Petra

So I finally left Amman. A friend of mine from Arabic class, Hanna, planned a weekend trip for her mother, who was visiting, and a bunch of us jumped on the bandwagon. The first day was spent in Petra (I was the only person who did that with them) and the second was spent in Wadi Fein, which I will write about tomorrow because I don't want to overshadow Petra. We set out after class on Thursday, so basically after dark, which was a bit of an adventure all by itself. We thought we might be able to take a bus, which everyone said would be safer and cheaper than a service taxi (basically a taxi that you share with anyone else going in the same direction), but it turns out that there is only one bus a day to Petra, very early in the morning. Fortunately for us, we got a taxi with a driver who spoke English (he spent a year or so in India, apparently) and who not only took us to the right bus station to get a service taxi, but negotiated with the taxi drivers to get us a good deal. On the whole car ride down, which was about 2-3 hours, Hanna and her mother quized me on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Jordan's part in it. It was nice to know that I haven't forgotten everything I learned last semester, and it's not a subject that I've talked to many people about, which surprised me at first, but it makes sense that that would be a very sensitive subject here.

Our hotel was cheap, but clean, so I was happy. We only had to sleep there, after all. All of Friday, we were at Petra. We went around 8, but there were already pretty big crowds at the ticket office, including a huge group of I think Japanese tourists, all wearing kuffiyehs (the traditional Arab men's headdress, made famous by Yasser Arafat). We got an optional public tour as part of our ticket price and decided to take it, which turned out to be a very good decision because our guide was one of the archeologists who had worked on the site. I'm not sure why he was ferrying tourists around, but he had pictures of his digs, and corrected several of the plaques which were apparently wrong. For example, the most famous part of Petra, the Treasury, the site of third Indiana Jones movie ending, was actually a temple, not a treasury. It more spectacular in real life than in any of the pictures I saw, but I'm getting a little ahead of myself. In order to get from the visitor center to the entrance to the city, which is a narrow canyon called the Siq, we had the option of riding a horse. At a walk, of course, although the guy leading mine did let me take the reins, so at least I was able to direct her myself. Once we reached the Siq, it's a ways down, gradually, to the point where the canyon opens up and the Treasury appears. Oh, most of this rock is sandstone, and the color variations are due to mineral deposits from rain, I think. Actually, except for the carved portions, it looked very similar to southern Utah. Here are some pictures from the Siq:







Once we reached the Siq, the canyon opens up and the farther you walk, the more there is to see. Almost everywhere you look there is evidence of the Nabataean people, the ones who built all of this. They ruled Jordan, and a bit of each of the surrounding countries, a little bit before the Common Era, and a little bit after they were conquered by the Romans. There was some evidence of both Roman and Greek influence in the architecture, including an amphitheater carved out of the surrounding rock, unlike any other in the world. It was lost to the outside world for quite a while (there were Bedouin people living there the whole time) until sometime in the 1800s when it was re-discovered by a European traveler. Of the buildings that remain, they are almost entirely tombs, temples or other public buildings. There are very few surviving houses, and apparently no tools have been found, so we don't know exactly how they did their carving, or much about their everyday lives. The last place we went was the Monastery, which actually looks very similar to the Treasury. It's at the top of what I think was the highest mountain in the area. The hike up wasn't technically difficult, but we went up at the hottest part of the day, so I had to rest a lot. I've learned to not try to predict Jordan weather, because the temperature seems to change drastically overnight, but it was probably the hottest it's been since I came. Here are some pictures of the Treasury, tombs, the amphitheater, the Monastery, and the row of columns which apparently was some sort of public audience chamber:












After viewing all these amazing ruins, one of the highlights for the day involved a flesh-and-blood man. While we were at the top of the Monastery, we saw six helicopters fly by, which some Jordanians that we had been talking to confirmed that only very important people, like the King, use. They also mentioned that Vice President Joe Biden was supposed to show up to Petra that day. Sure enough, we got off the mountain just in time to watch a line of about 20 bright and shiny SUVs drive down a very narrow back road to near where we were resting. So, we went over to see if it really was Joe Biden. The Jordanian army guy that we struck up a conversation with confirmed that Joe was there, with Hamza, one of King Abdullah's brothers, to see the sights. We waited for quite a while, watching some clearly American military personnel (the bullet proof vests and guns strapped to their thighs were the clues) taking pictures of each other, but no sign of Biden. Just as we were leaving, here he comes, down the road from the Siq, with about 50 other people. I wasn't able to spot Hamza, but Biden was wearing a baseball cap and easily identifiable. So, I saw my Vice President, in person, for the first time in Jordan. It was a pretty perfect ending to a good day.

I will tell you about the other half of my weekend tomorrow.