Tales from Rohan

Most Wednesday nights in Santa Cruz there is a “Circus Jam” where folks can drop in and mess around with aerial acrobatics, AcroYoga, juggle, hula hoop, poi and generally act like circus freaks.

Here is a video of some really fun AcroYoga in foreground. However it shows the spirit of the whole jam because you can see other pairs doing AcroYoga, some hula hoop action and aerial flying in the background. Enjoy!

I’m finally getting around to posting photos from Thanksgiving.

This year I cooked dinner for Alex, my aunt, and my cousins (the Carpenters). Alex was enormously helpful getting ready. As you can see, we all had a good time.

I went to a three-day Acroyoga workshop this weekend with Jenny Sauer-Klein, the co-founder of AcroYoga. I have not been so sore in a long time, but I had a great time. Unfortunately I did not get a lot of photos, but after the workshop I got a few shots of me taking Frederika through a fun sequence. Thanks Serena for taking the photos and Amy for spotting.

This is “Star”. Frederika starts by doing a shoulder stand on my feet. I got to fly this as well!

This is “Free Star”. Look ma, no hands!

Vertical legs

Step down into back flying (Back Bird)

Monday in Acroyoga we tried the 3-Headed Dragon. Fortunately somebody had a camera.

Today I rented a bike. On my way somewhere else, I was riding by the Intercontinental Phoenician Hotel (the most expensive hotel in Beirut which is also home to parliament members and other big wigs that don’t want to get shot) and decided it would be fun to ride the bike in and have a look around. I went in the main entrance for cars. After explaining that I really was going into the hotel rather than around it, the guard cheerfully scanned my bike for explosives, then I waited for the crash barrier to retract, then I pulled up at the front door and the front door staff got the giggles. They all thought it was fantastic that I rode a bike to the Intercontinental and immediately offered me complimentary “valet parking”.

Next I went into the hotel, put my backpack through the x-ray machine and walked through the metal detector. Once inside I headed for the pool balcony to check out the view. The view is a bit surreal. There a bunch of very handsome new buildings intermixed with buildings which were obviously bombed, shelled, and shot to hell. Behind the Intercontinental and still visible from the pool is the husk of the Holiday Inn. In front are a few less famous buildings shot to hell, plus to a very exclusive yacht club in perfect shape.
I don’t know if this is the same yacht club, but the very popular former prime minister Rafiq Hariri and several of his aides and bodyguards were assassinated in front of the St George yacht club with a massive car bomb in February 2005, widely suspected to be the work of the Syrian government. A month later a million Lebanese protested in the main square (Martyr’s Square) demanding that Syrian troops leave Lebanon.

Holiday Inn with holes, Intercontinental in pink

View from the pool at the Intercontinental

Rafiq Hariri and other staff killed the same day

A million Lebanese marched a month later demanding Syria to pull its soldiers out of Lebanon

I went to the National Museum in Beirut today. This place has the best preserved early (Bronze Age through Roman Period) artifacts I have ever seen. The most amazing thing is that the museum was closed during the civil war and was heavily shelled (it was right on the Green Line separating the more Muslim West from the more Christian East). Before abandoning the museum, the staff packed away some small artifacts and poured giant slabs of concrete around some of the larger items (like sarcophogi) and burried the mosaics. The bulk of the medium sized artifacts were left down in the basement. Fifteen years later when the staff ventured down into the basement, they had to wear hazardous waste masks. The humidity in the basement was 92%. There was standing water everywhere and lots of bombs had exploded in the basement. Amazingly they managed to recover and restore a lot of amazing pieces.

Big Stuff:


Small artifacts that made it:

Some things that didn’t make it:

I have tons of pictures from Petra, so it was hard to pick a few.

walking into Petra early in the morning…

entering the siq…

first glimpse of the Treasury

But wait, there are hundreds and hundreds of buildings 

exploring the tombs makes you feel a bit like Indiana Jones (really that’s my shadow)

But you really need to walk along one of the other siqs…

And get up on top of the rocks to appreciate your new vantage point

Palmyra (or Tadmoor to the locals) is an extensive, well-preserved Roman city in the middle of the Syrian desert. It was once an oasis along the route between Bagdad and Damascus.

I also caught a nice glimpse of a herd of (wild?) camels drinking at a watering hole from the bus window.

I think anyone who has been to Jordan will agree that you need to be at least a little bit crazy to drive here. Fortunately, I qualify.  It was my last few days in Jordan so why not…

I rented a car for 3 days to see some of the sites that are difficult to reach using public transport. The result?  dipping feet in one international border (Jordan River with Israel/Palestine), 2 fun traveling companions, 920km, two beautiful nature reserves, 15 hitchhikers picked up, 5 castles, and only one warning from the speed control police.

Wadi Mujib and Wadi Dana Nature Reserves (more on these in another post)

Audrey and Muriel and I scrunched into the petite Kia Picanta (1100cc)

Dipping feet in the Jordan river (5m wide) literally spitting distance from Israel.

al-Azraq, al-Kharana, al-Amra, and Umm al-Jimr all out in the middle of some serious nowhere desert.

Everyone loves their mobile phones. Even camel drivers…