So yesterday, after an uneventful yet taxing day at work, I come home and Heather tells me the news of the day. (disclaimer: I have read none of the news reports on this myself as most of them were in Arabic. Therefore all of this info is exponentially second hand.)
Up in part of the city where we used to live, there was apparently a trio of Bedouins who were dealing drugs of unknown specifications. The police attempted a drug bust and the dealers retaliated by attacking the fully armed officers with long freaking swords. Now the sword is a mighty weapon indeed, especially when wielded by a master, but they didn't reach quite as far as the police guns. And the police were a bit peeved that drug crazed sword bearers were slashing at them.
End result - one of the dealers got killed. As is the norm here in the Middle East, his extensive family was a bit ticked off as well. They showed their displeasure at the death of their relative by subtly rioting in the streets, shooting off guns and setting fire to things.
Many people couldn't run errands or go to work because of the ruckus. Apparently it's a totally legit excuse if you say you couldn't make it to work because there was a shooting going on outside.
Comparatively, doing grading analyses all day is sounding positively cheery.
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hey gretchen, i came across your blog via an expat blog & can relate to a lot of your posts especially when you said "For one who travels as much as I do, making friends just to have them leave you or to have you leave them is part of life" & "but the price of that change, that freshness is that you lose some of the friends you have on a seasonal basis." i just moved to amman from the US via berlin about a month ago; i've been living in a different city/continent every 3 months for the last 9 months and a lot of my life has involved moves to different cities & countries. while i find the change exciting it can also be a bit disheartening. since i just moved here, i don't know too many people yet, and would love to make at least a few friends to help ease the move. would you possibly be up for meeting for coffee or tea at a cafe some time? i realize this post is totally random, but i thought i'd give it a shot anyways :) ciao, salma
ReplyDeleteHi Salma,
ReplyDeleteSure, that sounds awesome. I'm always up for meeting new people!
Um... I'm not too keen on sticking my phone number or email address up where everyone could read it... and I don't want you to have to either. Are you on the Jordan Expat site? You could message me there. My username is phygem.
Hope to hear from you soon!
~G