Bee in my bonnet

Or that's where it would have been if I wore a bonnet.

The said offender was buzzing around in my cab and annoying my driver and I for several blocks before the driver got the brillant idea of rolling up his newspaper and swatting at it - while he drove through the crazy Amman traffic.

I had horrible visions of it stinging him and us crashing somewhere - a thought that was short lived because he managed to make contact with the bee and smacked it directly back over the seat and into my HAIR.

I shrieked, hearing and feeling it buzzing in my hair - obviously stuck and in a foul state. I resisted reaching up to pull it out, knowing the first thing it'd do is sting me!

So instead I yelled, "Get it out, get it out, eeee!"

The driver turned around and realised what he had done and said, "Oh no madam! So sorry! Oh no!"

Thankfully we had just pulled up to a red light, so he turned his full attention to me. His best attempt at helping involved him swatting his newspaper at my hair while I tried to stay still enough for the bugger to get out.

It only briefly occurred to me how ridiculous this scene must look to the people in the cars beside us. I'm sure they would have thought my driver was assaulting me with his newspaper!

Finally the bee flew out, we rolled down a window and shooed it outside.

Then I turned and noticed we were indeed the object of much curiousity. One cab full of men were full-out laughing at us.

Once we got rolling again the driver and I had a pretty good laugh about it too.

I'm just glad I didn't get stung!

No sign of Christmas

I woke up this morning and realised it's one month until Christmas and it couldn't feel less like it.

*Note about waking up - the sun shines through my curtains at 6:30 a.m. everyday. I know for certain that back home mornings are pitch black until much later than that! It's winter, isn't it? Aren't the days supposed to be really short and dark? What's up with the sun coming up so early around here?

Though I will be home right before the big day, I'm a bit sad to be missing out on all the Christmas anticipation. It's just not the same when you've got sun, blue sky and early fall-like weather (certainly no snowfall here). There are still mosquitoes flying around! The nights are chilly, yes, but the days have been oddly warm.

And there's no Christmas carols playing on the department store speakers. Actually there really aren't any department stores in the malls like we have back home, come to think of it. There aren't seasonal movie classics playing on TV. It had become a tradition with my family to catch A Christmas Story at least once during the holidays.

There's no annual hunt for the boxes of Christmas decorations, no Christmas card writing, no talk of where to get the tree, no discussions about how to manage the family-visiting schedule.

On the odd occassion I'll come across a store with a little plastic Christmas tree in its window, advertising a paltry selection of sad decorations.

If I wasn't already so self-conscious about people here watching me, I'd stand out front of that store and stare at the tree like a little kid wanting the puppy in the window.

It's been tempting.

Update: I went online to listen to one of our Toronto radio stations and waddaya know they're doing a special "Kick off Christmas" weekend show and David Bowie is belting out Peace on Earth in a duet with Bing Crosby. Made me want to curl up on a couch with a hot chocolate in front of a fire place somewhere snowy.

Talked to my mother today though and she said the weather back home isn't much different from Amman. Apparently it's 15 celcius and hasn't snowed for weeks. Whatever is happening with the Canadian weather, it better get its act in gear before I get home.

Green Christmases are no fun.

Bush is coming

George Bush is coming to Jordan.

I heard it from my friend back home before I heard it in the newsroom. In fact I think I was the one to break the news to most of my colleagues. Here's the story.

I can see the mass pandamonuim now.

Is it odd to anyone that his trip was announced so far ahead of time? Aren't his trips to the Middle East usually done last minute and as a suprise to, you know, discourage those who like to plan bad things?

T-minus 30 days

ONE MONTH LEFT.

My kind of assignment

Oh how sweet it is to go to English assignments. It's even sweeter when you're the only native-speaking English reporter there and for once you get to watch the Arab reporters fumble for words and stare blankly at the speaker when they don't understand what he's saying.

It's also great to have the speaker seek you out because you are the only reporter there he feels totally comfortable talking with. All the other times I have to chase down Jordanian officials who avoid me because their English is weak and they'd rather sneak out the back door than deal with the new Canadian journalist.

The tables have turned!

I'm describing my afternoon covering the event in the previous post. About six Arab reporters and I sat with the American representative and chatted about his organization and what they are doing in Jordan.

Some of the other reporters had difficulty phrasing their questions. Some had to use translators to get their point across. Some asked questions that had already been covered, which made them look like they were either a) not understanding or b) not paying attention.

It was awkward for them, but I felt little sympathy. I recalled all the occasions they would elbow me out of the way at events and give me bored looks when I would ask the speaker to switch from Arabic to English so I would have something to take back to the paper.

When I arrived at the event some of the American organizers thought I was Jordanian and expressed shock at the strength of my English skills. Others assumed I was American and asked what State I was from and why I was working in Jordan?

They said my accent made them think I was from the U.S.

It was the first time I was told I spoke with an accent. For some inexplicable reason I had always thought the way (central) Canadians talked was the default sound and it was everyone else that had accents.

I know, how ethnocentric of me.

But honestly, how many times has someone said "Hey, I like your Canadian accent"??

It just doesn't come up.

Article: Peace Corps in Jordan

Published in The Jordan Times, November 19, 2006

Peace Corps to continue volunteer work in rural areas

By Grace Peacock

AMMAN — After an almost 10-year presence in the country promoting peace and understanding between Americans and Jordanians, the US Peace Corps will continue its volunteer work in rural Jordan and consider an expansion of their programmes if requested.

This, according to Ron Tschetter, the newly-appointed Peace Corps director who wraps up his five-day working tour of Jordan today.

“Our vision is peace and understanding in the world and our objective is to create that by working at the grassroots level, building relationships and delivering a skill set to the community,” he said at a roundtable press discussion on Saturday.

Not only is it a goal of the Peace Corps to teach new skills, but Tschetter said they also want to bring a better understanding of Americans to the host country and take home to the United States a better understanding of the people they work with.

“The unique part of Peace Corps is that these goals have not changed in 45 years,” he said, since the organisation was founded in 1961.

Peace Corps volunteers have been carrying out these objectives in Jordan by teaching English to students in rural elementary and secondary schools, fostering youth development programmes and providing special education to the disabled. Over 300 volunteers have served in Jordan since 1997 and today there are 53 working in the country.

Tschetter visited with some of those volunteers, met with government officials and talked about Peace Corps programmes with Their Majesties King Abdullah and Queen Rania.

“They were very enthused and appreciative to the United States government for the Peace Corps activities in the country of Jordan,” Tschetter said.

“We come to the country with a skill that is needed, particularly at the grassroots level, working in the villages and towns where the activities are not as robust and readily available as they might be in a city like Amman,” he said, though the exact locations of the volunteer bases cannot be disclosed due to security concerns.

“So if Their Majesties invite us to consider other skill programmes [for Jordan], we will definitely take that into consideration,” Tschetter added.

Some of the work Peace Corps volunteers carry out in the Kingdom include serving as gender role models to children and promoting issues like empowerment and leadership. They also encourage youth development by focusing on community outreach, youth leadership, life skills and encouraging volunteerism in the community.

Most of the volunteers in the country are helping improve English education in rural areas, according to Darcy Neill, Peace Corps country director.

“Fluency in English is the key to higher education and jobs… and these volunteers teach in rural primary and secondary schools where native English speakers aren’t available to them otherwise,” she said.

Neill says they’ve spent much of the past nine-and-a-half years strengthening their core programmes to ensure they are delivering services to the people who need it the most.

“We try to do the things that people aren’t doing already. We try to be responsive to the country’s needs and offer our services at a grassroots level,” she said.

“Volunteers live in the villages, they learn the language and get to know the people because that’s where peace develops,” she added.

Help me

Here's a question for all you Ammanites:

Where can a Canadian girl get a bunch of good sized, good quality shipping boxes???

At home we have stores that sell them, along with any other kind of shipping materials you'd need (bubble wrap, packing tape etc.). Here, I am baffled. Aramex says they don't provide boxes and that their customers always get their own.

From where? Well, the lady couldn't say.

So help me with this mystery. I've got a lot (a LOT) of stuff I need to be shipping home and SOON.

Update: Nevermind. Cozmo and the nice old shopkeeper down the street came to my rescue. The boxes were a bit beat up, but nothing a little packing tape couldn't handle. They should make it to Canada. Now to find a reliable, affordable and friendly shipping company...

Whirlwind Trip: Part Two

~ At the border between Lebanon and Damascus we disembarked from our minivan (the first I've seen in the Middle East), left it parked haphazardly in what I suppose you'd call a parking lot - though not one single car or truck was lined up parallel to another. I was baffled how we'd ever get out again.

We walked up the steps to the government building to deal with the exit officials and came upon a sea of people all crammed up against booths where bored-looking security guys sat and processed the passports as slow as they could manage.

When we found the foreigners' booth we discovered the crowds were actually separated by gate-type things you'd find in the lines to rides at Canada's Wonderland. It was amazing to find some form of order!

Our excitement was short lived. People budded in with their friends and for whatever reason the guy doing our line disappeared and the 15 of us were left wondering if we should continue to wait or jump into another line? The line beside us was moving, but we weren't getting anywhere.

Our driver came over to check on us and when he discovered we weren't moving and our security desk guy had left he gestured to the second line and yelled, "Go up to the front!"

We looked at the two guys in line ahead of us with sympathy and fought our Canadian urge to stick to queue ettiquette and squished past them to the front where we stuck our passports in the face of the second security guy, ignoring the protests of the men behind us.

Miraculously, and not very fairly, the guy looked up, saw us two women standing there, looked at our passports and threw the one he had in his hand back to the man waiting in line and took ours instead.

"You are Canadians? Welcome," he said and went to work processing our exit papers, ignoring the indignant huff of the man who just had his passport tossed back.

I thought for sure we'd get beat up by the angry mob behind us as soon as we got into the parking lot. I was scared to turn around. But I bet we had just done every line-hating Arab proud! We ignored that queue just like the best of them.

~ Driving through Syria to Damascus was like being back in Jordan. The rolling hills had become sparse of trees and rock and sand once again dominated the landscape. Buildings and houses were back to the square, white stone architecture and I said goodbye to the intricate European-inspired designs we had just left behind in Beirut.

~ We were told not to talk politics anywhere in public in Syria. We were assured the Syrians were not as happy to discuss world and regional issues with foreigners, unlike their Lebanese counterparts.

~ We spent most of our time exploring the Old City, or getting lost on purpose, I should say. Regardless of any map you may have or intentions to stick to a route, it's impossible to know where you're going once you're inside those Roman walls. The narrow cobblestoned streets twist and curve and lead you in all directions until you start to feel like you're inside some giant labyrinth. It was a bit of a thrill to not know what you'd find around the next corner and whether you'd ever find your way out again!

~ Interestingly enough, excavations in the city have shown that Damascus was inhabited as early 8,000 or 10,000 BC causing many to believe it is the oldest inhabited city in the world.

~ At the Ummayad Mosque we were required to take off our shoes and don giant tan-coloured cloaks and hoods, even though our arms and legs were already covered and we had brought our own head coverings. Nope, it's the stinky oversized cloak for the foreigners!

We laughed at how much we resembled Jedi Knights from Star Wars and I had the brilliant idea of posing for a photograph while pretending to hold a light sabre in my hand. Later on I did a little photoshop magic and we ended up looking like pretty authentic Star Wars characters, light sabre and all! I'm refraining from posting the image though, so as to not offend anyone (you know - Star Wars in a mosque?). If you want to see the photo - email me.

The grand mosque was beautiful and is apparently one of the largest and oldest in the world. Inside there's a shrine that is said to house the head of John the Baptist, who was honoured by both Muslims and Christians. People would walk up to it, kiss their hand and touch the glass around what looked like a giant tomb. I couldn't help but wonder if there really was a head in there? Can't someone just check? Do an X-ray? It was an impressive shrine, nontheless. Head or no head.

~ By the time we were in Damascus we had learned how to order food at Arabic restaurants and how to eat it. Order lots of different mezzeh (like fattoush, tabouleh and dips) and then pick a couple of main dishes to share. Pick food up with your hands. Dip your pita right into the bowl of hummus or mutabbal - don't spoon it onto your plate.

But because we had been used to eating out with other people we didn't realize we would still get the same huge portions and have tons of leftovers and be stuffed to the brim. In Damascus though, things were so cheap that even the largest feast was pleasantly affordable. Wish it were like that everywhere!

~ Getting back to Amman was a chore. We were jostled around at the Damascus bus station and taxi centre where, after we got out of our hotel cab, some Trailer Park Boys Bubbles look-a-like asked us if we were headed to Amman, grabbed our luggage and began hurrying off with it at an alarming pace. We had to jog to keep up.

Turned out he was just helping us get to the Amman taxis, but of course requested a tip for his services.

Once at the taxis we were immediately swarmed by drivers trying to get our business. One security guard came over and told me he needed to see in my suitcase. What for? I wondered... we're leaving the country. It's the Jordanian security guys that should care what's in my bags, not you!

So I started to flip the lock but then a young driver decided he was claiming us as his fare and snatched my luggage out of my hands before I could barely do the lock up again! The security guard waved me away, apparently no longer concerned about my luggage.

Next thing I knew, our bags were in the trunk of a huge boat of a car (Cheryl turned to me and said "Dukes of Hazzard, here we come!") and the driver was walking away into a building with our passports in his hand. Desperate not to lose track of the precious documents, Cheryl sped off after him while I watched our belongings.

Once we assured he was not making illegal copies for all his cousins, we were on our way with two women and a man in the back seat and poor Cheryl squished between me and the driver in the front - with no back rest to lean on.

We stopped about four different times at different buildings once we reached the border. They had to search the car and search our luggage. We had to go through customs. We had to get our exit and entry stamps. They had to check our visas.

The whole business took us an extra hour and a half - the end of which all of us passengers ended up waiting around in a parking lot while our driver dealt with some customs agents for a good 45 minutes. When he didn't come back after half an hour I said perhaps he had been thrown in jail.

We did see him talking with a friend at the Duty Free who was stuffing cigarette packs into his socks. I'm sure it's happened.

Finally we cruised through the last check point and the last security official leafed through our passports. He bent down to peer into the car and looked from the photos to us girls sitting in the front seat.

"Grassy? Shirley? Welcome to Jordan."

It was good to be back.

Whirlwind Trip: Part One

As expected, Lebanon and Syria didn’t disappoint. We enjoyed a short and sweet flight to Beirut – the so-called Paris of the Middle East – and later drove through the mountains of Lebanon to Damascus – apparently the oldest continuously occupied city in the world – before driving back south to Amman for a total of six days and five nights of vacation.

Here are the highlights of Lebanon:

~ I found Beirut a bustling capital reminiscent of Montreal or a European city with its cobblestone, balconies, shop-filled streets in Solidaire and Hamra and vibrant night-life among the bars and restaurants in Monot and Gemmayzeh.

I didn’t know what to expect of a city that had been torn apart by civil war for 15 years but I was surprised to find the people friendly, excitable and fiercely proud of their city and country. They love to party too and I doubted that they ever slept. If it were not for the bullet-ridden walls and mortar damage left as grim reminders of a troubled past, I would have hardly thought anything unpleasant had ever happened in the lively city.

~ We saw the site where Prime Minister Rafic Hariri was assassinated last year in a bomb blast. Twenty-one other people were also killed in the attack many Lebanese blame on Syria. The buildings on either side of the site stood as grim reminders of the deadly incident, hanging from their frames like skeletons with gaping holes in their sides. The scene gave me goosebumps.

Of course I took a photograph and got yelled at by a security guard for it. Thankfully he wasn’t like Jordanian police officers and didn’t demand to look through my digital photos and make me delete it. So I claimed ignorance, shrugged and apologized before walking away with the photo securely stored in my camera’s memory.

~ Driving north between the blue Mediterranean Sea and the rolling Lebanese mountains we found the traffic horribly similar to the jammed streets in Amman. Our driver told us the hold up was due to repairs on the sites where the highways had been bombed by Israel in the summer. We drove by several places where you could see the road had been torn up and I wondered how many unsuspecting drivers had been killed when the bombs fell.

~ Though no one in Lebanon could understand why we wanted to visit Tripoli – a coastal city an hour north of Beirut – I quite enjoyed walking around the stone walls of Assaraya al-Hamra (the Red Castle) and wandering around the city’s old souks. We explored the narrow lanes, peeked into the cute crammed little shops (saw a skinned cow’s head at a butcher’s shop with the tongue lolling out of its mouth!) and seeing Lebanese kittens perched in a doorway. Sometimes I get more enjoyment out of the simple places in a city that I do out of the big fancy tourist sites.

~ We had many of the sites in Lebanon to ourselves. I don’t recall seeing too many easily-recognizable tourists during our journey, but I suppose that’s expected after the number the media did to scare them all away after the summer’s events.

Everyone we talked to in Lebanon swore the country was 100 per cent safe for tourists, especially now that the UN has moved its troops in. The only disruption we encountered was tight security around the parliament buildings where the government was meeting to sort out Hezbollah’s demand to restructure. We heard there were threats of street demonstrations, but they weren’t carried out until after we left.

~ The Crusader ruins of Byblos (the city where the word Bible is thought to come from and the alphabet was supposedly created) reached out to the sea, only a little way up from where environmental hazard crews were still busy cleaning up oil spilled along the coast after Israel bombed the Jiyeh power station. In a small stone souk by the marina we found shops displaying fish fossils that had been collected from far up in Lebanon’s mountains and date back millions of years. Can you imagine all of Lebanon under water that many years ago?

~ We also visited the Jeita Grotto in Lebanon where we ventured into the dark and humid depths of a cave to see stalactites hanging from above and stalagmites growing up out of the rock. Leaning over the railing you could see chasms opening up in the earth’s floor that appeared bottomless. We also took a boat ride through a cave of water to view more of the strange formations. In the dark, low cave I felt like we were in Phantom of the Opera, navigating the meandering channels in a gondola under the streets of Paris. I know, I have a wild imagination.

We weren't allowed to take photos in the cave, or otherwise I would have.

The Grotto also had a pathetic little zoo that made me itch to call the Humane Society - if there even was one in the country. It had ducks, doves, turtles, a peacock, some monkeys and a dog (who I think was actually guarding the place and was not meant to be on display). The turtles provided endless amusement as one little guy tried his darndest to get a bigger turtle to move. He’d ram his shell into the side of the other turtle over and over and then when that didn’t work, started to bite his feet. We laughed.

I was disgusted though to see that someone had actually painted the shell of one of the turtles.

~ In Jounieh we hopped on a cable car and braved the heights up to the Hill of Harissa to visit the site where a 15 tonne statue of the Virgin Mary overlooks Lebanon’s coast towards Beirut. The view from the chapel was magnificent!

~ Our dealings with money in Lebanon was confusing. To begin with, the Lebanese lira look like monopoly money and the English denominations are camouflaged in the bill’s design so you’re forced to stare hard at both sides like an idiot when you try to pay anyone. Add to this the fact that everyone accepts American dollars and will take your American money but give you change in lira or sometimes a combination of lira and dollars! Without the exchange rate memorized and with our horrible math skills, we had no idea half the time if they were giving us back the right change or not.

~ At night we went to many fine Arabic restaurants where our newly acquired Lebanese friends ordered way too much food and we were forced to stuff ourselves – though we could hardly resist! It became apparent to us that this is just the way it is done in the Middle East. I blame it wholly on the fact that there are so many great mezzeh dishes that by the time you’re done appetizers you never have room for the main course. The seafood was amazing too.

~ While walking along the Corniche in Beirut we saw men fishing in the sea, catching little shiny fish. I wondered if they were catching their lunch and if the oil spilled farther north had reached the shores of Beirut. Some old men were swimming in the water and invited us in. We declined.

~ The trip to Damascus was a long and winding one through the mountains. I felt car sick (or was that the result of the previous night's partying...?). We passed by a huge bridge that had been partially blown up during the summer’s raids. Seeing that made me feel even more sick. That had been the main route out of Lebanon to Damascus.

~ We stopped in Baalbeck to see the Roman ruins there. On our way into the site we passed stands where men were selling Hezbollah T-shirts and paraphernalia like we were in some kind of political Disneyland. I then recalled we were standing in the middle of one of Hezbollah’s main strongholds in the country. I looked around and saw pictures of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah everywhere.

A little boy ran up to us and tried very persistently to sell me a pack of gum. I told him la, shukran, and he said in his best attempt at English, “Ma-bee lay-ta?” Maybe later. I told him in’shallah. Cheryl then laughed and asked, “Did you just tell that boy that God willing you’ll buy a pack of gum later?” I laughed too. It did sound funny.

After hiking around the giant columns and temples for an hour we emerged back into the street to find the little boy waiting for us. I had my lira ready and bought a pack of cinnamon gum. He couldn’t have been happier. We went over to a food stand to order a sandwich. The little boy followed and began to tell us his story in broken, but animated English. He was 10 years old, but he talked and motioned with his hands like an old man. We figured on the streets, old men were probably his best company.

He kept calling me madam and told us through charades how evil he believed Israel was and how his town was bombed during the summer. I couldn’t believe I was hearing about politics from a 10 year old. I wished he could be off playing innocently with schoolmates instead of selling gum to tourists and telling us stories of war. It just didn’t seem right.

Highlights of Syria soon to come...

Lebanon and Syria photos

I'm back after a week-long hiatus! Here are the photos from my trip to Lebanon and Syria which I promise to post about soon.

Check this out

Check out my brother's disturbing-but-neat macro video that shows a lot of cool things really close up. If you're squeamish, I'd think twice. Gav, where'd you get all those weird slugs?

Article: Beslan students visit

Published in The Jordan Time, November 6, 2006

Belsan students stage musical performance at King's Academy

By Grace Peacock

AMMAN — Schoolchildren from the Russian town of Beslan on Sunday thanked His Majesty King Abdullah for their visit to Jordan, saying the experience opened their eyes to the similarities between the two cultures.

Eighty-eight children from the school, which was targeted by a terrorist attack two years ago, arrived in Amman last Monday to spend their autumn holiday in the country upon an invitation from the Monarch, who was in Moscow when the incident occurred.

“Two years have passed already since the tragedy and some of us felt we had been forgotten. This trip shows us that this is not true,” said Alikova Alana, 18, referring to the September 2004 hostage-taking and massacre at her secondary school.

The three-day drama resulted in the death of 331 people, including 186 children.

The director of the Beslan school, Dzutseva Ludmila, said almost 90 per cent of the 88 children visiting Jordan were injured in one way or another on the first day of the hostage incident, though only a few were part of the group taken hostage in the school’s gymnasium.

She added they were all in need of continued psychological rehabilitation.

“After what happened, the biggest problem was inside the minds of the children. People started to worry about them,” Ludmila said. “It is good for them to come to Jordan and see how similar our traditions and cultures are.”

The students have been to Petra, Wadi Rum, Aqaba, the Dead Sea and Ajloun, where they picked olives alongside local farmers. They have also visited mosques and taken lessons in dancing and music at the Performing Arts Centre in Amman.

The King and Her Majesty Queen Rania attended a musical show at King’s Academy yesterday, where some of the students performed traditional Arabic dances, played local drums and participated in a skit of a Jordanian marriage celebration. The King and Queen also viewed artwork painted by the children during their stay in Jordan.

“I am happy to see the performance of these young people who dance much better than I,” the King joked.

“I know it’s been two years since terror touched your school, our people and the world. I hope you know that in Jordan you will always have a very good friend,” he added.

The children have been travelling with Jordanian students during their trip and the developing friendships have helped heal wounds, according to Rustem Kelekhsaev, minister of youth, physical culture and sports for the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania.

“This trip has been very useful for the children. Communicating with peers from other countries, seeing sights and keeping active helps them through this rehabilitation,” he said.

Agnes Bashir, music teacher at the Performing Arts Centre and president of the Arab Alliance of Women in Music, is originally from the same region as the students and recalls being glued to the television watching the hostage crisis unfold.

After teaching the children about Arabic rhythms and talking to them about their experience, she feels the vacation has done them some good — both emotionally and intellectually.

“It is good for them to come here and see our country because they had a very poor idea of what Jordan is like. It is very important for them to see how East and West connect,” she said.

Just a little act in the big media circus

You know, being the only English reporter at an assignment can get awfully lonely.

I thought this as I stared out my window at the cold rain as we drove in the media van out to the King's Academy this morning. There were two vans full of reporters driven out. The only two other women sat beside me on the back bench of the van chatting amiacably to one another in Russian. The men around me, in Arabic.

I contented myself by watching the rain fall and the soaking wet pedestrians run for cover, wondering why no one in the city seemed to own an umbrella and thinking of how often I seem to find myself in these segregated social situations.

Oh well, I thought. You're on this assignment to do a job, not to make friends.

We ended up getting lost on the way there. Well, not so much lost, because we were clearly beside the huge grounds of the king's new boarding school near Madaba - you could tell from the immensely high stone walls. We just couldn't figure out how to get in.

Our military driver took us down one road then changed his mind and turned us around. Then down another that soon became a dirt road with goats in the middle of it. Turned around again. The male reporters started making jokes and laughing in Arabic. Driver cursed. Us ladies were holding onto the seats for dear life because the driver kept hitting the speed bumps at mach speed, launching us in the air and hitting our heads on the roof.

After turning around about five times we finally found an entrance, went through the heavy security gate and pulled up to the school's hall. We ran out and through the rain, opened the doors and found a completely empty building save for two startled cleaning ladies who looked at us wide-eyed and swore they didn't know where the press event was taking place.

Who hired this guy anyway? I thought of our clueless driver. We must be so late!

I would have relaxed a bit if I had realized I would be sitting around for hours afterwards waiting for the King and Queen to show up. That's the thing about these big royal press events. There's a lot of fuss, a lot of waiting, then ten minutes of pandamonium and suddenly it's over.

We were all at the King's Academy to cover a performance by the visiting Beslan school children for the royal couple. I passed the time by taking photos and talking with the young students, their school director, politicians and the trip organizers - making sure to get all the information I needed for my story.


Then I found a place to perch and I people-watched.

I noticed the boys' club of reporters barely moved from their huddle outside the door where a big plume of smoke rose from between them. I was thankful they had all waited to smoke until we were out of the van. I wondered if they would go around and do any interviews? They hadn't yet interacted with anyone indoors, I didn't think.

Then I watched the Russian school children, running around the large hall in anticipation of the royal visit, yelling last minute instructions to one another about their upcoming performances. Seeing them brought a smile to my face, not only because it was good to see the survivors of such a terrible massacre with their own smiles and bright faces, but also because I felt I was a little like them.

Not like them in any obvious sense, but just because of their Eastern European blood and my Ukrainian family line. I was more like them in some ways than I was like any Jordanian!

They had the same skin tone and facial features of a lot of Ukrainians I know. Some of the girls had freckles. Most of them had dark curly hair. And I could pick up a word or two similar to words I often hear my mother or dido (grandfather) saying to one another in conversation.

But I didn't need to understand them. Hearing the familiar rolls and sounds of the eastern Slavic language made me a little homesick.

It's odd how easily you feel a kinship with a foreign person when you've spent six months being the odd one out. You share a few similar characteristics and the next thing you know, you want to hug the person.

* * *

My interview with the Russian school director was a bit of a trial. She required a translator, who was supplied by the Royal Court, and she also had some sort of Russian press advisor hanging off her arm who would butt into the conversation if she felt she had something to say.

I asked my first question. A simple one, I thought.

"How has this trip been of benefit to the school children?"

The translator asked the question. I stood ready, pen in hand. The director narrowed her brow, asked the translator something, gave me a hard look and then asked her advisor something else. She looked mad? Confused? What was she saying? Did the translator ask my question right?

The translator started to explain something to her in Russian at the same time the advisor started to talk and suddenly I found myself watching this complicated conversation, not knowing what was going on and wondering why the lady didn't just answer the simple question?

This is why I love translators and covering assignments that involve people who don't speak English.

The advisor talked on and on in the director's ear and I assumed she was telling the director what to say. Finally the director nodded, looked at me and began her answer. It was long-winded.

I waited. And waited. I looked to the translator, who was watching the director speak. More waiting. Should I nudge him? About three minutes had gone by, the lady was still talking and I had yet to write down a word.

Ok, this is ridiculous I thought. How on earth is the translator going to be able to remember everything she's saying? He's got to interrupt her and tell her to speak in short sentences so he can tell me what she's saying!

That's how a professional should do it, anyway.

This bit of pottery one student made says "Belsan Jordan 2006" with the word Love in a little heart.

Finally she stopped talking and the translator gave me what I assumed was a paraphrase. One that seemed a bit short considering all the talking she had just done!

After another question the translator turned to me with the response, forgot I was English and started to speak in Arabic.

No, no, English, I reminded him. He shook his head, laughed and promptly gave me my answer in English.

After the next question he gave me the response by mistake in Russian.

Now the director was laughing and I thought, my God, this day has turned into a comedy show.

* * *

A couple hours later the King and Queen arrived.

I took out my camera and one of the security thugs (is it part of the job to look mean?) saw my press pass and pointed to the group of boys' club press photographers where I assumed he wanted me to take a place. The men were all fidgeting with their big fancy cameras, hot shoe mounted flashes and long telephoto lenses in preparation of the big entrance. They looked a bit surprised when I joined them.

"Hi guys," I said with a smile, not really caring if they understood me or not.

They looked at me, looked at my simple Pentax digital SLR and turned away, uninterested.

Snobs, I thought.

Of course I knew the photos I would take of the King and Queen would never be printed. I knew if my editors had wanted to publish more photos of the royals then they'd use the professional news agency photos. Mine would be shoddy, I knew, without the proper equipment. I just wanted to take these for ME. It was my first event with both the King and Queen.

And I suppose I also took the photos just in case the fancy news agency man's camera died on him and they needed back up. It never hurts to be prepared!

Once they waltzed in I got elbowed out of the way pretty quickly though. And the tough security men wouldn't let any of us get closer than about six metres.

Don't you see my camera? I wanted to say. Don't you see I don't have telephoto? I need to get closer! My flash doesn't carry that far!

I doubted the security guards had any appreciation for the limits of certain photographic lenses and flashes. So I gave up and went back to my seat to let the boys fight for the good photos.

Personally, I felt the royals were a little overrated. Their photos are in the newspapers every day. Who is this event really about anyway? It was about the children and I was secretly pleased I had spent a good deal of effort taking photos of them earlier whereas the fancy boys' club of press photographers barely raised their lenses in the directon of the children.

The King and Queen were there for about 15 minutes and then they left. It seemed the entire room heaved a huge sigh of relief when it was all said and done.

I had barely a chance to stand up and say goodbye to the people I had met when our media bus guy came calling for us to hurry up and leave.

The circus was over.

As I rode home in the packed van, watching the still-falling rain and feeling exhausted from the day's events, it suddenly occured to me who the clowns were in the whole production.

Too bad we weren't all squished in a toy version of a Volkswagen beetle because that would have been so much more appropriate.

Canadian weather

I suppose I should stop complaining about being cold! Here's what's happening at home - as shown in this photo my brother sent of the backyard in Collingwood.

Article: Clothing shop project

Published in The Jordan Times, November 3, 2006

US grant to finance clothing shop, training for women in Kafrein micro-business

By Grace Peacock

AMMAN — The rural community of Kafrein in the Jordan Valley will soon have a new, affordable clothes shop and the women will be offered small business training courses due, in part, to a $5,000 US grant from a group of American women visiting Jordan this week.

The donation comes from Spark, an organisation of young professional women based in San Francisco who are dedicated to spreading awareness of global women’s issues and assisting with innovative women’s programmes in developing countries.

The clothing shop and training initiative benefiting from their efforts, called Awaeena meaning “our clothes,” is managed by the Jordanian Hashemite Fund for Human Development (JOHUD).

Winkie Williamson, a JOHUD adviser, told The Jordan Times that a recent survey found that 20 per cent of women in the country’s impoverished communities say they have no choice over what clothes are purchased for them, due to mobility and social restrictions preventing them from travelling to the cities where they can buy affordable clothing.

Their husbands or male family members often do the clothes shopping for them.

“We often express our identity through our clothes, so not being able to choose your own is a major obstacle to social empowerment,” said Williamson.

“It’s very inspirational to see a group of American women who are interested in the lives of Jordanian women… this money will help us provide training and capacity-building in some of our community centres to help further women’s social and economic empowerment,” she added.

The clothing shop, to be run by local female volunteers, will open in the Kafrein community centre in four weeks. It will sell quality clothing, new and used, at affordable prices to women from low-income backgrounds. The shop will also offer dress-making and alterations, as well as a dress rental service for more formal engagements.

“We will also be bringing in evening dresses and wedding dresses to help them save money and save them from having to go to Amman. Many of these women can’t afford to take transportation to the city,” said Diana Nabulsi, project coordinator for JOHUD’s Spanish project in Kafrein.

Women will also have the opportunity to take part in business-training courses that focus on basic entrepreneurial skills like shop management, bookkeeping and marketing to help them with their work at the Awaeena shop, she added.

The Spark delegation is travelling through Jordan this week to see the work of other grassroots women’s programmes and to speak to government officials. After visiting projects like the Makana women’s advocacy group in Madaba and the CARE International Empower project in the Jordan Valley, the women were encouraged by the cooperation and effort already under way.

“Back home we’re bombarded by propaganda and negative media about the instability of the region. So it’s important to focus on the human factor and show our peers what young women here face in their daily lives, beyond the politics,” said Maya Garcia, Spark co-founder and president.

Bringing the stories back to the United States helps garner support and raise more funds for women’s initiatives, according to Kathleen Kelly, vice president of Spark.

“We find these stories about women doing amazing things in their communities and then we share this information with the women in San Francisco to raise awareness so people can become engaged in the issue,” she said.

Karen Hennessy, another Spark co-founder was impressed by the progress she’s seen among women’s advocacy groups during her visit to Jordan.

“These projects really teach these women how to negotiate, how to band together and make a strong case for their rights. They’re able to encourage change not only for themselves but also for their entire community,” she said.

Fairuz Taqi-Eddin, a Spark member originally from Jordan, is excited to be helping women from rural communities in her home country.

“It’s time to bring some positive news back from the Middle East. These projects really focus on empowering the most vulnerable in the community and the most vulnerable always tend to be women. It’s great to engage these women and make them advocates for their own rights.”

The Spark delegates plan to share what they’ve learned about women’s issues in Jordan with their 1,500 members when they get back to the United States. They hope to organise future fundraising activities and continue to support women’s grassroots programmes in the region.

Article: Improving Jordan's media

Published in The Jordan Times, November 3, 2006

Media project seeks to strengthen professional standards

By Grace Peacock

Amman — The journalism industry in the country is getting a $5 million boost to improve the profession’s standards and the quality of news products and strengthen media protection policies.

“Strengthening media professionalism is a priority of the Jordanian government, the private sector and academia and we felt the opportunity had arrived for us to support reform and help improve the professionalism and independence of the media,” said Shally Prasad, democracy officer for the US Agency for International Development (USAID).

After two years of consultation with local journalists, media organisations, analysts, academics and representatives of the government and public sectors, USAID contracted the International Research and Exchange Board (IREX ) to take on the three-year Jordanian Media Strengthening Project.

The overall goal is to make the media sector more independent and increase professional standards so the industry is more appealing to skilled journalists, Prasad told The Jordan Times.

The project will provide training for new and mid-career journalists, help establish media outlets outside Amman, strengthen media policy and protection laws and provide news organisations with essential marketing and sales support.

“Journalists should raise issues and help people think about problems, not just report verbatim on events or provide commentary,” said Samuel Compton, country director for the nonprofit organisation IREX.

According to Compton, the quality of research and journalistic product in both local print and broadcast media are in need of improvement.

“There is a place for editorialising but the body of a newspaper or broadcast news service needs to be informative and needs to direct people to think about issues,” he said.

Recent surveys undertaken by IREX show that Jordanians generally don’t believe local journalists “deserve to make very much money or deserve to be treated as professionals” because they see their work as substandard and their research efforts as minimal.

“We take great exception to this view of the profession… and that’s why we’re trying to give journalists a standard in the community that they deserve,” Compton said.

By early next year, two local universities will be selected for new journalism programmes. One will have either a campus radio station or student newspaper installed by July, with up-to-date equipment, software and an associated curriculum developed by professors from the University of Tennessee.

Another local university will be chosen to launch the country’s first media law course in collaboration with the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania.

Compton says it’s unfortunate that many journalism students in Jordan choose journalism because they can get in with low marks and aren’t sure what else to study.

“We want to help universities revive a position of excellence. Faculties and departments should be looking for high calibre students who want to make a difference and are determined to work in this profession,” he said.

The USAID/IREX project also plans to establish several community radio stations and newspapers in cities outside of Amman to promote local press services and journalism opportunities in rural areas.

Self-censorship and media protection will also be addressed in the three-year project through a policy making initiative that will examine best practices from around the globe.

“The laws here [regarding the media] are quite liberal but they’re also quite confusing,” said Compton, adding that this often causes journalists to self-censor their material because they aren’t sure what the consequences of their actions may be.

He said clear policies need to be in place to help journalists feel secure about publishing the truth, even if it is critical of a state department, large organisation or a politician.

“We want to help law- makers think about what’s required in this country to support a truly independent media,” Compton said.

The last component of the media-strengthening project will focus on marketing and sales assistance for small media organisations so that they may learn to become financially self-sufficient.