Amman, Day 1
Dahab, Egypt
I forgot to mention that after the long train ride the previous day, when I checked into my hostel in Amman, the Cliff Hotel, I had my first "wako" roommate experience. Now, I'm pretty open minded and realise that not everyone is on the same page, but this guy had some problems, and I got to hear all about them...
First off, he couldn't answer the question "Where do you work?" in less then 10 minutes. Instead, I had to hear the entire history of his company, the company before that, something about how workers from India had a consulting company in America that was somehow related, a company bought another company, etc... I still don't know where he works or what he really does. I do know that he wanted to sue Coca-Cola because his boss stressed him out too much and apparently caused him to literally lose his skin. I guess he has some disease that gives him extremely white skin that just peels off or something, I don't know and suggested he not show me when he started pulling his pant leg up. I then learned that he had traveled through South East Asia, but instead of telling me about that, he kept talking about the "Malaysian Crisis" and how little the local people know. (Anyone know what the "Malaysian Crisis" is?)
Next up was a rather religious segment related to a pilgrimage he wanted to make to Bethany, sight of some Christian Baptism or something. He kept saying "It's really important to me." in that tone that really means "Come on, ask me why it's so important to me..." So I obliged, and learned that he had a deaf niece who was about to be admitted to the hospital for some routine surgery but was concerned not for the surgery, but for the fact that the niece would be away from the mom for a night or two, so he visited the baptism site to heal himself or something, I honestly don't know... The final kicker was when I finally said that I worked in San Francisco. (You see, and this might amaze some of my readers, I hadn't said anything yet in this "conversation"!) Anyways, when he heard that I left in the US, he said that he would never visit there because he is too worried about being sued if he went. Sued? Over what? I asked. He didn't really have an answer, but for some reason he just had this idea in his head that because there were so many lawyers in the US that your chance of getting sued (as a tourist?) was so high that it just wasn't worth visiting. Uh, ok. And this guy is a pretty highly educated "IT" guy from Belgium... /sigh... Anyways, wako and I was glad when he checked out early in the morning...
For a backpacker traveling by themselves, Amman really doesn't have all that much to offer. Other travelers had warned me that Amman was little more then a huge Western city in the Middle-East, and they were right. While Amman does have an "old downtown", there really isn't much to see there and you can quickly cover the major tourists sights in half a day. That said, Amman is quite large and several million people live there, but it's very spread out with no real core downtown to explore. Most of the hostels are in the "old town", so that's where I spent my time exploring on Tuesday.
After your usual felafel breakfast across the street from the hostel, I started walking up towards the Citadel where, according to Lonely Planet, I would find a decent lookout of the city. You see, Amman is actually quite hilly and dominated by seven large hills that more or less separate the city into sections. The Citadel sits a top one of those hills and was supposed to offer great panoramas of the city below. After a rather uninteresting walk to the top, which to it's credit did offer some decent views of the old downtown below, I learned that you had to pay to get into the Citadel (which is nothing more then some basic ruins). With no student discount on tap, and me not interested in looking at more basic ruins (which didn't even get a worthy mention in Lonely Planet), I just kept on walking, this time towards the second tourist attraction of Amman, the Roman Amphitheater. From a top the adjacent hill, the theater was moderately interesting but again, nothing really to blow you away. I walked down towards the entrance and was again greeted with a rather large entrance fee which I again passed up.
Outside the amphitheater, I pulled out my Lonely Planet to see if there was anything else near by. This piqued the curiosity of the guard who decided to come over and insist that I come visit his sisters store just around the corner. I really wasn't in the mood to go shopping for silver jewelry, but since I didn't have much else going for me, I obliged and followed him around the corner. I spent less then 2 minutes in the store with the security guard and his sister eyeing me like hawks. Any motion towards an object got them all excited, so I kept my eyes down and my mouth shut. I thanked them, they insisted I stay longer, I thanked them some more and was off.
While walking back towards the hostel, I decided to check out the local mosque for the area. While nothing like the mosques I'd seen to date, I still sort of lingered around inside to enjoy the peace and tranquility that it provided from the outside world. A local teacher approached me and we exchanged pleasantries. After the normal formalities such as "Where are you from?" and "What do you do?" he simply looked at me and said "What out for your passport. Many people like passports around here, so what out." Then moved on. Uh, ok.. Strange thing to hear in a mosque, but whatever. Of course, I patted my bag just to make sure my passport was still there and sure enough it was.
As prayer time was called over the loudspeakers the mosque started to fill up with men arriving for the sundown prayer. One approached me and in a not so subtle way told me it was time for me to leave. I figured as much but as I made my way towards the exit, the "security" guard asked why I was leaving? He encouraged me to stay and said that I was more then welcome to be in the mosque during prayer time. (Which is sort of what I thought, but it does vary from mosque to mosque). I guess he had seen the other guy tell me to leave and said something along the lines of "Don't worry about that guy, he doesn't know what he's talking about." Not wanting to start something in a mosque during prayer time, I strongly suggested that maybe it was best if I just went outside. He really insisted that I could stay and experience the service, but I just felt that if even one person in the mosque would be uncomfortable with me being in there, then it wasn't my place to be, so I left.
I wandered back towards my hostel, passing through the usual fruit market and a rather large gathering of shoe vendors. Normally the shoe vendors are in actual stores, or even stalls with a closing door, but here the shoes were spread out on tables just like the fruit. No idea what the connection is between shoes and fruit, but you can get both right beside each other in Amman. Strange.
My plan for the evening was to head to one of the huge Western shopping malls that are supposedly in Amman. (Gasp! You say!) Well, yeah, screw Amman, I wanted to go to the mall. First off, there weren't many people in the hostel to hang out with, and those that were there were part of a Korean/Japanese tour group who spoke little English. Second, I had already explored most of what was around the hostel. Third, I needed some new hiking/walking shoes because after 2+ months, my shoes are just about done. And fourth, well, I was looking for some Western food to celebrate my two month anniversary, if you know what I mean... ;)
According to my Lonely Planet, I needed to go to the "Safeway Shopping Center". (Yes, San Francisco readers, Safeway.) Lonely Planet also listed a second place as just "Safeway", a few kilometers away. I diligently explained to the friendly hostel keeper that I wanted to go to the shopping center and had him write down the destination in Arabic on a piece of paper so that I could show that to the taxi driver. Well, it doesn't take a genius to know what happened... I arrived at Safeway, the grocery store. To his credit, there was an upstairs that sold appliances, stationary, basic clothing and toys, but it wasn't the "shopping center" I was hoping for. I've never had my mouth water so much while wandering around a grocery store... Aisle after aisle of food that wasn't a felafel, kebab or schwarma. They even had cereal! Mmmm, cereal! Anyways, I managed to get out of there with only buying some basic toiletry supplies, a chocolate croissant and a jar of Nutella. When in doubt, go for the Nutella, you can paste that stuff on anything for a quick meal.
The Safeway wasn't in the most pedestrian friendly part of town so I walked for about 20-30 minutes to the Shmeisani district, which is a sort of upscale "see and be seen" part of Amman. That is, if see and be seen involves going to Burger King, KFC or one of the dozen "Western style" eateries. Well, I wanted to be seen, so I went to Burger King and had a nice Whopper, with fries and a chocolate sundae for my 2 month anniversary. Call me crazy, but Burger King isn't good in Amman either and Ieft "BK" somewhat disappointed. (No one, and I mean no one, can compete with the fries you get from McDonalds. They should all just pay McDonalds for the recipe or something because having the second best fries just doesn't cut it these days...)
I grabbed a taxi back to the hostel which itself was rather interesting. The driver was young, probably early 20's and his taxi was rather pimped out. Blue lights everywhere, some neon on the hood, a CD player that light up like a Christmas tree and speakers that hadn't been touched in 10 years. He was quite proud of it all and loved to play his music nice and loud, which sounded like shit, though I didn't have the heart to tell him. I mean come on people... Speakers, speakers, speakers! You can't blast your Arabic music through just any stock system. If you're going to be rolling with the blue lights, then you have got to invest in some decent speakers, that's just pimping 101...
Anyways, we're shooting the shit back and forth and I tell him that I'll probably head to the Dead Sea the following day, then south to Petra the day after. Taxi drivers love hearing where you're going because they will insist on taking you there, regardless of the distance. This guy was no exception. Keep in mind that a taxi ride to the Dead Sea would probably cost around 50 JD, where as the bus is around 2 JD. To Petra, he'd probably charge over 100 JD, while the bus is like 4 JD, so I don't think the private taxi thing is for me my friend. But he was so insisted. Once he found out where I was staying, he of course wanted to help me find a cheaper place. So thanks, I'm good where I am thanks. In this guys case, I think he was somewhat genuine, but sometimes it's hard to tell the nice guys from the business guys.
Back at the hostel, he just gave me his card and told me to call him the next day for transport to the Dead Sea. Me saying "Probably not, I don't know, no promises, don't wait..." didn't really register, because his response was always "Ok, tomorrow, we go to Dead Sea.". Whatever, he gave me his card and didn't charge me for the taxi ride so I was cool with that.
At the hostel, Jerry from South Korea was in my room. He was a nice change from the wako guy from Belgium the previous night. I think Jerry is attempting to travel faster then any other traveler, because his itinerary was like way overloaded. He did more before breakfast then I had done the entire day. That said, we sort of hit it off and decided to head to the Dead Sea the following day together, because it's always more fun doing day trips like that with someone else.
Ironically, in the common area of the hostel, I ran into Hydir, who I had last seen back in Goreme, Turkey. He had been in Amman for the past week or so trying to get a new Pakastani passport. Turns out, he had applied for an Israel visa and even though they turned him down, he still got his passport stamped with something that would have prevented him from returning to Pakastan. In the end I assume he worked it all out because I didn't seen him the following day, but it just goes to show how complicated things can get when you're traveling between countries that don't get along...
Luckily, the Dead Sea wouldn't require a visa, though it would require a passport check...
Kenny
I forgot to mention that after the long train ride the previous day, when I checked into my hostel in Amman, the Cliff Hotel, I had my first "wako" roommate experience. Now, I'm pretty open minded and realise that not everyone is on the same page, but this guy had some problems, and I got to hear all about them...
First off, he couldn't answer the question "Where do you work?" in less then 10 minutes. Instead, I had to hear the entire history of his company, the company before that, something about how workers from India had a consulting company in America that was somehow related, a company bought another company, etc... I still don't know where he works or what he really does. I do know that he wanted to sue Coca-Cola because his boss stressed him out too much and apparently caused him to literally lose his skin. I guess he has some disease that gives him extremely white skin that just peels off or something, I don't know and suggested he not show me when he started pulling his pant leg up. I then learned that he had traveled through South East Asia, but instead of telling me about that, he kept talking about the "Malaysian Crisis" and how little the local people know. (Anyone know what the "Malaysian Crisis" is?)
Next up was a rather religious segment related to a pilgrimage he wanted to make to Bethany, sight of some Christian Baptism or something. He kept saying "It's really important to me." in that tone that really means "Come on, ask me why it's so important to me..." So I obliged, and learned that he had a deaf niece who was about to be admitted to the hospital for some routine surgery but was concerned not for the surgery, but for the fact that the niece would be away from the mom for a night or two, so he visited the baptism site to heal himself or something, I honestly don't know... The final kicker was when I finally said that I worked in San Francisco. (You see, and this might amaze some of my readers, I hadn't said anything yet in this "conversation"!) Anyways, when he heard that I left in the US, he said that he would never visit there because he is too worried about being sued if he went. Sued? Over what? I asked. He didn't really have an answer, but for some reason he just had this idea in his head that because there were so many lawyers in the US that your chance of getting sued (as a tourist?) was so high that it just wasn't worth visiting. Uh, ok. And this guy is a pretty highly educated "IT" guy from Belgium... /sigh... Anyways, wako and I was glad when he checked out early in the morning...
For a backpacker traveling by themselves, Amman really doesn't have all that much to offer. Other travelers had warned me that Amman was little more then a huge Western city in the Middle-East, and they were right. While Amman does have an "old downtown", there really isn't much to see there and you can quickly cover the major tourists sights in half a day. That said, Amman is quite large and several million people live there, but it's very spread out with no real core downtown to explore. Most of the hostels are in the "old town", so that's where I spent my time exploring on Tuesday.
After your usual felafel breakfast across the street from the hostel, I started walking up towards the Citadel where, according to Lonely Planet, I would find a decent lookout of the city. You see, Amman is actually quite hilly and dominated by seven large hills that more or less separate the city into sections. The Citadel sits a top one of those hills and was supposed to offer great panoramas of the city below. After a rather uninteresting walk to the top, which to it's credit did offer some decent views of the old downtown below, I learned that you had to pay to get into the Citadel (which is nothing more then some basic ruins). With no student discount on tap, and me not interested in looking at more basic ruins (which didn't even get a worthy mention in Lonely Planet), I just kept on walking, this time towards the second tourist attraction of Amman, the Roman Amphitheater. From a top the adjacent hill, the theater was moderately interesting but again, nothing really to blow you away. I walked down towards the entrance and was again greeted with a rather large entrance fee which I again passed up.
Outside the amphitheater, I pulled out my Lonely Planet to see if there was anything else near by. This piqued the curiosity of the guard who decided to come over and insist that I come visit his sisters store just around the corner. I really wasn't in the mood to go shopping for silver jewelry, but since I didn't have much else going for me, I obliged and followed him around the corner. I spent less then 2 minutes in the store with the security guard and his sister eyeing me like hawks. Any motion towards an object got them all excited, so I kept my eyes down and my mouth shut. I thanked them, they insisted I stay longer, I thanked them some more and was off.
While walking back towards the hostel, I decided to check out the local mosque for the area. While nothing like the mosques I'd seen to date, I still sort of lingered around inside to enjoy the peace and tranquility that it provided from the outside world. A local teacher approached me and we exchanged pleasantries. After the normal formalities such as "Where are you from?" and "What do you do?" he simply looked at me and said "What out for your passport. Many people like passports around here, so what out." Then moved on. Uh, ok.. Strange thing to hear in a mosque, but whatever. Of course, I patted my bag just to make sure my passport was still there and sure enough it was.
As prayer time was called over the loudspeakers the mosque started to fill up with men arriving for the sundown prayer. One approached me and in a not so subtle way told me it was time for me to leave. I figured as much but as I made my way towards the exit, the "security" guard asked why I was leaving? He encouraged me to stay and said that I was more then welcome to be in the mosque during prayer time. (Which is sort of what I thought, but it does vary from mosque to mosque). I guess he had seen the other guy tell me to leave and said something along the lines of "Don't worry about that guy, he doesn't know what he's talking about." Not wanting to start something in a mosque during prayer time, I strongly suggested that maybe it was best if I just went outside. He really insisted that I could stay and experience the service, but I just felt that if even one person in the mosque would be uncomfortable with me being in there, then it wasn't my place to be, so I left.
I wandered back towards my hostel, passing through the usual fruit market and a rather large gathering of shoe vendors. Normally the shoe vendors are in actual stores, or even stalls with a closing door, but here the shoes were spread out on tables just like the fruit. No idea what the connection is between shoes and fruit, but you can get both right beside each other in Amman. Strange.
My plan for the evening was to head to one of the huge Western shopping malls that are supposedly in Amman. (Gasp! You say!) Well, yeah, screw Amman, I wanted to go to the mall. First off, there weren't many people in the hostel to hang out with, and those that were there were part of a Korean/Japanese tour group who spoke little English. Second, I had already explored most of what was around the hostel. Third, I needed some new hiking/walking shoes because after 2+ months, my shoes are just about done. And fourth, well, I was looking for some Western food to celebrate my two month anniversary, if you know what I mean... ;)
According to my Lonely Planet, I needed to go to the "Safeway Shopping Center". (Yes, San Francisco readers, Safeway.) Lonely Planet also listed a second place as just "Safeway", a few kilometers away. I diligently explained to the friendly hostel keeper that I wanted to go to the shopping center and had him write down the destination in Arabic on a piece of paper so that I could show that to the taxi driver. Well, it doesn't take a genius to know what happened... I arrived at Safeway, the grocery store. To his credit, there was an upstairs that sold appliances, stationary, basic clothing and toys, but it wasn't the "shopping center" I was hoping for. I've never had my mouth water so much while wandering around a grocery store... Aisle after aisle of food that wasn't a felafel, kebab or schwarma. They even had cereal! Mmmm, cereal! Anyways, I managed to get out of there with only buying some basic toiletry supplies, a chocolate croissant and a jar of Nutella. When in doubt, go for the Nutella, you can paste that stuff on anything for a quick meal.
The Safeway wasn't in the most pedestrian friendly part of town so I walked for about 20-30 minutes to the Shmeisani district, which is a sort of upscale "see and be seen" part of Amman. That is, if see and be seen involves going to Burger King, KFC or one of the dozen "Western style" eateries. Well, I wanted to be seen, so I went to Burger King and had a nice Whopper, with fries and a chocolate sundae for my 2 month anniversary. Call me crazy, but Burger King isn't good in Amman either and Ieft "BK" somewhat disappointed. (No one, and I mean no one, can compete with the fries you get from McDonalds. They should all just pay McDonalds for the recipe or something because having the second best fries just doesn't cut it these days...)
I grabbed a taxi back to the hostel which itself was rather interesting. The driver was young, probably early 20's and his taxi was rather pimped out. Blue lights everywhere, some neon on the hood, a CD player that light up like a Christmas tree and speakers that hadn't been touched in 10 years. He was quite proud of it all and loved to play his music nice and loud, which sounded like shit, though I didn't have the heart to tell him. I mean come on people... Speakers, speakers, speakers! You can't blast your Arabic music through just any stock system. If you're going to be rolling with the blue lights, then you have got to invest in some decent speakers, that's just pimping 101...
Anyways, we're shooting the shit back and forth and I tell him that I'll probably head to the Dead Sea the following day, then south to Petra the day after. Taxi drivers love hearing where you're going because they will insist on taking you there, regardless of the distance. This guy was no exception. Keep in mind that a taxi ride to the Dead Sea would probably cost around 50 JD, where as the bus is around 2 JD. To Petra, he'd probably charge over 100 JD, while the bus is like 4 JD, so I don't think the private taxi thing is for me my friend. But he was so insisted. Once he found out where I was staying, he of course wanted to help me find a cheaper place. So thanks, I'm good where I am thanks. In this guys case, I think he was somewhat genuine, but sometimes it's hard to tell the nice guys from the business guys.
Back at the hostel, he just gave me his card and told me to call him the next day for transport to the Dead Sea. Me saying "Probably not, I don't know, no promises, don't wait..." didn't really register, because his response was always "Ok, tomorrow, we go to Dead Sea.". Whatever, he gave me his card and didn't charge me for the taxi ride so I was cool with that.
At the hostel, Jerry from South Korea was in my room. He was a nice change from the wako guy from Belgium the previous night. I think Jerry is attempting to travel faster then any other traveler, because his itinerary was like way overloaded. He did more before breakfast then I had done the entire day. That said, we sort of hit it off and decided to head to the Dead Sea the following day together, because it's always more fun doing day trips like that with someone else.
Ironically, in the common area of the hostel, I ran into Hydir, who I had last seen back in Goreme, Turkey. He had been in Amman for the past week or so trying to get a new Pakastani passport. Turns out, he had applied for an Israel visa and even though they turned him down, he still got his passport stamped with something that would have prevented him from returning to Pakastan. In the end I assume he worked it all out because I didn't seen him the following day, but it just goes to show how complicated things can get when you're traveling between countries that don't get along...
Luckily, the Dead Sea wouldn't require a visa, though it would require a passport check...
Kenny
posted by Kenny Carruthers at 12/22/2005 08:40:00 AM
<< Home