More pictures I took from a friend.


Grave stone of a suicide victim. Interesting because most of the grave stone have no pictures, only words and the date of death and birth.


Pretty house in Safed.


Does anyone get that feeling of just having to sit up straight? Well I did and now I'm Buddha.


The 2 Russians and the Twins.


Alex and us at the Soldier's cemetery in Jerusalem.


A pretty nature park that we went to during the first week of Birthright.

So, let me start with the Weddings. Before I came to Israel I knew that I would be going to Jordan and therefore I called up my old friend, Faris, from Webster, who happened to be Jordanian, and asked him 1.) If he knew of any cool places to visit and cheap places to stay, and 2.)If he was going to be in Jordan so he could show me around. It turned out that he was going to be in Jordan at the same time that I was and that he was getting married. So not only would I get to see him, but I would get to go to his wedding.
Now present day. Let me quickly jump back to Israel for a second. While RObby and I would staying at the Heritage House, Chaya the House mom, told everyone at the Hostel about a Jewish Orthodox Wedding that everyone was invited to. Apparently Jewish people do not send out invitations to certain friends and family. Instead they just send out announcements and everyone is invited. Chaya convinced us and three others to go and check it out because we had never been to a real Orthodox wedding. We dressed up nicely and headed out with one other girl and her brother. The cabbie took us to a street that had about 700 Orthodox men singing and dancing in the street around a van with an obnoxious glittery crown on top. There was really loud Hebrew music playing. We all got out of the car thinking, "Gosh, Jews really know how to throw a party!" It turns out that we were in the wrong location and that the happy dancing guys were celebrating the grand opening of a 10 million dollar Yeshiva (school). We wandered down the hill to hail another cab and to our surprise two more people from the Heritage House popped out of a cab. We yelled at them to get back in since they were in the wrong location. I think we confused them a little since we practically screamed, "get back in the cab! Get Back in the Cab! You're in the wrong location!" We didn't want them to have to pay for another cab like us.
Eventually all six of us made it to the correct location and entered the wedding after everything, but the dancing had happened. In an Orthodox wedding the women are on one side of a divided room and the men on the other. This is to allow the married couple not to have a wandering eye and it lets everyone be themselves without having to worry about appearances - the women could basically uncover their hair (they wear wigs or hats in public. Their immediate family are the only ones that are suppose to see their true hair since it is a symbol of beauty).
The two guys that we were with went to the guys side while the four of us girls sat to one side of the room while numerous Neve girls tried to explain what was going on. So the ceremony had basically be completed and now the bride and groom were in a special room where they are allowed to touch for the first time. In Orthodox culture, most of the people are matched together through a matchmaker or friends. They usually know everything about each other before they go on a first date by asking the other's family and friends about that person. After a few dates, if the couple likes each other they keep going out. Of they don't connect they try again with someone else. Since there is no touching on any of the dates, the couple gets to see each other's personalities and their true feelings. If they truly like each other they are married after a few months. Yes, shocking. I thought it was weird at first as well, but they say they know all the details about each other's lives before the first date and usually a friend would hook you up with someone they knew - meaning "would you hook your friend up with a jerk?" no, so the marriages usually last. I think there is about a 4% divorce rate. Nice huh?
Since the bride and groom were busy kissing or what not, we watched as everyone ate. Chaya had said that there is always tons of food and so we didn't eat anything and were starving. Now Chaya had been right, there was a ton of food, but the family was semi-poor and they were paying by the plate, so all non-official guest got soda only. Grrrr. We talked, our stomachs growled, and eventually the bride and groom came out of the little room and there was a whole lot of dancing. We all got pushed in a giant circle and around and around we went with the bride in the middle who danced with relatives and friends. When you're the bride or groom you better have your dancing shoes on because there are no exception's, only dancing. About an hour into the dancing a bunch of other people from the Heritage house shoed up, including the "hippies" They're a group of kids that all went on a Birthright trip together and decided to stay and travel for a bit afterwards. They're the "hippies" because the three guys carry instruments with them, everywhere and randomly decide to stop on a bench and play music. One has dreads, a couple with bandanas, and the 2 girls with them dance. They're all really nice and it was funny to see them, at the wedding because they came in normal clothes and carrying their instruments. When we asked them later why they weren't dressed up, they said they hadn't expected to come to the wedding and that they just ended up there. See, anyone is invited, just not feed.
2 hours later our stomachs were really growling and we all did a mass exodus to Ben Yehuda street to grab food. It was a interesting wedding, but I prefer to marry the American way.

Back to Jordan. I had to tell about the Israeli wedding so you could see the difference between that one and the Jordanian wedding. After Robby and I saw the Amman ruins we called Faris to come pick us up. He said that he would find us a nice hotel so that we could be close to his family for the wedding. It turns out that the hotel was Faris' house. Since there were just two of us, his mom said we could stay there.
Faris' house is amazing. It is an apartment that takes up an entire floor of a complex. All the furniture had that "look at me, but don't touch" feel along with the pictures on the wall. But since we couldn't stand the whole time we decided to risk breaking something and sit. It's surprising how elegant chairs can be really comfortable.
There are two maids in Faris' house. They are both from the Philippines and extremely nice. Robby and I preferred to talk to them than half the family because they were a little more down to Earth. Also they spoke fairly decent English, while everyone else knew "Hello". The first night that we were there there was a party for Faris at 10 pm. A bunch of family and friends came from all over. At first they all wondered about the two quiet white girls hanging about, but after a while people found out we were Faris' friends and then they started to talk to us. Robby made friends with a 12 yr old girl who has been traveling all over Europe this summer for fun. I'm very jealous of her life. She also spoke wonderful English and was often the translator for her parents and other people.
We finally got to meet Nor, Faris fiance. She is really cute and her and Faris make a great couple. Ever since I met Faris he had always joked about needing to find a "wifey" and now he finally found one. They met last year while hanging with the folks. They weren't even looking to get married and it just happened. Now that's better than a match maker in some ways. At least you know it is love instead of someone telling you it is love.
The following day was the wedding day, but it was a very lazy day. Faris' dad woke us up early for no reason that I could see other then the fact that we were in the living room and he wanted to watch TV. We lounged around drinking coffee and tea until 2pm when one of the aunts took us and her daughter to get our hair styled for the wedding. Robby just got hers straighten, but I decided to get mine curled. In the end I looked like something out of a 60's TV show. Semi=straight hair on the sides and the back with lazy curls at the bottom and then my bangs were side parted across my face. There was a small bob going on, but I made it vanish or the wind from outside destroyed it. After sitting around for another 3 hrs, my hair had started to go back to craziness, but at least I looked liked I came out of the early 90's now instead of the 60's. Jordanian's must really love the 60's hairdos because everyone else came back from the parlor with some sort of bob or Hawaiian style. Odd.
At 6:30pm a traditional Arab band came to the house and clapped and sung for an hour while people danced and Faris looked nervous. We danced all the way into the cars that then drove to Nor's house. There were about 12 cars all fighting for room on the road, honking in crazy happiness, and flashing their lights. Maher, Faris' brother was sticking out of the sun roof singing and dancing to Faris who was driving behind him in a Audi TT decked out with flowers and ribbons. Once at Nor's house we all got out and followed the singing band into the house where Nor and Faris united and stood together as the singing continued and people congratulated them. A bit later we danced back to the cars a headed to the reception. Now about 20 cars blocked traffic and made a ruckus. Everytime we hit a stop light, a bunch of guys ran out of their cars and danced a circle around Faris and Nor.
Hussian taught RObby a saying, "Afflent Majnun." roughly translates to " The rich are crazy." It is completely true. At the hotel we annoyed the residents for a bit with more loud singing and dancing as we walked down a hallway. 2 1/2 hrs after the singing first started, it ended and we went outside to the pool area to have drinks (non alcoholic since Muslims don't drink. They're already crazy enough). Faris and Nor vanished for a bit and Robby and I got stuck talking to Nor's uncle and his whole family of 8 kids and some brothers with kids. It turns out that one of the Uncles will be in Cairo the same time as us and he told us to look him up when we go there. We probably will since it's done us a fair amount of good hanging with people that have been referred to us.
at 10pm Faris and Nor returned and we all went inside to the grand ballroom where there was more dancing and singing. Faris and Nor walked around slowly so everyone could see them and eventually we were allowed to grab some of the really good food. Later that night Faris' grandma practically dragged us on stage and made us dance. That lead to everyone else wanting to dance with us. It was Jordanian dancing, so kind of shaking your hips while moving your hands in a slow, lazy up, and down way. Robby did something wrong since one of Faris' uncle's started pretending to swim everytime he saw her afterwards in imitation of RObby's horrible dance style.
Overall it was a fun day, but drawn out longer than it should have been and we didn't get to eat until our stomachs caved in. We also found out that Faris and Nor got officially married two weeks earlier and that's why there was no vows ceremony. Just dancing, singing and showing off.
We stayed at Faris' house for another night. We had planned to go to Madaba, supposively an interesting town with lots of Bible history, but we needed to figure out what we were doing with Aqaba. Somehow we had got ourselves hooked into going to Aqaba with Maher the following day at 6 am and we didn't know if we were going to spend the night at Faris' again or if we should have gone to find another hotel. We wanted to ask Maher and then go to Madaba for the day, but Maher didn't show up until 2 pm with Faris and we ended up eating lunch with the family and not having enough time to go to Madaba.
Maher took us dancing that night with his cousin and we went over our plans for Aqaba, basically a very touristy city since it is mostly beaches. We realized kind of late that Maher is 18 and not interested in the same stuff as us. We still wanted to see Petra and then Wadi Rum. He wanted to party and lay a bout on the beach. Luckily the plans got canceled because Maher had to stay another day to say bye to his brother who flew in for the wedding and then he wasn't allowed to go to Aqaba since Faris and NOr were going and it was considered rude since it was like jumping in on the honeymoon.
Now present days. We arrived in Petra yesterday after taking a small public bus. Petra is not that touristy of a place for Jordanians and therefore none of the big, nice buses come down here very often. So our bags got to be pillows for other passengers and sometimes steps. we planned ahead this time and found a hostel online that was in the town over from Petra. The bus dropped us off at the door of the Petra Gate hotel and we realized, planning isn't always a good thing either.
Now I've stayed in some pretty gross and creepy hostel before, but this one takes the cake. Down into the dungeon we walked and the choice of the blue room or the yellow room we were offered. I choose the blue room since it looked friendlier. The waiting room of the Hotel was covered in dust. They were doing some repairs, but I'm pretty sure the inside of the place hadn't seen a vacuum or dust mop in a decade. I was scared to sit on anything. Not sure my pants would have recovered. The blue room was two beds with blue comforters that have seen better days. There's no door on the bathroom, it's just separated from the last bed by a wall. There's a toilet, but you can only sit sideways on it since the wall is practically pushed up against the front of the toilet. The shower is rusted over and just a spigot hanging over the toilet. Yeah, next time we'll just wander in and out of places until we find one that we like. We had half paid for the night at Petra Gate and therefore had to stay. Luckily they gave us sheets that smelled refreshingly clean and we curled up in those the whole night. No telling what's under the covers.
The owner of the hotel was extremely nice. He drove us out to Little Petra and told us to explore and then hitchhike back to the hotel. He said it was perfectly safe and that anyone would pick us up. On the way to Little Petra we drove down a long whinedy, hilly road that maybe had one car drove by every 8 minutes. Robby and I looked at each other and decided it was going to be a long walk back (about 5 miles.
Since we didn't know what Big Petra looked like, Little Petra was amazing. Sandstone mountains on either side of us and giant pillars carved into the rocks everywhere. The Byzantines built Little Petra as a resting station on the journey to Big Petra. They liked caves and lots of the openings resembled 8 foot sarcophagus. A bit unnerving, but neat.
As we were following a set of stairs to nowhere, a Bedouin found us and showed us about. He grew up in Petra and knew the ins and outs of the desert. We went on a fairly long hike up through the hills and into the valley. I didn't know I was going to be hiking that day and so my stupid flipflops basically drove me crazy and had to be thrown down the mountain in order for me not to fall off the cliff. I decided that I was not going to bring a bag to Big Petra. Only a camera. Trying to boulder doesn't work with cameras and bags swinging every which direction.
The bedouin's name is Mohammed and he invited us back to his house for dinner. Along the way we met his cousin who told us about a performance he was doing later that night at one of the tourist bedouin camps. We all decided to head to the tourist camp later and watch the singing. Mohammed took us to his house so he could change clothes and we hung out with his three sisters, his mother and a couple of his brothers. One of the sisters spoke a little English, but most of them didn't speak any English. We entertained them by giving them Altoids Sour candy. They all thought it was sweet and when they put it in their mouths they got a kick out of watching each other pluker up. One of the brothers didn't like the taste, but loved to eat the candy. He kept asking for more and then cringing when he ate it. Fun stuff.
The cousin came back and all four of us headed to the Tourist camp. The camp is run by Mohammed's family and so everyone knew each other. We walked around the place and then had dinner with some Jordanian archeologist. Robby was happy. The cousin, who's name is Macmood, sung and danced with 7 other guys. It was nice, but they were a little off key and they kept whispering while trying to sing. Afterwards we went and looked at the stars with the guys. They invited us to jeep out to Wadi Araba with them the next day. We said yes because we were planning on going to Wadi Run anyhow and they said that Wadi Araba was prettier. Both are deserts with lots of hiking and beautiful landscapes.
It also turns out that Macmood is one of the staff members on the excavation in Jordan that RObby is working on in two months. So now she has a friend. Mohammed drove us back to our hotel and told us to meet him the next day and he would show us Big Petra and then take us to Wadi Araba.
So today we went to Big Petra and lucked out on getting in for the student price of $15 dollars instead of the normal price of $30. Everyone here has told us that we need about 2 days to see most of Petra and about a week to see all of it. I think that we covered most of it in the 8 hours we were there today. We saw a lot of the pillars carved into the rocks, the Treasury (which is the famous pillared building from Indiana Jones) a bunch of tombs, a Roman church that was discovered 14 years ago and is huge, we hiked a giant mountain and I almost had a heart attack, but it was worth it for the view and then we hiked down it semi illegally. There was a sign at the bottom that said, "no climbing". Opps, but there was no way in hell that I was going to climb down the way I came up. No way. The beginning to {Petra is a shady passage way in the middle of gray sandstone. Beautiful patterns are carved into the rock by erosion and human hand. It was my favorite part of Petra. Hopefully I'll get the pictures uploaded soon and be able to show you guys.
We were suppose to climb the 900 steps to the monastery on the hill, but we both decided no. RObby can come back and climb to her heart's content, but I just wanted a shower or a hot tub. My knees are killing me. Petra's beautiful, but I don't need to climb every mountain to feel the magnitude of the place.
Robby and I decided that we didn't really feel comfortable enough to go with Mohammed and Macmood to the desert and camp out, so we are going to go watch the World Cup tonight and head to Aqaba tomorrow. We plan to find a hotel on the beach and actually lay about doing nothing but sleeping and swimming. It sounds refreshing after the last two days. I'm completely out of shape and everything hurts. I need a lazy day.

Talk to you guys later.