Jerash

We went to Jerash yesterday. It was HOT! The car read 100 degrees for external temperature and it felt every bit of 100. Somehow, that didn't slow Jake down much. We had to keep yelling at him to slow down and stop running so he wouldn't get heat stroke. The kid is pumped full of energy.

Jerash is located about 30 miles north of Amman. It was a pretty easy drive (of course I wasn't in the driver's seat), and a very scenic drive compared to the drive we took to the airport.

Located in Jerash is supposed to be the largest concentration of Roman ruins outside of Rome.

We met our friends, The Farmer's, at Jerash and toured the ruins together. We had trouble finding the ticket booth and it took a while to get started. Many of the tourist attractions are not well maintained compared to American standards. They have different rates for residents of Jordan and tourists. A tourist pays 8JD (about $11) and a resident pays .05JD (about $0.75).  There were no paper maps or clear directions or markings, other than the signs posted at some of the major features (paid for by USAID). Regardless, it was still really neat, just has more potential.

From Wikipedia:

Jerash, the Gerasa of Antiquity (Ancient Greek: Γέρασα), is the capital and largest city of Jerash Governorate(محافظة جرش), which is situated in the north of Jordan, 48 kilometres (30 mi) north of the capital Amman towards Syria. Jerash Governorate's geographical features vary from cold mountains to fertile valleys from 250 to 300 metres (820 to 980 ft) above sea level, suitable for growing a wide variety of crops.

In the latter Ottoman period, the city of Jerash's name was abandoned and changed to Sakib, yet this was not a permanent development, as the name "Jerash" reappears in Ottoman tax registers by the end of 16th century.^[2][3]

A strong earthquake in 749 AD destroyed large parts of Jerash, while subsequent earthquakes along with the wars and turmoil contributed to additional destruction. Its destruction and ruins remained buried in the soil for hundreds of years until they were discovered by German Orientalist Ulrich Jasper Seetzen in 1806.^[4] He began excavation and a return to life of the current Jerash by inhabitants of older villages. 70 years later, this was followed by the Muslim community, Circassians, who emigrated to Jordan from the Caucasus in 1878 after the Ottoman-Russian war. Subsequently a large community of people from Syria came to the area at the beginning of the 20th century.

Hadrian's Arch and our entry/exit point.

In the bottom right photo, Jake was very concerned about getting to see a TRACTOR that was was nearby. The tractor was his favorite part of the day.

Top right is in front of the Sanctuary of Artemis. Bottom left is in the Hippodrome. And the bottom right is the Farmer family, Reid, Mitchell, Julie, and Hank.

On the way home we stopped and bought some fruit from this guy. They have these little fruit stands all along the roads. Some aren't very far off the road and not far from the fields they come from. Some very sweet pears, figs, and plums.

And today, we played. Jake went over to the Pesature's house to play with their daughter, Leila, while the housekeeper watched them. Kaylan and I went and got groceries. She showed me a few stores that will be great in the future. After a few hours at home and a nap, we all went over to the Pesatures and had dinner. It was wonderful eggplant parmesan! Thank you Kaylan and Dan!!! 

Reunited With Friends

The past few days have been busy and I haven’t made time to update. We had some friends, the Farmer’s, come in from Kuwait on Wednesday. Chris picked them up from the airport at about 9:30 A.M. and since their hotel wasn’t going to be ready until around 3 P.M., Julie and their two boys, Hank and Mitchell, stayed at our house with Jake and I while Chris and Reid went to the Embassy to get some work stuff done. These are friends that were in Monterey with us, so it was good to have friends around that we have a “past” with and fun to catch up. They will be in Jordan for a few weeks. Once the guys were done with their work stuff and the whole Farmer Family got checked into their hotel room down the street, we met them at the hotel for dinner. It was a slightly interesting occasion with 3 boys under the age of 4, Jake of course, was the most rambunctious. Their hotel has about five restaurants in it so we decided that we wanted to try the Lebanese Restaurant, but it didn’t open until 7 P.M. and it was only 6:30 P.M. So we decided to grab a drink in the lobby. And as I mentioned in my previous post about the traffic, the only time Jordanians are in a hurry is when they are behind you in their car, so it was a slow, but charming service being served our drinks. When we finished (now about 7:30 P.M.) and the boys (mostly Jake, actually just Jake) had probably annoyed all the patrons in the lobby by running around and being a little loud, we went to the restaurant. They weren’t open, so they sent us to another restaurant on the roof. When we arrived, we could smell this delicious food cooking on a big charcoal grill and were excited to be seated, the host said they were all booked and there wasn’t any room for us. We looked around to see one table filled and 20 open tables with NOBODY at them. We had to laugh because it seemed a little ridiculous. We headed back downstairs to another restaurant and we actually found a really great buffet, which meant no waiting for food to be cooked, especially since it was getting late. We ate and headed home.

Then on Thursday, our friends, the Pesatures, who are also stationed here, returned from a trip to Turkey. We hadn’t seen them yet, but were glad to have them back. They are also friends from Monterey so the Farmers know them too. So once again, the boys went to work and the girls kept the kids, but this time Kaylan picked Julie and I up and we went to her house since she has real toys. Dan and Kaylan have a daughter, Leila, and they have been here for a while so their household is actually set up. We had a good time catching up and the kids had fun playing. We all headed home around nap time. Then the Farmers headed out to see Amman, and we met the Pesatures at the Embassy for dinner. Every Thursday night they have dinner there. I may have wrote about this last week, when we went with our social sponsors. It is a nice time sitting out on the patio by the pool and they have music playing. Jake loves the bands when they play. 

When we got home from the Embassy, our phone rang, it was Grammy and Grandy. Jake had a lot to say. Below is a picture.

Today (Friday), I got to go to IKEA. Our social sponsors were going so I left Jake at home with Chris and jumped in with Jon and Jessica. IKEA is out by the airport, so about 20 minutes from our house. I’ve never been to an IKEA before, but it was a good first experience. I guess this one just opened in March and so it’s nice, clean, and new. I bought some really fun stuff like toilet brushes and pots and pans. Meanwhile, Chris took Jake to the little park at the Embassy and wore him out. Chris had been invited to one of the British officer’s houses by a man named Scott. Scott is a good friend of Andy Lambert, Chris’s British Exchange Sergeant Major that worked with him at Fort Benning. Andy got Chris in touch with Scott, and Scott invited him to the British Armed Forces Day celebration they were having. Once Chris got there, they asked where Jake and I were. Chris didn’t realize it was a casual family event, so he came back to the house and got us too We enjoyed the afternoon drinking Pimms and Jake enjoyed the bounce house. After the British Party, we went down to Jara Market and met up with the Farmers for a few minutes. It was fun to see in the evening, but we didn’t stay long because it had been a long day and Jake was tired.

The upper right is a picture of Scott and Chris at the British Armes Forces Day Party.

Out and about

The past couple of days have been pretty slow as far as "major attractions" go. Monday was a long day at work for Chris so Jake and I were pretty much housebound all day. I'm not allowed to drive the Embassy vehicle and we haven't found one to buy yet and even if we had, there is still a lengthy paperwork process to it. So my only outing was with our social sponsor, Jon, who took me with him to Crossfit Quicksand. It was a good outing and nice to get a little exercise in.

Tuesday, we went to the Orthodox park, with Jessica and Amelia. It's just about a mile from our house and is pretty nice for a park in Jordan. You have to pay to access parks in Jordan. Actually, you have to pay to access almost everything in Jordan. But it was only 2JD, so well worth it. I think the Orthodox club is actually a gym, but still not sure why it's called the Orthodox club. 

Then we went home for a nap. When Chris came home, we went out to do an airport reconnaissance. Some friends are coming in from Kuwait tomorrow and Chris is picking them up. We wanted to make sure he knew how to get to and from the airport and how to get to their hotel. The airport is pretty easy to get to from our house and is only about 30 minutes away. It was the most heavily trafficked park of the day, so it was difficult to get to the hotel once we were back in the city. But we did it and then even ventures to City Mall across town to pick up some things for the house.

Driving in Amman is crazy. It's almost impossible to explain. Traffic doesn't stop and it constantly looks like they are going to crash into you. If you stop, you'll cause an accident and then there is constant HONKING! The ONLY time Jordanians are in a hurry is when they are behind you in their car. Jake likes the beeping and will add a little commentary of hi own beeps from the backseat. Walking across the street, no hurry. Riding and escalator, no hurry. Eating at a restaraunt, no hurry. Get in their car, BIG HURRY! At the occasional traffic light there is no need to see the light turn green because the car(s) behind you will start honking as soon as the light changes. They also seem to use their horn as a substitute for a blinker. If they are going to pass, they will honk to let you know. There are very few lines marking the roads so if your car will fit past the car in front of you, you can pass. Definitely something to experience.

The picture doesn't do it justice, but here there are about five "lanes" of traffic merging into three, with no markings on the road so there are cars merging from every direction. Enough on the traffic for now.

Today, Chris and I had an overview meeting at the Embassy about how things work. It was really interesting and we learned a lot. We have to keep an eye on our water, gas, and diesel tanks to ensure they get filled before running out. 

I learned our doorman is called a Boab and ours is named Ahmed.  A Boab for whose services we will be expected to pay a trifle each month for, duties include keeping the building tidy, security of the building, washing the car, collecting our trash and helping to haul groceries.

We learned a few other things too, but that were the most interesting things. 

Jake got to play with Amelia while we were in the meeting for 3 hours. Then we came home and took a nap. And when Chris got home, we went over to Taj Mall and ate at P.F. Changs. Hopefully part of our household good will arrive soon and I'll have some stuff to cook with. 

Oh, and Chris took his PT test today and did really great!

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum....

Today was another busy day for the Baldwins. We ventured out to find the Roman ruins located in Amman. We left around 10:30 A.M. and Jake fell asleep about 3 minutes into the trip, which turned out to be a good thing. It should have take about 20 minutes to get there, but after about an hour and a half, we finally figured out how to get there. We were using a city map that only has the main roads. My iPhone wouldn't pick up satellites and the Garmin we just paid JD 240 ($338 USD) was sitting comfortably back on the kitchen counter. We got SO close on our first try, BUT traffic is terrible and Jordanians are CRAZY drivers, so we got pushed into the wrong "lane" and had to take a right where we needed to go straight for one more block then take a left and we'd have been there. The right put us on a one-way street full of vendors, stores, and traffic, which spun us around and got us going in the complete opposite direction of where we needed to be, but we finally made it, and it was worth it!

We went to the Roman Theater and Odeon, where our JD 1 ticket also got us admission into the Folklore museum and Jordan Museum of Popular Tradition. 

Then we made our way up to the Amman Citadel, which also contains the Archaeological Museum. We didn't go into the museum because we didn't want to press our luck with Jake, but spent an hour or so enjoying the open air museum and sites of the Citadel. Below are some pictures from our day. 

The above picture is of the Roman Theater. It was really big. I'm sure it doesn't compare to the Colosseum in Rome, but I was surprised at how big it really was. With the city built up all around it, the size from the outside was underwhelming, but once we went inside and walked up some of the stairs, it seemed so much larger. The top photo is a panoramic view from inside the Theater. The bottom left is a view from above at the Citadel (I think the building on the left is the Odeon). The bottom right is another view from inside the Theater.

The top three photos in the picture above are of some of the statues that once surrounded the Theater or were placed somewhere within.

The above picture is of some bracelets in the Museum of Popular Tradition. Most of the exhibits were of clothing, jewelry or other body ornaments. The signs offered descriptions of the items and who wore them. 

After the visiting Theater, we grabbed lunch at Hail Restaurant and Cafe. It was right next to the Theater and it was empty at 12:45 P.M. Chris asked the man if it as open and he seated us outside, handing us two menus then walked away. When he came back we began to order off the menu. He stopped us and pointed to five items we could choose from, so we switched our order completely and ended up with two kabobs.  The food was once again, very good. Jake sat still better than usual, and we enjoyed our lunch.

 Below is a picture of Jake "reading" the menu. He really does pretend to actually "read" and makes up stuff, usually spouting out any word that pops into his head at the time (usually something about Mickey, keys and locks.

Then we made our way to the Amman Citadel National Historic Site. This was also very grand in scale.  Referred to locally as Jabal al Qala'a, the Citadel is one of Amman's oldest known places, perched on top of one of the city's high hills. This summit has been used as a settlement and fortress for millennia, dating back 7000 years according to some estimates, to the time of the rise of civilization in Mesopotamia and the Nile Valley. It has witnessed numerous sieges, wars and earthquakes.

Chris and Jake are on in this picture (left) at the base of the temple if you look closely.

The above photo show you where the remains were in relation to the actual temple as it once stood.

The middle right photo above (and below) is a photo of the Umayyad Monumental Gateway. It was the formal entrance into the Umayyad palace. Visitors would be screened here and then wait to be announced to the governor before entering the palace beyond. The bottom photo was the view from beyond the Umayyad Monumental Gateway.

The middle right photo is of some of the cisterns that held water for the Citadel. Because there is no natural water at the top of the hill, they had to capture each drop of rainwater that they could, not letting any go to waste. The bottom right (with Jake pointing to a kite flying nearby, and Chris), is the ruins of the entrance into the Umayyad Mosque.

Above is a photo of the water cistern or "Birka" in Arabic. The cistern supplied water to the baths latrines, and other areas of the Umayyad settlement.

Jake is our little Tour Guide.

Chris and Jake taking a break.

Below are a few pictures from our drive to and from our adventures today. All are taken through the car window so I don't have much history behind anything in the photos, but thought they were worth sharing as "neat" photos. I'm not sure which mosque is below, but there was a huge church directly across the street. 

(Below) This is the back of a bus. Apparently the words faintly written with a Sharpie on the back of the bus are the places the bus stops. Want to go downtown? This is the bus for you, "Downtown" is so officially written on the back of the bus...who wouldn't want a ride? To be fair, this is not the wealthy neighborhood we live in, so I guess you get around however you can get around. We still found the Sharpie font funny.

Above is the bridge that takes us back into our neighborhood. It's a really interesting architecheral structure and thought it was worth posting. 

We had a wonderful adventure today. It was nice weather, a little windy, but that kept it cool. Jake was great and we figured it out on our own. Well... a little help from our friends on the street. Chris is speaking Arabic very well, at least as far as I'm concerned, because people can understand him and he seems to be understanding the directions when he asks for them. We got where we were going today all because of him (driving and speaking).

And...


Just a few selfies to leave you with...

The Big Tour and Souk Jara

The Big Tour:
Today was a big day for us. Our wonderful social sponsors Jessica and Jon, picked us up this morning and took us on a "how to find your way around" tour. It's a Friday morning, so traffic is a lot lighter than any other day of the week due to Jumu'ah ("Friday Prayer"). We dropped Jake off at their house to stay with their part-time Helper/Nanny and to play with their 2-year old daughter. Then we set off and learned a little about the area and since the traffic was so much lighter, we could actually drive a little slower and feel less stressed. Much of our immediate area is surrounded by Embassies and Malls, almost all of which can be referenced to a main road with 8 traffic circles. Once on "Circle Road" you can find your way to almost anywhere in the immediate area you might want to go. We drove through the medical area and know how to find the two main hospitals and we figured out how to get to about 3 or 4 of the shopping malls. The malls are important because they have the grocery stores in them too. The grocery stores are very modern and overwhelmingly huge in some cases. Our only actual stop on the tour was a grocery store where we picked up a few groceries for the week. Then we picked up Jake and headed back to our house.

This is a picture of some of the spices at the grocery store. We noticed that the labels tell you what the spices are used for.


Souk Jara:
Once we got the groceries put away, we thought we'd use our new-found knowledge for getting around to venture out to Souk Jara. We found it on our first try without getting lost. So we considered our first real adventure to be a success.

From Wikipedia: A souq or souk (Arabic: سوق, Hebrew: שוק sūq, also spelled shuk, shooq, soq, souk, esouk, suk, sooq, souq, or suq) is an open-air marketplace or commercial quarter in Middle Eastern and North African cities.^[1][2] The equivalent Persian term is "bazaar".

Below is a photo of the entrance to Souk Jara. And some additional photos of the market. This is not a huge market like some of the others we may encounter, but it was fun to see and a good place to get our feet wet.

We decided to have lunch at Souk Jara and found a wonderful little stand selling Fatatri. It is a wonderful food that reminded me of a very thing crusted calzone. It was delicious. Below is a picture of the "Story" of the Fatatri and the picture below that is a picture of the Fatatri we ordered. Delicious!!!

From Souk Jara, you can see some of the old Roman Ruins on top of a hill. We hope to go explore these tomorrow.

As a side note, a little about yesterday. Chris experienced his first driving to and from work alone for the first time. Driving in Jordan is CRAZY! People don't stop and they honk if you stop and it always looks like they are going to side swipe you as they merge into traffic. It's a little nerve-racking. But he did good and made it to and from work alive. In addition to that, he took Jake and I back to the Embassy for the Thursday night dinner by the pool. They have the Air Force Band in town for the 4th of July celebration so there was music with dinner. We had a good time and Jake was super sweet too.

Tonight is the big 4th of July celebration (Yes, on June 20th. I think to avoid Ramadan) and we plan to attend once Jake wakes up from his nap. I may add some more pictures of that later on today.

Pictures from the Independence Day Celebration:

This is the herd of sheep that came barreling down the hill toward our car as we were driving to the Embassy. Someday I think this will feel normal.

Jake and his friend, Amelia, eating Icecream in celebration. Jake finished and immediately said "More." Using his baby sign language signal for "more". He only uses it when he wants more sweets. 

Jake's favorite, the Jordanian fire truck. 

 

Waiting for a balloon animal. It was a dog for about five minutes before it became "art".

We had a good time and today was the first day it really felt hot at times. It's a dry-heat and often there is a breeze so it's usually very tolerable, but today in the sun, it got pretty warm.