Marhaba min Jordan!

The nice thing about living in Lebanon is that we are, literally, a hop, skip, and a jump from Europe, Africa, and of course, the Middle East. This means when a girlfriend calls me and says, "Tam, I'm going to be in Jordan this week, why don't you come out an join me?!" I can in fact, jump on a plane and 45 minutes later, land in a different country! This is how Sara, my former Moroccan roommate and I, decided to meet up after not seeing each other for over 5 years!

Jordan is a very easy country to navigate, in fact, for those of you who have never been to the Middle East, I highly recommend starting with Jordan. English is spoken widely and it's even easier if you stay in a 5 star hotel :) After arriving in Amman, Jordan's capital city, quite late in the evening, Sara met me at the airport and we found our way back to the hotel. After eating, drinking local Jordanian wine courtesy of room service and gabbing until 5AM, we fell asleep and didn't wake up until very late the next afternoon. This gave us just enough time to make a trip down to the Dead Sea (meaning "Sea of Salt" in Arabic: البَحْر المَيّت‎ ) before sunset! To the West, one can view the Palestinian West Bank and Israel. The Dead Sea is one of the world's saltiest bodies of water, with 33.7% salinity, thus the reason people can float! Sadly, this high salinity makes for a harsh environment for animals, hence its name. Biblically, the Dead Sea was a place of refuge for King David and it was one of the world's first health resorts (for Herod the Great). The salt and minerals have been commercialized, one can find a whole array of cosmetics, facial and skin products, and herbal sachets. On a side note, a benefit of visiting someone else who has been living in the Middle East is that you both miss the same things, to be specific, Mexican food, good margaritas and sushi, which is exactly what we filled up on the next few days.
Our next day was spent hiking in the famous archaeological site Petra (Greek πέτρα, meaning rock; Arabic: البتراء, Al-Batrāʾ) which lies on the slope of Mount Hor in a basin among the mountains, which form the eastern flank of Arabah (Wadi Araba), the large valley running from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba. Some of you may remember Petra from the Indiana Jones movies, it is renowned for its rock cut architecture and like the Egyptian Pyramids, Petra is considered one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. The Nabataeans constructed it as their capital city around 100 BCE. It seems unbelievable that Petra remained unknown to the Western world until 1812, when Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt stumbled upon it. Petra is described by UNESCO as "one of the most precious cultural properties of man's cultural heritage" and in 1985, Petra was designated a World Heritage Site.
Sadly, my trip was quickly coming to an end. After soaking in a tub every night (with hot water, a luxury our Beiruti apartment lacked at the time) and a fantastic haircut by who else but a bubbly, fashionable Lebanese hair stylist named Anthony, we spent my last day in Amman, shopping for souvenirs and checking out the Roman theatre, which can fit up to 6,000 people. It's been estimated to have been built between 138 and 161 AD by the Roman Emperor Antoninus Pius, it is constructed into the side of the mountain and is still used for sports displays and cultural events today. An interesting tidbit is that Amman is situated on seven hills, resembling Rome, historically making it a as a favorite place for Roman soldiers and officials to congregate.

After saying our good-byes, with new promises to meet up in Yemen in the future, I boarded my plane back to Beirut and a mere 45 minutes later, was greeted enthusiastically by my hubby and Abed, our favorite Lebanese cabbie.