Dead Sea and Airport Trauma

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So here we were in the famed Amman, capital of Jordan, famous for .... uh .... well, okay, famous for nothing. Amman, not to be confused with Oman (a country on the east coast of the Arab Peninsula), is the modern capital of Jordan that essentially looks, feels and smells like a European city. We were here simply because of its proximity to two important Jordan sights - the Dead Sea and the river Jordan.

We started our morning trying to get to the Dead Sea. Our taxi driver harassed us all the way to the bus depot, telling us that travelling by bus was much too complicated, and that he would happily drive us for a reasonable fee. Of course, as smart tourists, we didn't trust our taxi driver. Arriving at the bus depot though, we found a vacant depot with no signage, together with a rather confused and frustrated David, a guy we had randomly met at various points on our trip. David had been trying in vain for the last hour to get a bus. It seemed the taxi driver was correct, so we sheepishly returned to the taxi, together with David, and hired the cab for the trip (30JD for those interested in doing the same)

The trip out to the Dead Sea was only boring highway, so no interesting sights. In fact, the scenery all around Amman is rather dull - just dusty, parched foot hills - a dull change from the dramatic landscapes further south in Petra and Wadi Rum. Once we arrived, we tried to find the 'free' swimming spot mentioned in the Lonely Planet, much against the advice of our driver, who emphatically tried to sell us the advantages of the paid beaches. Despite the comforts of showers and change rooms at the paid beaches, the Lonely Planet free spot sounded more enticing. Described as an isolated, private spot beside a stream, it suggested a more idylic and more importantly, free, experience. Alas the LP was wrong - the place we found was filthy little outlet beside a dirty stream that, according to our doctor friend David, contained leeches and other little animals that would give us skin diseases. So for the second time that day, we returned sheepishly to the taxi driver, told him he was right, and headed back to the paid beach.

Melenie, my good wife, had packed multiple swim suits, in fear that she would be stoned by some conservative local for baring one too many millimeters of skin. So, emerging from the changing room, swaddled in a long scarf for added modesty, she was surprised to see beside her a local woman dressed in a string bikini. And right beside her, another local young woman dressed in a full body suit. Talk about extremes! When talking to our driver about it later, he said "of course, Jordan is a modern country, we have modern women, we're not barbarians, like some of our neighbours".

Which brings me to my second memory - our driver. We were peacefully settling down on the beach, when to our surprise we saw our driver skipping down to the beach - shirt off and now donned in a pair of shorts and slippers. Apparently drivers are allowed to enter the beach for free, so he had decided to join our little party. Our driver was a comic little guy - extremely smiley, jovial and helpful. He started telling us all about the Dead Sea and its medicinal properties. Both David and myself had open cuts that we were busily covering up so as to avoid killing ourselves from the high salinity of the water (as advised by the Lonely Planet). Our driver insisted that we should leave them open, claiming the salt would cleanse it, and even make them heal faster. He was indeed right - when I doused my wound in the magical Dead Sea waters, I saw it cauterise before my eyes - not much pain, and it definitely looked a lot healthier.

The driver also took it onto himself to become guardian of children on the beach. At one point, one little kid came out screaming from the water, because he had let some of the very salty water leak into his eye. Our driver ran forward, swooped the kid up in his arms, dug in a nearby bin for an empty bottle, and then proceeded to wash the kids eye with water from the dirty bottle. A tad gross, but still, a nice gesture. Another endearing moment was when the driver tried to warn us of the various points on our body we should not allow dead sea water into, such as the eyes, nose, and one's more obscure orfices. He expertly contorted his body to show us in great detail all these various orfices - quite endearing although probably more information than we needed to know.

So ... back to the Dead Sea. For the ignorant, the Dead Sea is one of the lowest points on earth, and is famed for having such a high level of salinity (ie. very salty) that no form of life can exist in it (hence the moniker 'dead'). A by product of the high salinity is that the water is more dense, and as a result, its near impossible for a human to sink. That means you can do all kinds of crazy acrobatics while floating in the Dead Sea, like stick your feet up in the air, read a newspaper, or contort into a ball - all without fear of sinking. Of course, we all had our doubts, and tried valiantly to sink. But in fact, its true - try as we could, we just couldn't sink. Perhaps the hardest thing was overcoming our own minds, which consistently informed us that the ridiculous little contortion we were engaged in would make us sink, when in fact, we were floating quite nicely. Its a very interesting experience, and definitely one to store in the bank of treasured memories.

The only down side to the Dead Sea is that the water tastes absolutely revolting - kind of like salty oil. I had been warned not to drink it, but in one of my definant acts of contortion, I happened to open my mouth. You also feel gross when you come out because all that oily, salty water, is now congealed on your skin. At this point, most people head over to a nearby mud patch that is a source of the famed Dead Sea mud - famed for its ability to beautify skin. This mud is supposed to be rubbed all over your skin - the coarse salt as well as the minerals apparently magically rejuvenate your skin. In my case, all it did was make me feel even more sticky and gross. Note my little picture below, that shows the Dead Sea mud patch, right beside some kind of pipe, that looks much too similar to a sewage pipe. Could the Dead Sea mud in fact be sourced from the nearby washroom?

After the Dead Sea, we headed to the River Jordan. The River Jordan marks the border between Israel and Jordan, and thus, is a highly security sensitive area. Tourists are therefore forced to go on carefully escorted tour around the main sights. First up was Mount (????), the spot where the Prophet Elijah was fed bread by the birds (a story in the Bible). It was just some sandy, uninteresting little hill - I'm not sure how they surmised this was the spot. Next up, we headed to the point where Jesus was apparently baptised. They believe it is at this particular point based on a the claims of an old church that was unearthed at the spot. Additionally, there are some other markers that suggest this is the right spot. I'm glad we saw it, but don't go expecting too much because all you see is a patch of river. Third on the list was a visit to a point where we could touch the River Jordan. Apparently, this is considered holy by some people, who bring their kids to be baptised in its water. In my opinion it was just a dirty green river which didn't look like the most sanitary place to dip a newborn into. What was interesting though was that the river was saw narrow that you could almost jump across the river into Israel. To prevent this, they have gun-toting guards on either side. Also, it was surprising to see just how small the Jordan really is. I had always imagined it to be a large, blue tributary, but today, thanks to the growing aridness of the region, its little more than a dirty green creek.

By now, it was late afternoon, so we headed back to Amman to catch our plane to Moscow. I would normally end our story at this point, except that had some rather interesting hapennings during this trip. The plan was to fly via a 5 hour stop-over in Cairo, to Moscow. We pulled into Cairo at 9pm and were ushered into the transit hall. At the entrance, we were asked for our passports by a rather scruffy looking guard. He took our passports, flicked them open, and then threw them into a tiny drawer of a tiny desk that looked far from secure. When asked what next, he told us to just sit and wait for a few hours, while they processed our passports. Now normally, I would have taken their word, and just sat and waited, but for some reason, this whole setup looked rather disorganized and insecure. So I asked politely for a photocopy of our documents, saying that I was uncomfortable not having any travel documents with me. They rudely told me no, told me to sit down, and that everything would be okay. I tried in vain to reason, explaining how scary it was not to have any travel documents, and how I was uncomfortable with the fact that our passport had just been thrown into some random drawer - a drawer that any passer-by could easily dig through. I tried the firmness approach, which failed, and then proceeded to the slightly raised voice.
At that point, a lady beside me tapped me and told me that some guy had been arrested a few minutes before for making a fuss, and advised me to sit down. I promptly shut my mouth and headed over to the waiting lounge where the lady proceeded to tell me how she hated the transit system here, but unfortunately, had learnt to put up with it as she was a frequent transitor through Cairo. I was just starting to feel a little more relaxed when the airport staff came and told me that they couldn't find our luggage. Which started me on a rant on how if they could't keep track of my luggage, how ever were they going to keep my passport safe. I went back to the counter, complained bitterly about my lost luggage and told them I wanted my passport back. At which point they told me "no, but did you know that we offer all our transit guests free food".

Ah, what a simple mind I have. That was all I needed to calm me down - stuff my mouth with something free, and I'm a happy customer. Who cares if they lost my luggage - just keep that gloriously free food coming. I was promptly back in the land of peace and harmony, until my good wife reminded me that our luggage was still lost, and that I should do something about it.

So I headed down with the luggage people to try to dig through the luggage depot for my luggage. This gave me a very interesting insight into luggage handling. In short .... don't EVER trust the luggage guys to look after your luggage. I saw various pieces of luggage strewn across the tarmac. Ever received luggage that was slightly damp? I noticed a few pieces of luggage lying in pools of water. Ever had some strange dirt marks on them? I saw luggage fallen in garden beds. Goodness - no wonder they loose luggage! Anyway, after 1.5 hours, they finally found our luggage. All looked good, except for our poor baby stroller, which was totally massacared - the hood was covered in oil and the metal handles were bent 90 degrees out of shape.

I took a deep breath, put aside the fact that my pasport was still not in my hands and was probably being handled by people as incompetent as these baggage handlers, and headed over to the baggage handling counter to lodge a complaint. Unfortunately, the baggage handling counter apparently only handled Egypt Air complaints - we would have to complain to a Royal Jordanian agent since that was our flight company. Alas, it was now midnight and there were no Royal Jordanian agents in the airport. In frustration, I instead filmed our mutilated pram to document the damage. I must have looked like a strange fool to any passer by as they watched me filming a pram that had clearly been through a war zone, together with various clocks and Cairo airport signage.

The mutilation was of course forgotten very quickly when I returned to the transit lounge and rediscovered the joys of free food. While chomping down on that chow, I realized how simple minded I was - like a dog that is rewarded by a biscuit in exchange for doing a hard day of labour. The end story is that they in fact did not loose our passport, and that we boarded the plane safe and sound. Still, if anything, the episode of tantrum throwing was good way to pass what otherwise would have been a very boring 5 hour stopover.

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Photos

Dead sea salts
The shoreline is coated in big chunks of salt, more salt than sand. Not very tasty, just in case you were wondering.

Floating in the dead sea
They guy in the foreground was our friendly driver. Guy on the left is David.

The dead sea hole
This is the hole from which dead sea sand/salt is dug out of. All the tourists come by, dig some mud out themselves and cover them selves for a self-administered exfoliation.

Pure dead sea salts
That hole in the background is where they pull the dead sea sand (world famous cosmetic) out of. That pipe in the front .... well, it was coming from the direction of the bathrooms.

Dead sea acrobatics
Some of the interesting poses possible when you can't sink.