There is no angel here

During my last class at at Ashrafiyya School, after the obligatory cake and Mirinda, the conversation somehow shifted to kidnapping.  One after another, men and women told stories of how their brother, their father, or their son was taken and held for ransom.  They argued about whether paying the ransom, sometimes as much as $100,000, hurts one's chances for resettlement with the UN or IOM.  They argued about whether it was the Shi'a or the Baathists, or just criminals who had abducted their loved ones.

Finally, one soft-spoken woman raised her hand.  She's a mother of two, an electrical engineer who's waited for seven months to immigrate with her family to the U.S. or Canada.

"I was kidnapped," she said as the room quieted down.

She then proceeded to tell the story about the time she got into a taxi in 2006.  She was leaving the hospital where she had been visiting her father.  After a twenty minute drive that should have taken ten, she got confused. She wasn't back at home yet.  She began seeing trees all around.  She lived in Baghdad, a treeless city if there ever was one.  She asked the driver to stop the car.  He stopped and took her out.  He told her that her family would have to pay for her life.

"I start to pray," she said to the class.  "I read the Bible every day.  I know that when there is danger, God will send an angel to save you."

She saw him pull out a gun.

"There is no angel here.  This is a bad place."

As she knelt in those woods, crying and praying, a police car drove by, unaware of what was occurring just yards away.  It spooked the would-be kidnapper sufficiently that he jumped into the taxi and drove away, leaving her there.

The Long Goodbye

Although I have three weeks left in Jordan, I've begun winding down my various activities, which mostly means roping other people into taking over my classes.  When I told my class at the Chaldean Church that I was leaving, they were really sad.  One student led me out of the room during a break, while they very noisily planned a surprise party for me.  My Arabic isn't perfect, but it's good enough that I can understand when a group of seniors are arguing over who will bring what to a barbecue in my honor.

So the big day came last Friday.  Various Iraqis had told me times ranging from 10:30AM to 1:30PM as the starting time.  I knew I wanted to get in on the cooking, so I came at 11.  We cooked semach masgoof, basically a big grilled fish.  A student I'll call Yohanna, with whom I've cooked/eaten previously, was in charge of the grill.  

After a long sear, Abu Iskander added a spicy tomato sauce.

When we finally started to eat, I was simultaneously in the best and worst possible situation.  There was this mass of great food, but I was surrounded by a roomful of people who think of me as a son or grandson and want to fatten me up.  As I ate, the pile of food on my plate got bigger, not smaller, as everyone added a large portion of fish, briyani, salata, and tabbouleh to my plate.  My plastic plate began to bend and crack under the mound of delicious Iraqi food.


After everyone was stuffed, we went into the church, where I gave out "diplomas" for the three month course in English that they had just completed.  Seeing how happy and proud they all were was really gratifying.  This is probably the last of my teaching during my Watson year, but it really has opened doors for me in the Iraqi community.  I can just hope that the communities I visit in Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco are as open and welcoming as the Iraqis in Jordan have been.

Me and Jethro

When I went on the pilgrimage a few months ago with the Chaldean Church, one of the most striking natural aspects of the trip was the road from Salt in the north to the Dead Sea.  It's a valley called Wadi Shu'ib (after the Biblical character Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses) and it's a long valley that eventually lets out in the River Jordan.  I estimated that from Salt to Shuneh al-Janubiyya (a jumping-off point for Bethany, the spring of Moses, or the Dead Sea) was about 15km.  That'll be a nice and easy hike.


Despite my compass and usually sound sense of direction, I got us stuck at the top of a big ridge, looking down on the road we wanted to walk on.  After trespassing through someone's olive grove (where I found shotgun shells), we were so very close to the road.  We jumped into a pile of rusty metal and trash, and we were once again on our way.  Crisis averted.


The hike was beautiful.  While the ridges on each side of the canyon are rocky and without any greenery, the valley has a small stream and is almost tropical.  We snuck in/walked in to a citrus grove and ate clementines for a while before moving on.  Later on, we made it down the creek, a little muddy stream that was running cold in mid-November.  After several hours hiking, the sun went behind a ridge, it was getting dark, and despite our rigorous training regimen of shisha and shawarma, we were exhausted.


I flagged down a car to take us the rest of the way to Shuneh.  The driver told us he had seen us hiking earlier.  Crazy aja'nib, foreigners.  We had walked something like 22km before quitting.  The bad news when we arrived in Shuneh was that there was no bus to Amman.  However, the guy who picked us up said he was going back to Salt and was glad to take us.  Both Andrew and I fell asleep during the drive back to Salt, which is always a good decision while hitch-hiking.


We got on a bus in Salt and were back in Amman in no time.  Though I like to think I'm better than eating at western establishments in the Middle East, nothing seemed better after 22km than Popeye's Chicken.  Andrew and I demolished a family meal, before retiring to my apartment, satisfied on all fronts.


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Sorry for the lack of pictures.  I was too lazy to upload them here, but they're all on facebook:


http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2034349&id=19101971&l=bfcec0f41e 
They cover Kerak, Umm Qais, Makawir, and this adventure in Wadi Shu'ib.

If Islam had been invented in Minnesota

Amman has been comparatively cold for the past week, and all the Jordanians and Iraqis are breaking out their winter clothes, which is funny to see with my smug sense of superiority after living in Minnesota.


One of the other teachers at the Ashrafiyya school for Iraqis where I volunteer always wears a hijab.  However, yesterday, she wore a thick knit hat and a big scarf around her neck.  I realized that for four Minnesota winters, I had worn the hijab daily without even realizing it.


I should probably stop before I get more blasphemous, but saying "peace be upon him" followed by "dontcha know" is a wonderful wonderful thing.

It's a Holiday for a Hanging

After a long rainy week in Amman, I decided to take a trip on Sunday.  Sunday is a work day here, so all of my gainfully employed friends couldn't come along, so I went alone.  I decided on Makawir as my destination.  Makawir (Machaerus in Latin) was the site of Herod the Great's pleasure palace on the eastern shore of the Dead Sea.  Many believe that this was where Salome danced for King Herod, where Salome's mother Herodias tricked him into executing John the Baptist (Yahya ibn Zakariyya to Muslims, Yohanna al-Ma'madan to Chaldeans).  What follows is one of the better stories in the Bible:

On his birthday, Herod gave a banquet for his high officials and military commanders and the leading men of Galilee.  When the daughter of Herodias came in and danced, she pleased Herod and the dinner guests.

The king said to the girl, "Ask me for anything you want, and I'll give it to you."  And he promised her with an oath.  "Whatever you ask I will give you, up to half my kingdom."

She went out and said to her mother, "What shall I ask for?" "The head of John the Baptist," she answered.

At once the girl hurried in to the king with the request: "I want you to give me right now the head of John the Baptist on a platter."

Mark 6:21-25

Getting to Makawir was no small feat.  Buses don't go all the way to the site, so I took a bus to Madaba, about 15 km to the north, then hitch-hiked down.  The first ride I got was with a guy who was either a baker or bread-enthusiast.  In any case, his truck smelled really good.  I tried to pay him, but he wouldn't have it.  He took me to his house, and showed me the road that I had to keep walking.

I didn't see anyone around, so I sang songs for the hour I was walking on this road.

I walked for another hour, passing on a ride with a dozen sheep in a shepherd's truck.  Eventually, I got another ride.  An old man who was just excited that someone had come to his town took me to about 2km away from the site.  From there, I hiked with the top of the mountain peaking over the hills.  The thing about hiking in mountains next to the Dead Sea is that because the drop is so far, every hill you climb is topped by blue sky or grey clouds.  It's an incredible feeling.

Coming to the top of a hill close to the site

Herod's Palace - Machaerus

[If you're trying to be a legitimate king, why do you live in a hollowed-out volcano like a supervillian?]

When I got to the mountain, it was just me and the birds.  As I sat on the western edge of the ruins, looking out over the Dead Sea to Jerusalem, the Holy Land kind of hit me.  While I fell off the religion wagon a pretty long time ago, these sites still have incredible significance to me.  With winds whipping over the site and small black birds flying overhead, I realized that I'm going to miss Jordan when I leave.  While I've had my ups and downs during my time here, Jordan is a beautiful country with a long history.  I am lucky that I stayed here long enough to visit the backwaters and market towns on top of seeing the famous sites in Petra, Jerash, and Amman.

After my moment of reflection, I was back to a rigorous schedule of galavanting.  In the middle of the triclinium was a large hole that at one time was under excavation, but the funding for this dig was obviously not there to continue this project.  I debated whether or not to climb into this hole, and I thanked Ol' Tom Watson for the opportunity to ponder this question.

Yes, it's a ladder into a hole.

While my friends are making big decisions about life, jobs, relationships, and other VERY IMPORTANT THINGS, my most difficult decision in a long time boiled down to: "Should I climb into this hole?"  While my heart said yes, when the top rung of the ladder cracked under my foot, my bowels said no.  I didn't have any rope, and there was no one to hear me scream, so I saved my energy for the caves in the surrounding hills.  It's likely that one of these caves was the prison that held John before his execution and was the probable site of the beheading.  I dutifully pulled out my headlamp and climbed in.  However, no bloodstains or Baptist-shaped chalk outlines were extant.

Having spent four hours traveling to Makawir and three hours exploring the site, I began the trek home, exhausted.  The traffic in late afternoon is practically non-existent, so when faced with the choice between hitch-hiking after dark in the middle of nowhere and riding with the sheep, I chose sheep.  This had good and bad consequences.  Thankfully, I made it back to Amman in just over two hours, in time to visit with Fr. Raymond and go to mass at the Chaldean Church in Jabal al-Webdeh before he goes to America for a month.  On the other hand, I smelled like sheep.  In a major way.

Also, unbeknownst to me, Fr. Raymond's early departure meant that I was being honored at this mass instead of when I actually leave.  So at the end of the mass, while he's speaking to the congregation about the English program and my service (yadda yadda yadda) and all my students are smiling at me and coming over to shake my hand, I'm frantically trying to remove the visible dirt from my hands and face.

After pleasantries and gifts, I refused a few dinner invitations and went home for the most glorious shower I've ever experienced.  Al-hamdulilah.  Thanks be to God, indeed.