After a lovely adventure on the Dead Sea we departed for the Ancient city of Petra on Tuesday morning. It took us awhile to get there since, after being rerouted off of the main highway, we found ourselves driving the deserted back roads of rural Jordan. We managed to find our way there after stopping to find some help. Help can be hard to get in Jordan as many people do not speak any English. It is a much less common destination for many because it does not hold the glitz and glam of places like Dubai. It is a destination that shows the true nature of the Middle East. The streets of even the smallest town are filled with men, women and children going about their daily rounds to get fresh produce and meat for dinner. People sell their wares and work hard in order to make a simple living.
And then there are the Bedouins.... the nomads who live in caves and live the simplest, yet arguably the happiest life, of any people I have ever encountered. The Bedouins have been around for centuries and date back to over 2500 years ago. Their culture and ways of living are so well settled that I find it truly admirable how comfortable they are in their own skin and the harsh desert environment. We all picked up the book "Married to a Bedouin" about a women from New Zealand who fell in love and married a Bedouin man from Petra. She moved there to live with him and his family in their cave. They had three children and the story goes on. He passed away in 2004 and she now spends her time between Petra and New Zealand.
The people of Jordan are some of the kindest I have met. That is saying a lot because the people of the Middle East have a tendency to show more kindness then most city dwellers in North America. In Kuwait, many people are more than happy to strike up conversation and find out where you are from. However, that is because 70% of the city is Expats and they come from other places. We have many things in common with 70% of the population of Kuwait City because we are all living a life away from the comforts of home and family. However, Jordan is different. When you get to Jordan you find that, even though you are a tourist and you are a main source of income for the country's economy, the local people are genuinely interested in you. Many will strike up perfectly innocent conversation and offer to show you places without an ulterior motive. It can really test your North American paranoia! Even through broken English we found ourselves feeling comfortable conversing with total strangers.
We finally arrived in Petra around 5 pm... just in time to see the sunset over Wadi Musa (The Valley of Moses). Wadi Musa is the biblical town were Moses struck the rock and started a spring of water that watered the people of Jordan. It is immediately beside Petra. We arrived and had dinner and an early bedtime. It was as if we knew what we were up for the next day....
We woke up at 7:00 am Wednesday morning with intent of going to the Archeological Site early. We were a bit jumpy with anticipation and their was an air of excitement in the cool morning breeze. Ryan and I have been dreaming of visiting the Ancient Ruins of Petra for 5 years now. We all got to the entrance, hired a guide and we were off. The guide brought us through the 2 kilometer, 3 meter wide gorge that serves as the only entrance to Petra all while teaching us about the Ancient Nabataeans that once called this place home.
When we reached the Treasury, the most popular and commonly known monument of Petra, we were excited to see the Grandeur of the buildings. The buildings of Petra are all carved with ancient expertise into the side of the surrounding rock cliffs. It truly cannot be described... it can only be explained in pictures. We kept going through the ancient City of Petra as the Bedouins sold their wares around us and spoke in broken English to the tourists making their way through the excavated ruins. We finally decided to brave the mountain climb. We needed to cover a series of over 800 stairs up the side of a mountain to get to "Al Dier" or the Monastery and get a view of the "top of the world" which overlooks Bethlehem, Jerusalem and the mountainous terrain of Israel and Jordan.
I was very proud of Shirley, Rob, and Mom. It was a climb that many people chose not to do because of the 800 stairs. We made our way back to realize that we had walked over 9 kilometers that day. We stopped for pizza for dinner and then Ryan and I headed back to do another 4 kilometers and do the "Petra at Night" Tour where you walk the entire first leg of the ruins but they are lit by candlelight. How lovely! It was so romantic, just us and 100 Chinese tourists.
The next day we were off to Wadi Rum, where the "Lawrence of Arabia" movie was filmed, to tour the Desert in a Safari Jeep. We were taken on a Bedouin adventure indeed! Our guide, Hasan, was very accommodating but spoke very little english. Just enough to get by. He was very quiet but knowledgeable and accommodating. We stopped for lunch and got a fire going to make traditional Bedouin black tea. Then Hasan handed each of a us a knife, fork, and a plate with an onion, desert grown cucumber, tomato, homemade flatbread and a can of tuna he had opened with his extremely large Bedouin knife. It was a simple lunch that tasted great after a long morning of running up the red sand dunes of Wadi Rum.
We were taken back to our campsite with about 1 hour left of sunlight. As soon as we got their we were shown our rooms. We were to live as Bedouins and being sleeping on small diwaniya foams with sheepskin blankets. It gets down to 7 degrees at night so we were excited to see lots of blankets ready for us! We watched the sunset over the desert and then sat down in our tent with a fire blazing in the middle of it. The sides of the shelter were closed to keep the wind out and we got quite warm and cozy on the foams by the fire. Hasan's brother and nephew kept us company and spoke with us while Hasan made a traditional Bedouin dinner of us.
When dinner was ready, we enjoyed a FANTASTIC meal of Chicken, potatoes, Rice, bread and Vegetables in Fresh yogurt. Of course, we ended off the meal with Bedouin tea. It was a lovely evening. We exchanged stories and songs. Singing is a big part of Bedouin culture so we ended up singing national anthems and impressed the Arabs with a rollicking rendition of "O Canada". It was a great night that will forever be in our minds. We settled down to sleep early again to the peaceful silence of the desert. The wind softly blew into our tents as we settled off to sleep. Rob and Ryan had their own way to warm the tents which we were not fond of but the aroma did keep the Rattlesnakes and Scorpions at bay
We woke up early to go back into Rum Village (which sounds like a party place but really isn't). We had to now drive the 3 1/2 hours back to Amman to catch our plane. All was successful and now we find our selves back at home in Kuwait.
It has been a wonderful time with our parents and we are so happy to have had them here to share a little piece of what our lives are like during this year of adventure. We are so proud of them for braving a part of the world painted so "volatile" by the North American media. It is nice to have them understand now what a wonderful place the Arab world is. It truly is not what you see in the media; in fact, it is a much nicer and safer place than any city I have ever visited in Europe or North America. Coming home will be less difficult now that our parents understand what our life has consisted of for the past year. We will miss them and it will be a tough goodbye... but we will see them again soon.
These adventures make us realize how lucky we are to have happy, supportive and healthy parents who are up to being adventurous alongside us. They support our decisions to do crazy things; they are with us in spirit everyday no matter where we are around the globe. They are truly great parents and even better friends.
Dead Sea Shoreline
The highway from the Crusaders Castle
Petra, Jordan
a fish?
a camel and bedouin man carved onto the rock
The Treasury
Inside the treasury. Natural rock color
Little boy putting a bret in his sisters hair
just a few of the 800 steps up the mountain
view from the top
I almost fell off the mountain
800 steps later...The Monastery at the top of the mountain
yes the sky was THAT blue
Last picture of Petra.... now onto Wadi Rum
Wadi Rum desert
