Claire's first Rihli

we got initiated.

i was so affected by this trip that i could not even blog about it before i left for our other trip. i had to recover. that is right...deep breaths.

so mamma-mare who loves adventures took her little bear on a day trip to the Red Sea in a van full of Arabs. day trips are called rihli. Val had made friends with a woman and she invited val to go on a 4 hour bus down to Aqaba, play in the ocean, eat lunch, go to Wadi Rum, take a jeep ride there and see the sunset, eat a huge Bedouin dinner and then drive 4 hours back. all for the price of about $30.

Now, we are talking hot hot hot. but the allure of that many hours with all Arab speakers, meeting all new Arab women, an adventure and beach time took over my senses and i just had to go.

So...it started at 5:20 am when we met our hostess, Hibba and her three children. her daughter who was 10, grabbed claire immediately and ran up her staires to tell her mom we had arrived. i got chastised from the mom for letting her daughter hold claire, and she instructed me to not let her hold claire. "she can touch her and kiss her but not carry her" was the clear instructions i received in arabic.

the other baby in our group, only 2 months old.

for the next 5 hours, her daughter attempted to hold claire about 10 times an hour. i am not joking. it stared with her always asking, then resorted to her trying to grab claire, and then we ended up pushing each other as i was pulling claire away from her. wow. that set the tone of the trip.

this post could literally be 10 pages long...i don't even know how to put it all into words. when we finally arrived in Aqaba...we took a boat ride. Val and i had not caught that part of the day, so we just went along with the plan. the boat was SOOO hot and there was extremely loud music and funny different people dancing that were along the tour with us. not the women we were with, just other Arabs.

claire loving val

funny dancing.

so at this point, i am thinking...ok just drop me off at the beach. we can relax, i can talk arabic, we can cool off...get me to the beach. but no. we take another stop. they drop us off at an out-door mall for 1 1/2hours. the shopping is awesome in Aqaba, i guess, with no taxes, so the women went crazy. Val and i found a place in the shade to sit and cool off and i fed claire her cereal.

it is now 2:30 pm. we then get dropped off for lunch, the restaurant was not ready for us so they ask us to wait outside for 30 minutes if we want to eat inside where it is air conditioned. or we can eat outside. we all opt for the eat outside option, because our beach time is ticking. we eat in a hurry, but not without me making sort of a scene because val and i were surrounded by young school age boys and i was determined to sit by some women, so i could actually talk arabic. so i stood up and said "it can't be this way, i wont sit with young boys, i want to sit with women" and they all sort of nervously laughed and let val and i sit next to them. wow.

this is when the day went in a tail spin. the kids start running in every direction because they are trying to find somewhere to change into swimming attire. it is chaos. people are yelling. people are scurrying, people are crying. it is 3:15pm. we are suppose to be back at our bus by 4:45pm to head to Wadi Rum.

(a taste of wadi rum. a Bedouin standing next to his SUV)

Our hostess calls for us to walk with her and we end up in a sports store so that one of the moms on the trip can buy her kids and herself something to swim in.

this is when it hits me. Arabs never have a plan. they jump into every moment and they don't have a plan.

i start losing my cool. i am holding claire. i did not bring anything to carry her around in ( or a stroller for that matter) , because i had pictured a day at the beach, she can crawl on my towel, we play in the water and so forth. so i have been holding my 22 pound baby all day and my back is killing me. it is over a 100 degrees. get me to the water.

we try and find our way to the beach, but we get lost. we walk in the heat for over 30 minutes, making wrong turns and every child and women that we are with is getting more and more frustrated, including me. wow.

we finally find the water, the beach, our destination. at about 4:15. which leaves us about 30 minutes to swim, dry off, change and walk back. dang. once we got in, i cooled down (emotionally and physically) but the water was so dirty that we could not go under.

Hibba, Zikara, and I swimming!

Zikara and her daughter, Meysa, both from Iraq. This is Meysa first time ever in the sea.

getting back was the same level of panic, tears, yelling, shouts because everyone was looking for a place to change. we left the water at 4:45...val and i were just following our leaders, and started walking about 5. dang. luckily the bus had thought ahead about this and was only about a 5 minute walk from us, had moved closer. there was NO place to change out of our wet, sandy clothes so we all piled onto the bus for an hour ride to wadi rum.

smelly, dirty, sandy. air conditioned bus. angry bus driver. beach day that ended up being 20 minutes in a beach. not what i was picturing.

we arrived at Wadi Rum and ended up taking a jeep ride that they told us was going to be 2 hours, it was only 30 minutes, and saw an incredible sunset.

the fun moms piling in the back of the jeep

claire loved hibba's hajab

we ate an amazing Bedouin feast and then headed back. claire and i arrived to our safe peaceful home at 2:30 am. wow.

don't forget that the entire day, that sweet little girl was at my side trying to grab claire from me. for real. even after like 3 lectures from me and 3 from Val. persistent.

so, it was an adventure. we learned some things. to not have expectations. to not really want to do anything that is promised to you...and prepare yourself for chaos.