I will start this post by admitting how negligent I have been. The first post I made came after I had been here for about 3 months. SO, rather than try to be chronological with the next few posts I will try to catch up by posting on major subjects and events. This will allow me to return to a subject and add thoughts and recollections with minimum hassles.
My neighborhood is named Jebel Luwebdeh. Jebel is the Arabic word for mountain or hill. Originally Amman was said to be built on seven hills. Jebel Luwebdeh is one of them and now reflects the name of the neighborhood. The names of the others are also reflected in the names of other neighborhoods such as Jebel Hussein, Jebel Amman and so on. Jebel Luwebdeh is considered by most to be the cultural center of the city. Although it seems quite small when walking around, it is home to numerous embassies, art galleries and studios, political and cultural organizations, mosques, churches and so forth. With all of this activity going on you would expect a lot of hustle and bustle, but is in fact usually a fairly placid place to live. When a wedding happens it can gridlock the entire neighborhood. I witnessed this the first time I ever saw a wedding in progress a couple of weeks after arriving here. I was walking back from the supermarket (about the size of a large convenience store) when I noticed that the traffic seemed quite heavy. As I moved along I began to hear what sounded like bagpipes and drums. As I walked by a large church I became aware that that was the origin of all the fuss. It was here that traffic was at a complete stop. The traffic was at a standstill the rest of the way home, which was quite some distance. There were some upset people in that line.
The weddings here are quite a spectacle. The bagpipe sounds were coming from an instrument that looked like something a snake-charmer would use. The drums looked like large tambourines and were stuck with drumstick that had a fat round tip. The group I saw were all men about fifteen or twenty in all most of whom had an instrument, and let me tell you, they were flat gettin’ busy! They were singing, dancing, playing their instruments, and hopping around. And they were good enough that at first I thought that they were professionals. A couple of them looked tired enough to pass out. It looked like a heck of a party. I hope to be able to post a video at some point. I had never seen anything like it. Now of course I have seen this kind of thing several times. And the fun doesn’t stop there. When the ceremony and major partying are over they drive around in a big caravan shouting and honking their horns. A couple of times they were honking in a kind of a tune. This can go on(and frequently has) into the wee hours of the morning.
At one end of the neighborhood is the King Abdullah Mosque, which i think may be the most impressive one I’ve seen, and at the other end is a staircase which leads down into the center of the city (the older part) which is called the Balad. On fridays which are the muslim sabbath there is a suq (pronounced sook) or market not far from the King Abdullah Mosque in a section of town called Abdelee. I had been to this a couple of times in the afternoon and had been impressed with the experience but the first morning visit was unforgettable. It was about 6:30 am (I had been told to be early for the best selection) and I needed a pair of shoes so I wanted to beat the crowd. I had been hearing what I thought was traffic noise for most of the way there but as I got closer I realized that I was hearing human voices. A lot of voices. I was still several blocks away and I was convinced that it was some sort of political riot. I was about to turn back when I remembered that I had my camera on me and thought that I may as well have a look. Thinking to turn around when things began to look unsafe, I proceeded to a cross street which would lead down to where the suq was supposed to be. When I saw women and children heading that way I realized that it was the suq I was hearing! There seemed to be only a couple of hundred vendors but the noise level was like a stadium full of sports fans! Each vendor was shouting at the top of his lungs! There was an amazing variety of goods for sale from produce to nargilas (traditional arabic water-pipes) and everything in-between. I looked around for about an hour before getting what I had come for and heading back.
