Picturing Jordan

There’s a shop in Amman’s main market downtown that sells traditional Arabic sweets. I’m not sure who was more excited about this half-kilogram of baklava (which is called “baklawa” in Arabic) — me, or the jovial young Jordanian selling it.

Even if the number of mosques in Amman didn’t outnumber churches by a factor of ten, the Saint Thaddeus Armenian Apostolic church would still stand out. The unique architecture caught my eye once and then I started seeing it every time I glanced at Jabal Al-Ashrafiyeh. After weeks of squinting and asking myself “Is that an Armenian church?” I finally went on an scavenger hunt and found it.

A few weeks ago I slept in a tent on the cusp of Jordan’s Rift Valley. Wild Jordan has regular hiking and camping trips to the reserve and they are very affordable. The staff are friendly and genuinely care about nature conservation. Trips to this and other national parks are part of an impressive government effort to preserve Jordan’s natural spaces.