Odds and Ends

I have three weeks left in Jordan, so really there is not a whole lot more to cover. I just figured I’d cover all those little things that didn’t fit into any other post.

1.     Maid. Jordanians are clean freaks. You wouldn’t know it by the state of the sidewalks, but they are. No Dust Allowed seems to be the motto. Take out the trash every day, sweep the floor—lest there be ants, and keep everything neat and tidy. You’d be kidding yourself if you think I do this all the time. Nope. I have a maid.

           

Her name is Magda and she comes on Sundays. I think she’s Sri Lankan. Or maybe Indonesian. At any rate, she cleans the bathrooms, the kitchen and even our rooms. I always look forward to Sundays because my room is vacuumed and my bed is made. The dishes are even clean AND put away in             the cabinet. The only thing I really don’t like about having a maid is that she puts everything away in different spots. That is probably why I have lost so many things on this trip.

Another thing about Magda, and hired help in general, is that they are all minorities. Most maids are from South Asia, and most “guards”—those who take care of the apartments are Egyptian. So are waiters. Funny (or maybe not) joke about Egyptians—They are called the Mexicans of Jordan. Maybe             because they are everywhere and they stare? I don’t know, but it is kinda funny.

2.     Canned Corn- Around the university there are several stands selling corn. No, not corn on the cob. Just—corn. There is a giant steel vat that has gobs and gobs of corn. They serve it in this tiny Styrofoam cup with a spoon. I don’t understand why, but people line up for the stuff. I have yet to try it.

3.     Notes on Cabs- I’ve pretty much exhausted the subject, so this is my final observation. Cars here are expensive I guess—the import tax. So, despite the state of a car, people will still act like it is brand new. Some cars around here are incredibly nice, but others are, well, not. Cab drives with the worst looking taxis will get super angry if you shut the door to hard. “al boaba shwaya shwaya” which roughly translates you better shut this door softly—it’s my baby. 

Thanksgiving: A CORNucopia of Corn Casserole

“Um. Look at our oven.” I told Sarah. I had just finished mixing up a double batch of my favorite corn casserole to eat for our Thanksgiving feast (why I did that I do not know). The oven. Oh, the oven.

Clearly, we did not check out our resources first. The oven is probably a foot and a half wide by two feet tall. The racks inside are only about five inches apart, not leaving much room for actual pans.

I know what you’re thinking. “Why haven’t you used the oven before?” Because it’s terrifying. You have to turn on the gas then stick you head in it to turn it on with a lighter.  I don’t want to mess with that. I’ll still to the stovetop.

At any rate. Once we figured out we had to divide the corn casserole into multiple pots, we faced another dilemma. We have no pots. Just one flat one for the casserole. We had to borrow another from upstairs.

Our thanksgiving dinner consisted of, corn casserole duh, green beans, mashed potatoes, rolls. Now, I didn’t want to spend a ridiculous amount of money on a butterball turkey, which you can find, so instead we decided on chicken breasts with a mushroom sauce. Which means, we dumped a can of cream of mushroom soup over some chicken, topped it with cheese and bread, and called it a day.  It was kind of janky.

Since pumpkins don’t exist in Jordan, Erin made a sweet potato-deep dish pie. It was lovely. I ate enough for three days and have enough to eat for the next week. Especially the corn casserole. I even had to break out elastic wasted pants. Sounds just like Thanksgiving at home, minus the cranberry sauce, turkey, jello, random singing, “grandma’s buns” and the 5 Kernels of Corn out loud reading.

Ok, so it wasn’t a traditional turkey day. But it made do. 

4 Days in Misr(ey)

Arriving in Cairo at 3 AM, things seemed promising. I exchanged a witty banter—or something like that in broken Arabic—with the passport control guy. We were picked up by a hostel representative who kept chatting at us. It was 3 in the morning—all I wanted to do was sleep. Our hostel, despite being in an absolutely decrepit building that smelled like cats and pee, was actually warm and inviting, not to mention clean.

Things quickly turned sour.

After a breakfast the next morning of a hardboiled egg and three pieces of bread, we jaunted out to check out the national museum, which was a five-minute walk away. Turns out on Wednesdays the museum isn’t open past 1:30.

So we decided to reformulate our plans and grabbed a taxi to Old Cairo to check out the Ibn Tulun mosque. It was completely empty, so we roamed around the beautiful mosque and climbed the minaret, which gave us views of a very very dirty city.

Despite not knowing the way to the Citadel, we decided to walk there. I can’t even describe how DIRTY the city is. Trash is EVERYWHERE. It makes Amman look like the cleanest city in the world. The whole city smells of pollution and urine and everything is covered in filth. At one point on our walk, we passed a dumpster that was trickling bright blood into the streets. We presumed it was cows blood—but I don’t really want to know.

The citadel was difficult to find, well the entrance was anyway. We were constantly surrounded by shebab (youngins) whos never stopped asking us “HI WHATS YOUR NAME, WHATS YOUR NAME WHATS YOUR NAME” They would touch us, and at one point Sarah got so frustrated by this kid that she reached out and clotheslined him.

The absolute disrespect women astounded me. The boys that really bothered us were from the age of about 11-20. Above or below that, most were fine. Even the soldiers and police officers made off-hand crude comments that made me so angry. Actually doing anything about it would only have made it worse.

The harassment we received put me in a sour mood, that even the pyramids weren’t that impressive. And like everything else in Egypt, it was covered in trash and smelled like pee. Driving along to the first pyramid, the Red Pyramid at Dashur, the canals that came off the Nile were basically dumping grounds. Trash piled up, souring the water, making this once clean and fertile land a little less so.

One of the more terrifying things I did on this trip was climb down into a pyramid. Things that go down are not meant to get back up. A tiny shaft that went about 200 feet down, descended into the ground.  Once I got over my claustrophobia, I had to hunch to even try to get down. The chambers reeked of Ammonia, and after about 3 minutes I was outta there.

I saw the pyramids of Giza by horse. Given how much I hate animals that could crush/stomp/roll over me, I wasn’t too pleased. Thy sphinx was comparatively small.

That night we took a dinner cruise on the Nile. I wish we hadn’t. Fun fact about the Nile: if you fall in you die. The water is THAT polluted. The only good thing about this cruise was the whirling dervish. He was cool. The food also sucked, but since I hadn’t eaten in 12 hours, I pretty much ate every nasty bit.

Continuing the trend of I hate Egypt, the next day we went to Alexandria. I had heard good things about the city, how it was cleaner. From outward appearances, it was beautiful. I wanted it so badly to be Beirut, where no one would look at us and we could stroll along the Mediterranean. It wasn’t so. Boys walked touching us asking us question, seeing if they could take our picture. NO, LA SHUKRAN was our resounding answer.

While in Egypt, I adopted battered wife syndrome. I constantly looked down, avoided eye contact with anyone and would flinch and jump away if anyone came too close. I think we all did.

The last day in Egypt, we went to the Egyptian National Museum. Even though it houses an impressive collection of artifacts, there seems to be little rhyme or reason. There were very few signs to tell me what I was actually looking at. Some of the few signs looked like they had been there since the 1940s. And everything was covered in a thick layer of dust. I may have spent over three hours in the museum, but I learned very little.

One of Sarah’s Egyptian male friends came into town, apologized for his country and took us to the Egyptian Souk. It was so much harder to bargain in Egypt that it was in Istanbul. I found some good things, but the level of bargaining I had to do wasn’t as fun as it was in Turkey. That night, her friend took us on a cruise along the Nile, this time it was much better. The dilapidated stereo pumped Celine Dion (Egypt is overly obsessed with her) and fun twinkly lights lit our way down the Nile.

I was oh so happy to get out of that country. Even though Egypt is SO cheap. The exchange rate is 5.5 Egyptian Pounds for 1 USD, and a full meal can easily be bought for 7 pounds, I never want to go back to that country. It definitely makes me appreciate Amman so much more. 

Mussels, Bubbles and the Hagia Sophia

Eid Break is traditionally a time when families slaughter a goat or cow in remembrance of the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son, Ishmael. The meat is divided into thirds. One third goes to the poor. One third to greater family. One third for yourself. For me, Eid el Adha is the time when I went exploring--although, I did see blood running through the streets of Cairo. That was gross.

Istanbul is incredibly beautiful. For one, there were leaves that were changing colors. There was air that was less smoggy. I could almost smell nature. In accordance to what everyone has said, it is an ingenious blend of east meets west. And there was no Arabic.

Right from the get go, Susannah had us moving. Night one was spent in Taksim, the sight of the suicide bombing last month. Taksim is like Iowa City on speed. Lights. Laughter. Hoards of people moving, mingling. Food is abundant. I was even brave enough, after some prodding, to try the street mussels.  A man has a stand full of mussels stuffed with a rice mixture. You give him a lira he opens one and squeezes some lemon juice on them. Then it’s down the hatch. These are one of the most dangerous street foods to eat, but oh yum are they delicious.

Instead of doing all the super touristy things right away, we spent the next day in Sariyer, near Susannah’s college. Nestled into a forest, the campus was beautiful. It made me jealous of how beautiful it was. There wasn’t any trash in sight. Sariyer is a little fishing village right on the Boshporus. We roamed the colorful streets and ate lunch along the water. I had fried sardines. Don’t judges. They were delicious. (That’s the theme of Turkey—delicous food)

I loved Turkey for the fact is was so clean. There was even recycling! The CARE about the environment. The air was crisp and I even needed a jacket that night when we took the ferry across to the Asian side of Turkey at Katakoy. We ate at another fabulous restaurant, Ciya. I even tried sheep intestine (tasted like lamb with a weirder texture.)

In the middle of the meal, a man bursts through the restaurant hands covering his head yelling. Outside, people begin shouting and pushing. No one knew what was going on. My first thought was a bomb. Then we see two men wailing on each other. Chairs get involved, then a table. Turns out this massive fight was over a football match. Silly Turks.

Of course, being in Turkey, you have to do the sights. The Blue Mosque was probably my favorite. The intricacies of the ceiling was incredible. Of course, the Hagia Sophia was splendid and the Basilica Cistern, an underground cavern that once held the cities water, was spooky. We bargained our way through the Spice Market and the overwhelming Grand Bazaar. I got to practice my burgeoning arguing skills.

But then there’s the stuff that a lot of people don’t do, or at least don’t admit. Like the Turkish Bath. That was an experience.

The five of us were led into a room where we were given towels to wear. After spending sufficient time soaking in the sauna we were led two at a time to a heated marble slab and told to lie down—naked—on the table. Shit got real. The sauna loosens the dead skin (apparently I have very dry elbows?) They take a loofa to EVERYYYY part of your body before coating you in bubbles for a massage. With two girls on a table at a time, it’s one camera away from a porno.

But it may have been the most memorable part of Turkey, if not for the inside jokes that came out of it. And hey, at least my elbows are soft now.

After that we needed some drinks, and promptly headed out to Ortakoy to meet up with Susannah’s friends at the local watering hole. We spent the night sitting along the water, bartering for jewelry and eating the biggest stuffed baked potato I’ve ever seen. I think it was stuffed with a hot dog. I don’t really eat hot dogs, but let’s just say at the moment it was all I wanted. A late night ensued.

Perhaps the best meal I had in Turkey was named “Mezze and Raka night.” Mezze is popular in the Middle East. Tiny little dishes are bought and split between a bunch of people and eaten over drinks of raka—which is akin to the Jordanian liquor, Araq. Nasty Nasty licorice stuff. But over eggplant, spinach, smoked salmon and countless other mezze we split, it wasn’t so bad. It did the trick. (Susannah and I followed this meal by playing some intense checkers for about two hours. I won 3-0)

The last day was spent at the Prince’s Islands. We had to take a ferry about 2 hours to get there. This island was charming. No cars were allowed, so instead there were horse and carriages or bikes. It is clearly a place to summer Istanbul’s wealthy. We wandered along the water for a while before summoning the courage to hike to the top of the mountain to eat/see a monastery/for the view? I’m not exactly sure why. It was such a difficult hike. The cobbled pathway did not make it any easier for those of us with poor shoes. The view at the top was spectacular. But my glutes and calves could have done with out it.

Turkey was a wonderland of things I had forgotten about. Clean public restrooms, recycling, fresh air, wearing non conservative clothes. Even still, there were reminders that this was still the Middle East. Men still catcalled. “Hi Spicy Girls”.

We got called that a lot “Spicy Girls” So it was decided that I was sporty spice, because I guess I am the most athletic of the bunch?

Part 2 comes tomorrow, and in it I will regale the misery that was Cairo. 

For Pictures click HERE

Two Month Reflections: What I miss about America

Hey team. I’ve now been in Amman for two months (HOW is that POSSIBLE) so I figure ill just list out things I miss about America. Yes, a cop out, but I have to pack for my 10 day trip to Istanbul and Cairo!

1.     Vanilla Pudding- I know this is a really weird thing to list as the number 1 thing to miss, but I do! I bought some ‘vanilla’ pudding from the supermarket the other day and was so disappointed. Instead of the snack-pack style of pudding I like, I was instead treated to goo. And not very flavorful goo. I ate it anyway, because it had sugar, but I wasn’t happy about it.

2.     Mattress pads and top sheets- So for some reason, mattress pads don’t exist, and for some reason, it really bothers me. It just creeps me out. I just want a mattress pad! As for top sheets, those also don’t exist in my apartment. I just have a comforter and a really itchy wool blanket.

3.     Non Bi-polar showerheads. Will it be scalding or freezing? No one knows. Taking a shower is such a crap shoot. On more than one occasion I have jumped out because my skin was about ready to burn off, but I also have jumped out because I was about to freeze. I miss consistent temperature and pressure. I miss not having to turn off the water while shaving my legs or shampooing my hair. 40 days.

4.     Driving- Even though I kind of understand the rules of the road here in Amman, I still would NEVER get behind the wheel of a car. That being said, I know when I get back and start driving again, I will probably be a little more aggressive than I would have been otherwise.

5.     Running in shorts- Ok, I ran in shorts once here. My legs were just itching to see the light of day. But it felt really awkward and I quickly went back to my sweatpants.  Yeah it’ll be a while before I can run in shorts outside in the US, but it’s something to look forward to.

It’ll be a while before I blog again, but next time I do it will be very exciting!

Break Out Your Axes--it's Election Time!

It’s election day! No School No School!!

Yes, it’s the parliamentary elections here in Jordan. Not like that means much—besides the fact that everything is closed so people can vote. Voting here is so two-faced and biased that no one really cares. In fact, the Muslim Brotherhood has called for a boycott of this election. People listen, this election is supposed to have the lowest voter turnout in over 20 years.

There are 120 seats in Parliament up for grabs in this year’s election. 763 candidates are running, including 143 women. Most, if not all, of the women are running for 12 seats that are exclusively reserved for women. Under the quota system, there are nine seats reserved for Christians and three for Circassians.

My overly cynical econ professor explained about how the election process works. About a month before the election, posters go up. This I can verify. I woke up one morning to tacky posters of candidates plastered every five feet. The pictures were AWFUL. I guess the posters have some cheesy slogan. But the funny thing, or perhaps not, is the fact that these slogans are all people vote on. Candidates don’t release their positions on issues. Nope, it’s only the slogan.

Most people vote for their friends, or their cousin’s friend’s cousin’s brother-in-law. Keep it in the family, you know. Cynical econ professor also explained that most people running for parliament only care about making money. People in parliament make around 3,000 JD (about 5,500 USD) but this is still triple the amount the average Jordanian makes in a year. So, it’s a lucrative profession.

The US embassy sent out a warning Americans in Jordan to stay away from polling places because it could get heated. At press time (1:24 PM) there already have been some crazy antics. 36 people were arrested in Madaba, about a half hour from Amman, for wielding knives and axes trying to get people to vote for different candidates. A driver, perhaps drunk, rammed into a polling station, injuring two. Four armed men were arrested for plotting to “disturb the vote.”  Still more were charged with election fraud. It’s only 1:30—there’s a long way to go.

Chill Out, You're on Arab Time

If you know me, you know that I am a very punctual person. I show up early to everything—parties included. I hate people who aren’t on time or force me to wait. Patience is not my virtue.

This virtue has been through a lot here in Amman. “Arab Time” is not “Laura Time.” “Bisura” (quickly) does equal the same “bisura” as it does to me.

If an Arab tells you we will leave at eight. LIES. We will not leave at 8, we will leave at 8:45. But of course, I will be there at 8, and will wait impatiently until 8:45. How many times has this happened? Countless.

It isn’t just time Jordanians move slowly at. It’s even how they walk! Oh dear god, they lollygag down pathways. The hardly pick up their feet—just tiny tiny tiny steps. And they just stand in the middle of the path. HELLOOOO I’m TRYING to get somewhere. MOVE.

Students stand congregated at the bottom of steps and refuse to move when you want to get past. They just give you dirty looks. There are other places to stand than at the bottom of the stairs. Or in the middle of the sidewalk, or in a doorway. It’s not that difficult people. There are open areas to congregate for a reason

Impending Doom

Driving along airport road you will see giant 4-foot diameter pipes lining the road. Workers are digging ditches to put the pipes in. This scene stretches on for miles and miles, until eventually you stop noticing it; they simply blend into the desert landscape.

These pipes are part of a huge project undertaken by the Jordanian government to help solve the water situation in Jordan. 250 miles south, near the Saudi border sits a deep-sea aquifer. This aquifer is set to pump fresh groundwater all those miles, through endless stretches of pipes to Amman to help offset the water crisis.

But how long will it hold out?

This water is renewable—but only if properly maintained. Maintenance has been a problem in the past, as the once beautiful Azraq wetlands were pumped dry. Now, water flows out of Amman back to the wetlands to try and preserve what’s left.

The Dead Sea is also shrinking. By a meter a year. There is already a stretch of land dividing the sea into two parts. Some say it will be gone in 50 years. One solution is the Red Sea-Dead Sea canal. A multi-million dollar project that is set to pump water from the red sea, across miles and miles to the Dead Sea, would alter the salinity of this lake.  Is “saving it” worth it?

What I have learned in Amman is a sad realization. This region isn’t going to be able to last much longer without having a war over water. The Nile is not going to sustain Egypt past 2017. Jordan is fast running out of freshwater. The gulf countries can only sustain reverse osmosis as long as the oil money holds out—they have 0 natural water resources. Syria and Israel are diverting water from the Jordan River-leaving it a pathetic trickle—only a fraction of what it was.

Yet there is a dichotomy. Shopkeepers freely wash off their tiled stoops, the soapy water runs off into the streets. People wash their cars daily, making sure they are extra shiny. People have gardens, watering their roses, their grass or their tomatoes.

It’s a status symbol, being able to have enough water to do this.

Yet it’s still sad that people here are so ignorant about the pressing situation. And that is one of the things I find so frustrating about this country. No one knows. And more importantly, no one cares enough to find out.

It’s on the horizon, a war, a catastrophe, and I can see it coming, but no one else even looks up. 

Um Amman? Why are you Cold?

So remember when I was complaining about how hot it was? How I hated being sweaty? How 95 degree heat made me want to die?

Well, now I'm cold. I sleep with at least one wool blanket a night, wrapped completely around me so I can snuggle into the covers. I wear sweaters to class, and if I wear sandals, my feet get cold. Goosebumps run up and down my arm sending me into fits of shivers.

I wasn't expecting this.

And the sad part of the whole thing? The actual temperature. It was 75 degrees today, and I was cold. I feel like I have completely lost touch with Iowa, and will promptly turn into a popsicle when I return.

But I guess this weather is late for the region. Cold weather usually starts in the end of September or beginning of October. It's only been in the last week that the beginnings of fall have started. The select few leaves have begun to turn auburn or burt orange and all flowers have died.

I guess it gets much colder. Since my coat was one of the first few things I chucked when I was packing, this might be an issue. Hey mom, transfer some money so your lovely daughter can buy a nice warm coat?