Last day in Jordan

Last night I had a great time in the old city of Amman. I walked around with friends and had some cactus, along with a juice cocktail. We saw some of the old Crusader ruins, along with some other important sites. Amman is a pretty young city, taking off only after the situation with Israel ensued. Amman has around 2 million people in it I think. I also think I misquoted that earlier in the blog. Again in Jordan, I discovered a vibrant presence of a Christian minority. They used to be a lot more however, and their percent of the whole population has been steadily shrinking ever since the 1948 war over the Holy Land.

Back in the 1960s, according to older residents, people in Jordan were wearing mini skirts and the atmosphere was very relaxed. After the 6 day war, everything changed. Granted, Jordan was one of the perpetrators in this conflict, but regardless the result was a massive influx of poor stateless and homeless Palestinian refugees. They turned to the only thing that you can turn to in a state like that, their religion. Then came the Iranian revolution brought on because of US meddling in Iranian affairs, and society grew even more conservative. Before women could walk down the street how they wanted to, without head covering. Now, you get strange looks even in some places in Amman if you are not modestly dressed as a female. Amman is rapidly westernizing. It is returning to its former self, and is very Western friendly. Everyone with education speaks English for the most part, and the country of Jordan itself is one of America's closest allies in the Middle East. They paid dearly for it too. In 2005 or so, three suicide bombers blew themselves up at three different western hotels in the middle of wedding celebrations, taking scores of victims with them. One of the victims was the distant cousin of my host in Amman. The bombers wanted punish Jordan for signing a peace treaty with Israel and being too friendly towards the US. So I guess the moral is think twice before stereotyping about the middle east, because some people have literally lost family because of their support for America.