First Days in Jordan

I hope I’m not falling behind already! The first night I woke up at approximately 3:36 am when I heard the adhan (“call to prayer”) over the early morning traffic (Amman, or at least its traffic, never sleeps). We met as a group for breakfast at a nearby restaurant where we had a breakfast of the local staples (hummus, falafel, pita, foul, etc.) and tea. I should mention that the way Arabs drink tea is quite different from home: they brew it very strongly, add lots—and I mean lots—of sugar, and serve it in tiny glass cups.


After breakfast, we headed over to the university where we met the director of the Women’s Studies Center at the U of J. We took a bus to downtown Amman, where we walked around the busy shops and markets before heading to West Amman, where the wealthier Jordanians and ex-pats live. In Jordan, you can tell when you’re in a wealthy neighborhood by the number of embassies or consulates on the block, and soldiers guarding them.


That night, we met up with the one and only Mark Laichena, who has spent the past six weeks interning at an NGO in Amman. We took him to meet Nadia and ended up spending the night in what we’ll write off as a lively debate about the college admission process.


The next day, Sunday, was the first day of the Arabic work and school week. It was also the first day of summer school for the University of Jordan, so the campus was bustling with students registering for classes. The school also holds graduation over several days during the summer, for the separate schools of nursing, pharmacy, arts, etc., so there was graduation traffic as well, preparing for the evenings’ commencement. We were given a tour of the university by two women from the Women’s Studies apartment.


The University of Jordan is the most prestigious university in Jordan, and probably one of the most beautiful as well. It’s a closed campus, and all the roads inside are lined with trees that provide some welcome shade once things start to heat up. It’s funny because looking out our window of the hotel you can see nothing but green, but there’s probably more vegetation on campus then there is in the rest of Amman!
We met our professor for the dialect class at the Language Center, and then had a brief orientation to learn about the resources available to us on campus. We were then given the rest of the afternoon to explore the city on our own, preferably in smaller groups so we wouldn’t stand out as much.


Mark had offered to show us around downtown and where he lived, so we called him up and agreed to meet at the King Hussein Mosque, which is at the bottom of Jebel Amman (“jebel,” by the way, means “hill” or “mountain” in Arabic). We ambitiously decided to take a bus to the downtown—what better way to immerse your self in the city then by taking a bus into the thick of it all? The thing is, there is no system for buses in Jordan: they slow down, a guy jumps out and shouts the name of their destination, and you jump in. Fortunately, we were able to ask several people for help and made it to Jebel Amman with no problem.


We met Mark in front of the mosque, where we asked a man to take our picture. We then went to a juice station (named “Palestine Juice”) where our photographer and his friend came up to us. At first we thought they were asking for the time, but then we realized they were asking if we had the time to go back to their house. While most people are friendly and most invitations come from a good place, we declined. We then walked to the Roman amphitheatre, which unfortunately was closed for the evening, so we climbed up the hill to see the city in the sunset. We could see the ruins of the Citadel at the top of one of the hills, and children flying kites, many of which are decorated to look like the Palestinian flag. The Jordanian and Palestinian flags are very similar, and everywhere, along with pictures of Jordan’s royal family.


Mark took us to an art gallery that was featuring and exhibit to commemorate 60 years since the “Catastrophe,” (i.e. the creation of Israel) by Palestinian and Jordanian artists. Jordan is the only country in the Middle East that grants Palestinian refugees citizenship, and their presence is felt throughout the city. The exhibition was at the city hall, where we were fortunate enough to meet one of the artists who contributed to the show. His name is Mohammed Sabah and although he is a Palestinian-Jordanian, he currently lives in Virginia and is visiting Amman for the show! He was very warm and friendly, and showed us more of his work as well of pictures of his family and famous people he has met over the years (including Jordanian royalty and Yasser Arafat!). He invited us to meet his family and have dinner with them, and gave us his contact information. We’re going to try and take him up on his offer sometime this week.


After the exhibit, Mark took us to see his apartment. It was quite a trek—I’d prefer not to remember how many stairs we climbed to get to the place. It was definitely worth the climb though—Mark pretty far up, so you can look down on the downtown area, so from the roof you see a wall of buildings lit up all over the hills for the most breathtaking view of the city.


We walked back taking Rainbow Road, which takes you through a trendier part of Amman. We took a taxi back to our place and promptly crashed for the evening.
This turned out to be a much longer entry then I anticipated! I will post again about my first days of school (and hopefully some pictures if our internet behaves!) soon.