November/December 2006 issue
Arabian Nights: Workshops in Jordan
by Suzanne Morrison, Branch Librarian, Fargo
The first two weeks of November found me
spending my annual leave in Amman, Jordan, on
another project for the American Bar
Association’s Central and Eastern European Law
Initiative (CEELI). They contacted me to assess
ABA/Jordan partner university libraries and
analyze the state of their legal collections. This
provided a great opportunity to see the country of
Jordan, meet the various law faculties and tour
libraries.
Magistrate Judge Karen Klein was also in
Amman to conduct seven days worth of
mediation workshops and judicial ethics
seminars. She proved a ready dinner companion
after long days of work. Luckily, Jordanians tend
to dine later, usually from 9:00 to 10:00 p.m.
Judge Klein left a week before I did, stopping
briefly in Muscat, Oman, to make a presentation
on mediation and communication skills to a
group of women lawyers.
I toured campuses my first week and a half and
then spent the last few days presenting three
workshops: one for professors on legal research
and two for students on legal research and
writing. My last day in the country I was able to
squeeze in a day at the office.
I spent my one day off
visiting Petra, the “rose
colored city” - a once
forgotten Bedoin city that
many consider to be one
of the Seven Wonders of
the World. (Rent Indiana
Jones and the Last
Crusade, as Petra is one
of its featured locations.)
Joseph, our guide, ignored the tourist-track and
spent the day leading us over rock piles to
deserted caves striated with brilliant colorations.
Toward the end of the day, we still wanted to
climb the 850 steps to see the Monastery, but we
rented donkeys to save time. Once on top, magic
touched us as we listened to the sound of flute
music floating from a ridge. We shared chai and
stories with Joseph and other Bedouins in the
tiny shop.
Eventually, dusk began to fall and we were the
only people around. After trudging back down
the 850 steps, we realized that we still had over 4
kilometers to hike out of the canyon in the dark.
Under the Arabian star-studded night, we rode
our donkeys and listened to Joseph sing age-old
songs. Truly, we felt as if we had fallen into an
Arabian Nights story.