Fun weekend of fun.

Thursday night 7/29: Jennifer, Nick, and I rented a car to drive around and see the desert castles that are here. More on those later. We'd wanted to leave Thursday night and just spent the night somewhere in the east, but it didn't work because we didn't even decide to go and to rent the car until 1 that afternoon. So we stayed in Amman, but Jennifer and I wanted to go out somewhere because we had a car. So we went with George, Miriam, and Carissa to a restaurant called The Seven Hills and was maybe 20-30 minutes away? Everything here is a pretty decent drive from anywhere else, so I don't really notice length anymore. Dinner was tasty. Pretty much the same food as usual. But still tasty. On the road leading to/from the restaurant there was a small amusement park. One of the best quotes of the night: "Can I ride a horse ON the ferris wheel?" We were joking with George about riding a horse and riding the ferris wheel too. And then had a fun joke for the rest of the night. Of course it's one of those you-had-to-be-there things, but it still amuses me.

I should mention that maps here are fairly useless because the streets aren't marked, or signs are wrong, or things change, or for any number of reasons. Regardless, we set off for Marka, which we can't figure out whether it's a city/town itself or just a section of Amman (all of which have names). We wound up looking for Al-Quds (Jerusalem) street, and from there were supposed to turn onto Al-Houriya (freedom) street. The irony is delicious. After turning onto some random street and driving for a while, and being stuck in traffic for a while, and having no idea what street we were actually on (but being totally okay with that), we magically wound up on the next street we needed. It was a pretty epic moment. We're not sure that we ever found houriya though. (These are probably only funny if you speak Arabic.)

We wandered around Marka for a while, just up and down the main street. And while we were there we ran into Ali and Othman, two of the Iraqi refugees we meet with in Marka every week and teach English to. We went back to their house and sat for a while, then went back out with them and got ice cream. We joked about eating their fish (in their fishtank) for dinner. It was fun. And we watched random Arabic music videos on TV and made fun of them. Woo.

Friday 7/30: Friday I got up bright and early to go see the castles with Jennifer and Nick at 7am. Ugh. We drove. We got mildly lost. We found the right way and still joked about being lost. Honestly, the desert looks the same whether you're going the right way or not. The first of the castles in the loop that we came upon turned out not to be a castle, but we didn't know this until we got back in the car after seeing it. It was really an old bathhouse for the castle/fort nearby. It was super small and when we drove by it at first we were all like, "No. No this cannot be a castle. What is going on?" So we explored a little. Moved on. The next castle (which was actually a fort) wasn't open for visitors yet, because it wasn't yet 9 am and probably because it was Friday. I'm not sure about that part. Either way, we admired it from afar and kept going. Stopped at Azraq Castle, or whatever it was called. It was in Azraq regardless. Wandered around in it for a while. Drove around and around looking for the Wetland Reserve that we'd been told to go to by other people. Finally found it and then were disappointed by the lack of animals and the lack of wet. It used to be an oasis but most of the water is gone. Whoops. There was a lot of water buffalo poop though. And I mean a lot. We saw some tiny frogs and three water buffalo and that was it. Anticlimactic.

After that we went to lunch at a Saudi restaurant in Azraq. Fun experience there. We asked what they had (menus as we know them in the US aren't too popular here). I remember saying "I don't care what we get so long as it's not an organ of some kind." We wound up ordering kubdeh (?), which sounded familiar to me, but I wasn't sure so I didn't say anything. Nick said he didn't know what it was but had had it before and it was good. So when our food comes, Jennifer tries it and looks at him funny. It was liver and he knew it. (Evidenced by how he started laughing.) Turns out it's not so bad. Not on my list of favorites, but I can now cross "eat something weird" from my to-do list. Yay.

After lunch we went to one last castle, which wasn't a castle but was again a fort. And had the remains of a city with it, but we were exhausted and melting so we didn't care too much about seeing the rest of the random things. Judging from the map I don't know how much of the random things was actually left to see; it sounded more like there was just spots where they thought things used to be. As we walk into the castle/whatever building, a huge Saudi family is leaving. And then they come back in.

And they stare at us. And giggle. And blatantly start taking pictures of us on their phones. It was actually pretty hilarious, in a "is this really happening?" kind of way. The kids followed us around and crowded around us in the small rooms of the castle. Finallyl one girl came over and asked if they could take a picture with us, and I swear there were at least a dozen pictures taken. It was cute. We walked back to our car not long after they did, and they kept staring at us, waving, and even taking pictures from their car in the parking lot. It was so. Cute.

We got back to Amman between 3 and 4. I took an amazing nap. And then I did nothing of import until bedtime. Yay.

Saturday 7/31: Saturday was the last organized trip we had as a group. We started at Mt. Nebo, where Moses is supposedly buried. The church there was closed for renovation. Story of my life; everywhere I go something is covered by scaffolding. So there wasn't a lot to see there. There was the big cross thingy and a hazy view into a few different countries. Still a cool experience, but would have been better minus the haze. And minus the heat. I'm pretty sure they told us that day was the hottest day of the summer. Awesome.

After Mt. Nebo we went to a mosiac school in Madaba, where people learn how to recreate old mosaics. It was impressive but the replics don't have the same feel as old ones. Then we went to St. George's Church in Madaba, where there is/was a huge mosaic map of the world at that time. More for pigrams and such, I think, and less geographically accurate, but still awesome. Except half of it was lost in the 13 years after they uncovered it and didn't do anything to preserve it. Then we had lunch, which was tasty but of course I can't name half the food we ate.

From there, it was Dead Sea time. At the Dead Sea it was over 115 degrees. Death indeed. There are one or two public beaches there (which you still pay to get into), and all the hotels around it have private beaches, so you pay the hotel instead. We did the latter. People burnt their feet on the way down to the beach because the sand was so hot. The water was so warm it was like the most disgusting bath ever. And so salty. Floating in it was cool. At least at the beginning. Then it got kind of old. And they tell you only to swim on your back because people have drowned on the surface of the water on their stomachs because it's super hard to flip yourself over.
We all covered ourselves in mud (so SLIMY!), which is really good for your skin and a really good exfoliator and whatnot. There are all kinds of dead sea beauty products here. And then we washed the mud off. I went up to the hotel pool with Brittney and we went down the water slide, which we figured out after the fact was probably only meant for kids because it was made of fail for us. Stayed in the pool a few minutes then got out and changed because the humidity was just gross. Yeah the heat wasn't fun but it's really the humidity that kills you. It's been 100+ here a lot but it's better than being at home with low 90s but high humidity. Found the hotel bar, got a drink, discovered I don't like pina coladas, and did my homework. Yes, I brought homework. But a lot of us did, because we had like 5 hours there and you can only swim for so long. The bar was air conditioned too, which was the best part.

We got back around 7 and I spent from about 8 until 2am working on a paper for VCU; instead of a thesis like some schools have, the Honors College requires a reflective paper if we want to graduate with university honors (different from latin honors, which is automatic if you qualify). So that was done, finally. It was due by midnight EST, so I finished about 5 hours before it was due. Awesome.

Since sometime before that weekend, today was the first day I've had to get a decent amount of sleep, and it was glorious. It's nasty and hot out again as usual, which is a bit of a problem, but eh. I can't wait to go to VCU and have my own room and bathroom. I'm so over the sharing a bathroom thing. And with 3 roommates here it's been pretty impossible to sleep through the night. Wah. It's not as desperate as it sounds, but being able to sleep for 8 straight hours with no interruptions will be so amazing. Yay. 15 days til Richmond. 10 til Boston. Excited kitty is excited.

Other posts about other things to come in the future, but I'm going to lunch with a friend at her Jordanian friend's house soon and I have to get ready. Bye bye!

Pictures