Saturday, November 12, 2011

Traveling to Jordan: Night 1: Exploring Roman Forts and the City








During our first night in Amman, we met up with our friend Zaher, who works at the school with us, and is from Jordan. We took a taxi ride to the Amman citadel. The citadel was an old Roman fort located at the top of a high hill/mountain in Amman. There were a few remains left of the fort (as pictured above). This citadel was very old, and very historic. There was also a lovely view of the city from this overlook, as you can see there are many lights behind us in the top photo. After spending some time at the citadel, we continued down into the city where we saw an old Roman amphitheater. It was amazing as well. Outside of the amphitheater, there were old bits of columns and stone. With my superhuman strength, I lifted these super heavy stones with my bare hands! lol joking! Finally, at the bottom, we visited a mosque. This mosque is the oldest one in Amman, and it was fairly large as well. One thing you will notice is that the mosques always have green lighting, and only green. This sparked my curiosity, so I decided to inquire about it. Apparently, there is no rule that says the light must be green, however, it is traditional. From what I recall being told, when the prophet Mohamed was buried, he was supposedly buried in green, so the mosques use green as somewhat of a remembrance to the prophet. Interesting stuff! After doing the historic things for the evening, the rest of our night was dedicated to eating and relaxing.

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