Wadi Rum - our Bedouin camp (Friday and Saturday)

Warning: long entry!!

We arrived at our guide's camp around 6:00 p.m. After our bumpy ride through the desert (Toyota truck pictured), it was lovely to be on solid ground again. :-)

Before getting into the nuts and bolts of our camp, let me say this...

When we walked into our camp's enclosure, tears came into my eyes and I could hardly contain myself. It was so beautiful, so amazing, so wondrous to be in a real Bedouin camp, to see the colorful mats and rugs, the teapot, the satchel hanging from a rock. I was overwhelmed by the experience, and it had just begun. I felt so privileged to be in that place and to be seeing all my eyes could take in. I can't really describe what I was feeling, but it was an amazing moment of authenticity, of wonder, and of awe at this world of great variety in which we live.

These Bedouin guides maintain semi-permanent camps at the sites that are traditionally their families' camps. Our guide told us that in the past, the Bedouin had tamed much of Wadi Rum. They'd once established water reservoirs, figured out irrigation systems, grown wheat and vegetables. This is no longer true; in fact, very few Bedouin in the Wadi Rum area still survive via their traditional methods of grazing goats and camels, etc. Most now use the tourism in Wadi Rum as their means of support. These camps stay up most of the year, and still look much the same as they always have. We got off the truck and started hauling our stuff into the tent area. The entrance to this semi-enclosed area is just to the right of the tent you see in the first picture, between the tent and the rock.

The following pictures try to give you a sort of 360' view of our camp's area, with the entrance at the south end of the camp. The tent's door (2nd picture) is barely visible because of the sun glare - just next to the small white table - between the black striped fabric and the tan fabric. The tent's sides can be lifted in the afternoon's hot weather. The tent is very warm at night and stays cool during the day until early afternoon, even in the heat.

The third picture is directly opposite the entrance to the camp. A shelf holding some traditional Bedouin items is pictured on the left, and on the right is a big pile of blankets and thin mattresses - the items traditionally used in (and out of) the tent for sleeping and lounging. We brought our own sleeping bags. As my sister said, "I like to know I'm the only thing sleeping in my sleeping
bag." Get it? Bugs, etc.

The next picture shows the same pile of mattresses and blankets, but also shows where various rugs, etc. are laid out as a seating area. Yes, just like you've seen in the movies, they have no chairs and sit on the ground for meals, entertaining, etc. We slept right where those mattresses on the right side of the picture begin. We took more mattresses from the pile, laid them side by side, and put our sleeping bags on top of them. We could have slept in the tent, but the temperature was perfect for sleeping under the stars.

As you can see in the next picture, the tent faces a rock overhang. This overhang totally protects the camp from the sun until about 11:30 a.m. Even after that, one can sit in the shade close to the rock until about 2:30 p.m. This was a wonderful, beautiful place to sleep, with the rock over part of us, able to look out the the expanse of sky above us.

The next to last picture shows Hannah running into the camp's enclosure. The last picture shows the great sand dune just outside the camp's enclosure. The boys immediately unloaded their toy trucks, climbed the dune and started playing.

OK, so now you can picture where we were staying. After unloading the truck, we got our stuff a little organized, sent the kids off to play, and began relaxing. Soon our guide and his son arrived with the traditional welcome - very strong, very sweet black tea and sesame seed covered cookies. I love that tea and, unfortunately, drank too much and then couldn't sleep, but more on that later. After this traditional Arabic welcome (by the way, it would have been very rude of us to either refuse the tea or not sit down with them to enjoy it), our hosts prepared dinner for us. We didn't have to wait long before that was laid out for us. The traditional meal served to visitors in Wadi Rum is Makloubi - upside down in Arabic. Chicken, eggplant, and cauliflower are placed in a deep pan and covered with rice and broth. After it is all cooked, it is turned out on a large tray and served...in HUGE portions! I was embarrassed at how much I left on my plate. My sister told me this is a part of Bedouin tradition and hospitality - generosity is a cardinal virtue among the Bedouin people. If they served us any less, it might imply they were cheap or unable to provide for us. Our Maklouba was served with a cucumber, tomato, and yogurt salad which I watched others mix into the rice - I did the same. The dinner was delicious!
After dinner, our guide left us, but with a guard. Hospitality being so important to this people group, they wouldn't want their guests to have a need or face any kind of danger without someone there to provide for them. Our guide's teenage son stayed with us. As he heard us winding down, he came into the camp enclosure to get some mattresses and blankets from the pile. After asking if we needed anything at all, he walked a little way from camp, made his bed, and slept there under the stars. He was close enough if we'd needed anything, but plenty far away to give us all the privacy we needed.

It was an amazing night! As I said above, I couldn't sleep much at all because of drinking too much of the wonderful tea. Usually, when I can't sleep I toss and turn and get quite irritated. Not so this night. I was almost content to be awake, lying under the stars. I knew I was going to get to enjoy the moon and stars more than anyone else. Every time I rolled over, awake again, I would smile, seeing the moon crossing the sky. In fact, the moon was almost full, and so we hardly saw any stars. At one point, the moon was so bright that I put a shirt over my eyes to make it darker. Incredible, wonderful!

The highlight of the night was this...upon waking, I sat up and looked around our camp. The moon had risen above the large rock under whose outcropping we were sleeping, and was shining on the tent like a spotlight. Oh, how I wish I was an artist and could render that image in paint or pencil! It was so beautiful! Something about it touched my heart deeply and once again, the tears flowed down my cheeks.

So a fitful night slowly turned into dawn. I watched the sky gradually lighten, the boys wake up one by one, stretching, looking around them with quiet smiles. My sister had told them, "If you wake up and the sky isn't very bright, you must be very quiet!" They obeyed. I followed Joshua out to the sand dune and thus our day began.