“Draw me a laaamb,” somebody said to me a couple of days ago.A fluffy, snow-white, innocent one, whose mummy washes him every morning, who skips around playfully with his cousins, kicks his fragile legs in the air and runs around momma sheep on the hillside meadow. Then Snowflake stops, chews on some grass he grazed on in the morning but had almost forgotten about by now, his gentle pink lips show, he looks at you with his crystal clear eyes, gazes right through you and goes:
“Baaa.” The next moment he rushes off with his friends over the rocks, scraping his young, gentle hoofs.
Lambs and young goatlings are so cute, and so are the little pans they’re going to be cooked in next week by the Muslims. Next Friday is 'Aid al-Adha, the feast of sacrifice, when the lamb that we've just met, called Snowflake, the one that went:
“Baaa,” will be turned in the direction of Mecca, they'll thank the Almighty and, like in the footage from Iraq, which we (luckily) never see until the end, he’ll be sent to the happy hunting grounds with a long knife.
Just yesterday the ship that I had been waiting for for a couple of days now has arrived to the port of Aqaba. In Slovenia you sometimes see trucks filled with cages full of chicken which, usually at night, stink up the roads. The driver's cage is in front, the one that only has warm air blowing inside if you'd like and when you'd like, behind there's cages for the little chilled chicken, and then there are wheels below. Now picture a couple of hundreds of metres long ship, which has the command bridge in the back, some steel in the front and bottom, just so it doesn’t sink and all the rest is lamb cages – everything that was cabins in Titanic is naturally air-conditioned cages here. When I drove past, Snowflake was no longer on board. The ship was empty, the crew was cleaning Snowflake’s poops and the poops of his buddies, while him and his buddies were on the truck, on the way to the inside of the country
Today I went to Amman to extend the hospitality of Jordan for myself and all the vehicles and on the way there I passed quite a few trucks, which were transporting Betsies (yes, cows can also be sent to the highlands) with her friends and Snowflake’s friends, full speed from the port. After the Iraq road branched off from the one to Amman their number reduced.
At the end of haj, the pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca (you can read more about Mohammed and Islam in many places), they observe a holiday in honour of Abraham's sacrifice of his son Isaac (the Old Testament), when the latter in the last moment, after the Merciful saw that Abram (whom he later called Abraham) really had faith and was willing to sacrifice his firstborn son (after him and his wife Sara tried really hard, since she only became fertile at about 99 years of age – everybody in the Old Testament lived a long life) on the Lords command, was miraculously replaced by a ram. Then Abraham did evil to the ram and embraced his son. As I mentioned, you'll get more information on this subject in the Old Testament.
And why do the Muslims celebrate the saving of IZAAK? They don't. Sara wasn't fertile, but in that time polygamy was already very common. Besides his wife, Abraham was also “acquainted” to maidens and house assistants. Yep, he was that kind of a fellow. And when he met one of them, Ishmael was born. Hmm?
And since earlier we mentioned the Lord’s commandment: “Sacrifice your firstborn child!” we actually coveredthe Jewish propaganda, which the Old Testament surely is. And the Muslims are convinced that Abraham wanted to sacrifice Ishmael who was born – as you correctly assumed – while Sara was still infertile. So, what's the catch? Isaac founded the Jewishrace and Ishmael started the Arab one. Yes, that's how things stand! This is dangerously close to religious propaganda, so I'll stop illuminating the past and whoever's interested will find enough reading.
I'm sitting in Amman in a “as-sultan koofee shoob” in Shmeisani quarter and I'm typing. In Amman it's much cooler at 900 metres of altitude than in Aqaba. It was 13°C there in the morning (16 at midnight). I'm surrounded by locals, covered with their typical Jordanian white and red chequered kerchiefs, drinking tea, playing “Backgammon” and smoking water pipes. There's an attendant walking up and down the cafeteria with fresh coal, making a lot of noise with his coal tweezers. He looks a bit bored. Some people are also smoking their own cigars and cigarettes, brought from outside. A little old man with a long, thick, grey beard just walked in and was offering gloves to the visitors from the door of the cafeteria. They're generally very expeditious here. At every moment they bring out exactly what you need from God knows which storehouse. Umbrellas, down jackets, gloves, pelerines, beach umbrellas... When entering Petra (no, it's not a girl, Petra is the ancient city of the Nabataeans, the most important Jordanian culturally-historical, and you could also say tourist sight) in winter months you can also rent a down jacket.
On the other side of the bar there are three guys who look like Saudis. Well, nice! The entire Muslim world wants to get inside their country now and they want to get out. Like Monaco in the time of F1 races. One of these days they'll close the borders, which means, whoever was late won't be a hajji, won't make the haj. Just two days ago I met a convoy of packed-full vans, cars, and buses with Libyan and Tunisian license plates on my way out from the camp to the south of Aqaba, where I stay now. They came with the ferry from the Egyptian Nuweiba and continued their journey to the Saudi border, about fifteen kilometres further. They take the ferry because of course they're not allowed to enter the so often praised paradise country, whose name hasn’t been revealed here yet, because then the Saudis (especially them) wouldn't let them enter either. I suspect the ferry is theirs.
I had quite some difficulties today in Amman. I was looking for diesel, the light had been flashing for almost a hundred kilometres. And what do you know, I stopped at several gas stations and there was only regular, super and extra super petrol. And of course again they were convinced I was making a mistake when I wanted to put “that truck mess” inside such a nice little car. Finally! Soolar! But what good does it do, when the pump nozzles were truck-size and my Partner would be sore if I tried to stick them inside. And I'd be sore with it. I finally found a station, which had a single shy diesel pump, beside ten petrol nozzles, somewhere in the end, in the shadow, where you have to be careful not to fall on the ground when you step outside the car, because of all the spilt oil. They like to fill it up themselves here. Which also means all the metal around the rear wheel will be smeared with oil and the nozzle will be happily back in its place when I'd tank at least three more litres myself. I'm being petty, I know. I'm trying to cure myself. Just like I'm gradually getting used to the fact that very few car wash places let me take the mop to wash off all the soapsuds and the soot off the rims and to stoically watching how they use the same mop to wipe three quarters of the window (which is when they’re finished with the window), then very quickly the wheel cover, the roof, and then thoroughly the side of the car and the rear door. AAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!! And I always ask which the very best car wash in town is. I almost got into a fight with a guy in Damascus once, when I brought the piggy off the field. It was all muddy, and they couldn't wait for the bike to cool off and I also wasn't allowed to wash it myself. I explained it to the guy to just sprinkle some drops of water around the aggregate, move to the rims and the plastic first and then go back to the aggregate. “No sweat, dude, we're professionals” the mouth and the body were saying.
You do know he directed the jet fully to the aggregate first, don't you? And when the self-content smile of the washer was saying: “I'm done, where's my baksheesh,” I finally managed to get my hands on the hose and washed tones of dirt from the spots all you readers probably know very well.
Translation from Slovenian:
Maja Simeonov