30 June: The police station

30 June Visa renewal day!  I guess we really are staying the whole summer.  After breakfast and a quick workout, we packed up and went to the local "Institute of Safety," or police station.  I wish I could have taken pictures to demonstrate just how different Jordanian and American police stations are but alas--they confiscated my camera at the gate. We were directed to the second floor of the building and, deciding that we should leave the girls in the stroller, picked it up and carried it up two flights of stairs.  After papers and passports were examined we were told to go back down and across the courtyard to get our fingerprints taken.  We found the fingerprint office easily enough and were welcomed by the officers lounging therein, smoking and drinking tea.  Not so different from the proverbial doughnut I suppose!  They were very chatty and won Yumi over with pictures of their children saved on their mobile phones.  Yumi always loves to see these photos and learn the names/ages of these other kids.  I think she is pretty lonely for friends here.  (As an aside, when I got her up this morning and said brightly "Today is a new day!" she asked hopefully "Are we going back home today??" Sigh.) Fingerprints taken, just I returned upstairs with Emi on my back to finish up the renewal.  Not too painful of a process and I was able to chat with a few people/get a job done in Arabic.  That feels good.  And the process for renewing a visa in Jordan is about 500 times easier than the same process in Egypt.  Oh, boy, you had better hope you don't need to renew your visa in Egypt if you only have one day to do it.  Impossible.  The process today, however, took little more than an hour. It was nearly noon when we finished but I had promised the girls we would go to Hakawati--the bookstore with a built-in craft center and story time.  We were too late for the storytime but forged onward anyway.  Maybe I should have just insisted on a return to the hotel, lunch, and naps, but I am an addict for activity.   The girls were clearly tired and hungry, however, so they did not want to sit with the nice jordanian girls who run the shop and do crafts.  They were only interested in looking at the halloween book that makes noise and the set of princess stories (both of which showed up in a previous post).  When Aya crawled over and tried to push the buttons that illicit scary noises, Yumi shouted at her in Arabic, ordering her NOT TO TOUCH.  Yumi was close to tears...I knew we needed to get home. The girls perked up, though, when we passed by the attached play area and saw kids playing therein.  So we joined them and I chatted with a woman I saw at storytime last week.  Turns out she comes every week and lives near where we are staying.  Maybe we have a new friend?  I hope so. On a side note, there were some other ladies there who asked me in accented English if I am America.  I gave my usual response, in Arabic:  "I am sorry, I do not speak English.  I am Russian." This usually works but today their faces lit up and they all launched into vociferous and enthusiastic Russian!  I had to do some back peddling ("I come from Russian origins but don't actually know Russian...").  These Russian ladies--only just arrived in Jordan--seemed pretty disappointed. Returned to hotel, richer by three books, stickers, and glitter glue.  Lunch, naps.  Turns out the hotel staff did not even know the Internet was down until I told them!  So now it is fixed.  Alhamdulileh. I took Mayumi over Abu Manal's to pick up the laundry (nice man, bleeding us dry-US$40 for five day's worth of clothes!) and to Amir's for something like 25lbs of grapes.  We also made a brief stop at the bakery for some of the yummy sesame seed snacks (baraze). Nate stayed back with the still sleeping Emi and Aya. This evening found us on Rainbow Street.  We caught a ride there with an extremely enthusiastic young man named Ahmad who works at a bank by day and moonlights as an unofficial driver.  He happened to be dropping someone off at the speciality hospital near our hotel and saw Nate trying to hail a cab.  We negotiated a price and away we went to Rainbow Street. An old friend of mine--Sylvia Cabus--linked me up with an old friend of hers who is married and lives here.  Today we had plans to visit her and her family.  What a treat!  She lives right off of Rainbow Street on the first floor of a magical villa.  The view from their lovely terrace garden of the city is astonishing.  Potted and hanging plants are mingled with hammocks and swings that hang from wrought iron arbors covering the garden.  Amanda and her Jordanian husband Samer are delightful.  We enjoyed chatting with them and, best of all, their daughter Dunya (an Arabic name I campaigned for on behalf of Ayame Little Pants), has TOYS and played with Yumi and Emi.  I neither saw nor heard from my girls for about a half an hour.  I eventually checked on them and found them, in the terrace garden, in PRINCESS attire.  DRESSUPS!  With TIARAS!!  My girls were in heaven.  We made plans to meet again soon.  I am very grateful to dear Sylvia for introducing me to her kind and fascinating friends. Next on our agenda was to check out a hotel on Rainbow Street recommended to us by my dear friend Lindsay.  We learned about the Heritage Hotel after making our 28-day reservation at Beity Rose.  Too late--but we agreed we would investigate Heritage in person and consider making a switch.  Well, the time has come to decide.  As it happens, Heritage does not have any available suites until mid-July.  So we do not have to decide as of yet, although if we are going to stay here another two weeks me might as well stay the rest of the summer.  Heritage is much nicer, but more expensive.  Much roomier, but quite far from Nate's school.  Aside from its distance from Nate's school, it is situated in a far more enjoyable neighborhood than Beity Rose.  And yet, we are considering a camp for Yumi in Sports City, practically next door to Beity Rose.  Heritage has a little bit more of a kitchen (a stovetop) but if I am truly honest, do I want to spend afternoons cooking?  And the Heritage refrigerator is still just cocktail sized so how to shop, cook, and store food in it?  Maybe we should just stick with Beity Rose, with it's parrot and nice staff that adores our girls and puts up with us?  Despite their lack of towels and nearby eating/shopping/wandering opportunities?  Obviously, moving represents another upheaval that maybe we should spare the girls from...but maybe they would benefit from the proximity to restaurants and "fun" neighborhood.   Well, the list of pros and cons can go on.  We have to renew our reservation with Beity Rose the day after tomorrow.  Obviously we couldn't move to Heritage the day after tomorrow even if we wanted to--but if we do want to move their then we will only make a two week booking with Beity Rose.  So we shall see.  One OTHER factor involves a camp for Yumi.  There are camps at nearby Sports City.  Surely there are camps near Rainbow Street but I do not now of any...except for one in which my new friend Amanda has her daughter participating.  It is a co-op "Arabic School" for Jordanian-American kids whose parents want them to learn Arabic.  They just play and cook-but in Arabic, lead by Arabic teachers.  Amanda said she felt sure her fellow co-op moms would be happy to let Yumi join.  The co-op is taking place near Rainbow Street.  But will Yumi even want to participate in this camp or the Sports City camp?  Even if she says she does, she may not end up liking it.  So many decisions... After the hotel, we ate dinner (standing up) in front of the juice and sajj place we frequent.  The same enthusiastic moonlighting taxi driver--who had called me three times while at Amanda's and Heritage--picked us up and took us home.  Nate took Yumi on a little walk to get ice cream because she was so good today--yay!  I got Aya ready for bed while Emi screamed in the bedroom...but everyone went to bed by 9pm relatively happy.

29 June: Bicycle shop adventure

29 June Sabbath Day in Amman.  We arrived to church services on time--a miracle!--and with everyone more or less in a good mood.  And everyone--more or less!--stayed that way throughout the two hours of services.   Our hotel Internet server is down.  Luckily, the wireless service in the building where we attend church is excellent.  While Nate entertained the girls in the garden behind the villa, I quickly checked email and paid the bills via our iPad (a purchase I made reluctantly before coming but now am SO GLAD to have). We returned to the hotel, ate lunch, and put the girls down for naps.  And that is when my adventure began.  Carrying NOTHING but my purse and the wheel with the flat tire Nate had removed from the stroller, I set off for downtown Amman.  Freedom!    I made my way downtown by bus and then the last mile or so on foot.  For the first time since arriving over three weeks ago, I took public transportation!  So fun.  I originally imagined that I'd shuttle with the girls from here to there on public transportation but it just has not worked out.  Mind you, unless I put all three of them on my lap, I'd have to pay for three tickets--which amounts to the same as a taxi ride in most cases.  Taxis really do make more sense given our circumstances and economy, but still.  I've really missed the thrill of figuring out and mastering public transportation--to the utter astonishment of local people on board. Today I had my way.  I bused nearly downtown and then walked the rest of the distance through the downtown Friday souq.  This souq goes on for blocks and blocks and today I delved further inside than I've ever gone.  It grew noisier, dirtier, more crowded and pungent.  I felt like I was in Egypt.  All along the way I stopped to ask shop tenders where the nearest bicycle shop it.  The responses were consistent so I knew I was on the right track and yet I am still amazed I found it.  Abu Suleiman operates out of an alley piled high with bicycle frames and surrounded by a gang of cycle manic teenaged boys.  To the inexperienced foreigner he may have seemed frightening--shabby, wild-eyed, gruff--but I found him to be very charming.  After taking off the offending flat tire, inflating it, and immersing it into a tub of water to identify the holes, he dug out a new tire and attached if to the wheel.  I watched carefully, asking questions, and chatting with the gaggle of boys hanging about.  The boys clearly thought I was bizarre but Abu Suleiman could not have actd less surprised at the visit of a foreign woman speaking eccentric Egyptian Arabic to his alley.  He fixed up the tire and refused payment.  "It isn't all about the money," he said.  "I am doing this for your three daughters." What a sweetie. My return to Shmeisani and our hotel was just as enjoyable.  I bumped in a demonstration that featured the usual burning of an Israeli flag--an unsurprising scene I've witnessed many times.  While I waited at the foot of Mount Hussein for a share twxi within spitting distance of the hostel in which I lived in 2006, a young man approached me with the usual questions: "What is your name? How old are you? Are you married?"' After questions 2 and 3 (followed by 4: "Do you have children?") he moved on.  But I had to smile: Jamila is not gone forever. I took that share taxi up past the King Abdullah mosque and walked with one of my fellow riders to a bus that took me the rest of the way to Shmeisani.  I returned to our room just as the girls were getting up.  It was the most enjoyable 1.5 hrs I have spent in Amman thus far. We had an invitation to dine at the home of people from our church congregation tonight.  As I had heard of a playground near this family's home, we planned to arrive early so as to check it out.  It was disappointing.  Covered in sand, hot, empty.  No where to set poor Aya down.  I love Amman but its playgrounds leave a lot to be desired.  Such a statement by an expat would have made me cringe had I heard it years ago in my travels here.  "Just learn to live like the locals!" I would have thought in disgust.  Well, now that I have very inflexible little people who love parks with grass and shade, I am making this statement: Jordanian public parks are challenging.  Go prepared to hold your toddler the whole time and bring lots of water. And a hat. We had arrived more than a half an hour early so as to "play" on this playground but everyone was done after ten minutes.  Luckily, a group of young men approached with a horse!  Now, people are always carting things around with horses and donkeys in Egypt but you don't see this so much in Amman.  They gave our girls a ride--fun.  Dinner at our new friends' home was also enjoyable.  Return home and relatively calm--if not late (9:00pm)--bedtime routine.  Barring Emi's usual 5 minute screams after being out to bed.  That has not changed. Finally--I am hoping to adopt a better attitude.  See if you can spot it.  While I intend to record everything including the girls' bad behavior when it happens, I am going to try to see the silver linings in things.  And write about them.  I can't let this experience defeat me; the girls are not likely to change at all but I have it in me to change.  And I will try!  I will try.

28 June: Day two without Internet!

(I am sending this on 29 June from church building which has EXCELLENT wireless). 28 June We have not had wireless Internet for the last two days.  I am beginning to consider an Internet cafe or wireless hotspot visit.  The thought is daunting--with the girls?--but I start to get the shakes when I am out of touch for so long.  Speaking of getting the shakes, I just consumed an unnatural amount of Nutella.  "What???" you cry?  Yes, I, HILARY, just ate tons if Nutella, nearly straight from the jar.  Well, I was upset.  I do not normally turn to food when in a crisis but today I decided to just go for it.   Yes, yes, upset over yumi's behavior and the awful, horrible feelings and actions that boil up and over out of me when she acts this way.  Skip to the paragraph starting with "This afternoon" if you would rather not read about it. We went to the embassy pool this morning.  I said earlier that I would no longer visit the embassy pool in the afternoons due to traffic.  Well, I am now down the pool during the morning.  Or, done taking Yumi to the pool.  I had fun, but she moped around nearly the whole time.  Her main complaints: " it is too cold outside of the pool (there was a breeze and it definitely was chilly to be wet and in the shade); it is too cold inside the pool; I can't swim; mom won't swim me around the pool nonstop because she has to take turns playing with Aya and Emi and, wonder of wonders, she wants to sit and relax on the poolside a little bit; why don't I get the snacks, icecream, etc that the embassy summer camp kids are getting?; my leg hurts; my stomach hurts; I am tired." Can you sense my bitterness?  The moaning and groaning continued as we left the embassy with our hosts (who must sign us out) and my resentment grew as I had to cajole and coax her to make each step.  It was humiliating.  By the time we got in the taxi, I was about to fall apart.  I prayed that I could make it back to the hotel without snapping but I failed.  We were not even half way back and both Yumi and I were sobbing.  The driver tried to help/interfere but I just begged him to leave us alone.  Sweetly, Emi sat next to me and sang Give Said the Little Stream over and over.   I was only able to get Yumi to calm down and eat lunch with the promise that I'd take her to the doctor later.  She is, in general, very interested in doctors, but some of her mantras when she gets into these fits involve feeling sick and that she's going "to die."  Is Yumi unhappy?  How desperately or urgently do we need to get her help?  Today she also begged to be allowed  to go back to heaven.   But she also begged to be allowed to go back to Herndon, so basically I assume she does not like it HERE.  She is clearly in a very unhappy stage.  I remember feeling what I assume she is feeling at a very young age, too.  And I turned out alright.  But in the meantime, she may grow even unhappier and so will all of us.  Naturally I wonder what I am doing wrong/not doing right.  And of course anyone will tell me that isn't the case...but can I really believe them?  Are we causing her unhappiness or not teaching her correctly how to be happy?  I know these questions and their variations haunt most parents but I am feeling it acutely now and my child is only four years old.  This is  discouraging.  And the help she needs--can we even get it here? This afternoon I took the girls down the street to the launderer Abu Manal and to the fruit seller Amir/Abu Mariam.  Our stroller has a flat so we walked.  It is  probably not more than 1/4 a mile but that is a bit of a trek for small girls in the sun.  I also gave the a small bag each of laundry to carry. :-). Our visit there was enjoyable--really the only Arabic conversation opportunity I had all day.  And the girls get to run around a little and explore the little "square" that houses the businesses.  Abu Manal and Abu Mariam always have little snacks and fruit for the girls as well. Once Nate returned, he took Yumi off to the Youth Sports Center at Sports City.  I asked him to look into a summer camp for Yumi.  I took Emi and Aya to Safeway.  There is a special play area located in the parking lot of Safeway--inflated slide, trampoline, and boat pond--and since Yumi had come no where near her goal of going there today (her sticker chart was depressingly empty today), I wanted to take Emi to make a point.  We popped first into Safeway though to get a few items...and we got sucked in.  I initially wanted yoghurt, milk, and cheese--about all that can fit in our refrigerator--but then I remembered that we needed snacks for church tomorrow (nuts, raisins, digestive biscuits) and that we are out of veggies (carrots and cucumbers).  I have since run out of many toiletries and decided to just make a trip of it and replace of all of it.  One the one hand, I was happy to get needed supplies.  On the other, I was reminded of how soulless a supermarket is.   I walked around with my cart, went through the checkout, and said no more than "thank you" to the cashier.  If and when we spend time in the Middle East in the future, will we do our shopping at grocery stores and become one of the faceless shoppers? Alas, we did not have time for the Safeway fun land and thankfully Emi took it well.  We struggled into a taxi and back to the hotel where we met up with Nate and Yumi.  They did get information on a kids camp at Sports City but were unable to register her.  And the timing of the camp is strange: 10:00am start with breakfast and 2:30pm finish, no lunch included.  Clearly a camp intended for jordanians.  Which is cool-but we have to see.  If we move hotels than Sports City no longer is convenient.  The three things (other than Yumi's behavior) weighing on my mind tonight: 1) switch hotel? 2) can we get the stroller tire replaced? 3) camp for Yumi? We checked out the movie "The Help" from Books and More and watched it tonight.  Of course, it is a stirring movie and when I get emotional in a movie I usually start to get extra emotional over any issues weighing on me at that time.  After the movie, Nate hugged me as I cried and cried.

27June (late-no Internet access!): The bidet soaks the duvet

27 June I may have pushed the girls too hard this morning but thankfully everyone held it together.   My original plan this morning was to take the girls to a humane society (center for abandoned animals) located just outside of Amman.  I have heard about this place from several sources and it sounds enjoyable. I called this morning in advance of our visit just to confirm that it truly exists and found out that appointments are necessary.  The woman who answered the phone kindly told me that she would be back in touch in a few days to set my appointment.  Oh.  I suppose it is just as well, because the woman also informed me that if I wanted to come by taxi I would have to have it wait for us to provide transport back, as there are not taxis simply waiting around on the road outside of town.  I am SURE there are busses and the old me would have been happy to fly by the seat of my pants and just figure out the return as I go...but that sounds less and less appealing now the I have three small kids in tow.  We shall see; I apparently have a few days to figure it out while I wait for them to call me back. Plan B!  What is Plan B?  There were a lot of things we could have done but of course I chose the most challenging.  Why do I do this? As I know Io have mentioned, I had an idea in my head prior to coming here of the kind of activities we would be doing each day.  Most of them involved going to souqs and eating street food.  I bought an extra ergo so I could carry both Aya and Emi on me, leaving me one hand for Yumi and one hand for the bags of fruit and veggies and trinkets we would buy.   Today marks the three week anniversary of our arrival and I still have not figured out that me + three girls + downtown Amman + the heat do NOT = fun.  Let me remind you that it all worked out okay--no casualties--but we all returned back to the hotel pretty worn out.  Picture this: On our way out of the hotel I let the girls go down to the hotel restaurant to say hello to Koko the parrot.  While coming upstairs Yumi tripped and, as I discovered later, skinned up her leg.  She immediately began a fit, shouting "no!" repeatedly and "I want to be by myself!"  She vehemently rejected all attempts at sympathy and offers of bandaids.  While the hotel staff looked on, I decided to just give her space and allowed her to walk a bit away up the street from me.  I told her that if she was not ready by the time I found a taxi than we would not be going anywhere.  She acted as she always does these days during a fit--so angry at me--but this time I knew it had nothing to do with me.  I was pretty certain she was mad because she fell.  Fortunately she pulled herself together and got in a taxi.  Only than could I see that she had indeed scraped up her leg and it assuredly did hurt.  Only then did she allow me to give other sympathy (and some chapstick to smear on her leg).  Whew!  I got off easy on that one.  Sigh of relief. I determined that the best course of action was to go for freshly squeezed juice--cocktail is what they call it here--a downtown Amman hallmark.  Three cups of half carrot and half orange later and everyone seemed be okay.  We stood in the umbrella shade of the cocktail shop and I watched how every passerby stooped to caress Emi's head or face.  She was protruding a bit from our spot under the umbrella and it is just second nature for Jordanians to cuddle children when they see them.  Not inappropriately, mind you, but definitely counter to western cultural norms.  Emi does not mind, thankfully.   I brought the second ergo along today.  Prior to our departure I stewed and stewed over whether I should buy and bring a second ergo.  I rightly imagined that it would be hard to negotiate Yumi, Emi, and bags of purchases in the souq and figured a second ergo was the answer.  I have not used the second ergo much, however, because 1) it HURTS to carry both of them and 2) Emi usually resists.  Knowing both of these things I still brought it and planned to use it.  Emi DID allow me to put her up on my back but it STILL hurt.  And yet the alternative--walk through the souq and make purchases while trying to hold onto both Yumi and Emi was not appealing as well.   So I walked through the fruit market with Aya on my front and Emi on my back.  We bought raisins and plums.  We bought large bath towels to use at the pool.  We walked what seemed a hundred blocks to get to my favorite restaurant downtown.  Yumi complained but hung in there.  I felt like a beast of burden as I collapsed at Hashem's and unloaded Emi, Aya, bags of fruit and towels into a heap.  The place was packed and we were lucky to get a table in the shade.  I immediately began using the water from my water bottle to wash off some fruit to appease my children who were clearly bordering on mutiny.  All of this was watched very carefully and with amusement by everyone in the restaurant.  I kept the girls busy with fruit and falafel while I ate hummus and fuul.  I found myself relaxing.  Maybe we were going to get through this without any meltdowns after all!  But as the fruit and falafel dwindled the anxiety returned.  I had to get everyone's faces cleaned off, convince Yumi that no, we really DON'T want hot water with which to make mint tea (a Hashem tradition but I was not about to attempt it without another pair of adult hands), gather all our bags and bottles up, pay, and get through the maze up tables to the street--ALL without anyone throwing a fit.  I felt daunted.  Why did I decide to do this again? We made it out of the restaurant and to a point down the road where the girls could rest in the shade.  I put Aya's hat back on and stood out in the street trying to hail a taxi.  Fifteen minutes passed!  No joke.  Thank heaven Aya is an angel baby.  Not a peep from her.  Yumi and Emi looked like that had only just survived a forced march double time and were being allowed a reprieve.  They sat on these chairs, wilting.  Imagine my relief when FINALLY a free taxi passed.  No matter that it was a special hire taxi taxi and, therefore, more expensive.  I hustled Yumi and Emi across three lanes of traffic and into the backseat.  Whew!   We returned to a flooded bathroom and no towels.  Emi, who had been needing a toilet for at least an hour, ran in there and promptly fell flat on her back.  I finally got super huffy with the staff;  they have ignored my nearly daily requests for towels but not this time, not after using some strong words.  We had TWO deliveries of towels after I delivered my strong words and I got the bathroom cleaned up.  Good thing, since we were all in need of a quiet time and the bathroom is Yumi's quiet time domain. The leak persisted, however, and it was a wet Yumi that emerged from quiet time 1.5 hour later!  No joke.  The duvet and pillow I lay down for her on the bathroom floor was soaked!  Argh.  But we got it all sorted out. We had plans to meet Nate on the main road on his way back from school.  We had 1.5 hours to burn before meeting him.  Sadly, I felt just like it was burning time.  I did not want to take them out on some sort of outing since we had plans for an outing later with Nate and I did not want to overload them.  So what to do for 1.5 hrs?  We have little to do in our hotel room but even more troublesome than our lack of activities is the persistent nagging knowledge that I came here to interact with Jordanians...something I cannot do from our hotel room.  I had an idea to the girls downstairs to the hotel restaurant in hopes to hang out with cook for a little while.  He is Syrian and very difficult for me to understand but SUPER nice.  This was not a bad idea but the timing was poor;  Mohaned the cook had just made a meal for the hotel employees and they were setting down to eat and watch some violent Hindi movie on television.  We hung out for about ten minutes but eventually moved on, walking slowly down to the main road.  We meet up by a fruit seller so it was there they we spent the rest of our time waiting for Nate.  It is good to eat some fresh fruit and try to chat in arabic  (key word here is "try" since the guys who run the operation are also super hard to understand and with cars whizzing by it does not make for an optimal conversation spot).  If only there was more shade...I also need to bring along a whole bottle of water dedicated to the washing off of the fruit anytime I go there: else, as today, I use up the small amount our portable bottle holds and it only is enough to wash about three pieces of fruit anyway. There we were when Nate finally arrived with a picnic dinner in hand.  We went on over to Sports City and walked on their running trails.  These trials are in a lightly wooded forrest coved ankle deep in trash.  Honestly-till the day I day, I will wonder what makes some people (regardless of nationality!) positively unable to litter (me, for example) and others do it without a second thought.  Bizarre.  We had fun, though, and the girls got to just run.  They were pretty cranky on the return walk (a sliver-Yumi, dropped stick AND no animals sighted-Emi, complete blowout by unnoticed by her parents-Aya).  Nate veered off with Yumi when we reached the hotel to take her for an ice cream because she did reach her goal today of no MAJOR tantrums.  I dragged the stroller and it's flat tire upstairs with Yumi and Aya and out both girls into the shower.  The day ended well enough with showers for all but me and only a little crying by Emi when put to bed.  Time to relax.....

26 June: I got a library card!

26 June Nate left earlier this morning in order to get more study time.  In theory, he should be studying for many hours each day.  His class starts at 1pm and ends at 5pm.  He should be studying at least four additional hours if not more daily, but that just has not been happening.  By the time he finishes his run and breakfast with the family, it is usually 9:30am.  If he leaves right away (and he usually doesn't), he will arrive either at the arabic institute or the embassy (where he studies) within a half an hour.  That gives him three hours in theory, but if he takes some time to go find/eat lunch and travel from the embassy (better Internet access to online dictionaries) to the institute (bad Internet access), it is more like two hours of study.  And the evenings? Ha.  We get the girls in bed by 8:30pm.  By the time we catch up with emails and such it is 9:00pm.  We spend time together and next thing we know it is past 10:00pm and we are exhausted.  No study. So today he started a new plan--to skip his run but walk to the institute (30 minutes) and use his tangible BOOK dictionary in addition to the patchy Internet.  His goal is to get in at least four hours of study.  A lot is riding on his success in this program so I appreciate his willingness to buckle down. This left me to manage the girls completely on my own this morning, and it did not start off well with Yumi grabbing a clump of Emi's hair and yanking it out.  I should add here that Emi is usually the hair-puller and Yumi has suffered much at the hands of Emi in the past.  I obviously cannot condone it from either girl, however, so we had to reprimand Yumi and insist she apologize.  This all happened as Nate was about to leave and while I knew I was in for another Yumi fit I urged Nate to just leave.  He did.  Miraculously, Yumi pulled herself together within a few minutes.  And she has more or less been okay today.  We started a sticker chart with the reward being an afternoon visit to the embassy pool or some other activity of her choice.  It worked pretty well.  For now. I do not have my hopes up but it worked today. After breakfast, workout, and showers, we ventured off to a private lending library called Books and More recommended to us by new friends from church.    We found it relatively easily and enjoyed the children's reading room.  It is furnished with floor cushions and multicolored little kid chairs and, most importantly, lots of princess books.  No matter how hard I try to interest them in a wide range of topics, it always comes back to fairy tales.  I suppose they are no different from kids around the world and across the centuries, but still.  Really?  Are Jasmine or Belle or Sleeping Beauty/Aurora the be-all and end-all?  To my girls, yes.  So we read some fairy tales and Aya munched on a few books.  I snuck away to chat with the Jordanian man at the front desk but cannot say I found this lending library to be a good source of Arabic culture and speaking opportunities. The chatty woman in charge is American and the books are largely in English.  The girls were happy to read and checkout a princess book a piece and I was definitely pleased to take a few items from their DVD selection.  All in all, a positive experience.  We lingered in the reading room just a little too long, however, and I was dismayed when signing up for a membership and book checkout took over 20 minutes.  Add to that a 25 minute ride home and the girls were CRANKY when we reached the hotel at 1:30pm.  And who could blame them--they were starving!   We went to the pool again this late afternoon/early evening.  Some friends from church--embassy employees and wives--typically go in the afternoon and invited us along.  I dangled it as a carrot all day to elicit good behavior from Yumi and I suppose it worked.  She was better. She still reacted negatively and defiantly to many of my requests and reprimands, but in every case stopped short of a fit.  While such behavior is discouraging, it is better than hysterical fits at every turn.  Thing is, I don't really WANT to go to the embassy pool in the afternoon. It takes nearly 1/2 in the back of a taxi to get there (not so bad, we are all excited to go) and 1/2 hr back (not fun, even if I have snacks on me which I cannot always be certain to have or have enough of...).  The embassy pool has its advantages; it has been nice to get to know these ladies who all literally spend all afternoon with their kids at the pool.  It is also relatively cheap as Jordanian activities for kids go--only 2JD/child.  The attached playground rocks--it even has a baby swing!  But going in the afternoon is just too difficult. It was nearly 7pm by the time we made it back.  I had tasked Nate with procuring dinner and we had...cereal.  :-). Nice of him to get it for us but I do not want to do this everyday.  Either I have to find a new type of carrot to dangle or we need to find another pool.  And of course there is the word class pool in the nearby Sports City.  So we shall see.  The embassy pool is closed tomorrow anyway so we will not be headed there.  How will I motivate my hard-as-nails four year old to choose the right?  We shall see. Finally--I wanted to take a moment and mention the nice employees here at Beiti Rose Suites.  They may not ever have toilet paper or enough towels on hand, but they sure are nice to us.  Yumi and Emi have stopped shouting "don't touch me!" and have really endeared themselves to the staff here.  And likewise.  When Aya sees the Syrian hotel cook Mohaned, for example, she strains and reaches for him.  Yumi jumps right into the arms of Yasir, the Egyptian hotel handyman.  Both of these men have wives (just one each I think!) and children at home in their respective countries, but work in Jordan for the employment opportunities and higher pay.  I can tell they miss their kids by how sweet they are to our girls.  We are considering moving to a different location with more space (kitchen); we will miss the nice people at Beiti Rose, however, if we do.

25 June: Jordanian pizza and fresh fruit juice on Rainbow Street

25 June Rainbow Street again this morning.  While it was not quite as ideal as our last outing there a week ago (yes, Yumi), it was pleasant enough.  We made the rounds to the household store (new words: magnet and strainer) and the bookstore (new book: all abut space in Arabic.  Leaving the bookstore was a challenge and I began searching for an available taxi to go back to the hotel immediately.  Fortunately, Yumi calmed down in time for us to eat at a sajj and juice joint run entirely by Egyptians.  They love us there.  Sajj is similar to a wrap but chewier and cooked quickly on a hot surface right before your eyes.  A shawarma is a sajj--the filling being spiced chicken sliced right from a spit and mixed with a type of tartar sauce and pickles.  And it is pressed against the hot surface like a panini.  This restaurant takes that authentic Levantine fast food--shawarma--and puts in all kinds of different ingredients, both sweet and savory.  We went with the vegetable pizza sajj and a fresh carrot/orange juice mix.  Tasty.  We ate it outside the restaurant, sitting on a ledge against the restaurant wall. It should have been the perfect outing but it was tinged by my discouragement of yumi's behavior, both while leaving the bookstore and a gigantic fit she threw this morning.  Warning: I an now going to rehash Yumi's fit.  Skip down to the paragraph beginning with "This afternoon" if you do not want to hear it.  I will not blame you! This morning's scenario:  Yumi got agitated because we ask her to wait when she very rudely demands some help on something.  She then hit Emi and completely lost control when I "put her hand in timeout"--something I do when I do not have an adequate timeout place (we do not as she will not stay in any spot and would just scream from it anyway) and/or the bad behavior happens so often that going through the whole timeout routine is not practical. I spent at least five minutes trying a new approach from a book my sister graciously gave me: "The Happiest Toddler." The thing is, this approach DOES seem to work on Emi.  I restate her feelings with an appropriate degree of emotion in my voice and then gradually get calmer to help HER get calm.  It works pretty well--with EMI.  But Yumi isn't a toddler and she just gets angrier when I restate her feelings.  She does not act getter because she's been understood.  See screamed at me this morning: "I want to go outside and be by myself without my family!!!". I restated: "I can see you are really upset.  You want to go outside of the hotel and be by yourself, right?  I said this (as advised) with about 30% less intensity than she used.  This is supposed to convince her that I care, that I am really listening.  And she did calm for seconds affirming that yes, she wants to leave the hotel without me and be by herself.  But then when I say that she cannot because that is not safe, blah blah blah, she just starts screaming it a over again.  I repeated this cycle with her multiple times.  Likewise, as she was clearly growing tired, she began to moan "mommy, mommy, mommy." But if I responded in a kind tone "Yes, sweetheart?" she would scream some more at me: "Don't say ANYTHING to me.". If I did not respond to her moaning, she would scream: "NO ONE is giving me any LOVE.". Total lose-lose situation.   Forgive me for hashing it all out again in a semi-public forum.  I am just trying to rethink and replay it.  I am half hoping someone out there has a clue as to what we can do.  Both Nate and I were in tears this morning;  Emi and Aya needed attention so I tended to them while Nate--who had been about to leave for school--had to hold her down in the bedroom unconnected as far as I know to any other hotel room.  This went on for an hour. This afternoon:  during quiet time another new friend from church texted me with an invite to the embassy pool.  Although by the time I would arrive we would only be able stay for an hour before we would need to leave with her (as her guests), I decided to go for it.  Not that I was feeling super magnanimous toward Mayumi but because I wanted to dangle the carrot in front of her. Maybe if she could have a lot of fun at the pool this afternoon then she would be more motivated to behave better to get the chance to go again.  So threw them all into suits and hopped in a taxi.  We had been driving for at least five minutes when I remembered--MY PASSPORT!  Obviously needed to enter the embassy.  I had the driver turn around, all while trying to decide whether to bail on this probably foolhardy plan (now I'd only have 1/2 hr to spend there before needing to leave) or to press forward.  W pulled up to the hotel and the driver urged me to leave the girls in the cab while going up to get the passport.  Ha!  Not likely.  He had a point, though.  Emi had no idea why we were back at the hotel and not the pool and resisted removal from the taxi with every fiber of her little being.  I tried Happiest Toddler Method for about thirty seconds but imagine this:  I have Aya strapped to me and so bending down to Emi's height (which is pretty low considering the is lying prone on the sidewalk) is impossible.  And yet I try.  I am trying to use the short "toddlerese" sentences the method advocates and curious passerby accumulate.  And the taxi driver keeps shouting out his recommendations.  And the clock is ticking.  S I give up on that and have to drag Emi inside, upstairs, downstairs, and back into the taxi.  She was happy as a clam once she realized we were on our way again, but I was in trouble.  All I could think about were the warnings by the author of Happiest Toddler:  if you don't listen to your child and give her respect, she will end up an insecure and angry adult.  I just sat there and cried the whole way to the embassy.  Wow-the US embassy sure has a way of bringing on the waterworks.  I hope it doesn't have that effect on everyone or US international relations with the Jordan will be in trouble. The girls had, of course, a blast.  And while poolside chatting with expat mothers was not my idea of a the perfect afternoon when I envisioned this summer, it sure was a relief today.  In my rush to get out the door, I did not even grab my suit, but Yumi and Emi were perfectly happy in the shallows.  Aya sat on my lap and contentedly munched cucumbers.  One of the mothers had a bag of goldfish and Doritos for everyone.  My girls were thrilled.  The attached playground scene...kids running around in bathing suits on the foam-surfaced playground (NOT sand), shooting water guns and popping goldfish into their mouths and laughing hysterically.  Yumi did not know any of then but was completely in her element and fit right in.  I watched this with mixed emotions:  happy to see the girls having a ball and sad that they have not yet really had a chance to bond well with Jordanian children.  I am sure the lack of bonding has little to do with the language barrier or anything to do with Jordanians themselves, and more to do with setting and opportunity.  Still--is it possible that my girls are more likely to bond with American kids because they are American?  I am not sure why this saddens me but it does. I had phoned Nate to tell him of our plans and ask him to arrange for dinner.  No way was I going to come back from the pool and then have to get everyone off to a restaurant.  Nate came through with all kinds of things I would never buy, including Nutella but hey--the rice and chicken hit the spot and it was easy.  MUCH easier than going out.  And easy was what I needed today.

24 June: Dinner at the club

24 June Children's Museum again today!  To make the membership worth it, we plan on going every week this summer, and why not?  We all have such a good time.  I saw and chatted with four employees we have seen each time (Noora, Ayah, Amaal, and Anas), all while chasing Yumi and Emi throughout the museum.  I told them in advance to stick with me but that direction seemed to go in Emi's ear and out the other.  They are already so familiar with the main exhibit hall that they know just where their favorite activities are located--and can zoom right there.  The place is full of kids and exudes what--to them--must be a very safe vibe because they do not cling to me in the least.  They want to be off exploring. We visited their favorite spots: forts, the wheelchair race, the rowing skeleton, space, the koi stream, the supermarket, the library.  Yumi cautiously entered a gigantic stomach.  Emi rode on a humongous bee.  We did could not do crafts as that room was closed for a special class.  The guy who runs it though saw us through the glass door and popped out to urge us to come back on a different day other than Sunday which, apparently, is the day reserved for special art classes.  I told the guy that I still remembered the words he taught me last week (scissors and glue) and he acted thrilled.  He probably thinks I am a complete whacko.  That, or just incredibly slow. I brought our stroller this time, just to see how it would work out.  I knew it would be a hassle to get it in and out of a taxi when I have three other little people to manage at the same time.  And it WAS a big hassle.  Of course, it was nice to be able to put Aya in there and give us both a break from the ergo but she really wanted to get out and crawl around.  Which I let her do quite a bit, so I an not sure how useful it was to the museum experience to have it around.  It WAS helpful, though, when leaving.  When we left after our first visit, a cab was just dropping someone off in front of the door and we hopped right in.  Lucky.  On our second visit, we had to walk nearly 10 minutes on a very hot day down to the main road--where we caught a taxi.  To make our departure easier, I thought I'd bring the stroller.  For this reason alone, it was worth it; not only did we need to walk down the hill, we ended up waiting at least ten minutes for an available cab.  The stroller made this all easier.  Not sure what I will do next time.  Probably bring the stroller.  Since we WILL be going again and frequently, I also need to decide if I should skip Aya's morning nap and give us more time there/make the long drive of there (nearly 30 minutes) worth it.  This naturally seems a good idea but it would make my more morning workout difficult or impossible to have her up and crawling about.  I have got Yumi and Emi pretty well trained to let me get nearly 45 minutes of exercise time in with minimal interruption.  And this is good, because it REALLY irritates me when they do instruct me with demands, fights, etc.  quite frankly, I assumed I'd never be able to get in a workout here because I'd find their interruptions too frustrating.  But as long as I have Yumi up on a barstool doing ABCs on the iPad and out of reach of Emi, it works out.  Yumi does not get down because she knows if she does than the iPad will disappear.  Emi gets to play with crayons, also something that will be put away if she stops playing with them.  This is the system I have developed. I could do my workout earlier while Aya is awake if we planned on skipping her nap and being out, but it would be harder.  Maybe worth it, though, because we did not get back here for lunch until nearly 2:00pm!  Thank goodness I brought snacks.  Amazingly, the girls were great in the taxi ride home and I got in a good chat with our driver.   This evening we went to the neighboring "Sports City" complex, just right cross the road from our hotel.  Sports City is the home of the national football arena, multiple pools and gyms, a fancy restaurant, and who knows what else.   Nate has been running on their jogging trails the last two weeks and stumbled across their main gym and amazing pool.  He took us over there this evening with the idea that we might consider a family membership of some kind and wanted my opinion/approval.  It is close but getting their on foot is no small feat; to cross the main road one must use a pedestrian bridge over which Nate had to carry the stroller (everyone dismounted first).  We also had to navigate across another major road without a bridge or cross walk--just dodging traffic with our three small children in tow.  No big deal.  Normally I'd have been all about this kind of adventure but I was pretty rattled by a relatively short but nasty Yumi fit that occurred just as we were trying to leave the hotel and meet Nate (as he was coming back from school) to go to Sports City.  I was thus in no real great mood and probably did not appreciate the sports complex as much as Nate hoped I would.  He knows much much I miss going to the gym and genuinely wants me to get a membership. There are so many reasons why it would not work, however.  For starters, Nate would have to watch the girls and, while they are not exactly little angels with me, they are worse with him.  And besides, he is here to learn and should not be taking precious study hours so I can go to the gym.  He is willing to, but I won't let him.  Going in the early morning or later at night is problematic, however, since both Aya and Yumi sleep right by the door of our hotel suite.  It is just not meant to be. With this in mind and discouraged as I was by Yumi's episode, I did not enjoy our tour of the complex as much as I know Nate hoped I would.  The pool IS beautiful, with a slide and fountain. Maybe we will just pay to come occasionally?  I'll sleep on it--maybe my perspective will be better tomorrow.   Suddenly it was 6:30pm and the girls were hungry and we were still smack in the middle of Sports City.  We made a pragmatic decision to eat at the fancy restaurant next to the gym.  There were positively no other patrons--no Jordanian dines at 6:30pm--so we weren't too worried about the girls bothering anyone.  We accompanied them as they wandered through the tables overlooking the outdoor tennis and volleyball courts.  We ate a fine meal that was definitely not worth the SIX TIMES we normally pay for a dinner.  Isn't that crazy?  Even a meal on the upscale Rainbow Street costs six times less than this place.  We just gritted our teeth and were especially grateful for Nate's generous per diem that was apparently determined with dinners like this mind...every evening. Returned to the hotel and Nate dashed off to pick up our laundry from the very nice and entrepreneurial Abu Manal who made a killing off of us this week.  Got the girls to bed by 8:30, a full hour later than their "normal" American bedtime but that is when we usually get them down here.  I am looking at the calendar and wondering how it is that three weeks have not even passed yet!  I feel like we have been here for ages.  

23 June: A nearly perfect morning

22 June Sabbath Day in Amman.  We were VERY NEARLY on time for church services in this morning.  Aside from one near-fit by Yumi, all went well and we all enjoyed our various meetings and experiences at church.  Emi's nursery class is run by a Filipina woman by the name of Jean--and looks very fun.  I is held in the "sunroom" of the converted villa and is loaded with light and toys.  Yumi's class has about five kids, ages 3-6.  Her lesson today had something to do with choosing to be happy (or sad).  Hmmmm...hope she took this to heart.     The other lessons for the adults focused in having a change of heart (from a hard/angry one to one full of charity) and viewing trials as opportunities for growth.  Very uplifting, and thanks to the fact that Aya is so cute, she was adopted by others (primarily the young BYU students visiting for Arabic studies), leaving me to learn and ponder.  Very appreciated. We have not yet quite figured out how to send our Sabbath Day here.  At home, we typically spend time with family and friends outside of the usual entertainment activities.  We avoid patronizing restaurants and other venues that require its employees to work.  This is challenging when on "vacation" and do not have your own kitchen.  Of course, we can eat the bread, honey, and fruit we keep on hand in the hotel and I hope we start doing that instead of going out to eat.  We WILL still want to continue to have outings.  Holing up in our hotel room all afternoon and evening after church does not sound enjoyable. Thus, when we left church today, we headed downtown for lunch at Al Quds (Jerusalem) Restaurant.  More less uneventful (and tasty--veggies, rice, hummus, pita) but we are always torn between the idea that we should somehow force  our children to sit at their chairs through the entire meal and NOT wander thru the restaurant...and the idea that children are just not ABLE to have restaurant manners ALL the time.  I am and will be conflicted about this until our last meal here...because we are not going to stop eating out but our girls are going to want to get up and wander after no more than 10 minutes at a table. This evening:  We had the kind of experience for which I came to Jordan this summer.  A real "Jamila" moment, or as close as Jamila, mother of three, can have.  Last Friday, the taxi driver that took us to church was an extremely friendly man.  They usually are, but this man immediately invited us to visit him and his family at his home.  Such invitations were near daily events in my previous travels but have been rare (this was the first in three weeks) this time around.  Maybe something about have three children, two of which resemble waring tom cats half the time, flailing around in the back of the taxi puts most drivers off. This man truly seemed in ernest and gave me his card. The card indicated that this man--Abu Mustafa--has a farm, producing eggs and honey.  I thought the girls might really enjoy a chance to visit a farm and so I called him several days later.  I learned that his farm is far out of town, near the famous fortress of Karak (a very cool place, by the way), too far to visit in an afternoon.  But he invited us to his family's home the following Friday (today) and we accepted gratefully.  Our first chance this summer to visit Jordanians in their home and provide our girls the opportunity to see how differently people can live. Abu Mustafa generously picked us up and took him out to his home in the eastern (poor) suburbs of Amman.  When I say "poor," he (and his neighbors) live much grander than people with whom I have stayed in India and Africa.  Not to say there are not truly impoverished people in Jordan but it is a fairly well-off country with functioning social services.  Abu Mustafa is, however, much poorer than the inhabitants of the neighborhood surrounding our hotel.  We actually went to the apartment of his son and family--about a 25 minute drive from our hotel.   Their apartment building is typical of nearly all the buildings of Amman: a white stone structure 3-4 floors tall. We climbed up to about the third floor and found his son Amr, daughter-in-law Riham, and wife Amiira.  Three kisses on the cheek among the women: left cheek, right cheek, right again.  Shoes off.  Introductions of the adults and the five children (three belonging to Amr and Riham).   Nate goes off to the "diwan," the room coved in cushions upon which the men lounge and smoke.  He does not emerge the entire two hours we are there, and when he does, he reeks of smoke.  The kids are sent to play in a room off the entryway--evidently the play area.  This family of three kids have about 6 toys in this small, uncarpeted room.  Yumi and Emi play with the toys--and the kids--happily enough.  Yumi realizes immediately that no one speaks English and she kicks into Arabic mode!  It is awesome to behold; she simply starts communicating exclusively in Arabic, even to us!  She even loudly announces to Amiira that she is hungry and to Abu Mustafa that "smoking is bad for the body."  All in Arabic.  Amazing!   I sit down in the narrow room that connects the entryway to the diwan which is lined in very typical Middle Eastern couches.  I cannot describe what I mean by that but I have been in hundreds of homes across the Middle East and the furniture is very similar.  It is not particularly exotic or "eastern" looking but it does not look American.  It does not look American in the way European furniture does not look American.  It just looks...different.  Obviously, I should have a picture. I chat with Amiira and Riham for nearly two hours.  Very enjoyable.  They are very friendly and patient with my eccentric Arabic, and speak slowly so I can understand them.  We have only minor interruptions;  my girls seem to be entertaining themselves pretty well but I can tell that they aren't playing in the same way they would be playing with old friends.  They all do a little running around, playing chase, but aren't actually collaborating together with their games like they would with old friends.  Later, Nate and I agree that even if these kids all spoke the same language they might still not bond immediately or play seamlessly.  All things considered, they do well together.  Yumi complains a little that they aren't playing with her (after which I see the obedient 4yr old Jordanian daughter leading Yumi around by the hand--surely at the command of her mother) and Emi gets her hair pulled by two yr-old Mohammad who is apparently a real terror (hair pulling aside, he could have fooled me).  Aya crawls between the playroom at one end and the diwan at the other, getting sweatier and sweatier in the un-air conditioned apartment. Prior to coming, I had asked Abu Mustafa not to go to any trouble on our behalf.  I hoped he would know this meant to not prepare a meal.  I wasn't certain our girls would eat what they prepared and do not want to suffer the embarrassment of rejection of generously prepared food.  I also told him that our girls go to bed early and that we should plan on going back to our hotel by 6pm, giving us enough time to eat and get them to bed.  I said these two things to him knowing full well that 1) they would insist on us eating and 2) they would expect us to stay for hours (and eat said meal at around 8pm) but I knew I would need to be firm on at lest the second point and I figured I had best be upfront from the beginning.  While this may be my first time in a Jordanian home with children, it is by no means my first time ever and I know what to expect. I am glad I explained our "special needs" (to have our children in bed by the unheard of hour of 7:30 or 8:00pm....Riham puts her kids to bed around 11pm or midnight).  While they grumble a little ("at least stay until 8:30pm!!") they have been forewarned and give in easily.  The tricky part, then, is explaining why we need to leave as early as 6pm.  The real answer is "so I can feed the kids dinner because they are starving" but naturally I cannot say that without our hosts insisting we eat with them.  Happy as I am to accept (even with the risk of ungrateful daughters refusing offered food), I know full well that they don't plan on eating until at least 8pm.  They may not even have the meal in mind started.  Oh, those of you who have stayed with local people while traveling abroad should well understand my dilemma! Well, we end up eating the remains of what clearly was their lunch but was a delicious platter of chicken, rice, potatoes and eggplant, put down on the table in front of me and the girls and a spoon issued to each of us.  Nate is served his own plate in the diwan.  No one else eats as they have clearly eaten (lunch) not long before we arrived at 4:30pm.  I've been in this kind of culturally awkward situation before but cannot afford to refuse as I have three ravenous children on my hands and no other chance to feed them within another hour in sight.  So I accept their food and we eat up.  I am glad I brought a box of baklava for our hosts to make up for our culturally inappropriate early dinner and departure. While eating I chat with Riham.  She is 21 with a 6 year-old son.  She married Amr, her cousin (literally, her maternal uncle's son), at age 15.  She quit school after the seventh grade.  None of this surprises me--it is very typical. By 6:30pm my girls are wilting and even our hosts can see that we were not joking--out girls were done.  Abu Mustafa and Nate emerged from the diwan and, after much cheek kissing and promises of another gathering soon, we left.    The ride back was unenjoyable with all three girls vying for space on my lap, grabbing hair, and generally falling apart.  I finally did the unthinkable and passed Emi up to the front seat to sit on Nate's nap in the front seat.  Just the thought of this makes me ill but I was at my whit's end.  I had to let Aya just wander around the backseat while I tried to keep Yumi from going into a fit.  I stroked her back with my right hand while I held onto the handle of the door with my left to keep Aya from opening it.  Thank you if you re cringing in sympathy over this situation.  I almost cannot believe it myself. Nate and I agree, however, that incredibly unsafe automobile situations aside, we are glad the family had this experience.  Poor Nate had to take one for he team, buried as he was in the diwan with smoke, the television, and relatively uncommunicative Abu Mustafa and Amr.  I, however, got to chat with two very nice Jordanian ladies and the girls really had a unique experience.  Once again, I am especially pleased to see how, in this setting, Yumi realized she had a tool (Arabic) and she used it.   It is 10:44pm.  It has taken me an hour to write this.  I hope you have enjoyed it.  I write this to the sound of drums; the owner of the hotel (we were told) is hosting a party tonight in the courtyard.  The usually empty space is full of festive low couches, musicians, hookas (water pipes) and a fountain.  The only way I could pry Yumi away from this scene that met us when we returned from Abu Mutafa's house was to assure her that it would be a boring party.  That was before the drumming and dancing started.  

22 June: An evening with a Jordanian family

22 June Sabbath Day in Amman.  We were VERY NEARLY on time for church services in this morning.  Aside from one near-fit by Yumi, all went well and we all enjoyed our various meetings and experiences at church.  Emi's nursery class is run by a Filipina woman by the name of Jean--and looks very fun.  I is held in the "sunroom" of the converted villa and is loaded with light and toys.  Yumi's class has about five kids, ages 3-6.  Her lesson today had something to do with choosing to be happy (or sad).  Hmmmm...hope she took this to heart.     The other lessons for the adults focused in having a change of heart (from a hard/angry one to one full of charity) and viewing trials as opportunities for growth.  Very uplifting, and thanks to the fact that Aya is so cute, she was adopted by others (primarily the young BYU students visiting for Arabic studies), leaving me to learn and ponder.  Very appreciated. We have not yet quite figured out how to send our Sabbath Day here.  At home, we typically spend time with family and friends outside of the usual entertainment activities.  We avoid patronizing restaurants and other venues that require its employees to work.  This is challenging when on "vacation" and do not have your own kitchen.  Of course, we can eat the bread, honey, and fruit we keep on hand in the hotel and I hope we start doing that instead of going out to eat.  We WILL still want to continue to have outings.  Holing up in our hotel room all afternoon and evening after church does not sound enjoyable. Thus, when we left church today, we headed downtown for lunch at Al Quds (Jerusalem) Restaurant.  More less uneventful (and tasty--veggies, rice, hummus, pita) but we are always torn between the idea that we should somehow force  our children to sit at their chairs through the entire meal and NOT wander thru the restaurant...and the idea that children are just not ABLE to have restaurant manners ALL the time.  I am and will be conflicted about this until our last meal here...because we are not going to stop eating out but our girls are going to want to get up and wander after no more than 10 minutes at a table. This evening:  We had the kind of experience for which I came to Jordan this summer.  A real "Jamila" moment, or as close as Jamila, mother of three, can have.  Last Friday, the taxi driver that took us to church was an extremely friendly man.  They usually are, but this man immediately invited us to visit him and his family at his home.  Such invitations were near daily events in my previous travels but have been rare (this was the first in three weeks) this time around.  Maybe something about have three children, two of which resemble waring tom cats half the time, flailing around in the back of the taxi puts most drivers off. This man truly seemed in ernest and gave me his card. The card indicated that this man--Abu Mustafa--has a farm, producing eggs and honey.  I thought the girls might really enjoy a chance to visit a farm and so I called him several days later.  I learned that his farm is far out of town, near the famous fortress of Karak (a very cool place, by the way), too far to visit in an afternoon.  But he invited us to his family's home the following Friday (today) and we accepted gratefully.  Our first chance this summer to visit Jordanians in their home and provide our girls the opportunity to see how differently people can live. Abu Mustafa generously picked us up and took him out to his home in the eastern (poor) suburbs of Amman.  When I say "poor," he (and his neighbors) live much grander than people with whom I have stayed in India and Africa.  Not to say there are not truly impoverished people in Jordan but it is a fairly well-off country with functioning social services.  Abu Mustafa is, however, much poorer than the inhabitants of the neighborhood surrounding our hotel.  We actually went to the apartment of his son and family--about a 25 minute drive from our hotel.   Their apartment building is typical of nearly all the buildings of Amman: a white stone structure 3-4 floors tall. We climbed up to about the third floor and found his son Amr, daughter-in-law Riham, and wife Amiira.  Three kisses on the cheek among the women: left cheek, right cheek, right again.  Shoes off.  Introductions of the adults and the five children (three belonging to Amr and Riham).   Nate goes off to the "diwan," the room coved in cushions upon which the men lounge and smoke.  He does not emerge the entire two hours we are there, and when he does, he reeks of smoke.  The kids are sent to play in a room off the entryway--evidently the play area.  This family of three kids have about 6 toys in this small, uncarpeted room.  Yumi and Emi play with the toys--and the kids--happily enough.  Yumi realizes immediately that no one speaks English and she kicks into Arabic mode!  It is awesome to behold; she simply starts communicating exclusively in Arabic, even to us!  She even loudly announces to Amiira that she is hungry and to Abu Mustafa that "smoking is bad for the body."  All in Arabic.  Amazing!   I sit down in the narrow room that connects the entryway to the diwan which is lined in very typical Middle Eastern couches.  I cannot describe what I mean by that but I have been in hundreds of homes across the Middle East and the furniture is very similar.  It is not particularly exotic or "eastern" looking but it does not look American.  It does not look American in the way European furniture does not look American.  It just looks...different.  Obviously, I should have a picture. I chat with Amiira and Riham for nearly two hours.  Very enjoyable.  They are very friendly and patient with my eccentric Arabic, and speak slowly so I can understand them.  We have only minor interruptions;  my girls seem to be entertaining themselves pretty well but I can tell that they aren't playing in the same way they would be playing with old friends.  They all do a little running around, playing chase, but aren't actually collaborating together with their games like they would with old friends.  Later, Nate and I agree that even if these kids all spoke the same language they might still not bond immediately or play seamlessly.  All things considered, they do well together.  Yumi complains a little that they aren't playing with her (after which I see the obedient 4yr old Jordanian daughter leading Yumi around by the hand--surely at the command of her mother) and Emi gets her hair pulled by two yr-old Mohammad who is apparently a real terror (hair pulling aside, he could have fooled me).  Aya crawls between the playroom at one end and the diwan at the other, getting sweatier and sweatier in the un-air conditioned apartment. Prior to coming, I had asked Abu Mustafa not to go to any trouble on our behalf.  I hoped he would know this meant to not prepare a meal.  I wasn't certain our girls would eat what they prepared and do not want to suffer the embarrassment of rejection of generously prepared food.  I also told him that our girls go to bed early and that we should plan on going back to our hotel by 6pm, giving us enough time to eat and get them to bed.  I said these two things to him knowing full well that 1) they would insist on us eating and 2) they would expect us to stay for hours (and eat said meal at around 8pm) but I knew I would need to be firm on at lest the second point and I figured I had best be upfront from the beginning.  While this may be my first time in a Jordanian home with children, it is by no means my first time ever and I know what to expect. I am glad I explained our "special needs" (to have our children in bed by the unheard of hour of 7:30 or 8:00pm....Riham puts her kids to bed around 11pm or midnight).  While they grumble a little ("at least stay until 8:30pm!!") they have been forewarned and give in easily.  The tricky part, then, is explaining why we need to leave as early as 6pm.  The real answer is "so I can feed the kids dinner because they are starving" but naturally I cannot say that without our hosts insisting we eat with them.  Happy as I am to accept (even with the risk of ungrateful daughters refusing offered food), I know full well that they don't plan on eating until at least 8pm.  They may not even have the meal in mind started.  Oh, those of you who have stayed with local people while traveling abroad should well understand my dilemma! Well, we end up eating the remains of what clearly was their lunch but was a delicious platter of chicken, rice, potatoes and eggplant, put down on the table in front of me and the girls and a spoon issued to each of us.  Nate is served his own plate in the diwan.  No one else eats as they have clearly eaten (lunch) not long before we arrived at 4:30pm.  I've been in this kind of culturally awkward situation before but cannot afford to refuse as I have three ravenous children on my hands and no other chance to feed them within another hour in sight.  So I accept their food and we eat up.  I am glad I brought a box of baklava for our hosts to make up for our culturally inappropriate early dinner and departure. While eating I chat with Riham.  She is 21 with a 6 year-old son.  She married Amr, her cousin (literally, her maternal uncle's son), at age 15.  She quit school after the seventh grade.  None of this surprises me--it is very typical. By 6:30pm my girls are wilting and even our hosts can see that we were not joking--out girls were done.  Abu Mustafa and Nate emerged from the diwan and, after much cheek kissing and promises of another gathering soon, we left.    The ride back was unenjoyable with all three girls vying for space on my lap, grabbing hair, and generally falling apart.  I finally did the unthinkable and passed Emi up to the front seat to sit on Nate's nap in the front seat.  Just the thought of this makes me ill but I was at my whit's end.  I had to let Aya just wander around the backseat while I tried to keep Yumi from going into a fit.  I stroked her back with my right hand while I held onto the handle of the door with my left to keep Aya from opening it.  Thank you if you re cringing in sympathy over this situation.  I almost cannot believe it myself. Nate and I agree, however, that incredibly unsafe automobile situations aside, we are glad the family had this experience.  Poor Nate had to take one for he team, buried as he was in the diwan with smoke, the television, and relatively uncommunicative Abu Mustafa and Amr.  I, however, got to chat with two very nice Jordanian ladies and the girls really had a unique experience.  Once again, I am especially pleased to see how, in this setting, Yumi realized she had a tool (Arabic) and she used it.   It is 10:44pm.  It has taken me an hour to write this.  I hope you have enjoyed it.  I write this to the sound of drums; the owner of the hotel (we were told) is hosting a party tonight in the courtyard.  The usually empty space is full of festive low couches, musicians, hookas (water pipes) and a fountain.  The only way I could pry Yumi away from this scene that met us when we returned from Abu Mutafa's house was to assure her that it would be a boring party.  That was before the drumming and dancing started.  

21 June: To the souq!

21 June Our quest for kid-friendly activities in Amman continues.  Turns out there are quite a few, even if they are very similar and are pretty pricey. Today we set off for MyGym Jordan.  Some of you may be familiar with this children's activity zone chain.  We had a difficult time finding it and almost had to ask our taxi driver to give up.  Seems as though I had given him some wrong information and it was all my fault (or so he claimed...).  But no worries!  Even arguing with him afforded me more language and cultural experience. MyGym turned out to be a padded jungle gym of slides, zip lines, ball pits, trampolines, and other activities.  The girls were naturally pretty jazzed although I could also seem them equally as interested in the snacks for sale. Of course!  They always want snacks.  I was initially disappointed to see that the women assembled were primarily  Filipina  nannies of Jordanian children.  The woman who took my money (12USD/child--sheesh!) was blond and spoke with some kind of accent...French, maybe?  We'd come all this way so I was not about to leave without paying and giving the girls a chance to play, but inwardly I sighed...no Arabic here.  The blonde woman gave the details about membership and discounts and clubs and camps...I only half listened as I figured this would be our last visit.  At the end of this I thanked her and asked her name.  When she gave me her name--an Arabic name--I realized she is Jordanian!   Nisreen, the owner, and I had a very nice chat while playing with and watching the girls play.  We even got off the usual getting-to-know-you topics and into a discussion of social class.  New words!  And I learned the word "to crawl," which is what Ayame Little Pants is still primarily doing. Well, exclusively.  If she is standing and you inch a bit away from her and encourage her to come, she will, a few steps.  But you have to get down on the floor next to her--not super comfortable on the tile floors of our hotel room.  And probably not too comfortable for her to fall on as well!  But on the padded floors of MyGym, she got some practice in.  All in all a good activity although we arrived late (11:30am) and stayed too long (1:00pm).  I bought a few snacks (those squeezable applesauce containers) to tide them over but they were definitely grumpy by the time we got back to the hotel. Which probably contributed to Yumi's big fit at lunch.  Sadly, it was her second today.  Sigh.  I am seeing regression.  I am not sure what put her off this morning.  She said she was tired so it is possible she is not feeling well.  We also Skyped this morning with my parents and that could have put her on edge; my girls never do well with Skype because either they refuse to share the camera space with the other or break some rules regarding the electronic equipment...or something!!...and it almost always puts them on edge.  So while Nate was out on his run she completely melted down and screamed, cried, flung herself about and even once ran out in to the hall of the hotel, howling.  Wonderful.  Nothing I tried worked.  I am happy to say that I did not lose my temper externally but on the inside I was dying.  I don't how long I can handle this and the thought that I will be putting up with this behavior for years to come is extremely galling to me. Finally, she accepted one of my hundreds of attempts to comfort her and she collapsed in my arms.  Nate came back and took in the scene--no explanation necessary.  I fed the girls from microwave oats I keep on hand for Aya because I was not about to face the trial of breakfast at the buffet.  Not this morning.  And as for me, I had no appetite.  I just kept the girls on our usual morning schedule and, as I described above, took them out after Aya's nap. I am probably to blame for Yumi's lunchtime collapse.  She was being whiney and rude and, after how horrible she was to me this morning, I just began to respond sharply and bitterly.  She outdid me pretty quickly and right away I realized I had made a big mistake.  I back peddled frantically and poured out saccharine sweetness; one thing I needed was a quiet time and I was willing to do whatever to salvage it.  Fortunately it worked and they are all pretty quiet right now.   This evening: I wanted to try the souq held in 'Abdali on Thursday nights and Fridays.  It looked festive and I hoped to pick up some extra shirts for the girls.  I also thought maybe the girls might enjoy a few ladies' dresses to use for dressup play.  In addition, I had heard of a special bakery in 'Abdali--so we decided to make an outing of it. The bakery was an experience!  I had heard it served great "ka'ek.". I thought ka'ek was a kind of cookie, but had been assured that one could eat a meal there as well.  A restaurant AND bakery, I assumed. So you can imagine our surprise, then, when we walk in and see...ovens.  And men pulling bread out of them.  And creates.  And no tables.  The man behind the counter said something to us in rapid fire Arabic and gestured toward a narrow opening between 12 foot high stacks of crates.  What else to do but go thru?  There was not much to see on the other side (no dining room, no sign of menus) but after a couple of seconds we figured it out:  on a long table lay piles of freshly baked bread of a variety I have only seen in the Levant.  It is basically a roll, covered in sesame seeds, and sold in rounds, long ovals, and in strips configured into circles and ovals.  I've eaten it millions of times on the street, cut open and sprinkled with za'taar (Jordanian thyme) and occasionally cheese.  Super delicious.  So THIS is ka'ek.  And in this bakery, you take your own ka'ek, cut it, adorn it with soft cheese, baked eggs (literally--they were pulling more racks of whole eggs out of the oven as we arrived), salt, and za'taar.  We were charged by the number of each of those items we used after we assembled them.  We also bought a sheet of a confection I have enjoyed many times in the Levant but never knew its name.  "Baraze" is basically a sesame seed bar glued together with honey. Arms full of ka'ek, we bought a bottle of water for the right to sit down in front of some guy's convenience store/shack/cart and dove into our sandwiches.  Although the meal sadly lack any kind of vegetable--a situation all too common for us this summer as we basically eat fast and street food every meal--it was darn tasty. Stomachs full,  we headed back up the hill to the souq.  And to cut to the chase, I did find some shirts and shorts for the girls, and two long house dresses for the girls to have fun with.  Our window of opportunity for cooperation from the girls was rapidly closing, however, and we knew it had to end before they got any edgier.  Nate and I commented on how it would be a lot more enjoyable to take the girls to a souq if we did not have to worry about then snatching up everything they see and, if it's food, putting it in their mouths.  And generally acting like barbarians.  But then I have to remind myself that they are 4 and 2.5 and what can we expect?   We definitely had some adventures today but it was also a discouraging one.  Here's hoping tomorrow will be calmer.

20 June: Rainbow Street

20 June We are finally settling into a routine: 1) Rise and shine at 7am followed by about 15 minutes of barely comprehensible Skype time with family (we have very poor wireless here but hey! I am thrilled because otherwise you would rarely hear from us as there are no Internet cafes nearby). 2) Get the girls up, changed, teeth cleaned, etc.  3) Feed Aya some oatmeal and a bottle. 4) Nate and I get dressed. 5) Move aya's crib out of the sitting room and into the second bedroom. 6) Go down to breakfast.  7) Nate leaves and the rest of us come back up. 8) Put Aya down for a nap at 9am and get Emi working on crafts and Yumi on ABCs. 9) I change again and do my workout for 30-45 minutes. 10) I shower and usually shower the two big girls. 11) Get everything for our outing ready: water bottle, wallet, room keys, dictionary, pad/pencil on which I write new words, something for Aya to eat and/or her bottle. 12) Quick tidy up and visits to the toilet.  13) At 10:30 (if we are lucky) get Aya up and leave for an outing. 14) Stay out until about 1pm or later if we are eating out. 15) Come back for lunch or gospel directly to naps after another round of visits to the toilet. 16) Aya goes to her crib in the second bedroom, Emi to the master bedroom, and Yumi to the bathroom! 17) I sit down, read and respond to emails, write up our morning adventure, record  our expenses, study my new words, study the map, look up ideas for activities in Amman, edit the photos I've taken, and try to read my book. That has pretty much been our day today, minus the various other inevitable events: Yumi and Emi are just simply not interested in the hotel breakfast and are far more interested in the hotel parrot.  Thus, they will not stay seated at the table without a major fight.  On the one hand, I can hardly blame them for wanting to be up and near the bird and I feel like after they have had the two bites they are willing to eat than it is only fair to let them get up and play with the bird.  On the other, it seems bad manors especially in a "restaurant setting" to let your kids be getting up and down from the table and roaming about (even if they aren't causing a major ruckus--which they actually do sometimes).  I dither between wanting to feed them before we go down for breakfast on the same oats I make Aya AND wanting them to be hungry so they will actually stay at the table and eat.  Well, today was like all others in that we had some of the same table battle that resulted in an abrupt and early return to the room on the part of us girls.  Emi was the offender. This morning we went to Rainbow Street.  We have been there several times as a family and I have decided that it is kid friendly enough to make it one of our regular morning just girls activities.  The girls enjoy the neighborhood and the shops well enough to make it worth it even if it is NOT playground or a fancy "edutainment" club (like yesterday's activity).  I never heard of Rainbow Street when last living here in 2006 and wouldn't have frequented it anyway as it is full of upscale shops and pricier cafes and restaurants (approx 6USD for a meal as compared to 2USD in less fancy neighborhoods).  It has this amazing bookstore, however, that has destined it to be a regular destination for the Ayer girls.  The children's section is huge and chock of full of Arabic and English kids books.  I intend to buy out their entire stock of Arabic books when we leave.  We limited ourselves today to three books: A little board book for Aya called "The little lion"--one of those books that feature a little clothe animal you can animate by sticking your finger through the book and into the cavity if the animal, only in this case you have to use your left index finger since the book reads from right to left.  A book for Emi called "Where are you (mommy)!?!" that is part of a series on common children's issues (to be honest, Emi wanted a book featuring Jasmine (from Aladdin) but I just couldn't bring myself to buy it!!). A book Yumi (unsurprisingly) chose about what it is like to go to the hospital.  It follows a little Arab boy's visit to the hospital and operation.  Yumi is obsessed with hospitals and doctors and shots.  It is more of a macabre interest rather than an intellectual of vocational interest I think.  She is very glad that our hotel is near the Amman specialty hospital and takes great delight in telling cab drivers where to go ("near the specialty hospital please!"). Rainbow street also is home to a nice household goods shop where we purchased a cutting board (new word!) kitchen knife, two cups and plates (ikea, I am certain), some Tupperware to store fruits and veggies, and some hand towels (getting the hotel to provide us with adequate number of towels is arduous and I am just tired of it. Time to take matters into my own hands.). The girls had fun filling up baskets of stuff we did not buy (well, got to give all their employees something to do, right?) and I had fun asking one of the employees the name of everything in the store, including the word for curling iron which they do NOT have.  New word! Rainbow street also is the location for the British Council English school.  We pop in their each visit to use their nice toilets and are quite popular.  On employee always takes Aya while I take the big girls to the toilet.  When I come out, she is surrounded by admirers.  Aya owns that place.  They also have a small reading room for kids that we did not visit today. Finally, we stopped for shawarmas.  Juice was also promised but that fell through when Emi started hitting.  Alas, it was time to go home--1:30pm!  It was enjoyable.  Maybe not quite as much conversation opportunity as  at the children's museum or another indoor spot where I can watch the girls play and chat up the employees, but SUPER enjoyable because the weather was great (90 degrees maybe?), books were involved, girls were happy, AND I learned a few new things.  So I am content. Our evening was not stellar.  I had meant to meet Nate near his school at the close of classes to eat at an Egyptian-style fuul sandwich place nearby.  We hadn't communicated very well on what time to meet, however, and I had not actually left the hotel by the time he called and expected us to be nearly there.  I said we would get right out the door and be on our way but...we were hardly 100 yards away from the hotel by the time he walked up.  He'd tired of waiting for us and just walked back...about a 20 minute walk.  Some confusion and irritation ensued, and we ended up going to buy fruit and veggies before leaving to eat, so it was pretty late before we ended up setting off as originally planned to eat fuul near Nate's work.  I just love Egyptian fuul and I hoped the girls would enjoy it as well.  But, as always, neither Yumi not Emi could get into it.  Why is it that they could not get enough hummus when I'd make it at home and yet here they won't touch it?  Or they just love any type of beans I make at home and yet they don't like fuul?  I make a different cuisine every night for dinner and they are expected to eat it.  And they do, for the most part!  But not here.  Sigh.  We lingered at the outdoor tables of this place for a bit longer than we should have, eating freshly roasted peanuts I bought from a street vendor next to the restaurant.  We popped into a nearby cafe to see about getting some freshly squeezed juice when it happened--Yumi freak out.  By the time Nate got Emi, Aya, and the stroller stowed into a taxi (and the awesome taxi driver was out of his seat and HOLDING Aya while Nate got the stroller in the trunk!!), Yumi had given up and collapsed in my arms.  So it was short-lived.  And so clearly related to over-stimulation and exhaustion.  Truly-eating out every night is taking its toll.  But we don't have a kitchen nor do we want to just order in food all--or even half--of the time.  Even in spite of the fit, I am GLAD we went to this fuul place.  We WANT to have these little adventures.  But we can't seen to have them without a strong likelihood of a tantrum of some kind.  I know--this is sounding like a broken record.  Don't forget that this is my journal so I am thinking through things as I type them.  Bare with me.  And if you have any ideas, SHARE THEM!

19 June: ???

19 June I can't decide which event deserves to be the heading for this post: 1) Aya taking her first steps or 2) Emi stripping off her pants and underwear in the taxi today. Our morning routine proceeded without incident today and before long we were off to meet another new friend from church at the traffic circle near her home for a morning of fun at a children's center she frequents.  I had no idea where we were going; we just piled into her MINIVAN and took off.  We arrived at "L'imagine"--a pretty magical place on the third floor of a nondescript building.  L'imagine offers "edutainment"--educational fun experiences for parents and kids.  The floors are a beautiful hard wood and the walls are coved in pastels.  There are various rooms for art, sand and water, dressups, and imagination play (doctor's office, kitchen, store, construction site).  There is a special room for babies and toddlers filled with beautiful wooden toys.   There was a Jordanian girl on hand to watch over and interact with the girls as they played.  I stuck by her side and asked a million questions.  Now I know how to say the Arabic words for examine, frying pan, and share.  I also spent some time playing with Ayame Little Pants--something I rarely do--and she rewarded me by taking three steps!  It was VERY exciting and my new friend Charish tried to help me record these new steps (also a new word: steps) but alas--Aya would not walk on command.  Let me insert here that Aya rarely gets mentioned in these posts because she is being so darn GOOD! And that is not fair; Aya deserves more attention because she really is the most pleasant little person.  She snuggles next to me in the ergo all day, and when she gets tired she just lays her head on my chest and goes to sleep.  Precious precious precious little girl.  I love her. The girls had a blast--so much fun that suddenly it was 1pm and we had no idea where the time had gone.  I decided Emi should go to the bathroom-a fatal decision.  She immediately balked and, when I kept pressing the issue, launched into a massive tantrum.  Once I realized that there was no way she was going to use the toilet and we might soon be unwelcome at L'imagine, I backed off...but now Emi's little brain was on overload and she could not recover.  She would not put her pants and underwear back on (all while screaming that she wanted the toilet) but would NOT get on the toilet (all while screaming that she wanted Nate to help her).  Well, eventually Charish and I just rounded up everyone else and got Emi forcibly into her clothes, into Charish's car, and then into a taxi back to the hotel.  Emi was crouched on the floor of the taxi, screaming, and somehow I missed the fact that she'd removed her shoes, pants, and panties.  I had to wrestle them back on her, trying hard to keep her flailing legs from braining poor Aya who was strapped to my front still.  Fortunately Yumi was placid through all of this.  Strangely (and blessedly), Emi decided that after 1/2 hr of constant screaming was getting tiring and suddenly flopped across my lab and almost went to sleep.  We arrived at the hotel in serene silence.  Lunch, naps.  Whew! We all went down to the main drag tonight for dinner--about a 20 strenuous walk up and down the 2ft high Jordanian sidewalk curbs.  I enjoy doing this because everyone is more or less peaceful while we walk and Nate and I can generally get in some conversion.  Aya and Emi rode in the stroller and I carried Yumi on my back in the ergo.  We ate some really terrible pizza at a small joint that was just closing when we stopped but eagerly offered to serve us.  The pizza was, as I said, terrible, but we had interesting conversation with the owner's brother--a very large man--who showed up in his SUV presumably to collect the day's earnings and possibly the some of the employees home.  Seems as though they were all family and all lived in one of Amman's many Palestinian refugee "camps"--tenement housing created in the late 1960s to accommodate the massive influx of refugees from the six-day war and such.  I pulled out my map and all these guys gathered around eagerly to show me where they live.  I am growing more acquainted with Amman daily. We went on from there to grab freshly squeezed juice for the girls and headed back to the hotel, stopping once for paper towels, oats, and honey at "Heba and Ahmed"'s store a ways down the street from the hotel.  Bedtime routines went smoothly.  All in all, another good day!  Wow.  I wonder if this trend will continue?  Stay tuned!

18 June: The island in Amman

18 June You didn't know there is an island in the middle of Amman?  It IS well-guarded, but not a secret.  Can you get voted off?  Definitely.  Exclusive?  Absolutely.  The American Embassy is an attractive but imposing structure in the upscale neighborhood of 'Abdoun.  This was not my first time to a US embassy (I've visited the embassy in Cairo several times), but it was certainly my first time to visit an embassy for the sole purpose of swimming in the pool. One of my new friends from church invited us to the embassy pool today.  And what an experience it was.  I accepted the invite in order to offer the girls a chance at "normalcy"--a chance to have a bit of the summer they were planning on.  Mayumi had her bathing suit on about three seconds after waking, she was so excited.  So it was devastating for all of us when she threw another big fit going down to breakfast and disqualified herself from going to the pool.  Why the fit?  Well, we were in a hurry to have breakfast and get on our way since this kind friend had generously offered to meet us outside the pool to provide us the escort we would need to get inside.  Knowing she would likely have her four kids in tow, I did NOT want to make her wait.  Yumi, however, immediately picked up on our need for move quickly and began to balk.  It is like she feels backed into a corner and just bares down.  She just refused to move. There we were, both Nate and I, extending out hands to her, first asking--than commanding--her to just come DOWN the stairs to breakfast.  And she refused to move.  Acting like a caged animal, but ironically forcing US into a corner.  Because what can WE do?  Just let her get away with it?   Nate hauled her back upstairs and I headed down to breakfast with a heavy heart.  Nate had planned on staying back at the hotel anyway to study so he suggested Yumi not be allowed to go to the pool.  It was the right idea, of course, but I was so sad as I headed to the embassy.   I was greeted at the embassy gate by a US marines and a long queue of Jordanians applying, I assume, for visas to the US.  The initial processing is down outside of the embassy so there they are--lines of people--papers and wallets in hand.  It feels weird to just walk into a place like that wielding nothing but a little, but powerful, blue book. My sadness turned to anxiety as I was informed that I should have entered at the back gate but would now be "processed" at the front gate after many papers were signed, ledgers filled out, passes examined, and an escort found.  The minutes ticked by.  My cell phone--which I had to surrender anyway--was dead, so I had no way of calling my friend to apologize for being so late.  After 30 minutes I could not keep back the tears.  While the Jordanian embassy guards tactfully looked away and played with Emi, I faced a wall and just cried. For these first time since coming.  But once I started, boy, I could NOT stop.  I was frantically trying to think happy thoughts and get under control when the escort they found me--one of Nate's coworkers--rescued me.  He was very kind and said he'd be a rich man if he had a nickel for every time he'd cried in a foreign country.  He had two other people with him, including the Community Liaison Officer, so we made quite a procession crossing the embassy compound: me, wiping back the still flowing tears, cute Aya on my stomach, Emi patiently waiting to go to the toilet, and three embassy employees trying their best to make me feel better.  And all because I wanted to go to the pool. But we made it!  And we had a great time.  I enjoyed chatting with the other visitors to the pool and my girls loved being in the water.  We stayed for over two hours and quite honestly did not want to leave when we did at noon.  But I knew Nate had to get to class and he'd want me back to take over Yumi Duty. I was surprised, then, to find them both gone when we returned to the hotel.  Since my phone was dead, Nate couldn't call to confirm when I'd be back (well, and I'd not have had it anyway, would I?  Surrendered it at the gate.) so he decided just to leave for lunch and class-and to take Yumi with him.  So I had to get the now very tired tired and hungry Emi and Aya back into a taxi and down to Nate's school to pick Yumi up.  Emi had a meltdown but what can you expect.  It was a big morning for her but I know she had fun.   Yumi seemed just fine when I collected her.  She made up some story about Nate taking her to some really great pool--better than the embassy pool--where there was candy and cake and treats and.....  I asked her "oh, so what will daddy say when I ask him about it?". She was quiet a moment and said "oh, mom, I forgot.  It was my grandpa that went to that other pool, not me.". Hmmmm.  A smart and tricksy girl. This afternoon was pleasantly uneventful.  After putting the girls down for naps and writing the above account of our morning, I got in the workout I'd missed by the early visit to the pool.  I released Yumi from her quiet time in the bathroom so I could take a shower, but then spent some time with her looking at the craft she made during nap time.  Everyday she makes some grand creation with the 5,000 stickers I brought with us to Jordan.   After each girl had awakened, we went out to the little commercial area close to the hotel.  Nate met us there.  We made a set of purchases that we make every three days or so: a package of diapers, 6 pack of 1.5 liter bottles of water, and several cartons of milk.  Other days we may get a bag of fresh pita and a round of cheese.  We have also kept a canister of oats on hand for which to make oatmeal for Aya (something I can easily feed her while at a restaurant to ensure she gets enough to eat).  This canister is now empty so that is on my list for tomorrow.  We make these purchases at a shop in this little commercial area.   We also visit the bakery, where they press upon us some little treat.  Today it was chocolate milk.  The launderers is next door.  You may recall our most recent mishap with a different launderer; I think from now on we will go to "Zeydoun" launderers in this little shopping enclave.  There is also a gym that Nate checked out today and may join.  I may too, if we can figure out what to do with the girls.  It is open in the mornings to women and the evenings to men.  The Egyptian fruit/veggie seller is also on our visit list; he has an actual shop with a wide selection and imported (I learned that work today!) goods so he is not nearly as cheap as the guys with the cart on the street down from the hotel.  But he has those equadorian bananas!  My girls just can't get excited about local bananas.  I also bought apricots and one carrot; my plan is to try to slowly but surely get the girls used to eating fresh veggies again, a battle I had to give up on these last few weeks.  We shall see.  The Egyptian guy who owns the shop is awesome.  He always has a treat of fruit for the girls. After spending nearly an hour visiting every institution in this small shopping area, we ordered some take out from the restaurant (shawarmas) and ate it in the hotel dining room while chatting with the Syrian cook whom Aya has a BIG crush on.  This is the same dining room with the cockroaches so I kept a wary eye on all the corners of the room.  We ate our shawarmas in peace, however, and our Syrian chef friend (Mohaned) added some fresh cucumbers to our meal.  Fresh green vegetables!  At last. Showers, bed.  All in all, a good day!