Le Royal Amman

... E last year, I didn't feel like sticking around long). While the gentle charm and humor of the first few hundred pages persists throughout the read, it's done in by its own saccharine nature. After 800 pages of cordial visits and inane declarations of happiness and admiration for one another, you can't help but feel that the Victorian era really was nothing more than a soft, tritely self-absorbed, and cloyingly genteel existence.

So let's ...

Ladies and gents, adoring fans, Fonzerelli...

We will return to our regularly scheduled Syria dissertation after the following message from yours truly:

Imagine if you will, I, Fanny Noni, wake from my sleep refreshed and with a full face of makeup just like the movies. I nimbly skip out of bed to greet the wild creatures that gather outside my window each morning. A few helpful nightingales help me get ...

... water (think DIY spa) so when Devan asked if I wanted to go I was all about it. I don't know if I said this before, but her gym has this awesome track that is suspended in the air and protrudes out from the building with windows on both sides so you get this really great view of Amman. In between machines I always walk a few laps and just think about how different but beautiful this city is from what I am used to.

Later that night Devan and I ...

... got my very first solo cab and headed to the Shmeisani Police Station to check in my residency. I probably could have walked there but no one knows the name of street here because they were just named not too long ago and there are like no maps in this country. Whatever though. I made it there in one piece only to be turned away because the computer was "closed." Awesome. Back to the apartment to get ready for the Valley.

We left for the Jordan Valley around ...

... us to her choice of restaurant and you won’t believe what it was…Chili’s. Yes, I want my baby back, baby back, baby back, Chili’s baby back ribs Chili’s! Haha. And even funnier was the fact that they turned us away! That would never happen in the states but technically it is because of Ramadan because everyone there literally began eating at 7:30 so there isn’t like a staggering out of patrons like there would be normally ...

... the bathroom drain, and pulled out big chunks of garlic…yes, garlic.



Lucky for me, I had read an ad that very day of an apartment available with a woman for the same price that seemed a lot better. I saw it that night and moved in the next day! So I’m FINALLY settled after three weeks of frustration, feeling disgusted, and living out of my suitcases and plastic bags…but, I haven’t got my money back…Lu’s working ...

... to go to Jordan to work on his cooking. I mean, this guy was all over the map. It just wasn't what I expected to encounter on a bus with Jordanian locals back from Petra...and the India and Clinton story was pretty funny.

When we got to the bus station in Amman this guy tried to give us a ride downtown...but he didn't seem to have a taxi...turns out he didn't he just had a random car...we declined.

We had taken a metered taxi ride to the bus station ...

... of the dead sea scrolls. Yesterday we took a minibus north to Jerash, a well preserved Roman city. The city is made up of huge arched north and south gates, the massive Hadrian's arch, a hippodrome, the huge oval plaza- surrounded by columns, two theatres- north and south, a long colonnaded street- which still has the original paving stones grooved from many chariot wheels, the nyphaeum- a tall beautiful fountain, many churches reduced to rubble, and the stately ...

... watched the two European Champions League Semi Finals in this working mens club equivalent. It was a really cool place to watch the games, as the whole place had an air of mystery about it (probably due to the amount of sheesha being smoked), as rowdy football fans mixed it with old men playing chess and backgammon and drinking fruit juices. The most engaging moments of Amman came through walking the endless narrow streets interacting with the locals, and this was no more enjoyable ...

Today we were on the way to the airport by 7:00 am with Bob, the taxi driver.  Since it was Friday there was very little traffic so it only took about 25 minutes to get there.  We cleared customs and then went looking for Starbucks-found it but no Egypt mugs anywhere.  Oh well.  Ran into 1 school family that I had seen at the pyramid light show the previous Thursday-kinda fun. Landed in Amman and were back at the apartment by 12:30.  Mary Ford had my car and ...