Where is everyone?

The next day, our trip through Jordan started with a tour of the city centre of Amman. We were on a tight schedule, so the city tour consisted of a quick visit to the Roman amphitheatre and a visit to the ruins of the old citadel. The first thing I noticed when entering the amphitheatre were three large photographs of the former king, the crown prince, and current king Abdullah II. When you start looking for it, you will see pictures of the him almost everywhere. It is not obligatory to put those pictures up, but people like it.

Figure 1: Me in front of the photo of King Abdullah II in the Roman amphitheatre

After the bus had managed to climb the steep slopes of the citadel hill, we made a quick tour around the ruins of the old citadel. There are ruins from before the iron age up to the Ummayad (8th. century) period. The site has undergone restoration, though some parts have not been restored well due to lack of funds. It was also clear that the site was adapted to hold the hand of the tourist. There was a path leading around the site, guiding the visitor where to go. Signs along the path provided the visitor with information.

Figure 2: Temple on the citadel hill, with modern Amman in the background

Then we went to the ruins of the city of Jerash, once part of the Dekapolis (10 city-states in the area). The feeling I had had the whole day became very clear here. We were almost the only tourists on the site. There were only a few other tourists, so we had the whole site for our own. This site has been developed less compared to the citadel, there were some signs with information around, but restoration was poor in some areas. What surprised me was that there were no barriers at all. You could just walk up and climb on the ruins if you wanted to.

Figure 3: Empty street underneath a clear blue sky in Jerash

In my next post I hope to look deeper into the state in which original archaeological sites have been adapted to tourism, and where the tourists have gone as I travel further to the ruins of Umm ar-Rasas.