Action-Man, 28 June, Mafraq, Jordan

Amman must be named for the "children of Ammon" in the Old Testament. Most of Jordan's population lives in Amman. Jordan doesn't have many big cities. East Amman is developing and moderate, but west Amman is rich and Western. Last night, three Jordanian girls took us to the Mecca Mall and other hotspots. Girls with cell phones, girls with money, girls with cars—these are the things a young traveler looks for. They drove us past towering hotels and tall new bridges.

We sleep in a guest house near first circle, Jabal Amman. Amman is built on seven hills, and jabal is the Arabic word for hill. First circle is the first of eight circles on circle street. In the valley below, white stone houses are built on the many slopes of the city. I see row after row of houses, each row higher than the row before—flat roofs and plain white walls. Valleys of houses rise and fall and dwellers reach them by dusty trails, narrow roads and concrete paths of innumerable stairs.

Now I am on a bus to Mafraq. I am three seats behind the driver. Ahead of me, on both sides of the aisle, are a dozen men, each with slacks and a button-down shirt. Their necks bear the tropic tawn. Each of them looks fresh from the barber. The barber must have paid special attention to the back of their heads on that line of hair from the middle of the nape to the ear.

Drew is reading Plato. He has pulled aside the thick gray drapery from the window to let in the breeze and sunlight. The bus driver has flipped on the bus speakers and a man is chanting prayers in Arabic to Allah. Could the words of those prayers be words of love to Allah? I don't think so. Islam is a religion of bondage not love. We are in the middle of the Muslim empire, where mosques appear at every corner, as often as churches and cathedrals in Christian Europe of old.

Sam