Photos from Jordan & Israel

Back from the trip with over 450 new photos on my hard drive from the last trip through the Middle East. In this Dropbox gallery you can see some of the better shots from Jordan (mostly Petra but also the capital, Amman), as well as shots from Bethlehem and Jerusalem, Israel. This time of year the weather is completly different than first time I visited the area, but luckily for me, the lower sun and the cloudy sky gives better photos. Be sure to check them out!

My portfolio’s available!

Sorry about this long break. Now I’m back again and first thing’s first: I decided to make my portfolio available. You can find the link in the main menu, or use this one. 

So we’re in the middle of november, time’s running really fast now and Christmas is approaching soon. I’ve been keeping myself busy guiding tours in Jerusalem and visiting the beach in Sharm in my spare time. Weather is beautiful and reminds of normal summer in Poland (or a really good one in Sweden, if you rather think that way). Israel on the other hand got colder, with temperatures around 15-20, so I’m finally making use of the jackets I brought with me to Egypt. 

On the other hand I wish I was in Halmstad right now, at least for a while. Two reasons: 1) there’s finally an Apple reseller in town, and 2) Max’ famous Frisco Cheese ‘n Bacon hamburger – only available in Sweden.

Today I’m off to Jerusalem, and when I’m back Tuesday I’m looking forward to seeing my dad who’s coming to Sharm for a week. That’s it for now!

Bethlehem

So we’ve just arrived in Bethlehem. Today was rather lazy, except the border crossing between Jordan and Israel, over the Jordan River (which is like 1 meter wide, except common believe that it is a big river – it’s really more of a little creek). We were lucky, the border checkpoint controls took only 3 hours (once I spent 6 hours there…). Now we’ve seen everything there is to see in the small city of Bethlehem, in the Palestinian West Bank, and tomorrow we’ll go to Jerusalem. The only problem is that the hotel that’s booked for us is obviously overbooked, and there’s no room for us. Wonderful. Aw, one more thing: it’s way colder here! Only about 19°C in the nights, so you feel the chill. Damn, winter’s coming!

Amman, Jordan

Amman, Jordan

What a day! No sleep last night, since the bus pick up arrived at 1am. From Sharm to the Egyptian-Israeli border crossing in Taba-Eilat. I saw something there I want to do one day: a couple on bikecycles, biking their way though the Middle East. The guy even had a guitar on his bike. Another cool thing was that Jews celebrate something right now (the celebration of the ending of 40 years wandering thorugh the desert, I think…), so they like live in tents for a week or so. The tents are everywhere along the 9 km short Israeli Red Sea coastline. So there was a guy making a espresso over open fire in a mocca brewer! Only in Israel…

 

Wadi Rum, Jordan

After the bored crossing was completed we went with bus for about 10 minutes to the second border, this time Israeli-Jordanian in Eilat-Aqaba. Took a couple of hours to complete, like it usualy does in this part of the world, but after that we went to the most beautiful desert in the world, Wadi Rum. An hour or two there, and then a bus ride to the famous city of Petra. When even this was finished, I had to take a mule the 4 km back to the bus… First time on a mule for me ever. I felt terrible. Poor animal.

Anyway, after that 4 hours with bus to the Jordanian capital city, Amman, inhabited by 2.1 million citizens. The hotel is actually really nice, and the Internet connection is free, so I can give you an update. Right now I feel like sleeping after such a long day! Byea

Screwdrivers and Israel

Egypt is not Europe. I knew it before I came here. But I had no idea how frustrating it can be to leave the Old Continent. 

My hard drive “died” last week. Surprising, cause I put it in only 10 months ago when I installed Leopard, back in November. The reason is probably burned electronics on the drive – something that might have been cause by the damn electric sockets which are not grounded! That would be nice to have here since they turn the electricity on and off all the time (I literally mean like 10 times a day!). Furthermore, I guess that the current isn’t really stable and I can see the sudden peaks and falls of the voltage just by having the lights on in the evening. Anyway, my disk died and I needed a new one.

Before I could change the drive however, I needed screw drivers. More specifically a Philips #00 and Torx T8 which are necessary for changing the hard drive in MacBooks. My first guess after speaking with some natives was that I won’t get it in Sharm. So I took a trip to Israel. Thought that would be nice. They are civilized, after all..right? 

Maybe they are. Maybe not. I don’t know. But I had no luck with finding the screwdrivers in neither Jerusalem or Bethlehem. Probably I just don’t know how to look. All the time I ended up in the Arabic parts of the cities by the way… Where are the Jews?!

So no luck here. But the visit in Israel gave me at least some nice photos…

On the Mt. of Olives a mix of tourists and Israeli land forces. Fully equipped… Shit. 

Oh it was soooo bright!

These children reminded me that the summer’s over and it’s time for school for some! Too bad…

Meat. Lots of meat. Old City in Jerusalem. Wonder if it’s kosher?

Something similar in the background.. you see? Must be dangerous to live so close to lots of gold…
Old City in Jerusalem

I found some Jews in the Old City after all. Turned out the city is divided in four quarters: Muslim, Christian, Armenian and Jewish. At least that’s the traditional division.  
No in Bethlehem. Looking for screw drivers. 
Bethlehem is a part of the Palestinian Autonomy. No Jews on the streets here. No screw drivers either..unfortunately.

A view from somewhere in Bethlehem.
And the panorama over Old City in Jerusalem from the Mt. of Olives. 

So that’s it. Got back to Sharm. Found the screw drivers (at Radio Shack…). Bought an exactly identical hard drive in a computer shop. I got it for 80 euro last year in Sweden. Now I payed 100 euro… Today the same costs about 55 euro in Europe (checked it on the Net). But hell.. what was I supposed to do?

Now thanks to Time Machine (love you!) I’m back and running just where I was! Egypt and technology are however still two very different and incompatible concepts. No Internet at home, cause somebody somehow messed up the telephone cables for the DSL line. And it’s Ramadan, so they can’t promise it will be fixed anytime soon. 

But still it’s 35 degrees and sunshine… At least the life is wonderful!