For Mom, Love Steve » Jordan

Photos: Amman, Jordan

snw2srf2stt — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 17:04:51 +0000

No, I haven’t turned into a suitcase traveler. Just a girls stuff that I met on the bus from Israel and we decided to hit some spots.

Amman’s not too bad. Got a room with tv. Internet is not too bad. Have a chicken place I go to every day. Plus they have some nice ruins right on top of the hill overlooking the city.

Right about here is where Roman architecture kicks in. Heading north it just gets better. Sure would like to go to Syria. Bastards. I am not done trying yet however. Just have to see.

Photos: New 7th Wonder of the World, Petra, Jordan

snw2srf2stt — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 15:54:01 +0000

You first walk 1.2kms through the Siq or Canyon which suddenly opens up to the beautiful and awe-inspiring Al Khazneh or Treasury.

Random shots of Petra.

A shot of the sunset over Wadi Musa the main town overlooking Petra. This was taken from the dorm room of the Valentine Hotel. They had an amazing buffet with grilled chicken, pilaf, baked potatoes, and 20 different plates of Mez (salads) all for $5US. Fantastic.

Indiana Steve: Petra, Jordan

snw2srf2stt — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 15:08:49 +0000

Ever heard of Indian Jones and the last crusade? I kind of remember the film but not entirely, but one thing I do remember was that canyon scene where they are riding horses through the tiny crevissed opening and then popping up in front of these amazing looking building carved out of stone. Well, that is Petra “the red rose city”, at least one small part of it.

Petra was the impressive capital of the Nabataean kingdom from around the 6th century BC. The kingdom was absorbed into the Roman Empire in AD 106 and the Romans continued to expand the city. An important center for trade and commerce, Petra continued to flourish until a catastrophic earthquake destroyed buildings and crippled vital water management systems around AD 663. After Saladin’s conquest of the Middle East in 1189, Petra was abandoned and the memory of it was lost to the West.

The ruins remained hidden to most of the world until the Swiss explorer, Johann Ludwig Burckhardt, disguised as an Arab scholar, infiltrated the Bedouin-occupied city in 1812. Burckhardt’s accounts of his travels inspired other Western explorers and historians to discover the ancient city further. The most famous of these was David Roberts, a Scottish artist who created a number of accurate and detailed illustrations of the city in 1839.

The first real excavations of the site were in 1929 after the forming of Trans-Jordan. Since that time, Petra has become by far Jordan’s largest tourist attraction, partially due to the exposure by the Steven Spielberg movie, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, in 1989. Due to the fantastic engineering accomplishments and well-preserved dimension of Petra, the archaeological site was chosen in July 2007 as one of the New Seven Wonders of the World.

You have just been cut and pasted. Oh well.

Petra was a quick three hour bus ride from Aqaba. On the bus was a Japanese backpacker named (I don’t remember. He actually told me but it was a Japanese name and I have a hard time with more normal to me English names. In my defense he couldn’t remember Steve so he called me Nakano for a while and then when he found out my middle name Kazuo, he had it no problem. So if it had been fair and his middle name was Bob or Chuck, I would have probably remembered it.) Anyways, we ended up hanging out for the three days we were there and taking in the sites of Petra. I do have to say that it was a bit trying, a bit fun, a bit hilarious, and a bit disconcerting. The guy was a smile and laugh kind of guy who didn’t have the greatest grasp of English, but he did try hard. It was good that he was not afraid to just walk up to people and talk to them, but he also had this weird thing about taking pictures of other people that got us some weird looks. He hadn’t quite gotten the jist that people would rip you off, so he was kind of an easy target. I quickly took away all negotiations from him as that would have killed me. It was good fun when people asked us where we were from. He tried to explain it to some Japanese tourists that we met, but they just didn’t get it. I just don’t fit in anywhere.

Back to Petra. Petra is a huge complex of tombs, monuments, and Temples. It encompasses about a six kilometer square and takes a few days to explore. We did most of it in one with the exception of a few walks that exited out of the site. We were blasted when we were finished. I guess a few pictures would do more justice so I will leave it at that.

I would have to put Petra down as one of the must-see things. It could have been better if there were more internal things to see like all the stuff they pulled out of the Egyptian tombs and pyramids. Most of Petra is strictly a look at the outsides which are still impressive.

Photos: Wadi Rum, Jordan

snw2srf2stt — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 14:49:00 +0000

Jordan: Wadi Rum desert

snw2srf2stt — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 14:37:10 +0000

One of the inspiring things to do while visiting Jordan is to spend a day or three out in the desert in Wadi Rum. Basically, it is a comglomoration of various desert scapes that are elevated even more so during sunrise and sunset. It was so awe inspiring that Lawrence of Arabia was partially filmed here. I guess that also relates to the fact that Mr. Lawrence also walked through the place and had a spring and his house named after him. I am very unfamiliar with Mr. Lawrence but Dan wrote a comment about him earlier on the blog so I linked it here.

Nowadays, for tourists it is a quick stop for some desert life. I had passed on some of the Sinai desert stuff basically because I have been out in the desert for the last three months and am pretty off about it. Wadi Rum had an aire about it so I figured I would check it out.

The morning that I was going to catch a bus out to the little village of Wadi Rum, I ran into a couple from China who were on a three week vacation. They asked if I wanted to split a cost for a cab and to share a tour. I was originally planning on doing an overnighter in the village and a full day out in the desert, but secretly I preferred not to as I really only get full enjoyment of sleeping under the stars in the desert when I am surrounded by 30 Muslim Sudanese men (see Sudan posts before making any weird assumptions of me.) They had already worked out a decent price on the taxi so adding me made the price relatively close to what the bus was going to cost, and I wouldn’t have to wait an hour or two. Nice.

The couple were on a three week vacation through the Middle East. The wife/girlfriend? worked in “a regular company in China” and the husband/boyfriend? worked in telecommunications and just finished a stint in Iraq (North Iraq is fine, Baghdad is fucked up. New Iraq Government is the key problem not the US. Also fucked up.) Her name was Lilly and his I forgot, bad with guys names.

We ended up working out a deal and bypassing the usual government regulated tour operators and ended up going with his “cousin” for $50D versus $65D. The tour was basically a 6 hour drive through the alternating desert landscapes stopping at all the highlights finishing with a sunset. Red sands, rock bridges, Lawrence of Arabia stuff, inscriptions and rock art, pretty much rounded up the trip. This was all wrapped up with a sort of argument between me and the driver. He thought he was going to be the smooth Ali Baba and park behind a mountain so that he could leave as soon as the sun set over the mountain. I knew exactly what he was doing and waited to see if he was going to move us or take us back. When he said that was it, I pointed out the definition of a sunset, where we were supposed to be on the map, and the slashing of his payment by half if he didn’t fulfil our agreement. We quickly were taken to the sunset spot to view the setting of the sun.

After our run through the desert, I opted to go back with them to Aqaba as the option of sleeping in the desert or in a hotel at a beach resort town wasn’t a hard decision for me.

I am the greatest traveler ever!*

snw2srf2stt — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 18:03:33 +0000

Africa is done, finito, completo, doneo, arriva derci, see ya wouldn’t want to be ya, chow baby, later gator, and on and on and on. One year five months in the big and scary Africa (yes big, not really all that scary.)

Okay, celebration over. Onwards we go to stage four, the Middle East.

The plan is, well since I am here already, I took the Ferry from Nuweiba port, Egypt, to Aqaba, Jordan. It was one expensive ferry. $79US for a one hour ride, crazy. The boat was nice, more cruise ship than Ferry, and the price also included getting a free Visa ($20US value) as Aqaba is a free trade zone so entering there gets you a free pass.

I ran into a couple from Peru who were doing a tour through the Middle East so I got to practice up on the rusty Spanish a bit and also to trade notes about traveling in South America. I do miss it so. They were professional photographers and were looking to do some advertising for the Middle East in Lima, Peru where they live as there is not much information for the few Peruvians that travel. We also ran into a group of four Australian girls doing an around the world trip. They ended up having the same itinerary of wanting to get to Petra that same day, so they arranged a mini-bus from the port to take them straight there. I ended up hitching a ride to the city center with them as they had to change money. My priorities were a bit different. The closest thing that I have had to a shower was when I bought a six litre bottle of water and used that to do a very pretentious shower the night before I was leaving Dahab. My clothes had actually gone unwashed since I was in Cairo. Sounds scary, and it was, but not to the extent that it seems as I really did spend a lot of time in the ocean in Dahab (salt water showers as well), and a good chunk of the day in Nuweiba. That and the fact that I really didn’t wear a lot of clothes most of the time kept what I had fairly unstinky. So, the plan for me was to drop anchor in Aqaba where there was clean water in which I could take a shower or two, wash all my clothes, and use the cheap internet as I really wasn’t able to in Nuweiba.

And that is where I am now. In Aqaba, freshly washed in clean water, with clothes which are freshly washed in clean water, typing on the internet. Tomorrow I should be heading off to Wadi Rum for some Lawrence of Arabia action (that was where some of the movie was filmed.)

Oh yea, the plan, I will head and hit the highlights of Jordan, and then I will definately not go to Israel, I repeat I will not be going to Israel via the King Hussein/Allenby bridge and not getting my Jordanian exit stamp and I will not get a Israeli passport stamp on a seperate piece of paper and I will definitely not travel around Israel hooking up with past travelers who invited me to meet them, and I will not leave via the same bridge getting a exit stamp on a piece of paper which will not accidentaly fall over the side of the bridge once I don’t have my entry stamp as I go back into Jordan and since I am definitely not going to Israel then I should be able to make it into Syria and Lebanon and possibly Iran. Did I make myself clear that I will not be going to Israel. Okay. That’s the plan.

Not much else to report except that Africa didn’t kill me, I survived. Okay, it almost killed me, twice, maybe three times, but still I made it. Good times, well except for that lady in Ethiopia that threw out my water (after extensive internet research, I still don’t know why she would do that,) and that Rat Bastard Immigration chief who tried to make me stay another week in Sudan (Kiss my ass).

Fast fact before I leave Egypt. Did you know that you can buy a Twinkie, HoHo, or a thing called a Tigers Tale which is a modified Twinkie where they make lines with Rasberry syrup, for the price of 2 for one Egyptian pound. In American money that is like nine cents each. Incredible. That discovery I rank up there with finding King Tut. Nine cents, for a twinkie. Nice.

Fast fact before I leave Africa. My main two reasons for visiting Africa were to 1) hear a lion roar out in the bush at night (accomplished a few times but most significantly in Zimbabwe when there were lions and hyenas howling and roaring. 2) Was to see and float down the mighty Congo. I did the Congo kinda and one of its sister rivers a lot. The third and unknownst to most and quite possibly politically incorrect is the fact that I wanted to go so that when I returned back to the states I can tell my “African-American” friends that they can’t use the race card against me because I am more African than them. I am now 1/39.5 African (if you go by time served.) It’s good to be African/Japanese/African with a little bit of Latin America as well.

Fast fact while I am in Jordan, they got MCDONALDS. Thats right MCDONALDS. Hell, there is 7/11 (which I don’t even know if they still exist in the states, a Burger King, Cinna Buns (sp) the big ass cinnamon buns they sell in shopping malls, a Days Inn hotel, crap, it was just like being in the states. The McDonalds thing was a shocker as I just wasn’t expecting it and then bam looked up and there was the big M just floating in the sky. Me and Jordan are going to get along just fine.

*Named Steven Nakano, middle name Kazuo, born in Fresno, started trip in May 2005, using a blue and black backpack, wearing black boots, survives on McDonalds… just to clarify the greatest ever.