Trip of a Lifetime - Conclusion (Part 1 of 2)

Conclusion: Curiosities, Companies, Causes, and Companions

The trip is over, and it's time to tie up some loose ends. I didn't intend to make this full of alliteration, but I'm a fan of a good literary device, so now that the title just worked out that way I'll milk it for all its worth.

CURIOSITIES

Bathroom curiosities will start this section. It's curious that the more you spend on a hotel, the less of a shower enclosure you get. 

Here's the Landmark Hotel in Amman. That stationary glass panel only extends about two feet from the shower wall, and the shower head extends out a foot. 

The bath mat would be soaked. The floor would be soaked. 

I didn't take a photo of the one in our Jerusalem hotel. It was similar to this. The mirror was on the opposite wall. It's an incredible motivator for dieting.

Here's the shower in our simple kibbutz. Full closure! They even provide a squeegee on a pole so we could squeegee the floor if it got a bit wet, which it didn't, because it has shower doors.

Here's the shower in a TENT in a bedouin camp. Full closure! Dry floors!

When I just googled "no hotel shower door" to find a photo of the one in our Jerusalem hotel, I discovered that Condé Nast Traveler even wrote an article about The Slow Disappearance Of The Hotel Shower Door. So it's a thing at the fancy hotels. You wouldn't catch that kind of nonsense at a Motel 6 or Best Western. Only at a 5-star hotel will you get the experience of sloshing on a completely drenched bath mat at the edge of a soaking wet floor right outside the shower. And no squeegee or floor drain. Just dry yourself off and throw your own bath towel onto the floor to sop up the floor pond to avoid a nasty slip-and-fall.

Another bathroom curiosity is the kitchen sink dish sprayer mounted to the wall next to the toilet. We couldn't find toilet paper in every bathroom, but we could always find these sprayers. The first time I saw one I got an "ew" face. I've seen bidets in restrooms, and they gained popularity in US households with "the toilet paper shortage of 2020," but bidets usually have the sprayer in the bowl. The wall-mounted kitchen sink sprayer seemed a little more unwieldy and likely to cause a mess on the seat.

One of our travel companions had warned us about the possibility that we might not find toilet paper anywhere. She had packed a small pack of toilet paper designed for travel and camping. (Not my photo. I grabbed this photo from the internet.) See how small this roll is? This roll would fit into the core of a standard roll of toilet paper. It fits very easily in a purse or jacket pocket. 

After her warning I grabbed the extra roll of TP in the hotel bathroom at the Grand Court Hotel. But traditional rolls don't really fit well in a purse or pocket. So my standard toilet paper roll ended up in my suitcase, which got packed away in the back of the bus (and now that roll is here in Longmont, Colorado). I tried to always keep some tissues in my pocket just in case. One time we stopped at a convenience store and our guide stood at the bus door holding out a tissue box for us to grab some tissues on our way in. He said, "The chance that there is no toilet paper in there is 100%." Between the tourist places that had toilet paper, and the times we were prepared with our own, there was only one time that I wasn't prepared. I knew there wouldn't be toilet paper, but in my denial I still looked everywhere. There wasn't a single roll anywhere. No wrapped rolls sitting on the toilet tank, no empty dispensers on the walls where toilet paper would usually be, and not even any trash receptacles for tissues or even feminine products. Just a sprayer on the wall.

It was ... effective! (I might even say... exhilarating?)

Cuisine is the second curiosity. On our first day in Israel we were in our Jerusalem hotel at the buffet, and I picked up a 1/2" thick rectangle of something near the dinner rolls. When I got it back to the table mom asked what it was. "I don't know. I'm just trying a little of everything." I took a bite off the corner. It was firm and not easy to cut through with the side of a fork, kind of like a really dense brownie in consistency. It tasted sweet, and felt a little ... gritty? I told my mom I thought I had just bitten into a slice of brown sugar? But it wasn't sweet enough for that. During our walk through the Jerusalem Shuk the next day we learned that it was halva. 

Having grown up north of Chicago, with Armenian neighbors next door, Greek and Italian and Indian and German and Pakistani and Chinese and Sushi restaurants everywhere, the third-largest Jewish population in the world with their kosher delis and restaurants, mom inviting all the foreign engineers to our house when she'd introduce them to her company as head of human resources, and our travel to many countries, I've been exposed to a lot of foods from around the world in my life. So it was a surprise to see something I had never heard of that we found literally EVERYWHERE in Israel and Jordan. The halva we  tasted was at a place called "The Halva Kingdom." The perfect name for what we experienced, and there were four or five Halva Kingdom locations in the shuk. It was made of tahini (ground, toasted sesame seeds). Each "cake" of tahini in the case you see above was a different flavor. Pistachio, Chocolate, Vanilla, Pomegranate, Date, Walnut, and combinations of two or three ingredients. Our chef guided us from shop to shop during our tour, and the employees at each shop happily handed us samples of all sorts. Across the way we visited another branch of Halva Kingdom and saw how tahini is made in the ancient way. Toasted sesame seeds entered a large stone mill from a hopper above the mill. They were crushed between rolling stone disks, and the oil drained through a pipe at the bottom of the mill. 

This store sold bottles of this tahini in every flavor you can think of. Buffalo chicken, spicy chili pepper, chocolate, honey, dates, walnuts, coriander, parsley, mocha, and more. Gift boxes of multiple bottles were a big seller. We got little spoons and sampled many of the varieties. It's shocking how much can be done with sesame seeds. 

Currency is the third curiosity. We could pay in dollars in Israel and Jordan. We could also use Jordanian Dinars in Israel, and the New Israeli Shekel in some places in Jordan. We could swipe our debit and credit cards just about everywhere except the little make-shift markets on the street that had no electricity, and therefore no credit card processing machinery. Otherwise, even in the smallest of shops in Jerusalem's Old City market we could use our cards and currency.

COMPANIES

National Geographic is the company Amy decided to use for this trip for mom and I. She has seen this trip on the horizon for a long time, and she wanted to go with a very reputable company that would put safety and traveler experience at the top of their priorities. 

G Adventures is a travel partner that National Geographic uses. They have multiple styles of travel. The most economical level is Classic. We went that route, but the tour that went for 15 days through Israel and Jordan was "Upgraded." 

The National Geographic Expeditions page has the same exact tour listed in Journeys. The higher level of travel, with fancier hotels, expert lecturers, and more cultural excursions, is National Geographic Journeys. Their Israel/Jordan tour is exactly the same as the G Adventures Upgraded. Same tour for the same price on the same dates. Their most expensive tour is called "Wildlife of the World by Private Jet." That one lasts 24 days, it offers the ultimate service level, and it costs about $100,000.

What impressed me about G Adventures was their commitment to animal welfare, child welfare, environmental welfare, respect of local culture, and redistribution of wealth through directed channeling of tourism dollars. They partner with Planeterra, which is a non-profit organization that supports communities in need. 

CAUSES

One community in need that we visited was the Noor Women's Empowerment Group in the Aida Palestinian refugee camp. This is a group of 13 women with disabled children, who have banded together to create opportunities for their children by building a rehabilitation and education center for them. They earn money through offering cooking classes, selling hand-stitched embroidery items, renting out space to visitors to the camp, and taking donations. If you'd like to support what they do, you can learn about them and donate through their website. This page provides a video of what they do, and how much good can be done with different levels of contribution. 

Another community we visited was in Jerash, Jordan. Beit Khayrat Souf teaches cooking classes to tourist groups, which brings them income, thus empowering women toward equality in society. They opened their doors in 2016, and began receiving support from both Planeterra and Unicef in 2019 -- just before the pandemic shut them down. 

Jameel, a founding member of the association, says “Every woman should have this confidence to go out and start working, and to share the workplace equally with men.”

Equality in the workplace is a big ask in Jordan. In 2016, when Beit Souf opened its doors, the comparative percentages of economically active men to women was 58.7% to 13.2%  

Here's a sign we saw in a women's restroom at a gas station in Jordan. 

The first thing that jumps out in this photo is probably the hole in the floor. It's a squat toilet. I didn't attempt it. The other stall had a toilet (and this time I had the tissues that our guide handed out in the bus). Anyway, do you see the sign that's INSIDE the women's bathroom? It says "Sorry Bathroom Women." This is an apology to the men who have to walk five paces further to use the men's room. I wish I knew what this says in Arabic, which might reveal more about the message than the sign creator's English efforts. Maybe it says, "Hey bro, you clearly weren't looking at the sign of the woman OUTSIDE this room, but this restroom is for WOMEN, so please get out and walk five more steps to your own bathroom. Thanks, Management." However, I suspect the Arabic also apologizes to the men that this is the women's room. I include this photo simply to say that a center that strives for women's equality in Jordan is doing some pretty tough work. 

For more examples of gender obstacles women face in Jordan, walking on the sidewalks of Jordan turns out to be a daunting thing for women. I know that mom and I clearly look like tourists, which might have had some impact in what we experienced, but my mom and I also a women tourists. The men were not about to step aside for us on the sidewalk, even if they were walking side by side, we were against a building walking single file, and there was nowhere for us to go. On several occasions we had to step off the sidewalk into the street to let them pass. Last month I saw a woman's Facebook post that's going viral in America. It said, "I decided not to step aside for a man on the sidewalk if we were walking toward each other. In two weeks I've collided with 38 men." Well, in Jordan it would be far more than 38. One female in our group said, "I tried to order something at a restaurant last night, and the waiter wouldn't look at or acknowledge me. He kept asking the men questions about what they'd like to order, but when I'd ask for something he'd look away and not acknowledge me. It's been years since I've experienced anything like that." 

So bravo to the women of the Beit Khayrat Souf, in your most admirable goal of equality!

Another place we visited was the Al Numeira Environmental Association. This link takes you to the description of their work from Planeterra, and this link takes you to their own website, which describes their multiple efforts to increase sustainability and improve the environment in their region of Jordan.

Mission Statement: Al Numeira Environmental Association’s mission is to promote innovative water conservation methods and environmental education to build a more sustainable future and improve human well-being in the Jordan Valley.

This association feeds tourists from the foods they grow, they receive broken bicycles and repair them, then rent them to tourists who want to roam the area on bikes, and they repurposed used and discarded materials to make all the furniture we sat on, and all the planters we saw were made from used tires. 

The women in the front and center of this photo made our lunch. Not to sound like a broken record, but it was delicious. (Do people say "broken record" anymore? Does it indicate that I'm an AARP gal, since cassettes and CDs have already come and gone since the last time I heard a vinyl record skip?)

This conclusion has too many parts and words, so I'll cover the final segment, Companions, in a separate post.