On My Way Home

My border crossing from Israel to Jordan went smoothly, and I am now happily checked into a hotel in Amman. The manager is great here...he will show me how to get to the airport via bus, which costs only $5, as opposed to taking a taxi, which is $30. There is also free internet at this hotel! And I only paid $18 for a single room. A good deal for Jordan. The manager is so funny! He likes to joke around. At first he told me it costs $15 per hour of internet...he was only joking. Just now, he offered me a peach, then took it out from under my nose for a second, pretending that he was not going to give it to me. I feel safe and happy here.


I think it is a literal impossibility to refuse tea in Jordan. The manager offered me tea three times when I arrived, and I said no each time, but now he just asked me if I wanted sugar or no sugar. He just brought the tea out to me now....I guess it is a hospitality thing.  :0)

Tonight I had dinner at Hashim's, a falafel and hummus place that is open 24 hrs. Delicious as usual, but after I get back to the US, I think I am done with hummus for a while! I just finished walking around the Suk (Arab Market), next to the Al-Hussein mosque. I took the time to soak in the sights, sounds, and smells of my last night of this journey. It sure has been a long one! Seven and a half months and four countries ago, I left Portland, Oregon to fly to Kathmandu, Nepal.  Tonight, as I threaded my way through the colorful lanes of peaches, tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplant, bell peppers, oranges, and bananas, I felt gratitude swell in my heart and looked up to see a full moon shining up above. It seemed as though the sky was reaching out to bless me.
Thanks God, for keeping me safe along this journey, and thank you for guiding me home. Amen!

USA, here I come!!!

Eilat

May 24, 2012

Eilat, Israel

Here's what I've been doing the past few days:

Nadav and I decided to take a trip to the very south of Israel, a town called Eilat.  It is a beach town on the Red Sea, just across the water from Jordan.  The temperature is super hot, 108 degrees Fahrenheit at midday, but it doesn't feel as hot as India because the humidity is very low (desert climate).  Speaking of desert, our AC bus ride took us all the way through the desert on the way here - it was a bit eerie at times, not seeing anything except sand and date palms (for agriculture).  Yesterday night we went to the beach and had a beer while looking out at the water from one of the many restaurants.  It is very touristy, but also fun.  There was a busy market, music playing, rides to go on, and the colorful lights of the town reflecting off the water.  We have been couch surfing with a wonderful family - this is our second night here.  We cooked dinner for our hosts yesterday night.  The mother, Lara, is interested in Shamanism and dreams of taking her whole family (husband and three kids) to India someday for several months.  

Today Nadav and I took a bus to another beach, where we went snorkeling (pronounced "shnorkeling" in Hebrew).  It was great.  I saw bright blue, turquoise, purple, and yellow fish (parrot fish?), what looked like angel fish, urchins, a couple jellyfish, and other brightly colored small fish that I don't know the names of.  Wish I'd had a waterproof fish id card with me.  I loved watching the many kite surfers, with their colorful, parachute-like kites pulling them across the water on their boards, sometimes flying high above the waves for several seconds at a time.  It looks like a lot of fun, a sport I would like to learn someday.

Tomorrow morning we are going back to Tel Aviv, and may attend a drum circle on the beach there just before sunset.  Many Israelis who have been to India like to make music there on Friday nights to bring in the Shabbat (Sabbath). 

Shalom!

Melissa

Fragments

2012 ,May 21

Tel Aviv

Morning

I love the names of things which curl out from our tongues, pinching between our lips and teeth to pierce the echoless void between those we love and those we don't understand.

I love the epitome of recycling one's effort over the course of a storm.  We reuse the drops of rain, sloshed down in buckets over tin roofs and lightning rods jitterbugging in the dark, to bathe a new flower alive into sunshine.

I love the rebound call of infinite spring, awake at last from nighttime and a thousand miles away from home.

I love the crystalline look of a pale face, eyes staring out from behind black-rimmed glasses, topped with a crop of chestnut hair.

 "Half awake and half asleep," he said, no more knocking on the door of pleasure and expecting nothing in return.  A flock of doves rushed in on a breath of air, too cold for San Francisco in springtime.

Words are never forgotten once they are spoken; they hide in crevices of comfort before having a strange effect on the mind of the observer, as though they carry meaning beyond the brave candle flames which light the pathways of our own thought patterns.  Words edge up your skin like the blade of a knife, enticing soul memories out of their jars like flowers by your bedside, so you can smell your own fragrance as you drift off to sleep and awaken refreshed.

Light is a flight which never mastered the use of gravity. 

This rhythm is not mine, but a wreath on a door where people know they can enter the mystery by knocking three times and waiting to hear what is inside to receive them. 

Stream of Consciousness

20 May 2012
Evening
Tel Aviv

I want to teach you with the words of my soul so we can remember how to be alive, and return to our place in the abode of things. Tell me how you dream. Do you weave fabrics across a twisted loom, or crochet directly with your fingers from God's cat's cradle? I want to speak again with leather tongues and bootstraps made from rawhide. I don't want to lose myself again in you, but stay entwined in my own breathing, blood coursing through my veins and the crevasse of my heart, to light my candle-burning eyes awake with the fear that this may be the last moment I live or the first moment I die.

Can we speak ourselves alive together? Can we stop radiating soul sparks in such lonely places and come together again to feel divine?  Where did I go when I was not with you…back into my cave, or deep inside a mole-darkened tunnel?  These adventures never let God know how small or amazed I feel to continue walking, trembling, upon this path.

I don't know music other than the blind kiss of this irresistible storm which blows the blankets of my emotions off like leaves before a thunderbolt.

Will the day come when I stop trying to measure my soul against the vagaries of others? How is it that one minute I am black and dull, the next afraid or listless, then seized by a fury, emptied out, and spewing poetry from my ears? The questions will never end, not until the stars empty themselves of light, or the fingers of our galaxy forget to stroke the sun one last time. Each word is a personal memory, a masterpiece waiting to be created no matter how awake or asleep we are. Every fragment of lost soul will come home, or we will find it in the end, just you watch.

Even I don't know what destiny is, but I sense it the way a cat smells the tracks of a mouse under the garden bushes at midnight. There is a turning point, a place of balance between fear and excitement, drowning and elation, life and no-life. It is the simple (or not-so-simple) choice between who we are and who we choose to be; between who we think we are, who our parents, relatives, friends, or society thinks we are, and who we feel we are—in our bones, stomach, and intestines, in the soles of our feet waltzing out the door at 2 am to remind us that we know how to improvise.

This is the fire that calls us home. This is the water that cleanses us, the earth we grow upon, the air we breathe and fly into. We have not forgotten how to chase our own shadows down; we have just forgotten how to look at ourselves in the light. Maybe our little waltz would birth lightning and storms, anger brewed in strong black tea, or milk squeezed from Satan's tit. The truth is that I don't know where this writing is going, just as little as you do. We're both strangers here on this blank page, staring out at each other after another long day lived inside the solitude of our own minds.

These memories keep turning themselves into sparks and then I forget what is happening, at least in medical terms. My soul opens up to receive pieces of low-hanging light, I am visited by angels, and deep-glowing eyes stand out amidst a haze of cloud. I wonder if certain readers have come to know me in a different way by hearing these lines taken from inside my cocoon. How do I know what my insides look like until they are spilled out on a mural to paint, murmur, and stare befuddled at the colors they make? These poems will never end, nor will this experience. I just keep plugging and unplugging the metaphors, trying to get the amplitude right.

Jerrash

Today I went to Jerrash. It is a site with extensive Roman ruins. As it turns out, it was the day for all the teenage girls to have a field trip there. Literally there were hundreds of them, all laughing and crying out, just being teens. (I think teens are the same all over the world). They were very friendly, vivacious, and fun. They loved to ask me where I was from, what was my name, was I married, etc. One girl asked me why everyone in the west thinks that Arabs are terrorists...I told her I thought it was because of the media. Then I asked her what she thought of the hijab, because I noticed some girls were wearing it and others were not. She said that she would wear it when she got older, because otherwise God would send her to Hell. Wow! I did not expect that answer. I wish I could have asked some other girls the same question and heard some of their answers. Basically, most of them thought I was the coolest thing around, being from America and all. With their basic English skills and outgoing personalities, they would say things like, "You are so beautiful! We love you! Do you love to the Jordan people? Can we see your eyes?" (I was wearing sunglasses.) After I took the glasses off, they all cheered. "Ohh, you have such beautiful eyes!" they said. Some of them had drums that they would play, and the whole group would sing an Arabic song. Of course, they wanted ME to sing, and dance. I finally agreed to sing a Justin Bieber song with them, the same one that was so popular with my teenage students in Nepal ("Baby, baby"). After finishing the chorus, a security guard and the girls' teacher asked us to stop. Adults here don't like women and girls getting too excited or singing/dancing too much in public. What a shame. All I could think was that these girls are SO lovely and energetic, with such free spirits. They were so curious about me too. I felt sad that they were growing up in a society where they will be so held back in their creative expression and freedom.

Amman Continued

Amman is WAY different than anywhere in India. No cows in the streets, no open sewers. Everything is clean and empty and calm compared to India. Also, all the buildings are the color of sand. Much less colorful. Most women wear hijab (head covering), but it is not required, especially of non-Muslim Western women. Most of the signs are in Arabic, but the tourist ones are in English, and most people do speak English. I have had no trouble getting around. Yesterday I went around the downtown tourist sites by myself. I went to see the Citadel, which is the site of some Roman ruins (a Hercules temple) on the top of a high hill. It was a gorgeous view of the whole city. It is a beautiful thing to hear all the mosques chanting the call to prayer. The only other loud sound is the song of the ice cream trucks, which also deliver gas for cooking stoves to each house. They play a song in a minor key that sounds eerie and mysterious. Much less honking of horns than India, although I think it is probably still more than Eugene. I love the Arabic language. It is so beautiful. I also love Arabic music....I bought 6 cds for a dollar each. The food is great - falafels, pita bread, hummus, baba ganoush. I got a taste of the "Arab hospitality" that the people are known for in the Middle East. As I was walking down the hill from the Citadel, I heard some women laughing from inside a house. I peeked my head in, and the smiled and shouted, "Hello! How are you? Come in! Would you like some coffee?" I went inside and they served me a tiny cup of strong Arab coffee, along with some bread which I ate with cheese. It was great. They were a very happy family, the husband and wife were retired, and their daughter had several small, cute children who danced to Arabic music that was playing on the Arab MTV channel. After leaving, I met another tourist from England who I spent the afternoon with. In the evening, I went with Samia and some of her friends to a place outside Amman where there was a beautiful view of another town, all lit up at night. We smoked shisha (flavored tobacco from one of those big Arabian tobacco-smoking gigs) and talked while enjoying the view. Today Samia and I plan to visit Jerash, a site to the north with amazing Roman ruins. If there is time, we will also visit Um Qais, which is supposed to be very beautiful. Tomorrow Samia is going to Egypt, and I will go South with her, either to Petra or to Wadi Rum (a beautiful desert). I plan on crossing into Israel on May 3.

Amman, Jordan

I'm now staying comfortably at my friend's apartment in Amman, Jordan. We went to visit the Dead Sea today, right after my flight landed around noon. Wow, I was floating so high in the water! It was weird, but cool. The Dead Sea is the lowest place on Earth, and also has such a high salt content that nothing can live in it and your body naturally floats really high in its waters. There are rocks encrusted in salt crystals on the shore, and when you swim in the water, it looks and feels almost like oil because it is so salty. I could see Israel on the other side. The rest of the landscape was very dry and deserty. It was amazing, flying through Sharjah in UAE and also flying into Amman - the plane almost looked like it was just going to land in the desert, before it landed on the airstrip. When I flew out of Sharjah I saw the city rising up out of the desert at the edge of the water, the skyscrapers blending in with the color of the sand like it was another planet. Amazing.