Pizza Hut
WARNING. Viewer discretion is advised. Mostly because it's going to be a long post! I've got all sorts of things to tell you today. Maybe too much info for some. Things I think some might find interesting since, well -- not many experience living in the Middle East as a daily life thing. :) I have a lot of time on my hands before I can connect so thought I'd just write for the hell of it. I feel like it.
Today's Main Mission: Escape, make our way to Pizza Hut for lunch, then hit Safeway. Team: Myself and my friend temporarily stationed here at the 'villa'. Plan: Manage to get our asses out of our beds, get dressed and break out past the main gates and hit the streets -- not running but well, walking. Location: A rather remote area around the capital of Amman, Jordan at 'The Villa'. (What constitutes a villa anyways? It's big, has three residences, some gardens with numerous fruit trees and even Pistachio! It sits in an area that seems to be developing at a fairly decent rate. It was once nothing but landscape. On one of our walks, I found a really old cave and there were old stone walls around the land-- that date back who knows how many years. There are still bedoins that live around there. Every day you can watch them walking along with their herds of goats or sheep. This is were I veer off temporarily onto another topic.
I'd like to say something about the bedoins. Even a good portion of the natives here refer to them in unsavory terms, as a backward people. Kind of like-- bedoin = hillbilly. To a degree, it may be true in that they don't hold degrees from one of the local Universities or even a grade school.. I've been watching them for awhile, though. This evening I watched them and it seemed just beautiful as it has in the past. So tranquil. The grass is tall, green, and there are flowers -everywhere- right now. It's just -- really wonderful. Though they are often the pun of jokes. Their weathered faces almost always hold a warm smile. They sometimes visit quietly between themselves as they idly stroll along or stand near the sheep, like watching over children. And the sheep or goats never get very far from their owners. The goats are the cutest because there are lots of babies right now and they must feel frisky, prancing and nearly bouncing-- just like little kids. Heh. No pun intended. :) It was just so picturesque with the sun starting to set, the rainbow of colors from the many flowers, the green rising up around ancient stone and rocks, women, men, and today even children enjoying the fantastic weather, wearing their traditional garb. It seemed so natural, a simple and nice life for them-- I imagined. My ex says they will go away as more people build up around here-- no place for their herds to roam and eat. It mad me just a little sad. I've gotten used to the sight of them on some far mountain or hillside, sometimes near. It's just like you've probably seen in pictures or movies, traditional arab clothing. No turbans, but what they call 'hattahs', the red or black checked scarves they wear on their heads and are held on with some kind of black bands. I'm sure it helps keep the hot summer sun off the scalp and help cool the body. It gets very hot in the summer, as one can imagine. I don't feel like I can describe to you what I saw other than, it was just beautiful, these fat fluffy animals and those that care for them. Yeah, really hard to explain the experience at that moment. Not to be corny but y'know-- it's true, everyone and everything and every place is beautiful in it's own way. you just have to look for it. I'll try to post some pictures if I can later. I don't know how they feel about having their pictures taken and don't really want to disrespect or offend their beliefs. Back to the 'mission'.
To start, fyi, the villa has three residences presently with the potential to grow upward if desired/needed. There are two floors currently. Two homes upstairs and one down. It's pretty nice but all stone, marble, concrete, tiles. It's a harsh environment here so, probably a reason wood is used little-- besides there being few trees one would really use for lumber. There are trees but Juniper and things. Pine trees.. I live in one upstairs and my friend lives in the house across the way. This will soon be the residence of my ex's present wife and kids. I live alone with my kid across the way. Mine is pretty spacious even if it's not the main house. Two bedrooms and a huge main room, kitchen, two baths, the 'dining' area is just a leg off the 'L' of the main room. Anwyay. It's sporting beautiful rounded corners with castle-like arched windows that are pretty cool. However, we sometimes feel like we are in a prison since all the windows have bars, all doors are steel, bolted and locked with sturdy deadbolts/locks. Apparently theft is one of the main types of crimes.
Okay, so we /really/ missed having some old fashioned Pizza. I had been to this one particular Pizza Hut and knew it was a good one, so took her there. It was her first time and she had a great time. The pizza is actually better than what I got back home! But there's another location that makes really sucky pizza-- as a Pizza Hut. After we stuffed ourselves on a double pepperoni double cheese pan pizza, washed it down with Pepsi, we started walking around the area. Pretty nice area, I must say. Givency shops. Yves St. Laurant or however you spell it.. all those big names. Beautiful things like you've never seen. I mean, the fabrics here are out of this world and crafted so fantastically by some of these big designers.. but like 200.00 a meter! Heh. I can't afford that and like I have anyplace to wear some fancy clothes. So.. anyhow. Pizza was great and now we are roaming around and enjoying the day. We stop at one of the many outdoor coffee shops/cafes. I order a Nescafe and my friend orders ice cream. Unfortunately-- they don't really have -real- ice cream here. It's more a sherbert. The man brings out something in a hot pink sprinkled with fruit cocktail and has a green cone upside down on top of it, like a hat slightly off kilter. I must have gawked or gasped as he set it down for he paused a moment, as if not sure what to do at all. Our eyes wide with-- horror. Oh my god. Heh. It looked terrible. But then we quickly remembered our manners, recovered from our speechlessness and thanked him. We watched traffic go by for the longest, traffic and people. The seats were cushioned so nicely and we sat under wide table umbrellas. Finally we are set into motion again and our destination is Safeway.
There are actually several locations, too. It's not like any Safeway in the US, though. Vendors lease out spaces and it's really a mall, not just a grocery store. Almost anything can be found but alas.. no pickle relish. :/ We have hotdogs, found hotdog buns, Heinz ketchup, Mustard, Mayo. Good stuff but no relish. *sighs* We pouted a bit and consoled ourselves with some Werther's Originals and Lays Potatoe chips. Surprised? Surprised it sounds kind of normal? There are products from all over the world here but we can find a lot of foods we ate back in the US. KFC, Burger King, McDonalds, Chicken Tikka, Popeye's Chicken, Pizza Hut.. all found here and I've even seen a few signs for Subway shops but it seems they went out of business. But don't let this fool you. There are some major differences between Jordan and America.. social standards are very different. You are careful about how you socialize with men and how much you talk to them, as well as how. Too friendly and you'll be taken as a whore. :/ We found some imported beef that was a nice grind for chili, so get a kilo of that imported beef and made us great chili later. MmmMmmm. We found cheddar cheese, Tostidos and stuff but like-- salsa and items like that are insanely expensive. You'd think some cheese dip were loaded with gold. So we skipped that stuff. :/ We added up the cost of making tacos one night and it came to 30 dinar .. which is like 50 US dollars or something! And we are talking, a 12 taco shell kit! Oh please. Heh. So, we give up some things. That's a lot for tacos! We mourn, gripe and walk on.
It was a full day, a fun day, but then my son lost it when he found out we went to Pizza Hut without him. I then spent the whole evening in an instructional/discipline situation about being considerate. Well, I couldn't blame him for being disappointed but he didn't make the best choice this time.. in how to react. It was like.. sometimes people will do things without you, nothing personal. It's life so get used to it. I tell you what. I was so tired after bringing up all the examples of how he does things with his friends -- without me. Heh. I cured him quick when I said, from now on, when you go to Burger King with 'the guys'.. mommy is coming with you! Hehe! That worked wonders. Just a little pouting but that was okay. The discipline portion was that he found out by reading my friend's email to whoever-- when he was told what she was about to type was not for his eyes so don't look. She didn't want to hurt his feelings.. kind of like what you don't know, won't hurt you thing. :) Anyway, he sneaked a peek and was brooding so hard! This is how we knew he had looked. So, I had to punish him for reading another person's personal email uninvited and even warned off. :( I hate to punish him but really, it's rude. So, his punishment is that he has to admit to her what he did, apologize and not repeat this poor course of action. It's punishment because he does NOT want to admit to her what he did. Poor guy. I told him, if you went to the bathroom and someone walked in on you when your pants were down? You'd not like someone seeing your bare butt or more. Or trying to dress and your privacy is not respected. It's the same thing. Privacy is private-- meaning not everything has to be seen by ya or whatever. Eventually he fully understood my upset, all was settled and we joked around for a few before bed.
I watched a couple of movies. Not sure what the first one was called but the second was called 'The Pallbearer' and it was not bad. Actually it was really good. It wasn't an action adventure thing, not a comedy but rather kind of like-- a strange situation arises, questions about life and one's place in it kind of come up. I liked it anyway. That guy from the tv show Friends.. whose name escapes me now. *sighs* Not the two that roomed together, the tall dark haired guy that dates uh.. lets skip this part. I couldn't sleep. So wrote this. I'm supposed to meet my sister online for some chat but I also have to watch my time. So, when I have to be online, I try to be everywhere I need to be, do everything I need to do while online. It's obscenely expensive here but I figure I'll do my best to get as much of it as I can since I get my news, email, see friends and family, keep in touch with life, the world through this medium. I'd be isolated otherwise. I'm going to try to be more careful, though-- don't want to be cut off completely. :/
Anyway. I've written this insanely long post and it's ready to go when I connect. If you made it this far, I commend you. That's alot of reading. As I said, I felt like writing. I guess for me I'm really using it like a journal, a diary of sorts! Except I know there's the potential it might be read by someone. So, no tales of wild monkey sex right now! ;P
And.. now I'm sleepy and it's not quite time for my chat. :/
Today's Main Mission: Escape, make our way to Pizza Hut for lunch, then hit Safeway. Team: Myself and my friend temporarily stationed here at the 'villa'. Plan: Manage to get our asses out of our beds, get dressed and break out past the main gates and hit the streets -- not running but well, walking. Location: A rather remote area around the capital of Amman, Jordan at 'The Villa'. (What constitutes a villa anyways? It's big, has three residences, some gardens with numerous fruit trees and even Pistachio! It sits in an area that seems to be developing at a fairly decent rate. It was once nothing but landscape. On one of our walks, I found a really old cave and there were old stone walls around the land-- that date back who knows how many years. There are still bedoins that live around there. Every day you can watch them walking along with their herds of goats or sheep. This is were I veer off temporarily onto another topic.
I'd like to say something about the bedoins. Even a good portion of the natives here refer to them in unsavory terms, as a backward people. Kind of like-- bedoin = hillbilly. To a degree, it may be true in that they don't hold degrees from one of the local Universities or even a grade school.. I've been watching them for awhile, though. This evening I watched them and it seemed just beautiful as it has in the past. So tranquil. The grass is tall, green, and there are flowers -everywhere- right now. It's just -- really wonderful. Though they are often the pun of jokes. Their weathered faces almost always hold a warm smile. They sometimes visit quietly between themselves as they idly stroll along or stand near the sheep, like watching over children. And the sheep or goats never get very far from their owners. The goats are the cutest because there are lots of babies right now and they must feel frisky, prancing and nearly bouncing-- just like little kids. Heh. No pun intended. :) It was just so picturesque with the sun starting to set, the rainbow of colors from the many flowers, the green rising up around ancient stone and rocks, women, men, and today even children enjoying the fantastic weather, wearing their traditional garb. It seemed so natural, a simple and nice life for them-- I imagined. My ex says they will go away as more people build up around here-- no place for their herds to roam and eat. It mad me just a little sad. I've gotten used to the sight of them on some far mountain or hillside, sometimes near. It's just like you've probably seen in pictures or movies, traditional arab clothing. No turbans, but what they call 'hattahs', the red or black checked scarves they wear on their heads and are held on with some kind of black bands. I'm sure it helps keep the hot summer sun off the scalp and help cool the body. It gets very hot in the summer, as one can imagine. I don't feel like I can describe to you what I saw other than, it was just beautiful, these fat fluffy animals and those that care for them. Yeah, really hard to explain the experience at that moment. Not to be corny but y'know-- it's true, everyone and everything and every place is beautiful in it's own way. you just have to look for it. I'll try to post some pictures if I can later. I don't know how they feel about having their pictures taken and don't really want to disrespect or offend their beliefs. Back to the 'mission'.
To start, fyi, the villa has three residences presently with the potential to grow upward if desired/needed. There are two floors currently. Two homes upstairs and one down. It's pretty nice but all stone, marble, concrete, tiles. It's a harsh environment here so, probably a reason wood is used little-- besides there being few trees one would really use for lumber. There are trees but Juniper and things. Pine trees.. I live in one upstairs and my friend lives in the house across the way. This will soon be the residence of my ex's present wife and kids. I live alone with my kid across the way. Mine is pretty spacious even if it's not the main house. Two bedrooms and a huge main room, kitchen, two baths, the 'dining' area is just a leg off the 'L' of the main room. Anwyay. It's sporting beautiful rounded corners with castle-like arched windows that are pretty cool. However, we sometimes feel like we are in a prison since all the windows have bars, all doors are steel, bolted and locked with sturdy deadbolts/locks. Apparently theft is one of the main types of crimes.
Okay, so we /really/ missed having some old fashioned Pizza. I had been to this one particular Pizza Hut and knew it was a good one, so took her there. It was her first time and she had a great time. The pizza is actually better than what I got back home! But there's another location that makes really sucky pizza-- as a Pizza Hut. After we stuffed ourselves on a double pepperoni double cheese pan pizza, washed it down with Pepsi, we started walking around the area. Pretty nice area, I must say. Givency shops. Yves St. Laurant or however you spell it.. all those big names. Beautiful things like you've never seen. I mean, the fabrics here are out of this world and crafted so fantastically by some of these big designers.. but like 200.00 a meter! Heh. I can't afford that and like I have anyplace to wear some fancy clothes. So.. anyhow. Pizza was great and now we are roaming around and enjoying the day. We stop at one of the many outdoor coffee shops/cafes. I order a Nescafe and my friend orders ice cream. Unfortunately-- they don't really have -real- ice cream here. It's more a sherbert. The man brings out something in a hot pink sprinkled with fruit cocktail and has a green cone upside down on top of it, like a hat slightly off kilter. I must have gawked or gasped as he set it down for he paused a moment, as if not sure what to do at all. Our eyes wide with-- horror. Oh my god. Heh. It looked terrible. But then we quickly remembered our manners, recovered from our speechlessness and thanked him. We watched traffic go by for the longest, traffic and people. The seats were cushioned so nicely and we sat under wide table umbrellas. Finally we are set into motion again and our destination is Safeway.
There are actually several locations, too. It's not like any Safeway in the US, though. Vendors lease out spaces and it's really a mall, not just a grocery store. Almost anything can be found but alas.. no pickle relish. :/ We have hotdogs, found hotdog buns, Heinz ketchup, Mustard, Mayo. Good stuff but no relish. *sighs* We pouted a bit and consoled ourselves with some Werther's Originals and Lays Potatoe chips. Surprised? Surprised it sounds kind of normal? There are products from all over the world here but we can find a lot of foods we ate back in the US. KFC, Burger King, McDonalds, Chicken Tikka, Popeye's Chicken, Pizza Hut.. all found here and I've even seen a few signs for Subway shops but it seems they went out of business. But don't let this fool you. There are some major differences between Jordan and America.. social standards are very different. You are careful about how you socialize with men and how much you talk to them, as well as how. Too friendly and you'll be taken as a whore. :/ We found some imported beef that was a nice grind for chili, so get a kilo of that imported beef and made us great chili later. MmmMmmm. We found cheddar cheese, Tostidos and stuff but like-- salsa and items like that are insanely expensive. You'd think some cheese dip were loaded with gold. So we skipped that stuff. :/ We added up the cost of making tacos one night and it came to 30 dinar .. which is like 50 US dollars or something! And we are talking, a 12 taco shell kit! Oh please. Heh. So, we give up some things. That's a lot for tacos! We mourn, gripe and walk on.
It was a full day, a fun day, but then my son lost it when he found out we went to Pizza Hut without him. I then spent the whole evening in an instructional/discipline situation about being considerate. Well, I couldn't blame him for being disappointed but he didn't make the best choice this time.. in how to react. It was like.. sometimes people will do things without you, nothing personal. It's life so get used to it. I tell you what. I was so tired after bringing up all the examples of how he does things with his friends -- without me. Heh. I cured him quick when I said, from now on, when you go to Burger King with 'the guys'.. mommy is coming with you! Hehe! That worked wonders. Just a little pouting but that was okay. The discipline portion was that he found out by reading my friend's email to whoever-- when he was told what she was about to type was not for his eyes so don't look. She didn't want to hurt his feelings.. kind of like what you don't know, won't hurt you thing. :) Anyway, he sneaked a peek and was brooding so hard! This is how we knew he had looked. So, I had to punish him for reading another person's personal email uninvited and even warned off. :( I hate to punish him but really, it's rude. So, his punishment is that he has to admit to her what he did, apologize and not repeat this poor course of action. It's punishment because he does NOT want to admit to her what he did. Poor guy. I told him, if you went to the bathroom and someone walked in on you when your pants were down? You'd not like someone seeing your bare butt or more. Or trying to dress and your privacy is not respected. It's the same thing. Privacy is private-- meaning not everything has to be seen by ya or whatever. Eventually he fully understood my upset, all was settled and we joked around for a few before bed.
I watched a couple of movies. Not sure what the first one was called but the second was called 'The Pallbearer' and it was not bad. Actually it was really good. It wasn't an action adventure thing, not a comedy but rather kind of like-- a strange situation arises, questions about life and one's place in it kind of come up. I liked it anyway. That guy from the tv show Friends.. whose name escapes me now. *sighs* Not the two that roomed together, the tall dark haired guy that dates uh.. lets skip this part. I couldn't sleep. So wrote this. I'm supposed to meet my sister online for some chat but I also have to watch my time. So, when I have to be online, I try to be everywhere I need to be, do everything I need to do while online. It's obscenely expensive here but I figure I'll do my best to get as much of it as I can since I get my news, email, see friends and family, keep in touch with life, the world through this medium. I'd be isolated otherwise. I'm going to try to be more careful, though-- don't want to be cut off completely. :/
Anyway. I've written this insanely long post and it's ready to go when I connect. If you made it this far, I commend you. That's alot of reading. As I said, I felt like writing. I guess for me I'm really using it like a journal, a diary of sorts! Except I know there's the potential it might be read by someone. So, no tales of wild monkey sex right now! ;P
And.. now I'm sleepy and it's not quite time for my chat. :/