a Geographer's Place

The Fulbright mission, “…to increase mutual understanding and support friendly and peaceful relations between the people of the United States and the peoples of other countries,” remains a dominant driving force in cross-cultural communication and appreciation. I’m proud to be part of the Fulbright Family. I stand ready to help anyone who is thinking of pursuing a Fulbright opportunity. The program is, quite frankly, amazing. One of the Forgotten Fortresses of the Eastern Desert: Qasr Q'ilat  (Castle-castle). It's really a dam that's been there since, according to my Bedouin guide taking a smoke break on the dam, Roman times. He showed me Roman engravings. This is OUT IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. But such a neat place! I ’ ve had some time to reflect on our experiences in Jordan, now that we ’ ve begun settling back into life in the States. And here's the thing: I have absolutely nothing bad to say about the experience  –  or the Kingdom, or its people. I can hones...

When we first arrived in Amman, it was winter. A little chilly, but pleasant. It snowed several times. I noticed how the city was always changing , and the role its vernacular landscape played in the change. But there was something about the city I couldn’t quite describe. All the adjectives I thought of just didn’t accurately portray what I was observing. Then Kaelin said, “…it’s raw.” After a lot of thought, I agree. Jordan is raw . This has led to many great discussions over the last several months. Just so you know, I don’t consider “raw” a bad thing. It’s just a non-pretentious, what-you-see-is-what-you-get type of word to me, especially when applied to place. Like definition 2c : “[N]ot being in polished, finished, or processed form.” Essentially, something which has potential to be much more, but is not quite there yet. That describes Amman – and the country as well. It’s a young Kingdom, still finding its way and deciding who it wants to be. It’s striving to be a country...

Probably my favorite mall feature: The animatronic T-Rex in Galleria Mall at  Christmastime. Notice Santa with pterodactyls. A bustling metropolitan area with more than 4 million people, Amman has lots of things to keep a Travelist busy. There are ancient ruins, museums, Arab souks, architecture, restaurants of all kinds (and price-ranges)...and the list continues. There are also no fewer than a dozen universities scattered throughout the city limits. And Amman keeps expanding. The city changes so fast that Google Maps can’t keep up with it. For example, where last month there was no road, unexpectedly there is one now, or where there were just a few pilings for a bridge last month, suddenly there is a new bridge. Their construction crews certainly work fast here! For some reason, malls have always fascinated me. It may be that I grew up without them, only visiting them around Christmastime with my parents until I was in college and lived in “The City”. Or it may...

The most famous set of ruins in Amman are the Citadel, Roman Odeon, and Nymphaeum – all of which I’ve blogged about previously ( here and here ). What many people fail to realize, is that Amman is home to a lot more ruins. There are active dig sites (archeologists actually excavating sites) in around the city. For this entry, I want to show you an off-the-regular track place called Iraq al-Amir . Roughly translated, it means “Cave of the Prince”. But there’s more than caves! The village proper lies a scant 35 km or so from downtown Amman. That’s about a 40-minute drive from our house, depending on traffic. The road drives through Wadi As-Seer, a village originally settled by Circassians in the 19 th century, but that has since been usurped by Amman (a wadi , pronounced, wah-dee , is basically a catch-all term for a canyon of any size). Circassians are still prominent in Wadi as-Seer. You may know them from T.E. Lawrence (the Brit) tales: to initially gain the trust of Arab...

While conducting research in your home region can be tricky, conducting research in another country, while always tricky, can also be...complicated. Proposals to write, permissions to get, paperwork to complete...and it continues. This day began with a meeting at the Department of Antiquities to solidify research agendas. The support and interest is apparent, but the paperwork and waiting. Ugh. Lots of it. The good news? This allows plenty of time for fieldwork planning. The joys of fieldwork. After the morning meeting with the DOA, we headed out to the Citadel. I’ve written about it previously , and not going to repeat myself here, so there aren ’t any  pictures for this short blog. On this visit, however, we were able to visit the museum. Although the interpretive plaques are a bit yellowed and old, they still convey pertinent information and the museum’s layout and artifacts are crazy neat! And once you’ve seen pretty much all the places where those artifacts are from, it...

The last several days we have been exploring potential research sites in Amman itself in case we aren’t able to get to our intended research sites. And Amman has plenty to explore! Just look at the view from The Citadel: Looking southeast over Amman from Jabal al Qal'a , as it's called in Arabic The Citadel has a temple dedicated to Heracles (Hercules to Westerners), a Byzantine church, and an Umayyad palace. If you want more, the Wikipedia entry is good, although their first picture of “Amman Citadel Ruins” is NOT from the Citadel, but rather the city of Jerash (this is why ground-truthing is so important!) The large pillars represent what is thought to be the entrance into the Temple of Hercules. Apparently there was also a very large statue of him - they have the hand and elbow on display, just sitting out in the elements. The small-ish box-like structures in the foreground are (empty) sarcophogi. Notice the sprawl of Amman in the background. In a nut shel...

As promised, here are pictures of our apartment (keep reading!) We chose the Um-Uthaina neighborhood. Language side note: If you’re looking for our neighborhood on a map of Amman, you might not find Um-Uthaina . Depending on how the name gets transliterated, it could also be spelled Um-Ozaina , Umm Udhayna , or even some other way. This happens because there are several sounds in Arabic not present in the English language, or there are certain letters in English that make different sounds depending on which word they’re used in, like the “th” in  bath and there . In Arabic those different sounds are actually different letters. So when a word with this characteristic gets transliterated into English, there may be different pairings—one of which is the dh/th/z—to distinguish between those different Arabic sounds. That means finding a place name on a map is sometimes tricky. And although Kaelin can tell the difference when these are spoken, I am still trying to get m...