Taking photos

I’m trying to develop my way of taking photos. We bought a new camera before Christmas and I have still not learned all different possibilities with it. And I’m too lazy to read the manual!

This artichoke have dried now and look real interesting, more like a flower.

Tea with mint

Here in Jordan, as in many other countries, people have their tea with a couple of fresh mint leaves. Even I use it now. Together with my Christmas gift tea it’s really lovely.
If you haven’t tasted Kusmi Tea yet, run out and get it!

The taste and the scent of the tea are just incredible (even without the mint leaves). I have figured out that the tea comes in different tastes. I got Anastasia with lemon and orange blossom taste.

Friday

A very quiet and peaceful day. Yesterday evening we went and said good bye to Lise and Steen who now are moving to Cyprus for a period of tree years. I will miss Lise very much, we had a lot in common.
Today it has been an awful weather with heavy rain and storm winds the whole day. But in the afternoon we decided despite of the weather go shopping. The rest of the population in Amman had made the same decision….
This is the ingredients for today’s dinner.Now a couple of hours after the dinner, Bo has left for Cairo, and will be away for some days.

Visitor

Today I had a little visitor. It was Sherleen from upstairs. She is soon becoming one year old and I will make a dress for her. Her mother Linda and I will go down town one of these days to look for fabric.

Dubai

We went to Dubai for a couple of days, B for work and me for holyday (!). The first night I wanted to take some photos of the heavy traffic. Then I forgot to turn off the camera and the next day when I wanted to take lots of (interesting) photos, my camera was dead!

I spent two whole days on the beach and at night I went to one of the great shopping malls for food and some shopping.
Everywhere lots of ladies covered in black buying Dior, Burberry, Prada …. Even I sneaked in to the fancy stores and saw the prices of handbags ….about 2000-5000 US dollar each!

Remember my Arabic languge books...? Forgot them in the hotel room in Dubai! What will my teacher say!!!

A rainy day

In Jordan the winter months are January, February and Mars. And up to a week ago I didn’t think it was much of a winter. Even the Jordanians complained, it was too hot and it was too little rain. But now in the end of February the winter is here! Storm and rain most every day and only + 8 degrees during the day. We have central heating in the flat so we are not complaining. But many people here in Jordan suffers a lot during winter.
Today we are staying indoors, looking out at the rain. There are no drains for rainwater in the streets so lots of smaller or bigger "lakes" pop up here and there. We live on the top of one of Ammans many hills and it is not so bad in our street but down town it is worse. And it is a bit of an adventure to drive throw water filled tunnels and roads.

Surprisingly my geraniums at the balcony are still blossoming! I gave them a handful of fertiliser in October and that gave them a kick!

Tonight

Tonight Bo will treat me with his new food invention, he is very proud of it. He investigated it during my stay in Sweden.
Here you have the complicated recipe. Take a red or a yellow pepper and cut it in four pieces. Fill the pieces with soft cheese. And ready to eat!

Elin

Congratulations to Elin on her two month birthday.

Hair dryer

My old hair dryer suddenly started to feel far too hot and smelled very strange. So off we went to the shop to buy a new one.
Over twenty different types of hair dryers were lined up in the shop. I asked a shop assistant which one he could recommend. He said with a sombre expression that he strongly recommended this dryer from Braun. Why, I asked with curiosity. He answered seriously that then my hair would end up like the hair on the box. The hair on the box was long, extremely shining and brown.
Happy for the positive answer I bought the hair dryer from Braun and went home.
After being using it for more than a week I must say I feel a bit disappointed ….Ok, my hair gets dry, but the rest …….

Jeans

Last weekend we bought the coolest little jeans to Elin. I often end up at the children’s department in the stores now days! But I try very hard not to buy anything because I know she still got lots of clothes. But this time I couldn’t resist! Aren’t they cute?

Arabic

I have decided to try once more with the Arabic language. My new teacher, Khawla, starts with the alphabet and by teaching words that begins with the letter we are practising. (I think this is something I recognise… ;) !!)
My teacher in Cairo, the strict Ola, started with the grammar, and that was not really my way.

So for tomorrow I must know the letters alif, ba, ta, tha, djiim, ha, zha, d, thal, ra and za. I must recognise them, write them and know at least one word which starts with every letter.

I have bought a book for children to practise in.

Wish me good luck! (Tack Freddan!)

Eating in the streets

Very often you can see mobile food vehicles in the streets. Today when I was walking back from Swefihe to Smezani from my Arabic class I run into this gentleman and his mobile vehicle. He offered falafel with vegetables and bread.
I always feel a bit shy to pick up the camera and ask if I may take a photo. This man told me that he came from Egypt …and of course of that, we became friends immediately.
It was an extremely windy day and I didn’t adjust the camera right. But anyway here come’s one more photo.

Todays paper

Almost every day Bo brings home the newspaper, The Jordan Times, from the office. It is interesting to read about what is happening in Jordan and the rest of the world from the Jordan’s point of view.
Today they had the consoling news that the water storage in the major dams increased from 65.55 million cubic metres to 72.16 million cubic metres thanks to last week’s heavy rainfall. But it is still only 33 % of the dam’s capacity. This is a country with an enormous lack of water and this winter has not brought much rain.
In today’s paper I also of course could read about the conflict between Gaza and Israel. A never ending story it seems to be, but of course everyone hopes for a solution.
I could also read that the romance in president Obamas marriage is an inspiration for all Americans …….

If you want to have a look by yourself just go to: http://www.jordantimes.com/

Valentin's day

Tomorrow it’s Valentine’s Day and I want to give this rose back to the one who gave the real one to me two weeks ago!

Oranges

Every morning I pick a couple of oranges from the fruit plate and squeeze them for breakfast.

This morning it surprised me to be blood oranges. There are so many different kinds of oranges in the stores and it’s difficult to know what kind you are choosing, and sometimes there is no one to ask.

The blood orange juice tasted really good and the colour looks really nice in a photo too!

Black Iris

The black iris is Jordan’s national flower and it will bloom in April. It’s very unusual and rare and not many people have seen it in real. But you can find it in paintings or as here as a sculpture.The colour is not really black more very dark purple they say. You can also find lighter shades.
My quilting group is going to make a quilt with black iris on. We are going to sell it in a big bazaar in the beginning of May. The money they get from the bazaar will go to rebuild Gaza. We are trying to find patterns that will look like an iris and we have found many to choose between. Some of the women dye the fabrics by themselves. And the colours turns out to be very nice and in many shades.

Signposts

Sometimes I wish I could read Arabic. Can someone help me? Maybe the one on top means: If you walk this way you will find a tree. And the one on the bottom: If you walk this way you will find a place were you can exercise.

We looked like the figures on the sign when we finally found this toilet! This one is funny. There were so many of this signs on the side of the trail so you hardly could enjoy the nature!

King Hussein garden

King Hussein garden is a garden without flowers. Probably because it’s a lack of water in this country. You can find the garden on a hill not far from the big City Mall. It looks a bit boring but at least you can have some nice walks here and you don’t have to think about the traffic. I do not think it’s very old, because not many people have found it yet and there are not many visitors.

On the top of the hill there is a big beautiful mosque. And also some flowers!

We wanted to go closer and look at the mosque from the inside. But a guard came running, no photos, no women, no nothing …..Maybe it was only bad timing! A grandmother and a grandfather had a nice, small pick nick with their grandchild.

The Royal Automobile Museum

If you are a car enthusiast and are visiting Amman, you have to pay a visit to this museum. It’s a personal collections of King Hussein. It contains about 70 cars and motorbikes both old ones and newer.

Looking back at Christmas eve.

My first try to make a mosaic of pictures. Not too bad, but may be it depends of the object!

Dead Sea

On Saturday we went for a daytrip down to the Dead Sea. It takes only one hour for us to drive down. And it is “down” all the time! Amman is about 900 m over sea level and the Dead Sea is about 400 m under sea level! In Amman it was +14 and down at the sea it was +24. Not bad at all!




The salt crystals on the stones look like ice. This could be a winter day down at Kalmarsund as well as a summer day at a dead sea.

Father and daughter.

I spent six weeks in Sweden and most of the days I visited our grand daughter Elin. Most of the time she was eating or sleeping! And during that sex weeks she gained 1, 5 kilos and became 6 cm taller!
Above you can se her and her dad sleeping on the sofa!
You can see more pictures of her on her own blog if you are interested! http://elinliedberg.blogg.se