Mansour Amman

... food that we don't usually get to eat here that I had to go home and not move for like an hour. When I could reasonably move around and communicate without feeling like I was about to purge my entire dinner I also made a special appearance at my family's Thanksgiving via webcam. I said the before dinner prayer and felt so on the spot that I forgot the words half way through, lmao. Luckily everyone else chimed in and finished for me. Then I did the ULS premeal poem ...

... were still working on getting all of our windows to close completely. The rain didn't stop till the afternoon so I eschewed waiting for a taxi and stayed home from work which ended up being good because I cleaned the apartment all day for YTY and for my mystery guest who was due to arrive two days later. I was also able to be home to get a new propane tank for under the stove, let the guys in to check the radiators, and let the guy in who came to fix our bathroom ...

... and Romans.

Right across the street from the Citadel is the Roman Theatre, an incredibly large and well preserved amphitheatre built in the 2nd Century AD and capable of seating 6,000 spectators.

Tonight all groups go out together for a last supper at an interesting local restaurant called Tawaheen Al-Hawa. The tables are set up under a traditional Bedouin tent. The meal consists of salad, traditional Arabic mezzas, and barbeque ...

... taxi de berg op, naar het Ajlun kasteel (1 euri..). Bij het kasteel bleek dat de kaartverkoop onderaan de berg was, maar de suppoost vond ons zielig, dus mochten we dr gratis in. Kasteel was wel mooi, met rare gangen en doolhoven.

Bovenop de berg reed een toeristenbusje naar de kaartverkoop, dus wij liftten mee met een groep fransozen. Die naar de stad bleken te rijden met een tourbus, dus wij weer mee.. Bleken ze naar Jerash te gaan, en ja hoor, we mochten blijven ...

... Fasting by default made me super tired and we arrived at high noon so I didn't really absorb my surroundings until after a long mid-day nap.

When I woke up I was a bit refreshed and started to take everything in. The Eco Park is quite far North. From the area you can see the West Bank the Jordan Valley is basically split between Jordan and Israel. Of course this area, while full of army dudes and check points (think El Paso/Juarez but worse ...

... than passable Brooklyn accent.
Crossing into what is unkindly nicknamed the Hashemite Kingdom of Boredom from almost anywhere else in the Middle East induces a palpable lowering of tension. This is all the more true for the numerous security contractors, diplomats, spies, journalists and exiles who use Amman as a temporary escape from neighbouring Iraq.
Security has been tightened across the country since last November’s bombings – claimed by ...

... floating you are seriously on top of the water. It is the weirdest experience! The other thing you will definantly notice is if you have any open wounds or cuts cause you will sting like there's no tomorrow. The water here is 38% salt!!!!!!! If you have a cut or a tiny nick you will know about it. Now you can't actually go that far out into the Dead Sea as the military will came and basically shoot you, so no swimming to Israel. It is really easy to see that ...

... is all the signs for the Iraq Border. Apparently it isn't so far away, you can take a taxi for about 100 JD. Needless to say, Cory and I have opted to not visit Iraq. Final Recap on Egypt Food - 80%. Most of the food was actually decent, if you could figure out was it was. The shawermas were always a good bet, and anything that you could see being made, so that you could just point. It was almost always cheap. My only real big complaint was ...