and read 7 pillars. Here’s his room above the gate



Now I know some of you thinking this travelling lark is pretty soft, but today Nicole managed to show just some of the work that goes into a shot like this.



One doesn’t just teleport into such a position.



Just one false move…… I look a bit like I’m creeping about so I can disable a tractor beam (30 seconds after writing this, iTunes pops up Star Wars, spooky). This reminds me of something that has been troubling me the last few days: just who was the coolest man of our childhoods? Was it Han or Indy? I think Magnum and Daley Thompson are scrapping for a rather distant third. Of course for Hughesy that’s an easy question-Noddy Holder.

Back in Amman and after a 2 hour lunch, I took a quick butchers at the Roman theatre, which seemed to be of a particularly steep pitch.



I was feeling a bit tired and culdn’t be bothered to go right up to the top, but I has no choice. After a call of ‘Mister, Mister’ and a wave of a camera phone, I was led up to the uppermost level. Very nice the view was too. Hope you enjoy the photo. Maybe I should get some signed ones to give away……

Day 33 Jerash
A day of ash. We visited Ajlun castle, then on our way to JerASH saw the aftermath of nasty looking car crASH and then I spent the evening eating and hubbly bubblying with ASH, who was staying in my hostel. That tabloid journalism job is mine.

Ajlun castle was a more classical feeling castle



than those in the desert: it was on a hill that was steep enough to persuade us to get a taxi, so the views were lovely. This was just a brief stop before we headed to Jerash, where the Romans had a city of somewhere between 15 and 30 thousand people. In this town there were 2 theatres and a hippodrome that seated 15,000: this was the smallest in the empire-the Circus Maximus took 157,000. It was here that chariot racing took place. With those crowds and those population, you can be assured that the punters loved it.

I can’t imagine there’s anyone reading this who can’t imagine the raw excitement of a Roman Chariot show. I’m sure you’d all travel a long way to see such a thing, so you don’t need much from me here. It was a bit amateur dramatics, but we had the legion performing some manoeuvres





The quality of the marching was quite dreadful, but there was little time to reflect before the slaves came on for some gladiator fighting.



We were a very generous crowd and spared all but one of them, mainly because he was beaten by a Rambo lookalike. Then the chariots.



12 dinar? We robbed them. And then I nearly got away.



Take away what some barbarians would call tacky tourist gimmicks and Jerash is still a stunner:





And in one of the theatres a band tests the acoustics.



I chatted to the piper and there was a Scots regiment here when the British were about the place.

Getting back was something of a farce, but I blame the Americans: they’d spent two days joking about their friend and how she’d never make it to the hotel.She and Ash were in the foyer waiting when we bumbled back in.

Day 34 Amman
After 4 nights sleeping in Amman, I finally spent a day in the city and it’s been one of those days. The of them can be booked on line, 2 of them had mail addresses that bounced and 1 had a duff phone number. Suddenly Hertz wouldn’t let me book my car on line and a misjudgement of map scale had me walking 40 mins to do it person. The museum of Jordan’s political history that I wanted to go to turned out not to be next to the Iraqi embassy. Or anywhere else. Perhaps that wasn’t a great loss.

I was a little out of puff, but happily Hertz had some very comfy chairs. The lady of Hertz was off on her spiel. Did I want to hire a driver? We have this car and that car. Seeing as the office is in the Grand Hyatt-a nice man in a suit directs you to security screening before you reach the lobby, she was probably used to a different kind of customer. After a while I interrupted her, the gist of which was ‘I want the cheapest piece of shit you’ve got’. Seeing as there was a 85 dinar invoice on her desk for an airport transfer, I think 145 for a four day one way hire was a result. Even if it is a 800cc car. I’m hoping that wasn’t quite right.

My visit to the Wild Jordan was more successful, not least as I spent half hour with a future Miss Jordan. I am booked into the eco lodge at the Dana nature reserve, but you’ll have to wait for the next instalment to hear about that one. The plan seems to be coming together. All things being equal I will get to Little Petra for lunch on Thursday, then move onto Wadi Musa (the village by Petra) in time to dump the car, dump the bags and buy a ticket for the candlelight tour. This would mean my first experience of Petra will be at night, walking down a candlelit Siq to the treasury.

I just hope all this talk of snow proves to be bogus.

And John climbeth Jebal Alexander-Qala to the citadel of ancient Philadelphia, and upon the summit he sayeth to King Abdullah ‘Cometh on then, showeth us your flag.’



And Abdullah surely did.

Perhaps that could be a passage for the newest testament. That is the highest freestanding flagpole in the whole wide world. The North Koreans have a bigger one, but they’ve had to support it with cables. It’s 127m high: Abdullah has 3 lovely children, so it appears he’s not compensating for anything. I understand there’s another big bastard at Aqaba. The ruins atop the hill were nice, but not too spectacular. After a couple of hours I wandered down for juice, cake and to write this lot.

I was going to head off for a Turkish bath and chips after this, but I’m not sure I can be arsed. After all I have bought a dozen DVDs for £7.