Land of Contrasts

There is a book in the bookstores here about Amman and shows a bunch of pictures on how Jordan is a country of contrasts. It is so true! I was noticing yesterday as I was driving around town, the many contrasts. Here we were in the middle of the city in our taxi and on the side of the road where there hadn't yet been any development, and there was a little bit of grass, there were some shepherds grazing their sheep. I commented to the friend that I was with, that it would have been very interesting to see those sheep getting to that spot, because all around was traffic, buildings, stop lights and so on. It was like two different worlds merging together.

It struck me again on the contrasts when I was looking and calling about some apartments for rent. One that I looked at was a great price, and close to the area that we want to move, but it was a scary little hole in the wall. I knew the moment we entered the stairwell that I wouldn't want to live in this place. Then I heard of another apartment that sounded great. Everything we are looking for, so after the woman that is living there finishes telling me about how great this place is, I ask her the price, which I realize that I should ask right away to save from disappointment. The price they were asking for on this apartment is also in the area we want to move to, but the rent was like 4 times what we want to pay. Yikes!!!!

We will go out again today and look at some places. Lord willing we will find the place we need and that will suit our family. I am planning to take my camera today so hopefully I will get some pics of these amazing contrasts.

The Party

Ok, so I have been meaning to share a bit about the Christmas party that I had for my neighbors. It was quite an interesting evening. Never a dull moment when you get two completely different cultures together. My friend Victoria and I hosted at my house and I wrote out an invitation (in Arabic) and gave them out the day before, so at least they would know it was serious. Sometimes when you invite someone over their reply to coming is "insha-allah" , meaning that you never know if they will show or not. I meant to take a picture of the invite because I was pretty impressed with them myself, that is until I handed them to my neighbors and when she asked me what time the party was, she pointed out that I had written a 2 instead of a 6. Oops! Numbers in Arabic get me so messed up. The 4 is a backwards 3, 6 actually looks like a 7, and the 5 is a 0, so it just messes with my mind.

Here they are: ١٠ ٩ ٨ ٧ ٦ ٥ ٤ ٣ ٢ ١ Those are the numbers from 1-10

Anyway, so 4 ladies with their heads covered showed up and about 7 kids. I bought all the kids some gifts and Victoria and I got some gifts together to try and play the steal game. It was very funny! I don't know if they didn't get the concept of the steal game or what happened, but Victoria and I were the only ones who stole, and when I was trying to explain the rules, they corrected me in my Arabic and told me not to say "steal" because that was a bad thing. They had a good time though and I think enjoyed getting some gifts. The topper to the whole night was when the ladies were smoking and the grandmother of this 9 month old put her cigarette in his mouth. And they all laughed. Oh my, Victoria and I were in shock. People are very concerned with children here and majority of the time will tell you when your child is not dressed warm enough, or that you need to take them to the Dr. when they have the littlest sniffle, but this topped it. They were actually laughing about it and did it twice. So, I am not worried anymore when people fuss at me that my kids are not dressed warm enough or that they think I am not doing something right. This did it for me.

Anyway, overall the party ended up being a lot of fun. I think they enjoyed themselves as well. Victoria and I got to sing a Christmas song for them that we learned in school and we asked them a little bit about what they thought Christmas was. It was a good time to build relationships and plant some seeds. Until next time.......