That's all she wrote

It's been a great run, but I'm sad to say after 182 posts Tales of a Peacock has come to an end.

Thanks for the support!

See you out there in cyberspace...

The long journey home

I think I'm driving my family crazy already. Every little thing makes me want to say, "You know in Jordan it's like this..." or "Did you know? In Jordan it's like that..."

I sound like an overly excited six-year-old who won't shut up.

Everything's just so different. I can't help but compare.

* * *

My journey home started at 4 a.m. Friday morning where in my freezing cold apartment in Amman I frantically sat on, stood on and squished my suitcases just to get them to close. A driver showed up at 5 a.m. and took me to the Queen Alia Airport.

I grabbed a cart, threw my luggage on and tried to wave away several airport guys who offered, quite persistantly, to help. One wouldn't give up though and so I said fine and let him push the cart, while I started to check my pockets for the money I was sure he'd request. Twenty metres later we were at my check-in line and he held his hand out.

I gave him one JD.

He kept standing there. "Only one?" he said, pointing to my two suitcases.

I glared at him. "Look, it's 5:30 in the morning, you pushed my bags 20 metres - all you're getting is one dinar. Don't start with me," I said, not caring if he understood.

I'm sure my tone made things clear enough. He huffed and walked away.

After my bags were checked (where I should have kissed the one goodbye!), I was ushered onto the plane and while we were taxiing down the runway I thought about when I landed in Jordan for the first time those six months ago and how brown I thought everything was. Thinking of my first impressions made me chuckle, though really I was very sad to leave the place - and my friends - behind.

About five hours later we began our descent into Paris. The weather here was terrible and the plane pitched back and forth like a ship on the high seas. People around me grabbed their vomit bags... and two ladies ended up using them, much to the repulsion of the rest of us.

Personally, I don't mind turbulence. I think it's kind of fun. Like a rollercoaster. But when we came closer and closer to landing and were still rocking all over the place, I started to worry we wouldn't be able to land.

Somehow we made it - though hitting the ground was a bit rough and I may have been holding the arm rests in a death grip expecting the plane to flip over at any moment.

I think we were one of the last planes to land in that weather. Other passengers on other flights told me they were forced to circle the airport until things calmed down. Winds were gusting up to 148 km/h and when we taxied into the departure area they wouldn't let us off because they were afraid the portable stairs would blow over, or someone would be injured.

They kept us on that plane, just sitting there, for an extra HOUR.

The next day I read about the strange weather in the newspaper:

"Strong winds of up to 148 km/h battered France on Friday cutting power to about 150,000 homes, bringing down trees around the country and killing a man in the capital."

Apparently a billboard blew over and crushed him.

My first trip in six months to a city outside of the Middle East opened my eyes to all the habits I'm going to have to learn to break.

For instance, when I got into the hotel shuttle and the driver started speaking to me in French, my first reaction to being spoken to in a foreign language was to try to respond in Arabic. He looked at me confused and I realised my mistake, shook my head and laughed. Then that part of my brain that retains my French speaking abilities kicked in and I corrected myself.

Another guy in the shuttle who was also staying at my hotel turned to me afterwards and asked, "So, you are Arab?"

Turned out he was a Palestinian living in Jerusalem and was visiting Paris for business. He heard me speaking and assumed I was a native Arabic speaker, from the few words I said! Guess I got something right in those months of practise with taxi drivers.

Other habits I'll have to break: not flushing toilet paper (I told my family about this and they were a bit grossed out - though my friend who came to Canada from Jordan once thought the idea of flushing it was gross...) and jaywalking.

I ventured into the city on the Metro to visit the Louvre. As I approached the crosswalk in front of the museum the walk sign went red. Some cars passed and I darted across when a break in traffic came, much to the unapproving stares of everyone else patiently waiting on the sidewalk.

Oh right, they don't do that here, I thought. Funny.

It's also been odd to see drivers obeying stop signs and traffic lights and driving in their own lanes and using their indicators. The absence of honking has been wonderful!

While waiting in line at the ticket counter for the museum, one man didn't realise there was a queue and accidently stepped up to the window. I was about to say something when he turned around, realised his mistake, went crimson red and apologized profusely for budding before going back to the end of the line.

Huh. That's nice, I thought.

I decided to skip the Mona Lisa (saw her back in 2000 on a backpacking tour of Europe) and instead checked out the new Rembrandt exhibition and then, as a tribute to the region I had just left behind, I perused the Near East collection.

I left for Toronto the next morning. Thankfully the plane was practically empty and I claimed a nice spacious window seat just behind the wing.

After eight and a half hours on the plane and an extra hour dealing with my missing suitcase, I met my father and headed home. I was back! And I don't think I've stopped talking since. When I saw the rest of my family and saw the familiar Ontario landscape, I honestly felt like I had never left.

* * *

On the plane from Amman to Paris I had an interesting seatmate. He had the window, I had the aisle and there was one extra seat between us. He was an older man - reminded me of Michael Caine - and was a professor at a univeristy in London. We chatted a bit and when he found out I was leaving Jordan after living there for six months, he asked how I felt about it?

I told him honestly that it hurt. It was sad and my heart felt heavy for it. I was upset to be leaving a great group of people I had come to call my close friends. I was upset to be leaving a country and a city that had given me so many good memories.

He nodded and smiled. He said perhaps my heart wasn't feeling heavy for the loss.

"Perhaps it hurts because your heart is trying to make room for that piece of Jordan you're taking with you," he said.

If he hadn't been a total stranger I probably would have hugged the man. I laughed, said that's a good way to think of it and thanked him for cheering me up.

It was true - as sad as I may be for leaving the place and the people behind, I am very grateful for the time I had there and the memories I will always carry with me.

Thanks everyone! It's been a blast :)

One last rant...

Nearly home!

I'm back in Canada, at my grandfather's place in Toronto (where, *gasp, he only has dial-up internet access) loving the cold weather and thankful to be done with my awfully long journey.

(Yes, I know I always complained about the cold in Jordan, but for some reason the Canadian cold is so much more bearable. Perhaps it's because my parents brought me my snowboarding jacket to wear and the house is actually heated and insulated).

Today I'll be driving up north to Collingwood with my brothers, who just flew in from Whistler last night. It's a strange coincidence that all of the Peacock children arrived at Pearson Airport all in the same day.

So while all seems well, now that I'm home, there are a number of unneeded stresses I'm having to deal with.

First of all, Air France lost one of my suitcases (I know a few of you will not be surprised) and Aramex is a crummy shipping company and my poor boxes I sent home look like they've barely survived their journey.

In fact I honestly suspect they were opened somewhere along the way, rifled through and re-sealed in a careless manner. When my father and I went to pick them up at the airport cargo area my first reaction to seeing them was, "Oh my God."

They looked like they had been sat on. The tape was all peeling off and the flaps were partially open. I hoped everything inside survived the abuse they had obviously taken in the past week and a half!

But when I got to my grandfather's place and went to open them, I noticed something. You see, I had taped the boxes up over and over with BROWN packing tape. I tripled taped every corner and seal to ensure the boxes were as secure as they could possibly be. I was confident the boxes would not open on the trip.

However when I went to open the boxes here, I noticed that the reason the flaps were partially open was because my brown packing tape had been sliced along the flaps on all sides and then re-sealed with one strip of CLEAR packing tape.

When I realized this my heart stopped. Who went through my stuff and is anything MISSING??

When I looked through everything, most of my gifts and clothes seemed to still be there. However, the boxes do feel a lot lighter than when I shipped them and I won't really know for sure until I empty it all out and do an inventory check with a list I have on my laptop. That will have to wait until Collingwood.

But still, I was (and am) PISSED. Aramex is sooo getting a claim filed against them. Even though it may have been someone in Dubai or in London, the box is supposed to be in their care. They are the ones who ensured my belongings would make it safely to the destination.

So in addition to possibly having some of my gifts stolen from my boxes, I am also missing one of my gigantic suitcases.

I recall, waiting at the luggage carosel, thinking it was taking forever for that last suitcase to show up. I recall looking over at a family leaving with their bags and thinking, huh - that one bag the father has on his cart kind of looks like mine. But then I dismissed the thought, because I couldn't really see that well cause I was wearing a pair of old prescription glasses and really, who in their right mind would mistake my heavy-ass suitcase (that was over the weight limit) for theirs??

But when my bag didn't show up and I was told no more suitcases were coming, I wished I had run after that man.

The Air France people had about 10 other passengers who were missing suitcases. Some of them they had on a list - they knew the suitcases were missing, but no worries because they've already been located in other places. Mine? Not on the list. The man said it should have arrived.

I said no, I think it's been stolen.

The man and the woman at the counter laughed politely. They assured me on occasion people mistake suitcases for their own, but they always bring them back when they realise they've got someone elses.

I said, what if they took it on purpose? What then?

They looked at me like I was a maniac. They looked at me like I had no faith whatsoever in humanity.

Well I didn't!!

On a family trip to Hawaii once, a man tried to steal one of our suitcases. He happened to have a bunch that looked like ours, and decided to take ours, thinking he could quietly escape with it. Thankfully my father spotted him with it (my dad, the ever-resourceful man, had taped ducktape around the suitcase so we would recognize it) chased him down, and nearly tore the man's head off.

So I know it happens.

But all they could do was have me fill out a form and tell me to call them the next day.

"We'll have your suitcase for you and will deliver it to your home," the man said, confidently. But then he looked at my doubtful expression and added, "Hopefully."

This kind of stress is really not needed right now. That bag better show up and I better discover that all my gifts and belongings are in my boxes, where I left them.

* * *

I will post again about the rest of my trip when I get to a computer with high-speed access. I just wanted to get all this ranting out of the way so I don't have to have so much negativity in, what will most likely be, my last post.

In Paris

It's been a long day: I woke up at 4 a.m. (after having had about 3 hours of sleep), took my unbelievably heavy suitcases to the airport and left Jordan, destined for Paris and then Toronto tomorrow.

I'm currently in the French capital where winds and rains are wreaking havoc on air traffic. Luckily we managed to land, but suffered our own interesting delays soon thereafter.

I also ventured into Paris and holed up at the Louvre to get out of the horrible weather and to occupy myself during this 24-hour layover.

My first trip in six months outside of the Middle East has been eventful, but I'll have to write more about it when I get back to Canada. I forgot to pack my power adapter in my carry-on and I think my laptop is going to die any second.

Just wanted to say I miss everyone terribly already :)

Tagged again: Book excerpt

I've been tagged again by Jad. This time I'm supposed to grab the nearest book, turn to page 123, go down 5 sentences and post the next three on my site.

So here it is:

"...And if that is what happens, if I have already lost him, I will at least have gained one very happy day in my life. Considering the way the world is, one happy day is almost a miracle."

From Paulo Coelho's Eleven Minutes.

This didn't work quite as nicely as it was supposed to because page 123 is the last page of a chapter and there aren't enough sentences to fufill the request... so I just posted the last two. Good enough!

I won't miss the taxis

I didn't think I'd get out of Jordan without having at least one more taxi adventure. It would have been too good to be true.

That's why I just HAD to get lost going to Darat al Funun in Weibdeh. Again. Make this the fourth time I get lost going there in a taxi. You'd think I'd know the way by now, but I've never taken a direct route. We always drive around and around, asking for directions and in some haphazard manner we finally manage to stumble upon the place.

Funny though that the drivers always say OK when I tell them where I need to go, like they know where the place is. Never fails though. They get to Jebel Weibdeh, to Duwar Hawooz, and then they look at me over the seat and say "Wein?"

Tonight I had to mime to the driver to get him to ask for directions. I pointed out the window at some guys on the corner of the street.

"Ask for directions."

He shrugged. "Hada shara?" (this street?) And he started to drive towards it.

"La, la," (no, no) I say, waving my hands. What's the word for directions? I learned it in my Arabic classes all those months ago... ijahatos? I knew it started with an "i". I say the word and there is no recognition on the man's face.

Ok. I point to the men, point to the window, act out the rolling-the-window-down motion and then move my hand like it's talking.

"Directions!"

He shakes his head.

Wow this guy is thick, I thought. Fine. I'll do it myself. I rolled down my window, yelled out lausamat and got one of the guys to come over. I asked, "Wein Darat al Funun?" and the guy proceeded to tell us. In Arabic, of course, but I hoped my driver was paying attention!

After all that we ended up getting lost again.

At one point my phone rang and I told my friend (who didn't know how to get to this place either) I had to go cause I was busy being lost. He laughed and said good luck.

So we drove around some more, the whole time the driver is mumbling away to himself, probably saying something like "This crazy girl has gotten us lost and doesn't know where she's going." I took his cue and started talking to myself, wondering how a cabbie can not know the way to such a well known cultural centre?

At least by this point the driver realised he should be asking for directions and we asked two more people before finally arriving at the place. When he saw it he slapped his hand on his forehead and said, "Ah, Darat al Funun!"

Isn't that WHAT I SAID??

Questions answered

The countdown draws to an end and though I'm thrilled to be going home, I can't help but feel upset about everything I'll miss here. It's a very confusing time. I feel numb.

I took at look at some of my earlier posts and thought now that I've got six months in Jordan under my belt I'd answer some of the amusing questions friends and family posed before I left.

Are there hair salons there? - Yes, and it's so fabulously cheap that many girls go get their hair done all the time if they don't feel like doing it themselves. I have taken advantage of this convenient service quite often myself. And all the hair stylists are men!

Will you see camels? - I certainly did! Not in Amman, of course, but they were all over the place in Wadi Rum (where I got to ride one) and in small rural towns. Not sure what this talk is of them spitting all the time though, I never saw one do that.

Do you have to wear a head covering? - Nope, and to be honest there aren't a lot of women in West Amman (the less conservative area) who do. The more conservative the areas, the more women wear a hijab (headscarf) or a niqab (full face covering). The only place I had to cover myself was in the Damascus mosque.

Can you date men? - I think the person asking this question meant can I, as a foreigner, date Arab men? The answer is yes, but if I were to marry a Muslim man I'd have to convert to Islam. Interestingly enough I've been told by some of the men and women I've met in the region that some guys have no issues dating foreign women but when it comes to marriage they feel socially pressured to find a "wholesome" Arab woman whose reputation is held in high regard among their social circles. I took some offense to the implication that foreign women can't be wholesome and worthy of marriage and motherhood, but was assured not all men here feel this way. I certainly hope not!
Update: I've been told I may have the whole converting religions thing backwards. I'm really not sure. Point is, I suppose, that the woman may be asked to convert even though it may not be absolutely necessary that she do so.

Are you allowed to walk places alone? - You're allowed to do whatever you want, but whether it's safe to do so is another matter. I walked home alone from a bar once and got verbally assaulted and bothered by some of the men in my neighbourhood. After that I never walked alone late at night. But in other areas of the city, it's perfectly fine to do so. It just depends on the kind of people who populate the areas and what time of day it is.

Do they have milk? - Yes, but it's sold in a kind of petra pak unrefrigerated - not like our bags or cartons back home. And you only need to refrigerate it once it's been open and it can be stored, unopened at room temperature for weeks after purchase.

Is there air conditioning? - In offices, malls and some homes, but not in my wonderful little apartment. I spent a sweaty few months sitting in front of my industrial-sized fan, cursing the desert heat. Now I spend my time in my apartment wearing three layers of clothing, drinking hot liquids and cursing the desert cold.

Is this city in the desert? - I guess technically, but the desert surrounding Amman is not like the Sahara desert with endless sand dunes and quick sand. There are lots of rocks, some vegetation and plenty of mountains and valleys in the south and north.

Is it like Lawrence of Arabia? - Wadi Rum was Lawrence's world. And I loved it.

Going anonymous

My trip here is almost done and I've been thinking about my future with blogs.

Since this one was created for my adventures in Jordan, I believe it's only fitting that I put it to retirement when my journey comes to an end. So they'll be no more Tales of a Peacock in a few weeks' time.

Sad, I know.

In its replacement I will be launching a new anonymous site - one I've already been working on - that I feel will serve my purposes well for the next chapter of my life. I've decided to go anonymous to protect myself from the curious eye of future employers and the nosey eye of ex-boyfriends and the troubling sort ;)

So stay tuned.

Baths and engagements

Yesterday was a busy day.

Went to the Turkish bath, drove out to the countryside for a traditional Muslim engagement party for a coworker and partied with a bunch of Canadians at an event organised by one of the embassy's employees.

Too bad I did all this while suffering from a horrid hangover. Drinking is evil. E-V-I-L.

Anyway, the Turkish bath or hamam was an adventure in itself. For 20 JD you get to sweat to near-death in a sauna, lounge around in a jacuzzi, have your skin nearly scrubbed off by a Philippino attendant and then get a full-body massage - all while you're half naked in a room with 20 other half-naked women.

Quite the experience. Modesty must be left at the door.

While in the steaming hot sauna I felt like my face was on fire. We were given glasses of ice-cold cranberry juice and I resorted to hovering my face over it to catch some of the cold air evaporating upwards. I'm just not made to handle that kind of heat abuse.

The scrubbing was interesting as well. After being in the jacuzzi, you have a quick shower and then lay down on a marble table soaking wet and try not to move for fear you'll slip right off the slick surface and land on the floor. The attendant takes some kind of loofah and rubs and rubs.

She scrubbed so hard I swore she was drawing blood. I grimaced and bit my lip. This is supposed to be fun? I thought.

Despite the pain, my skin was glowing afterwards. And the massage was lovely.

The engagement party was an interesting experience. A few of my fellow female coworkers and I drove out to a village near Zarqa (got a BIT lost on the way) to the home of one of our secretaries who was getting married.

She had made herself a beautiful scarlet hoop dress and all her female relatives flitted about her in preparation for the little ceremony between her and the groom, while the men stayed outside and hung around in a big tent. The sheikh arrived, they exchanged what amounts to a kind of wedding vow and signed the marriage contract with several witnesses present.

We were told this makes them officially husband and wife but they will go on to have an elaborate wedding reception at a later date where family and friends can attend.

The next thing I knew all the women were hollering the zaghareet (that high pitched noise they make with their tongues... that's the best I can explain it) and us ladies were being ushered to the roof where a tent had been erected and women were shedding their veils and dancing to traditional Arabic music.

The men went back downstairs to their own tent where I presume they had their own little party.

We left shortly thereafter and got lost again on the drive back to Amman.