A Day in 'The Holy City'

Yesterday we returned from a four day study in Jordan. We visited a couple Decapolis cities, like Pella and Gadera, and some key sites in Ammon Moab and Edom. We also went to Petra, which was very fun, I've wanted to go there since even before I decided to study Archaeology. Petra is a Nabatean site, and they carved their houses and tombs out of the soft sandstone. I was glad we got there early before the place was too crowded, and we got a chance to walk around and hike to the monastery, about 45 minutes away. I didn't know how big the site was! We also saw some amazing views up near the monastery. Asside from looking at the land and some bible stories about the trans-Jordan tribes and kingdoms, it was fascinating to see Jordan as another country, and how different it is from Israel just across the rift. In many ways they are similar, but, for one thing, the differance in religion was seen in a ifferance of dress. In Israel, you see many Jews wearing their kippa, or even the Hassidic Jews in their black suits and hats. In Jordan, however, you saw men wearing red kafias, the checkered head scarf, and sometimes long robes, especially among the older men. The Woman all had their heads covered, some were clothed entirely in black with only a slit for their eyes. Because there are also many Muslims in Israel, you see some of this there as well, but not nearly as much as in Jordan.
When we got across the boarder, we got a new buss, and met our tour guide (required for every group visiting Jordan) and our policeman (required by the United States for every group of U.S. citizens). When we got in the bus, our guide, James, said "Folks, it's not often your buss driver, your guide and your policeman are all Christians!" He later told us that Islam and Christianity are the only represented religions in Jordan, and Christianity is only 4% of the population. Jordan's King, Abdullah II, has done quite well at making a relatively stable nation, and many refugees from Syria and Palestine are there. In fact, within the last decade or so Jordan's population almost doubled because of incoming refugees. However, it seemed a bit less developed than Israel, with lots of trash, and facilities which weren't as nice. It was funny to get this impression going to Jordan, because in many ways those were similar impressions I had going from the U.S. to Israel. Now, coming back from Jordan, Israel seems pretty developed! I really enjoyed Jordan though, and it wasn't really primitive or anything, it just made me realize how wealthy we are in the United states.
I also found some venomous critters, including a "Deathstalker" Scorpion. It was under a board I picked up on Tell Deir-allah. These guys are lethal, one sting can, and likely will, kill you. Yikes! It was pretty big too. James told us that Bedouins cook two scorpions and grind them up, then mix them with water to feed to their children as babies. Once's they've had scorpion as a child, they grow up to be immune, and would probably only get a slight fever after being stung.
Later, on Bozrah I found a baby snake, which James said was also venomous.
It is hard to believe there are only a few more weeks left to the semester! I think it will probably be good to move on to something new, although I will certainly miss this, and all the people. I'm starting to really look forward to being back home in the States too, I'm realizing some funny little things that I miss in everyday life, like being in certain stores like walmart, or wearing shorts in public, or holding U.S. dollars. Things I normally wouldn't think about much, but after almost three months without them, I notice it! I'm trying not to think about it much for a while yet, I still have two and a half months left here!