October 24, 2004
Bedouins and Petra
Today I received an email from a guy called K. He participated with us in the exchange. K. is an interesting guy, who comes from a traditional Bedouin background. He is a bit too proud of his family heritage, he did not stop telling us about the long line of his family, and according to him they date back to few years before Noah!
Now, I mentioned him because of the incident in Petra.
In Petra, he asked me if he feels that the locals are exploiting our group, should he interfere or not, and I said, well you do that within reason (I wish I have not said that!) There, we went into different directions; Elena went with the Spanish group to do the 1000 steps trip as a challenge. And because they are a bunch of YOUTH who are full of enthusiasm and vigor and energy they decided to take donkeys up and down for 2 JD each!
After the lovely trip, they came down slowly. Elena was the last to arrive and when she reached the main plaza, she saw the Spanish group surrounded by the Bedouins on their donkeys! She came down RUNNING (now that is youthful!) to see what is going on, and a Bedouin lady told her that a Jordanian guy in the group has offended her and that it became a matter of honor!
Basically, this is the way the story goes, when K saw the Spanish group coming down, he asked them how much they were going to pay. The boy (who is 6 years old) that was leading the donkey told him that it was none of his business (He is a kid and probably he got scared). So K got offended and started yelling at the boy, he told him something like how could a nobody like you talk to me like this. The boy’s mother happened to be nearby, and she came to the rescue. She started yelling at K with a broken glass bottle! He started yelling back, and the words got bigger and bigger. Finally another Jordanian guy in the group had enough sense to take K away to cool down the situation but the sense did not last him enough to take the Spanish with them!
It was at the point that Elena reached the crime scene! The lady was very upset; she told Elena that they work there all day under the sun, all what they ask for is respect. Elena spent a good hour talking to the lady and trying to smooth the situation (she actually asked her if kissing her head would make her feel better?!) But the lady was very sophisticated and she agreed to let the matter go. But NOT Elena, she was FURIOUS with K. the next she saw him near the bus, she started yelling at him there in front of everyone. Man, you really don’t want to be on Elena’s bad side. She can be LOUD!
On our way to Amman, I had to interfere. I did not want to kick K out of the exchange because despite his not very REFINED manners, I knew his intentions were good. He actually was trying to save his friends from being exploited. Now as the leader a CULTURAL exchange program which aims to teach people TOLERANCE and RESPECT of Local communities; I had to explain to K that he can not be rude to kids and older ladies and that he should not have left the Spanish group who do not speak any word of English or Arabic there. Have you ever known such fun?! Finally we came to a compromise he had to apologize to the Spanish group and I would forget the whole incident.
The story ends here; he DID, telling us that his character changed that day and that this required a lot of SPIRIT, as this was the first time he apologized for anything in his entire life!
So I take it that he learnt something.
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