Exploring and Adjusting

Hello again! It wasn’t exactly my plan to post this frequently, but the past few days have been pretty exciting so I thought I’d give an update. While weekends in the Middle East generally consist of Friday and Saturday (with the workweek starting on Sunday), our program gave us Thursday and Friday to rest, acclimate, and explore the city before beginning with our academic orientation. On Thursday, some friends and I took a taxi down to Rainbow Street, one of the most famous streets in Amman. It’s not a particularly large or busy street, but it is fairly pedestrian friendly (unlike most of Amman) and has lots of shops and restaurants along it. It so happened that on that same day there was a demonstration in the city, supporting a 50% pay raise for teachers, that had closed down some of the major streets and intersections. We got stuck in a bit of traffic, but we managed to arrive safely in about an hour, roughly twice what it would have normally taken.

            At rainbow street, we visited books@cafe, which is exactly what it sounds like. It was a cool place to hang out and enjoy a coffee or tea on the patio overlooking Amman. Café culture is really big in Amman as well as the rest of the middle east, and numerous cafes can be found all throughout the city. This particular location is a much more westernized version of the concept, with menu items such as salads and nachos and a wide selection of English books available. If it wasn’t so far away, it’d be a nice place to sit and study while enjoying a tea or coffee on the patio overlooking the city.

            After lunch, we walked over to one of the many open-air markets in Amman. The market, called a سوق (souq) in Arabic, is right besides one of the city’s mosques, and serves as a central location for the community. Venders line up along the walls with buckets of fruit, vegetables, nuts, and spices while shoppers squeeze through the little remaining space in between. The market is covered by colored sheets that shield shoppers from the heat of the sun. Despite what I originally thought, not much haggling goes on in these markets, the listed price is generally accepted as the final price. The main places in Amman where bargaining might occur are in certain tourist-heavy markets that take advantage of tourists’ relative ignorance, and taxi drivers who try to increase their fare (again, especially for tourists).

            Following this a group of us made the trek up to the Amman Citadel, a historic site complete with the ruins of a temple to Hercules, a Byzantine church, and an Umayyad palace. Located on one of the seven original hills of Amman, جبل القلعة (Jabal Al-Qal’a), it is one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in the world. The on-site museum hosts a selection of artifacts from a wide range of eras, from the Neolithic period to the Roman empire to the Islamic age. Among the artifacts were a few of the ‘Ain Ghazal Statues, some of the earliest known representations of the human form, and a whole case full of glass vials found in tombs that held the collected tears of mourners. The citadel also boasts a fantastic view of the city sprawling around it in all directions. Definitely worth a visit!

            Friday is يوم الجمع, (Youm al-Jumu’ah) or the day of gathering, in which many Muslims congregate at mosques for an afternoon service. Because of this, most shops are closed on Fridays at least until 2pm or so. After a slow, sleepy morning (I managed to sleep until 11am, thank you melatonin gummies!), my roommate Ellis suggested that we go explore one of the Turkish baths in the region. We found one that was a five minute walk from our apartment, which charged 15 JD ($21.21) for an hour-long service. If I had any hesitations before, I found out soon enough that it was worth the price!

            While it differs from place, visiting a Turkish bath often entails something closer to a spa treatment than a public pool. When we arrived they stored all of our belongings in a locker and offered us a glass of a sweet, spiced drink, then we changed into baggy, paper-thin shorts and a pair of sandals they provided for us. After getting warm water poured over us, we sat in the hot tub (with jets!) followed by a steam room and a sauna. This was a lot of heat for my taste, and I found it a little difficult to relax. The steam room was the most intense, and it felt difficult to get enough air when every breath came with a lungful of warm steam. The sauna felt more comfortable despite it being hotter, but I was still glad when it came time to move on with the treatment. I think that, having done this once before, I would be more comfortable and relaxed if I went again.

            Following the heat treatment, we were doused once more in cool water and invited to lay down on a stone bed. An attendant gave us a full-body exfoliating scrub and wash, followed by a wash with a sudsy towel (think car wash). This was followed by a massage, including a neck crack that caught me by surprise. Next, we were given a clay-like body smear and a shampooing before being washed down one last time and led to a shower. We were wrapped in three separate towels (around the waist, the shoulders, and the head) and led to a spacious room lined with couches and windows offering a cool breeze, water and hibiscus tea in hand. Now, this probably won’t become a regular occurrence for me, but it was a ton of fun and definitely something I would want to experience again!

            Saturday was less fun as it involved sitting through an academic orientation from 10am to 5pm, which covered all the information we could’ve wanted about our upcoming term. We met Manal, the academic director of CET, who is a rather intense, very direct Syrian woman. I already like her a lot (and am just a little bit afraid of her). She spoke to us only in Arabic, while a translator repeated after her in English, but I was happy to find that I understood a good amount of what she was saying. Later that day I made my first meal in our apartment’s kitchen (stuffed peppers), a small but important milestone!

            This morning we took our placement tests, but our afternoons were left free. Tomorrow we have our Oral Proficiency Interviewers in the morning, and we take our language pledge in the afternoon followed by an Arabic-only dinner banquet. After that, classes begin! These past few days have felt very touristy, but soon we will be getting down to work. I’ll probably check back in here next weekend to update on the start of my classes. Until then, take care!