Day 129: Stranded in Amman

It’s official. We’re stranded in Amman. We woke up somewhat early, packed our bags up, had breakfast, and asked about reserving a room when we got back from Petra. “You cannot go to Petra today. The roads are closed!” The front deskman declared.

“What about Jerash?” I asked.

“Also closed.” He declared. And then the other front deskman sliced off some cake for us as they handed the same key back over for us to go back to our room. But not before we re-enacted the conversation because… with everything closed… what else were we going to do for the “Day in a Minute?”

It was a rather uneventful, and cold day. We trekked up one of the hills to find an open cafe on Rainbow Street. Got caught in a snowball fight, and rather than eating at Hashim (one of the very few restaurants open in town, Hashim has the most amazing hummus and falafel- for cheap too!) for the fourth time in a row, we broke down and went across the street for Happy Hour at Wings and Rings. One of the managers lived in Northern Kentucky/Cincinnati for ten years. He knew my hometown, and I knew where abouts he lived near my hometown. Behind the old Kroger’s near NKU. The world is small.

Day 127: Amman, Jordan

We woke up to worse weather. Of course this region experiences the worst weather in 20 years just as soon as we arrive. We bundled up and headed out, trying to make the best of our time in the capital city. We trekked over to the Roman Theater, and then started to make our way up to the Citadel.

En route, we ran into a Palestinian completely overjoyed to see us. Walking down the street carrying a tank of gas and two ceramic mugs, he immediately put down the gas and walked right up to us excitedly trying to talk to us in Arabic. He forced the two mugs into our hands and continued to talk to us, as if we knew exactly what he was saying. We didn’t, but by this time, a crowd had gathered in what we assumed was where he worked. From the glass front, it looked to be a paper mill or a printing press. The men in the storefront looked as amused – and confused as we were. One of them came out and tried to translate. The only thing we understood was that he was from Palestine and was really excited to see us in Jordan, and that the mugs were for us. He tried to fish out other presents from his pockets (a lighter) but I refused and told him to keep it. He tried to take a picture of me (with my camera) but I told him I preferred a picture of him, instead! Then his colleagues encouraged me to put my arm around him, which made everyone happy.

Not two buildings later, some men waved us into their garage to warm up near a fire that they had going in a metal bin. As I was only wearing my barefoot water shoes and my feet were freezing, I jumped at the opportunity. We made small talk – what we could in – and were given steaming cups of tea. I re-gifted the mugs from the Palestinian (don’t tell!) and one of them jumped up when we went to leave to give us a ride up the rest of the hill to the Citadel.

We walked in the gates right around three, and were able to get into the indoor museum just before we were told it closed. After walking around the citadel for a half hour, we arrived back at the front gate to find we were locked in. The whole city had shut down, and we were on the highest point in the city behind locked gates! Luckily, a taxi driver spied us and pointed to another exit.

I really love how all of the buildings are the same color and just stacked right on top of each other. Because the weather was so dreary, I couldn’t decide if I liked the images in color or black and white, so I decided to do both.