Traffic

The traffic here is heavy. Lots of fancy cars, never seen so many Mercedes, Bentleys and Jaguars before. And every one drives very fast. No one pay much attention to traffic signs, they seems to be as a suggestion only. “This could be a one way road, but if you feel you want to drive in the other direction, it’s ok!”
Someone said that the Jordanians believe that the driving mirrors are for decoration only. No one ever look in them, so maybe they are right!

But suddenly a policeman stops the traffic from all directions and five black cars, some with dark curtains, pas by even faster. That’s the king, or someone else from the royal family who are taking a ride. After some seconds the policeman waves and the traffic starts again. This is a man who has no problems with the traffic in this country. “Flytta på er här kommer jag!”

Japanese food

Yesterday evening I went with our neighbours to a European film festival. We watched a Spanish film called Secretos del Corazon. A fantastic, sensible and moving film.
Yes it was in Spanish with sub title in Arabic! But some things are universal. Afterwards we went to a Japanese restaurant. I had a pemelo and shrimp salad. Which was delicious.

Our Christmas tree

I found our small Christmas decoration things from Egypt. They are made of camel boons and are very charming. You can hardly see that the angel is an angel! Together with some red ribbons it looks rather Christmas like.
I made coffee to Bo 4.30 this morning because he went to Beirut with the first morning flight. Well, I went back to bed for a couple of hours ….Hope he could sleep some minutes on the plane.
Right now Johan is on a plane back from Brazil, Peter on a plane (or train?) to Stockholm, Fredrik on his bike back from work.
I’m looking forward to Christmas and the time when we are all together again!

Can’t find any “Julstjärnor” so instead I look at my Christmas red geranium.

Flowers

I haven’t bought many flowers since we moved to Jordan. But yesterday I strongly felt it was time for it.

Today I have made some preparation for Christmas. I have been wrapping gifts. It looks like I have made it easy for myself and bought the same gift to my fourteen friends! But that’s not the whole truth.
I’m doing it for Bo (and for his fourteen friends!).
You can see a small flash of what’s inside in the front. If you can guess what it is you will get that one for Christmas because we have one left over. Först till kvarn …..

Purses to put things in.

I do lots of sewing these days. It is always rather small, silly projects. For the moment I ‘m making small pursers or holders to put things in.

My favourites are my IPod cover and my passport cover.

Purses for money and make up stuff.

A small quilt basket to put what ever you want in.

Som more storage things.

One purse for my cell phone and IPod cables and one for my hearing aid batteries.

Baking a cake.

I have started to do some baking. This is my third try. The first one was an apple cake, the second a banana cake and yesterday a carrot cake with icing on the top. It’s VERY healthy! Made with carrots (of course), almonds and oil and not much sugar at all! I found the recipe at http://www.recepten.se/recept/morotskaka.html.
I had some problem to find icing sugar. But I looked at the pictures of the boxes and hoped for the best.
My oven is very strange. When the recipe says 175º, my oven says 300º. Well, now I know about it, but the first times I used it I didn’t get a good result.
It’s also very odd to switch on. I have to go down on my knees while I with my left hand frequently pulls a button, down under the stove, then the right hand is stretched up in the air trying to find the handle which regulates the gas!

I don’t need more exercise that day!

Back in Amman

So, this is the house where we live. Our flat is right under the big roof balcony. As you can see, the bougainvillea is still blooming.
During the day it feels like Swedish summer here, but it is rather cold in the nights.
Today I asked our boab Saied, to put on the heater, because it’s really cold in the bathroom in the mornings.
This is the entrance for us who rents flats in the building. The owner has got one for themselves. The neighbourhood looks mostly like this! There are cars everywhere and no place for pedestrians. The huge building in the front is slowly getting finished, we hope. We also hope it will turn out to be a garage!
This is our street sign. I wish I could read and write Arabic! It looks so beautiful!

Maadi

In early morning one of the days in Cairo I went with Bo to Maadi. I walked from the office down to our old neighbourhood. It took me one hour. But I love walking in Cairo comparing to Amman. In Cairo it's crowded with people and something is happening all the time. It's a kind of chaos that I find very attractive!
I walked around and looked at all old places, visited some good shops and went to Mira for a lovely two hour massage. After that I felt five centimetres taller and ten years younger!

These two pictures show two ways of living in Cairo. The picture above is taken from our hotel window over the roofs in Cairo. Lots of people are living in small ramshackle buildings on the top of every building. You can find the description of this kind of living in the book The Yacoubian Building by Ala Al Aswany . This book has been on the top of the best selling list in Egypt for many years!

This building is a new built villa in Maadi. For the rich and wealthy!

Bulak

Just around the corner from the hotel is the Bulak area where you can buy everything made of fabric. It sounds like heaven for me, but it's more like hell because everything is syntetic. I am in the land of cotton and there is no cotton to buy!

My first day in Cairo

Took a long walking tour round the north part of Zamalek in the morning after Bo left for office. The traffic was already havy but a rather strong wind from north made the air ok.

On my walk I could see all the house boats in that part of the Nile. They look very nice in a distance. But I don't know if I would chose them for living.

After a visit in a modern art museum with, for me, not understandeble art, I took a rest in the beautiful garden at Marriott hotel and had a glass of lemon juice at table 87.

Really refreshing!

I better hurry up tomorrow´s (well soon) Christmas Day!

I´m making a baby boy quilt for Johans and AnnaKarins new baby. And today before we went to the gym I had some hours to work with it.
The baby girl quilt is finished. But it´s good to be prepered for both a girl or a boy!

Tonight we are leaving for Cairo. We will stay there until Thursday. It´s fun to come back to Cairo again. Now I have lots of places to discover and new ones to investigate.

To begin with...

It´s many mounths since we arrived in Amman. And finally I will start my blog ... right now!

At the top you can see a picture of a bouganvilla on the balkony.

We decided this morning to take a tour outside Amman. It was Friday morning and not much traffic since most people stay inside before they go to the mosk.

In the Lonely Planet we had read about the desert castles. And that sounded both romantic and intresting.

Well, the map and the real life is not the same in this country so we ended up, a couple hours later in an other interesting place, Umm al-Jimal!

Umm al-Jimal is only 10 km from the Syrian border. It´s black basalt ruins of a settelment probably founded in the 1st century BC by the Nabataeans, but was quickly taken over by the Romans, my guide book says.

We had a lovely walk in the ruins. No souvenier shops, no guards, no turists! Just the two of us!

Then we went back to Amman to find a place were we could eat. We used our guide book again and found Fakhr el-Din, a Lebanese food restaurant.

The restaurant was very elegant and set in an old villa. It was crowded with families having lunch together.