Christmas Day

A day of wonderful gifts: phonecalls to family, presents from home, messages from friends, music on the radio, a winter's day of unimaginable warmth and blueness, a walk in the country with no planned destination.
And then, the destination made itself known; the home of a marvellously hospitable family - parents with six children. They invited me in, not only for coffee, but for lunch as well, and the promise that tomorrow I'll return for a traditional Jordanian meal with them. Their home is not rich, but their warmth and kindness are as rare and precious as any treasure.

Closing Ceremony

Our hosts for the Round Square Junior Conference, the Sanskaar Valley School, Bhopal, exceeded all expectations in every way - in their courtesy, generosity, consideration for guests, organisation and above all in their outstanding cultural presentations. At the closing ceremony, they presented dances representing several regions in India. In the approaching darkness, the wonderful colours glowed and sparkled as above the dancers a series of small, flaming hot-air balloons rose into the sky.

King's Academy makes a splash

Being the only Arabs in an overwhelmingly Indian gathering, it didn't take long for the Jordanian contingent to make their presence felt.

Then off to Sanchi

A very noisy bustrip took us to the giant stupa, intricately and delicately carved with lots of animals and scenes from the Buddha's life. Our guide was the crabby Mr Joseph, whose explanation was rather hard to decipher, due to his soft voice, strong accent, apparent distaste for his audience, and the din made by everyone else. As a result, I'm still not all that sure what a stupa actually is - but it was very big and impressive, and the view from there over the surrounding countryside was gorgeous. Afterwards, we did a whirlwind tour of the Sanchi Museum, which I'm also sure was very interesting, but we were in and out at such a pace it was a bit hard to tell really ....

Monsoon Wedding without the bride and groom

We went to a marvellous party in the grounds of a private residence in Bhopal. Every sense was stimulated: we were welcomed by banks of flowers and a band of drummers; every tree was draped in coloured lights, booths of puppets and magic shows lined one side, an intricate Gudjerati maypole dance was performed, and a thali meal was set out on the grass. Eating and dancing continued into the night.

More of India

Here's some street scenes that try to capture what it's like, but of course don't.

World Wonder No 2

A quick trip east to India, including Agra, and the mindblowingly beautiful Taj Mahal. A ravishing, blue day, tourists in bright clothes, the white marble shimmering .... altogether a grand day out.

World Wonder No 1

Here we are at Petra, being overawed by its size and scope, not to mention the staggering grandeur of the facades and the astonishing colours of the rocks.
Evening was best, when after an exhaustingly steep walk, with the stallholders and donkey boys, to the back gate, we watched the sun set and had dinner in a cosy, rug-lined bedouin cave.

a bit of culture

Last weekend was an auspicious one: a string quartet, called the Apple Hill Players, came to school for workshops with the students and to present some concerts. The most wonderful concert took place after dinner in the Headmaster's house. There, amid the wonderful colours made all the richer by candlelight, they played the lovely Puccini quartet, a subtle little almost-tango, and finished up with some Bach. Here are some pictures of our students, practising away. Also, apropos of nothing at all, is a picture of a beautiful embroidery we saw at the shop at the Jordan River Foundation. Embroidery is very popular here.

new life in the desert

Autumn is here, and already there's been one or two showers of rain. As a result, the desert is beginning to spring into new life. Today, on a walk beyond Musa Spring, we not only saw these astonishing plants pushing their way through the hard earth and fabulously striated rocks, but were treated to tea by two brothers building a new farmhouse beside their lovely oasis garden, watered from an underground spring. We sat beside the little fire amid a great host of flies, sipping the sweet tea from the blackened kettle, while Ahmad, the little boy of one brother, brought as gifts some wonderful fossils. The distant Dead Sea darkened in the approaching rain.

And here we are picking olives

Quite contrary to my rather romanticised expectations, olive picking is slow, laborious and extremely itchy. It took us an hour and a half to pick one tree. No wonder you see some people in the country pruning and picking at the same time; then they can at least sit down and do it. Other people, though, have step ladders and all sorts of paraphenalia - not to mention the whole family from grandma down to the smallest tots. Watching others is far more enjoyable than doing it.

Playing with children

One of our community service activites is planning a concert with the Ruwwad children. These are mostly the children of Palestian refugees from East Amman who are very poor. Ruwwad is a centre that runs activities for them - reading, games and arts. They arrived on Saturday morning to prepare for singing, percussion and plays. I think they enjoyed the lunch best.

Sunset above the Dead Sea

Then, on the same day, a walk in the hills above the Dead Sea. Beautiful in the extreme, plus a small adventure when we found ourselves arriving at a military installation of some kind. The soldiers picked up their guns and donned their hard hats, only to find the approaching threat in the form of 2 elderly eccentric ladies. The ladies beat a hasy retreat back down the hill! (I didn't take a picture of the soldiers!)