The Jordan Museum

Another slow morning – we have only the Jordan Museum to visit today and it opens at 9 am. We have time to have breakfast and get ready.  ( and yes, we unfortunately still are awake a little before 7am… I am hoping this would change a little ). The museum is 20min away on foot.

I am quite impressed at the Jordan museum, it has a lot of details and well done flow. It’s in chronological order. But while usually, the bronze ages or older sections would be a little boring with pieces of rocks and some pottery. I found the one in the Jordan museum showing some very interesting exhibits.

The first one are these statues that are 9000 years old. I saw one of them in the Louvres, but I don’t think I understood their importance. In Jordan a room is dedicated to them. They are the oldest statues showing a human form.

Likewise, some skulls with plasters and inlaid stones can be seen and they date just as old.

As we move through the ages, from city states, to kingdoms and influences of the Greeks and the Roman. I start to piece together the timeline and get a better ideas of the main names to remember.

Many archeological sites that we will visit are mentioned in the Museum, this is a good foundation to the trip.

There is an entire room to the Nabatean civilization, the ones who founded Petra. So getting some extra knowledge there was also good.

Finally, a room is dedicated to the scrolls of the Dead Sea. Which is a major findings for history but also for religious history. It’s interesting to know more, and it’s intriguing too. There aren’t that much information available, since it relates to the old testament and the life of a secluded community – which felt more like a fundamentalist sect. Most monotheist religions have the old testament in common, and many still argue about the interpretation of the scrolls, it’s a sensitive topic. I would love to put my hands on a translation for me to make my own opinion. I will have to look for more information.

This concluded the historical part of the Jordan Museum but a temporary exhibit on the first floor was taking place called the 1001 inventions. It’s a tribute to the contributions of Arab engineers and savants during the medieval time. While it is common knowledge that they are the father of our numerical system and a lot of modern medicine. It was a well done exhibition showcasing a lot more other discoveries that paved the way to modern technologies. I found that it was really interesting, it was also full of interactive activities, so not at all boring !

We sat down at the end of it all and looked at the clock. We spent 3h30 in the museum. Our back and neck were a little stiff. We took a long breather on that bench before starting the walk back to the hotel in search of a restaurant for lunch.

On the way to the museum, I had spotted a few  shops selling Arabic pastries, there was no way that we would not stop for some. I love Arabic pastries! 

And we stopped at the second one, taking a good selection. And the price of it all ? 1.83 JOD, ridiculously affordable. Needless to say, we are going for a repeat of this purchase with some hot tea during the next two weeks.

Alexis had seen a restaurant that seemed busy yesterday, we stop there today. Indeed, it’s a bustling places full of locals and all tables are full. You eat, then you go. We get a table that just walked out. The menu has only few dishes: mutabal, hummus, fatteh and falafel. We order a meat fatteh, mutabal and hummus. It’s again, delicious and served extremely quick. One of the waiter walks around with huge platter of tea glasses, fresh mint and sugar are on the table for you to fix your drink.  And the next surprise ? The entire meal for two costed only JOD 4.5.  I have a feeling a lot of our tourism is going to be around food, I have enjoyed every bite so far.

We walk back to our hotel room for some quiet time. And in the evening, we get to the rooftop with some hot mint tea and a few of our sweet pastries. We watch the animation of the busy street below. The air is crisp and cold, and it’s quite enjoyable.