At long last, breaking out the tape recorder and notebook

Welcome to research. Oh thank god. Today I finally had the experience I had hoped would be my daily grind for the summer.

I started the day at the University of Jordan, where I spoke to an insect taxonomist about the housefly and other insects of the Jordan Valley. We looked at pictures, talked about trap details, drank coffee...and then he talked my ear off for 45 minutes about how he just doesn't understand why the American people are so nice - he married one - but our foreign policy is just so unfair to Arabs. I thought he was going to cry. There was a great moment where he had been talking forever, and then another professor showed up, and the session was over. I took that opportunity to steer us back to bugs.

After renewing my visa, I met with a retired general, M, who was a member of several committees on the Jordan-Israel peace treaty signing. His views on Israel were a complete reverse of the taxonomist's. M felt like a strong relationship with the Israelis helps Jordanians bargain for Palestinians - their quality of life, visas, being freed from prisons. There was a time, in the late 1990s, the afterglow of the signing of the Oslo peace agreement between Palestine and Israel and the 1994 peace treaty between Jordan and Israel, that it really felt like a new Middle East had arrived. M's face lit up when he talked about that time, but the smile flickered and left when the conversation moved to the intifada.

I missed a chance to photocopy a housefly thesis, but instead I had coffee with two farmers from the Safi region of Jordan who told me about how disorganized the marketing of Jordanian produce is. They are involved in companies that are teaching farmers to keep better financial records, to budget, to comply with European standards, and to contract with French, British and Turkish buyers for their vegetables. I may go down to their farms on Saturday.

And here is a gender moment for you, in the Sheraton hotel today at 5.
Me: "How much is wireless internet here?"
Pleasant hotel staffer #1: "Six JD for two hours"
Me: "Are you serious? Six JD? That's crazy! How about 3JD for one hour"
PHS1: "No, maam, I am sorry."
PHS2: "Are you an in-house guest?"
Me: "No, but I can be" (smile, smile)
PHS2: "Right this way, to the business lounge, miss."

By the way, the serious hotels here have a thing for American bad music. Intercontinental plays Celine Dion. Century Park Hotel plays Boys II Men (the birthday song).

I am trying to find a translator to go with me to Safi, and I think I am really hurting my case by always being half asleep when the translators call. I have these vague recollections of conversations with pleasant-sounding fluent English speakers named Nadia, Anwar, Rana, Faid...but no idea what I have committed to whom. I hope I don't have three different people hoping to wade through chicken shit on Monday.

Tomorrow night is a major party night: going to Distant Heat, the (fucking expensive) biggest party in Jordan. It's a trance thing in the middle of the Wadi Rum desert. Should be great and wallet-draining. Looking forward to it. Maybe there will be photos.