Craziness in Jordan

Last weekend, Ananda and I took a trip to Jordan. Before I go any further, let me strongly recommend you go to Jordan. I say this for many reasons. First, the people are amazingly nice and hospitable. Even military guards at check points would smile and say, without fail, "Welcome to Jordan," with one arm waving and the other holding an assault rifle. Another great thing is that it is a complete departure from the inorganic growth and planned development of countries in the GCC (UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain). There is actually culture in Jordan. These sentiments were echoed among several travelers that we met along the way.


----> link to the web album


Well, a lot happened this weekend; too much to detail here. So I'll stick to a few highlights and comedic incidents that made this trip enjoyable.

Upon arriving in Amman, the capital and largest city in Jordan, we rented a car which only had a tape deck, was smaller than a Mini, but probably got 10 miles per gallon. Great deal!!! I burned CD's for no reason. We had a one night stay in Amman before going on our adventure through the country and spent the next two hours trying to find our hotel. I was driving. Ananda was on and off the phone with the hotel manager.

Conversations, from my 3rd-person perspective, were pretty funny:

Manager: "Go to the McDonalds and KFC and stop there."
Ananda: "We passed the KFC a long time ago, but the hotel is nowhere near there."
Manager: "What do you see?"
Ananda: "We see the university."
Manager: "Ok. Take a right before the light."
Ananda: "Before the light? Or at the light. Because there is no right before the light."
Manager: ".. (actually not sure what he said).."
Ananda: "Ok. Maybe you mean at the light, because it starts turning right a little bit before the actual light."

This sort of harmless miscommunication happened throughout the trip.

After that first night, we headed down to Wadi Rum. This is the desert where most of Lawrence of Arabia was filmed, and, of course, where the real Lawrence of Arabia led his attack on the Turks during WWI. For me, Wadi Rum was definitely the highlight of the trip. Imagine being in a vast desert with virtually nothing around for miles other than sand, rock, sun, and the occasional camel. Very cool. At night, we stayed outside under the stars -- probably the most stars I've ever seen before. It was probably because of the complete lack of light & pollution, along with the fact that we were much further south than I have ever been while looking up at night.

The next day, we went off to Petra. This is a lost city that the Nabataeans created over 2000 years ago. The entire city is carved out of the rocks. Very magnificent, with two sites which required excruciating hikes up the mountains in the desert heat: one was to the High Place of Sacrifice and the other was to the Monastery.

After the first day of Petra, we decided to try to squeeze in a trip to the Dead Sea. We left early-evening and, by the time we drove across the mountain range and down to sea level, it was already dark. We decided to push forward anyways, and this is where some funny incidents took place. The first was at a check point, where a young military officer approached us:

Officer: "Where are you from"
Me: "I'm from Canada"
Ananda: "And I'm from the United States"
Officer: "OK, give me password."
* Ananda and I just glancing at eachother, realizing the officer was joking around with us *
Us: "Oh yeah. The password."
Me: "Inshallah!" (i.e. the ubiquitous term meaning "God Willing")
Us: "Inshallah!"
Officer: "Password, passport, passport..."

Oh shit. He didn't say password. He was asking for our passports!!! So here we are, laughing and joking around with a military office, armed with a rifle. Behind him, another solider sat on an armored humvee with a 50 caliber machine gun mounted on it. And all I'm saying is "Inshallah!". Yes, we are from MIT Sloan. Leaders of tomorrow. In any case, after the confusion, the soldier bid us farewell, "Welcome to Jordan!"

A little bit further down the road, we reached another check point. This time, we decided not to give any passwords. We approached the check point, and went through a similar explanation that I am Canadian and Ananda is American.

Officer: "Get out of the car."
Me: "Get out?" (Soldier nods)
(I look at Ananda with a bit of concern but it's not like we had any contraband)
Ananda: "Should I get out of the car too?" takes seatbelt off
Officer: "No no no no no! Paper of the car!"

Dammit! Again!?!? We thought he was telling us to get out of the car, but he was just asking for the paper of the car -- the registration papers! (turns out the cars registration was expiring the next day. Thanks Avis, you assholes).

Regardless, the solider let us go and bid us farewell, "Welcome to Jordan!"

We pushed forward yet again. A bit further down and we're starting to get tired. It was dark but we found a good spot to pull over. We figured we'd just park the car, take a really quick dip in the Dead Sea and head back to Petra. Within seconds of pulling over, a jeep pulls up with lights so bright you couldn't make anything out. But then, someone moves forward. Another military officer. He speaks to us in Arabic and we tell him we only know English. So his partner comes up and shakes my hand. He tells us we are in a secure military zone and that we cannot stay. I explain that we're just trying to figure out where we are going. He told us we can stay for a little while, but must go soon. Naturally, we get the hell out of dodge.

You see, Jordan borders Israel, separated for the most part by the Dead Sea. As we're driving up the coast, we can see lights in the distance. That's the enemy. And here we are ready to take a dip in the Sea at 10pm in total darkness. Idiots.

Definitely a great trip, with a requisite amount of shenanigans. Once again, I definitely recommend you go to Jordan at some point. I haven't described all of the sites, but the pictures here speak for themselves I think.