The Las Vegas of Jordan

I meet Omar, my travel company's agent in Aqaba at 6:30 this evening—he informs me that the daily ferry to Nuweibaa, Egypt, won't be sailing again tomorrow and assures me that I will now be picked up from my hotel at noon tomorrow, driven 2 miles to the Israeli border, where I have to pay 8 Jordanian dinar departure tax, whereupon I enter Israel, go through their border security and customs, pay the Israelis $30 departure tax, (payable in US currency only), walk across the border into Egypt, where a driver will meet me with a sign and drive me to Talab, where, finally I'll be met by my Egyptian driver who will take me to Nuweibaa to obtain a tourist visa then on to St Katherine's Monastery on Mt Sinai to begin my tour of Egypt. Omar accompanies me to a currency exchange and I buy the $30 US and some Egyptian pounds. I then walk to the Golden Anchor Saloon, one block from my hotel, for a haircut, then to a seafood restaurant, recommended by Omar, for dinner. Unusually, they're serving alcohol.

After dinner I wander around a bit and notice how many liquor stores, electronic stores, night clubs and bars are in the neighborhood. Now I remember Mannah, my driver, telling me that Aqaba is a duty free zone and Jordanians come here to shop, party and stock up on goods not easily obtainable in the rest of the country. I spot a large Movenpick Hotel, the same chain as the one I stayed in in Petra. But this is altogether different. It's a vast, glittery phantasmagoria of faux Arabic architecture, with fountains and massive outdoor bars, where small groups of young men are smoking shisha. I make for an indoor bar where I sit and order a strawberry ice cream dessert—after all, this is the Movenpick of Swiss ice cream fame. I'm aware of the strains of Paul Mauriat's 1968 hit, Love is Blue and I turn and realize it's being played and sung by a good looking man in a dark suit standing on a little stage at a bank of keyboards. He has a ponytail. As far as I can tell, there's just me and another couple in this bar that could easily accomodate 100 people. Now in a voice, with a reverb that's bouncing from here to Egypt and back, he begins to croon What a Wonderful World, complete with electronic sax and strings.

I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom for me and you
And I think to myself what a wonderful world.

I see skies of blue and clouds of white
The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
And I think to myself what a wonderful world.

The colors of the rainbow so pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces of people going by
I see friends shaking hands saying how do you do
They're really saying I love you.

Suddenly I find his kitschy, yet ernest rendition to this empty bar strangely moving. Weird.