I saw my first camels on the way downtown the other day. My driver was a 23 year old who loves Bill Cinton. We started talking and he said "Obama, shway (like so so, ok), Bush (makes thumbsdown motion), Clinton moomtaz" and then he pointed to a picture he had of the late King Hussein indicating how tight Clinton and Hussein were. Anyway, he asked if I wanted to go straight through the city, or take a highway around the outskirts where we could go faster. so I opted for the road not yet taken... literally. We were driving incredibly fast, so I unfortunately didn't get to snap a picture, but we went by a tent with 2 or 3 camels tied outside of it along the highway. I wonder how much of the year the people live there. The driver was cool though, and had me beep the horn once in traffic, which was actually on the shifter as opposed to in the middle of the steering wheel.
This weekend a bunch of students from the program headed downtown on friday and saturday to explore old East Amman. On friday we hit up the area around the Hussein Mosque, and all of the little shops and souqs. There's a really cool shop with nice hookahs for around 20JD that I'll probably go back to at some point. We grabbed some food in a place down a side street where the ceiling upstairs in the seated dining area was so slow that I had to keep my head cocked to the side. You know the place must be good though, because it was filled with native Jordanians. Also the food there, like many places in Jordan, was very cheap. A shewarma sandwich here is usually less than a JD, which is awesome, and at one of the places near school with awesome falafel you can get two sandwiches for 1JD.
On friday after eating we went to a cool outdoor market. I didn't buy anything but there are just tons of clothes that are all pretty cheap. It's like goodwill on steroids.
We met these guys at the top. We saw them looking over and saying "englisi, englisi." A girl on the program, Biff (all the way to the left) mentioned "I think we're about to be approached." They came over and explained that the guy in the keffiyah was a Saudi and he wanted a picture with us.
My new fbook profile pic.
The market area downtown.
After grabbing some food post-ampitheater we went to this really sweet restaurant/cafe called Jafra in Westel Ballad (the downtown area.) See pictures above. I had sahleb which is a steamed milk, coconut, nuts, cinnamon beverage. We had some really tasty (zaki) house arghillah. This was the same place that during drop-off when we were asking for directions to the Arab League Cafe everyone directed us to. I guess it lived up to the hype.
Our most recent lectures were pretty interesting. We had one from a political scientist about the Jordanian political system which was particularly of note. He, like our first lecturer, said that what is happening in the Middle East hasn't been seen for almost 30 years and this was before Mubarak resigned. But he was still cautious, asking "will this be Berlin 1989 or Tehran 1979." Definitely a fair question. He gave us a history of the Jordanian political system, and an idea of how it is structured.
He said Jordan officially has a tripartite system, with an executive branch (the Prime minister, appointed by the King), a legislative branch (elected house of representatives where laws initiated by the prime minister must begin, and a senate that is appointed by the King,) and a judicial branch which is tasked with adjudicating legal disputes, but does not exercise judicial review. There is an ad hoc council on interpreting the constitution, but is mostly academic. Another interesting aspect of their system is that within the house of representatives, 20% of the seats are reserved for a women's quota, something that would probably never fly in the United States.
Some of the interesting recent developments he pointed out was the dissolution of parliament in 2009, the formation of a new government (the King is the umbrella really for all political action, and his meant to be in charge of the country's direction, but be sort of above the politics, whereas the "government" means the prime minister, the cabinet, and parliament.) A new election was passed in April 2010, but the lecturer pointed to confusion resulting from redistricting as a sign of the laws unprogressive nature.
Recently, since King Abdullah fired the government, a new prime minister designate has been put in place (he needs to be confirmed by the legislature) and he has 90 days to change the election law.
When Mubarak resigned much of Amman was excited. There were celebrations in front of the Egyptian embassy, and many Jordanians I have spoken to have expressed a sense of solidarity with the Egyptian people.
Someone was saying today that Glenn Beck said that "Jordan is next." From what I can tell he, much to my surprise, has gotten even further from reality than before. The city of Amman is made of almost three million people mostly just going about their daily lives. Revolution, by no means, seems imminent.
The lecturer outlined some of the reasons why Jordan is particular. For one, though Tunisia and Egypt were born out of provocative corruption in the face of extreme economic hardship (and Jordan certainly faces economic difficulties,) the populace distinguishes the Monarchy (the Hashemites actually trace their roots to the Prophet Muhammad) significantly from the government. Though monarchal defaming is illegal, monarchal glorification is promoted, but voluntary, and most Jordanians seem pretty attached to their King, especially through his father, Hussein. Another factor tied into this is that corruption, which certainly exists here, is not nearly as provocative as Egypt, Tunisia, or police states like Syria and Libya. Which leads to yet another distinction, the situation in Jordan, though not a civil libertarian's paradise, is not a police state. The final and fourth thing the lecturer pointed to was the strong social connections that exist within Jordan, which provide a substantial safety net. The unrest in Jordan stems primarily from activists, interesting bedfellows of islamists, left-wing parties, and unions, who are calling for better standards of living, better salaries, and lower prices.
The talk finished with the expectation that Jordan will make significant reforms to their election laws, and perhaps even amend the constitution to elect the prime minister. The professor thought that the country is not yet ready for this, however. A strong advocate of meritocracy, he felt that the people would not elect a strong capable prime minister, and that parliament must be strengthened first. He points out that current reforms certainly are preemptive following Egypt, Tunisia, and now possibly Yemen and Algeria.
We also went for a lecturer at the Higher Council for Youth, a government agency tasked with youth empowerment and implementation of what the president of the council, the speaker, termed "strategic culture." Much of the talk was a broad statement of goals, and a list of difficulties facing youth that are fairly universal in the developed world. The question and answers were interesting though, as was that idea of "strategic culture," particularly the religious aspect of the councils mission. They seek to maintain the Islamic nature of the country of Jordan, while directing religious thought away from extremism. This certainly provoked a re-realization of where I am, and how high the stakes can be for what many seemed to find to be a boring lecture. How effective the council is was unclear, but they seem bent on adapting Jordan's uniqueness for the 20th century. There were Jordanian students there who asked questions during the Q/A and hung out with us after, which was pretty cool and was another opportunity to practice arabic.
I have to start thinking about my potential ISP topics. I was originally thinking of looking at an extension of Jordan's labor law in 2006 to protect migrant domestic workers, and try to evaluate its success. But now I'm also thinking of researching opposition groups in Jordan that are calling for representative reforms to get an idea of their philosophical inspirations. Are they inspired by western political theory, or because they are out of power and popular. My last two ideas were if there are any efforts to promote sustainable development through legislation and building regulations, and an analysis of any anti-poverty policies that exists, such as the EITC in the US. If you have any thoughts on the matter, feel free to let me know. I'm leading towards the second given the current situation.
I want to upload some videos on here. But they take forever so for now, there'll just be a select few on facebook!
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