Contextualised Christmas Dinner

Our friends arrived at 4.30pm, which is still lunch time in Jordanian culture, so we told them that is was Christmas lunch, not dinner. This year we decided to do a full Christmas meal for our local friends, since we are trying to grow more in sharing food and hospitality with people.

There were 14 people, including our family, so we had brought the breakfast room table into the main area of the house to join with the dining table. This was the third Christmas meal we had cooked for our local friends, and the third turkey we had roasted in our oven.

In Jordan, lunch is not lunch unless there is rice. Food without rice is considered snack food, no matter how much of any other staple food is eaten. Therefore, we decided to cook some Jordanian style rice instead of roast potatoes. We cooked a Jordanian rice dish called 'Maglooba', which means 'upside down'. This is because the rice and vegetables are cooked together in a big pan and then turned upside down onto the serving plate. Turning such a big pan over is not easy, and needs 2 people to do it.

They thought the bread sauce and cranberry sauce were a bit strange but enjoyed the turkey meat and the mince pies and Chocolate log roll for dessert.

After the meal we served mint tea and espresso coffee, which always goes down well with Jordanians who normally drink small cups of very strong coffee, rather than large cups of coffee like most people in the UK.

We had a discussion about the Christmas traditions which relate to faith and the ones which are just secular. They saw the guitar in the corner of the room and asked if Paul could play something, so we sang a couple of Arabic songs that we know before they left.

1001 inventions by Isaiah

We went to the 1001 inventions exhibition in the Jordan museum. It about lots of inventions that were discovered in the Middle East in ‘The Golden Age.’, which were the Dark Ages in Europe.

This is Ibn Haytham, he worked out how the eye works and did lots of experiments with lenses and mirrors hundreds of years before any other scientists did similar things.

Abbas ibn Firnas was the world’s first pilot. He found out how birds fly and tried to become a bird himself by attaching feathers to his body and two wings that he could flap. Then he jumped off a tower and succeeded in gliding to the ground. On this simulator we had to flap our arms as fast and as long as we could to see how far we could go.

Many rock formation on the moon are named after Golden Age inventors and scientists.

Surgery was invented in the Middle East

This section was to show that many inventions and discoveries from the Golden Age are still used today, such as drinking coffee, studying at university, algebra, the toothbrush, the crank and hospitals.

A Different Village Playgroup

It wasn't a great start to the morning as the local lady who had invited us to do playgroup in the new village wasn't answering her phone. Ten minutes away from where we were meant to meet her, she finally called me back. It seemed like she had forgotten that we had planned to do playgroup that day but in an honour / shame culture then it would be shameful to admit that she had forgotten and shameful for us to suggest that she had forgotten! So we all continued with the plan anyway but we weren't sure quite what was going to happen. We were expecting her to bring along some young women volunteers but there were none, neither was there any sign of the tea and coffee that she said they would provide.

We drove out into the countryside and finally arrived at a building in a small village with a number of scattered houses around. The manageress of the “women's centre” came out to greet us and glowing introductions were made. It is common to speak very highly of someone when introducing them as a sign of honour.

Word Got Out

We were not expecting to enter a room full of women and children! There must have been about 30 mums and over 40 children crammed in together. The manageress was very apologetic and said she'd told only 2 mums (maybe only half an hour ago!) but word spreads very quickly in a village and soon all the mums knew that something was happening and had turned up to find out.

One Big Family

The facilities were very good, so we set up toys in a smaller room for younger children, a craft on 2 tables in another room and the mums stayed in the bigger room. After another round of formal introductions, my friend did a “thought for the day” about each of us being valuable and some gentle exercise for the mums. I meanwhile helped with older children make “binoculars” for the craft and we were blessed with 3 volunteers from the village who helped us. The children were some of the most well behaved children that we have worked with which might have been a reflection of the strength of community in this village and how most people living in the village were part of the same extended family.

Encouraged to Encourage

We had been asked to give parenting advice so I did a slot encouraging the mums to not just give attention to the negative things that their children do but to notice and praise their children when they do well. It seems that people here rarely praise or tell their children “well done”, maybe because they don't want their children to become proud, or fear of envy, the so called “evil eye”.

We finished with drinks and snacks and even though we hadn't expected so many people to be there, thankfully there was enough to go round. One mum asked, “How often are you going to come? Everyday?”. Unfortunately we can't go everyday but we hope to return twice a month.

Buying an electric car

I left home at 7.40am in a Careem Taxi, the local version of Uber, which is much more convenient than walking all the way to the main road to flag down a yellow cab, especially in rush hour. I arrived at the car dealer at about 8 o’clock to buy our new car. After handing over payment in cash and signing a contract of sale, we headed off to the vehicle licensing department to register the vehicle in my name.

A vastly improved process

The last time I bought a car in Jordan, the process took most of the day, but as a result I had made friends with the previous owner of the car, who is still a very good friend. The dealer had assured me that I’d be able to get to work before my 11.30am start time. We got to there at 9am and I was immediately amazed at how much they’d improved the system since the last time I did this. Everything was very well signposted, so you don’t need to go around asking people which office to go to next. Everything is now computerised and efficient and we were finished by 9.30. We went back to the dealer, sorted out the insurance. I took our new car from there to my work and got there by 11am. 

Buying second hand cars in Jordan

It’s a Nissan Leaf electric car. Normally, cars in Jordan are double the price of the UK because of very high import taxes, but the government here recently decided to encourage greener vehicles by announcing that electric vehicles are exempt from import tax, sales tax and registration fees, which probably halves the cost of the vehicle. Finding a good second hand car in Jordan can be tricky because of the erratic driving, high number of crashes and poor vehicle maintenance of many Jordanian drivers, but this dealer imports second hand vehicles straight from America, so that they have not been driven before by any Jordanians.

Kanafa time

The following day, we bought some Kanafa for our neighbours, which is the tradition here when you get a new car or a new house. It is a dessert made from cheese & butter with sugar and pistachio nuts on top, baked in an oven. We found out that this is supposed to protect you from the ‘evil eye’ which the local people believe can bring bad luck if people look at your new car or house jealously. Our neighbours really appreciated that we embraced this tradition of their culture, and they know us well enough to know that we don’t believe in or have any fear of the ‘evil eye’

Slow queue for the fast charge

There are a few charging points in Jordan, and it only takes half an hour to charge but we heard that you have to queue for about 2 hours to use one. Later on, an electrician arrived to install a charging point for our car on our driveway. With the mileage that we do, we should only need to charge it once or twice a week.

Barbecue in the woods

It was the day before the start of Ramadan and it was also a national holiday, so we decided to invite our friends for a barbecue in the woods. They are very poor and don’t have a car, so it was the first time they had been out of the city to visit anywhere beautiful like this.

Our plan was to pick them up at 1pm, but they called to delay this until 2pm to give them time to finish preparing some stuffed aubergines and courgettes for the barbecue.

Cultural difference

Two members of the family have slight injuries which make it difficult for them to walk far, so we went to a forest where it is easy to set up a barbecue next to where you can park your vehicle. There were several other groups having barbecues in the same area but this did not bother our friends because, in their culture, people like to go to places which are full of other people rather than seeking peace and quiet, as we would be inclined to do.

Arab negotiating skills

As soon as we got out of the car, they spotted someone who was offering horse rides to people and immediately called him over. He said that it would cost £1 per person but our friends demonstrated their amazing negotiating skills and got him down to 25p per person. They had also brought a rope and a blanket with them, which they strung up between two trees to make a swing for the kids.

Too much food

The meat that we cooked, combined with all the other food that had been brought was far too much to eat but they really appreciated having some meat to eat because they normally can’t afford to buy meat very often. 

We had a great time with them, sitting and talking, while our kids had fun, playing in the woods with their kids and we left at about 6pm. It was a great experience for our friends, who had never been to a place like this outside of the city before, and it was also special for us to be able to bless them and to share in their joy.

Wadi Zarqa Ma’in

The previous evening, we had decided to take a trip to a wadi (valley) near the Dead Sea called Wadi Zarqa Ma’in. The kids had the day off school because of ‘labour day’ which is usually on 1^st May, but the government decided to change it to Sunday 30^th April at the last minute, to give people a three day weekend. The school decided to give them the day off on Saturday 29^th April, since Sunday is a day off anyway at Christian-based schools. It is a frequent occurrence here for the government or the school to change things at the last minute.

It took just over an hour to arrive at the wadi and then we started walking. We had not visited this wadi before and straight away, we noticed that there was a lot of water flowing down this wadi, compared to other wadis we have visited. We had to carry Jenson through a lot of it, and hold Ethan's hand to make sure that he wasn’t washed downstream in some places. 

Along the way, there were small pools we could swim in and the kids had so much fun. The water was very warm because it originates from the Ma’in Hot Springs. Lots of local people were also there, enjoying the warm water, but most of them stayed in the lower pools or trekked further up the wadi than we could manage with our kids.

We got back home mid-afternoon and, in the evening, I (Paul) went to visit a friend. My friend is having difficulties in his marriage and is now under pressure from his clan sheikh to marry a lady who is available for marriage so that he can bring her to clan events, where it is expected that he should bring his wife. There are about 10,000 people in the clan and my friend is the official ‘clan advisor’ which is like being deputy sheikh. It is a difficult situation and marriage problems can be common here.

Visiting a Syrian fanily

We arrived at the house at about 4pm. The father of the family met us on the street and showed us the way up to their apartment. In Jordan, houses are often difficult to keep warm in the winter and this house was freezing cold. There was a gas heater, but the gas bottle was almost finished and the windows were all open – presumably to allow some oxygen to enter while using the gas heater. There are often cases in Jordan of people dying of carbon monoxide poisoning while using gas heaters.

Fleeing the fighting

The family was Syrian and they had fled to Jordan to escape the fighting, like many other Syrians. In Syria, they were a middle-class family with good jobs and a nice house but since coming to Jordan, they have been reduced to a desperate state of poverty, forbidden from working and relying on food vouchers from the UN which are only enough for the bare essentials. Like many Syrians who have fled to Jordan, they are just waiting and hoping for things to improve in Syria so that they can return home.

Health problems

They have 5 children, one of whom has developed bladder retention problems as a result of the trauma of what happened in Syria. Another has a problem with a swollen knee which makes it difficult to walk and is taking a long time to heal. We wondered if the lack of nutrition is contributing towards the lengthy recovery process.

Amazing hospitality

We arrived at this time so that they would not feel obliged to cook a meal for us but, according to Syrian hospitality customs, they wanted to give us the best meal they could make in order to make us feel welcomed as friends. Giving food to guests is considered to be a very important expression of hospitality in their culture, more than would be true for most Jordanian families in Amman. They had explained to us that it was very difficult to afford to buy meat, and yet they had put a small amount of mince in the rice, along with a delicious selection of other Syrian dishes.

Some things are worth a lot more than money or food

We wondered how much of their monthly food allowance had been spent on this meal but on the other hand, we could visibly see how much our visit lifted their spirits as we tried to bring some love and joy into their household. We were very proud of our kids who got on really well with their kids and had lots of fun, playing with them. Their mum thanked us profusely for coming and bringing joy into their family for the first time in ages. We hope to repay their amazing hospitality by inviting them to our house for a meal soon.

10 amazing things we saw in the Jordan Museum, by Kira & Isaiah

1) The oldest human statues in the world were found in Jordan, from 7500BC. Apparently, some people in those days had two heads!

2) A 17,000 year old skeleton was found in Petra, buried face down with its hands and feet tied together. This was a common thing to do in those days.

3) The Bedouin girls have been making rag-dolls like this one for thousands of years.

4) They found some mysterious writing from 1200BC and no one knows what it means or what language it is.

5) The lands of Ammon, Moab and Edom, which are mentioned in the Bible, are in present-day Jordan.

6) In 2 Kings 3, it is recorded that Israel, Judah and Edom joined forces to attack Moab, but the attack was not successful. The tablet below is an account of the same story written by the Moabites.

7) This clay camel water fountain was made in 1000BC. It also shows us how camels used to carry lots of water.

 8) These coins are from Petra in the first century AD. Petra was the capital of 'Arabia' which the Apostle Paul visited for 3 years (Gal 1:17-18), so he probably used these coins!

9) These are the kind of toys which Nabatean children used to make thousands of years ago.

10) These are some of the 'Dead Sea Scrolls', which were written in the first century AD and were found in a cave near the Dead Sea in 1948. They contain the oldest surviving Biblical manuscripts in the world. Above is a fragment from the book of Isaiah: "A voice cries out: Prepare a way in the wilderness for the Lord. Clear the way in the desert for our God." The scrolls below are made of copper.

Christmas Eve Open House Party

It was 10am and we were ready for the visitors to arrive, but no one came. This year we decided to have an all-day open house Christmas party on Christmas Eve for all our local friends. We started at 10am, because one of our neighbours started work at 11am but in the end, she was unable to make it.

Is anyone coming?

We were worried that no one else would come either because of heavy rain. Rain is not such a common occurrence in Jordan as in the UK and many Jordanians do not like to go out in the rain unless they have to. Fortunately the rain eased off and then stopped later in the afternoon.

Is this halal?

The food consisted of a mixture of traditional English Christmas food (mince pies, chocolate log roll) and local snacks that we got from the snack bar on the corner (various types of samosa). Kate found some jars of mincemeat at one of the supermarkets here. Some of our guests checked with us that none of the food contained pork and was all halal.

Shoot the Reindeer

Instead of ‘Pin the beard on the Santa’ we decided to have a ‘Shoot the Reindeer’ competition. As you can see from all the names and scores, we also used it for three other parties we did over Christmas time (Isaiah’s birthday, Kira’s schoolfriends Christmas party and a party for our British friends here).

Arabic singing

At three points in the day, people noticed Paul’s guitar and requested to hear him play, so we sang some of the Arabic songs that we know, and Isaiah sang an Arabic Christmas carol that he learnt at school.

First ever Christmas party

Over the course of the day over 20 people came but at different times, so we were able to have quality time talking to each of them. Some were friends that we see regularly, but others were people that we have not seen for a while, so it was great to catch up with them again. They were all very interested in finding out more about what we do at Christmas and why. One of them was shocked to hear that the Jews do not believe that Jesus was the Messiah. A common misconception here is that Christians and Jews basically believe the same thing. For most of our visitors, it was the first time they had ever come to a Christmas party.