Last week, I got the opportunity to visit yet another interesting part of the world – the Middle East. I have been to the Dubai airport before, while on my way to United States. But transits don’t count, right? So last week I visited the city of Amman, the capital of the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan. I was there for a whole week. It was not the trip I expected, but in a really good way.
Let’s start with the weather. I was expecting the weather to be burning hot with tons of scorching sunlight. It turns out the weather over there is actually better and far more comfortable compared to the usual weather in Colombo. The temperature is almost as same as in Colombo (around 30 degrees Celsius) but the humidity is nearly 0. So it’s actually very comfy. And during the nights the temperature would drop to something around 18 degrees Celsius resulting in some very cold nights and mornings. I also learnt that they have the usual four seasons over there at Jordan. They even get some snow showers during the winter. Who knew?
The city of Amman is indeed one of the largest, most developed and beautiful cities I’ve ever been to. It’s very clean and tidy for a capital of a country. I was kind of surprised to not see much pedestrians walking around the town. But the roads are always full of vehicles all the time (even at midnight). So I guess pretty much everyone owns a vehicle. I also got to see quite a number of Ferraris and Porches storming the highways. I also realized that travel costs are actually very low in Amman. You can get a taxi anywhere and travel about 4 km for 0.75 Dinars (~ 1 USD).
Amman is also full of great hotels, restaurants, cafes and various shops. Truly great place for tourism I should say. Somewhere close to down town they have a street called the ‘Rainbow Street’. The street full of night clubs, restaurants, coffee shops and book shops is a great place to go and get something to eat and chill down for a while. They also have these huge shopping malls at Amman– larger than any mall I’ve ever been to. If you ever get to the city of Amman please make some time to go and visit the Mecca mall or the City mall.
Something has to be mentioned about the people of Jordan too. They are really nice and friendly. People at Amman are always full of smiles and have nothing but nice things to say. During my short stay I was even offered a couple of lunches and one great dinner.
Unfortunately for me I didn’t actually get anytime to go and visit the real tourist hotspots in Jordan, like the city of Petra or the Dead Sea. But then again, it’s always nice to have something to look forward to.
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