Story World Research in Jordan

Michael Finberg
7 min readApr 19, 2024

Dateline: November 1993

“You goin’ to Amman?” I turned around. It was an American. “Yup,” I answered. “I’ve got a flight to India.” The American was tall and wiry. He had tanned skin and blond hair and sounded confident and intelligent. “Where you go’in?” I asked. I was curious about him and wasn’t sure why. “Oh, I don’t know. I’ve been to Turkey, Syria, and Lebanon. It’s my third time in Jordan. I guess, I’ll go back to Lebanon, I’ve got a friend there.” I sensed my new friend was an Arabophile and this turned out to be right.

“Whaddya think of Israel?” I probed. “Ah, I don’t like it. It’s a police state. I was staying near the Old City and I could see the soldiers with their clubs every day, and they used them often.” I felt a strange connection to this new companion. His name was John and he felt almost like a brother. “The West has messed up the Middle East. That’s why Iran’s a big power here. Israel holds all the cards and is playing a rough game. The Israelis are dictating unfair terms to the Arabs.” I didn’t feel like arguing with him. I liked John a lot and so decided to humor him. When we got to Amman, I noticed how very little paranoia I felt in the air. It felt pretty safe and I felt at home. John helped me lug my stuff as I inquired about Petra and flights to Delhi. I had changed my Amman to India flight four times during this trip. Now I was doing it again. I wanted more time in Jordan.

Amman was bustling and bursting with activity. It was a city resting on hills, or jebels, as the natives called them. John and I checked into a hotel and just hung out. I noticed that the Dome of the Rock was on every twenty-dinar bill and that a huge photo of the Old City hung on the wall of the Jerusalem restaurant. That’s where John took me to eat. We helped ourselves to plenty of saffron-flavored rice and grilled chicken.

I noticed that John was not unlike my earlier self, a highly educated drifter. He had a logical and powerful mind. It was hiding a lot of emotional baggage. We talked about science. John had been a physics major. We talked about philosophy. “You have to define your terms,” John declared. “What is the mind all about?” he asked. I looked for a way to pierce his mental wall. “Well, the problem is the mind itself,” I parried. “This thing that needs to define things constantly prevents us from seeing the truth.” John was quick to lobby back a serve. “Oh, now you’re sounding like Wittgenstein, man. That guy put philosophy on top of its head. He said it was all just a meaningless game unless you wanted to put meaning into it. I don’t agree with that. Philosophy is an important human activity. Humans need to do it.” There was a silence. I saw my opening. John’s mind was blocking his heart and I sensed a very deep and open heart across the table. I decided to let John experience the sublime through meditation. It worked. I did a Mahakala meditation and the next morning took off for Petra. John was calmer and he lent me his watch. Mine had broken down. It was very early morning when I plunged into the dark and deserted streets of Amman. I could hear the muezzins serenading the city with their sweet and hypnotic wails. All of this felt completely familiar.

The bus plowed through the desert highway at top speed. I munched stale pretzels and tried to catch some sleep. The screams of babies in the front of the vehicle made this impossible. I was on a luxury tourist bus, the only one that left that day for this kind of trip. From my window, the desert looked flat, barren, and forbidding. I could see Bedouin nomads camping out in the early morning heat, oblivious to me and everything else. I was going to Petra, the great lost city of the Nabateans, a mysterious race of warrior priests who had carved out of hills and cliffs a monstrous city hidden by canyons and forbidden-looking brown and orange mountains.
Petra was ALIEN. It reminded me of the Grand Canyon, Star Wars, and Lost Horizon all rolled into one big rocky complex of tombs, caves, and dizzy-looking monuments. The place was huge and covered a wide area. The mind had a hard time taking it all in. The huge “treasury” building dwarfed all who came close to it. Inside, there was nothing but emptiness, dark and uninviting.

Later, in the afternoon, after the tourist hordes had departed, I walked up to the “monastery,” another huge and towering cathedral-like structure. The dead silence seemed to make the stones speak. The shouts of an occasional Bedouin echoed and ricocheted off the stony walls of this vast temple of ghosts. I did my meditation, but like in Qumran, the local spirits would have none of it. GET OUT! WE DON’T WANT YOUR BLESSINGS! This was their disappointing message. I then counted my money. I had only four hundred dollars left! I needed to leave Jordan soon.

I spent the night in a comfortable hotel and almost didn’t return to the ruins the next morning. A blinding windstorm hit the entire area with its frightening hints of violent doom; the holocaust ended almost as soon as it began. I taxied back down to the ruins and didn’t know what to see with only a few remaining hours left. The bus would be heading back to Amman in the late afternoon. A young Arab who snapped my photo told me to go to the Altar of High Sacrifice. I did so. The energies were awesome. I grunted and sweated up the steep trail, climbing higher and higher. I stopped to gaze at the unfolding panorama that was Petra. I could see donkeys trailing below, looking as small as ants. A young Dutch mother and her two daughters had decided to rest slightly ahead of me. I was dizzy and the blonde little Dutch girls were transformed into angels by my fatigued eyes. I could feel a heavy vibration in this rarefied atmosphere. It was indeed the vibration of SACRIFICE.

Above, I could see the huge slab where women and men were offered up to the faceless gods. Drainage ditches had been carved around the sides for this perpetual bloody feast. A British couple and their tour guide decided to do a reenactment for the cameras at my urging. Old karmic alignments were rekindled as the wife lay on the sacrificial slab. Her husband and I went into a camera frenzy. Powerful energies were released. They felt primal. No blood was spilled, but the intention of RELEASE was just as strong. I was releasing something, but wasn’t quite sure what. It was intense and brutal as it was sublime. It was IT in a different form.

John helped me load my luggage into a cab and grinned cheerfully as he said goodbye. We had exchanged addresses. I was now only hours away from INDIA. I was relieved and excited. The crazy Arab cab driver stopped to talk to some friends who tried to grab my luggage; I screamed and the cab driver just laughed. His friends then banged on the sides of his vehicle as he zoomed away. I was almost hysterical. To this day, I’m not sure if this incident was a joke or the real thing. Arabs can be weird, VERY weird. Jordanian Airways charged me a hideous amount for excess baggage. I refused to pay it and a standoff ensued. As the minutes ticked by until departure, I did an angry meditation. The Jordanians relented. They wanted to compromise. I gave them one hundred and twenty dollars. Now I only had three hundred dollars left and I knew big trouble lay ahead.

The security checks at Amman airport were very strict. It took forever for me to be cleared, but eventually, I was able to board the plane. It taxied onto the runway and accelerated towards infinity with a lurch and a thud.

I was finally on my way to the center of my journey. I was on my way home, where people understood me. Support and protection awaited me. There were still more trials ahead, but the REAL PILGRIMAGE was yet to begin. The flight was only five hours. The plane landed and I heaved a sigh of relief. I was on Indian soil. I could feel KALI and the Gurus extending their arms to me. I felt the warm embrace of the protectors. I was finally HOME!

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Michael Finberg

I'm the author of an experimental anti-cookie cutter blog. Leave a response. I'll comment. if it's appropriate.