Today was a pretty ho-hum day. We did a little tour around Amman, going to the citadel, once an Ummayed Palace, and saw two of the ten Roman theatres in Jordan. 
We spent quite a bit of time at the train station and all I could think of while I was there was doing band photos in the old trains. I was pretty disappointed that I didn’t get to take more shots in the downtown area and in what I believe was one of the major bus transfer stations, which was basically just a big parking lot.
People had set up all manner of stands: clothing, shoes, CDs, DVDs, toys, something that looked like a churro stand, fruit, vegetables, nuts, old shoes, old clothes, you name it. I don’t think this was the flea market, since that apparently happens on Fridays, but it was similar. Part of the reason I didn’t get to take many photos was because Yousef couldn’t find a parking space and didn’t want me to go very far out of his sight while he watched the car. At least, I think that’s what he was saying. “Don’t go,” he said in broken English and waived his hand toward one of the side streets downtown. It’s pretty frustrating and very annoying. 
I spent an hour or more taking useless photos of trains because we got roped into a tour by someone who didn’t speak English and then when we get to an area like the bus station or downtown souk, I’m given 5 minutes and told I can barely cross the street. To top it off, my editor wants detailed information about every photo I take. Ha! Maybe she can extract the info from Yousef, he’s probably an expert on Jordan train history after this morning. Our last stop of the day was an exhibition hosted by the Japanese embassy featuring kites and tops. All of us at the paper had a slight misconception as to what exactly this meant, as we thought we would see colorful kites flying through the air. No such luck.
These kites were affixed firmly to the wall, although they were colorful. There were about 4 other photographers present, who I’m guessing were hoping for flying kites as well. It was interesting to watch how they worked and see the gear they were using and carried with them. They were all men and all knew each other. One of them came up to me after getting in the frame of my shot to apologize. “Ah...I’ve heard of you,” he says after introductions. “Heard that you were coming… I’m friends with all those guys, Samir, Ranjina, Jenny... Why haven’t I seen you until now?” he asks. I told him I had been traveling around the country building up the paper’s stock archive. “Oh, I would love to have that assignment,” he says. Ha, ha…and I would love to have YOUR job, I thought to myself, shooting for AP and Reuters.
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