We had another great day.
First we went to a mosque in Amman (the city that we were in for the last two days of our trip, and the capitol of Jordan.) It is called the King Abdullah I mosque. This is the place that the women had to wear headscarves and these black dresses that they gave us! It was pretty crazy.
So we got the dresses, and got all garbbed up, and we went in. It was cool. I just looked around and wasn't listening very well to Sumir, because he was just telling us about Islam for the hundredth time that we've heard about the prayers (and also cause his tecnique isn't super finessed and I was just ready not to have to listen to him anymore...as bad as that sounds, I promise that was the most positive attitude that I could muster...and it worked. I really got to look at the mosque and I guess I was half-listening.) Anyway, here are some pictures!
This is me and a bunch of our lovely ladies, all in our black robes and scarves :)
I guess all mosques have these lanterns? But they're really cool... And my cheeks look chubby here...great.
Miss Amanda and I at the mosque :)
This is a cool open model of the Dome of the Rock. They had models so you could see inside of all the major mosques, and I thought this was cool.After the mosque we went to the Amman Citadel, which is where the original people of Amman lived. It's a tel, which I've told you about. Anyway, there was some really cool ruins there. There was an awesome temple there, and also a cistern and a mosque and etc. etc. It was cool. I think the people were Nabataeans. There were some dead sea scrolls at the citadel museum, too! It was really sweet. Brother Brown explained and narrated about them. Also I think the grossest bathroom in Jordan was at that museum. So gross. Word to the wise, if anyone travels in a third-world country ever, take TOILET PAPER. And never, EVER look in the toilet. Ever. Anyway.
I believe this is the temple of Zeus behind me? I'm not quite sure. BUT it was pretty cool :)
This is Molly, Victoria, and me, and you can see the poorer neighborhoods just covering the hills in the background.
This is Sarah and me in front of some ruins. Oh and I got the necklace that I'm wearing in Petra! love it!
Just a sweet scarab beetle. Kinda yucky. Oh well.
These are some of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Obviously these aren't the nicest ones, cause I'm taking pictures of them, but they were still pretty sweet.
These are more of the scrolls, and I'm pretty sure these were made of metal? Not sure though.
This was after the tour, I got a picture with the columns...and look how HUGE they are!Something really sad also happened while we were here. It was after the tour, and we were all standing at this lookout point looking at the surrounding hills covered in really poor housing, and there was this guy sitting on a ledge of an ancient terrace on the other side of the railing of the lookout, and he stood up to leave, and he lost is balance and fell, head first off the side of the cliff. I know this may come as a shock to some of you, a very big change of mood of this blog, but I really thought that I witnessed someone's death. I was afraid to look, cause I thought he would be dead. Police officers were there and ran over, and also our nursing staff and our doctor went down. He had a broken clavical, possible broken ribs, and his ear had been almost completely torn off. He fell about 15 feet onto a ledge. If he had been 2 feet to the right, he would've fallen another 25 feet, and probably would've died. He was really lucky. An ambulance came, and we were all herded back on the bus, and it was really kind of nerve-wracking, but we all got back in tourist mode, and I'm sure everyone was saying little prayers for him. I know I was. But the tour went on after that.
After the citadel we all hopped on the bus and we went to the River Jordan Baptismal site! it was so crazy. Obviously it's a traditional location, but it was really cool. Jordan at the time of Christ was a big river, and so when it talks about Joshua parting the river like Moses parted the Red Sea and bringing the Children of Israel across to the Promised Land, it was more impressive than it might seem if you look at the river today. We got there, got off the bus, and there was a walk to get there, but it was good. There is a 1st century church there, which is why they think that it's a pretty good marker for the actual location. Anyway, so we got down there, and it was really, really funny...They told us that the River Jordan is pretty polluted, and icky...and so Brother Brown was reiterating that when we were there by saying, "If you must get wet in this vile stream, please get only your feet wet." haha it was hilarious! I guess you have to know Brother Brown. He has a very dry sense of humor. It's great. Anyway, It's also very true. And I didn't get my feet in...it was really brown and I was just afraid of creatures that could be in it. There was a purified, filtered basin of water from the Jordan...so I put my hands in that for a little while. It was funny, too cause immediately after I took them out, I used hand sanitizer. I guess that shows you the difference between us and people that say things like "I'm never going to wash my hands again!" after experiences like that. I sanitize immediately, that's just who I am. And guess what....that's okay cause it's not the water that Christ touched...that water was there 2000 years ago. It's a river people, let's get real. :) But the basin water was pretty sweet.
This is the 1st century Church commemorating Jesus' baptism. It was really pretty.
The church and bell tower again :)
Me and the church...
This is the River Jordan at the traditional baptismal site!
Basin of water :) River Jordan water!
Me washing my hands in the basin... :)And, after that we went to the border and crossed! It was sweet. Except they denied our visas at first, and said that we were students instead of tourists, and wouldn't let us through. But, let's be honest...are they really going to keep a group of 82 20-25ish year-olds in their midst for a long period of time. They were bound to get sick of us and just stamp our passports to get us out of their hair. That and I think they called the center and confirmed through Mr. Heyet (sp?), who is the manager of the Center. Anyway, after that we were home!
Whew! Jordan, check!
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