happy fathers days: kingdom of jordan

Showing posts with label kingdom of jordan. Show all posts

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Souvenir from Jordan

A souvenir is something you keep to remind you of a trip or other event. Its universal,customary and habitual for all of us to buy souvenir's for our self or as gifts.

Jordan is a place with lot of places of tourist interest. So you will find varieties of souvenir's.Here are some of them you will get to see and buy there.....

The above photos show only few types of souvenir's. There are lot many of them. They are all v.beautiful and perfect gift items for your friends,relatives, near and dear ones. So do buy few of them during your visit to Jordan.

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Official Website:Jordan

Want to know MORE about Jordan?

Then check out the official website of King Abdulla II....
http://www.kinghussein.gov.jo/

And the Official Website of the Jordan Tourism Board
http://www.visitjordan.com/

Jordan Map

A map is essential for planning a trip and staying oriented during the trip.We can have idea about the places, the distances between them, by having a look at the map. Then its easy to plan our trip without wasting lot of time while travelling.
I followed the map below while planning my Jordan trip....

Silver Jewellery Of Jordan

"Silver Jewellery" is something I found all around Jordan. Be it at road-side shops, malls or 5-star resorts, they all sell them. I just love jewellery and was tempted to buy them. But I had doubts about its purity and didn't buy.Most common silver jewellery that you will find is earrings of beautiful designs. Of course there are bracelets, necklaces and rings. But you will find lot and lot of earings.

Bargaining in Jordan

Like any other country in the world, Jordan is no different. While going out for shopping try to bargain.If you are not aware about the market rate, then it is first advisable to move around, have idea about the existing price and then bargain.Even if it is written "Fix Price" in a shop, you must bargain because I found they give discounts.

Holidays in Jordan

Public holidays

Holidays in Jordan are either religious (Islamic or Christian) or celebrations of important events in Jordanian or Arab history. Non-Islamic holidays are fixed, while islamic holidays vary according to the lunar Muslim calendar.

National holidays

1 January: New Year's Day
30 January: King Abdullah II's birthday
1 May: Labor Day
25 May: Independence Day
14 November: The Late King Hussein's Birthday
25 December: Christmas Day

Holidays in Jordan

Public holidays

National holidays

1 January: New Year's Day
30 January: King Abdullah II's birthday
1 May: Labor Day
25 May: Independence Day
14 November: The Late King Hussein's Birthday
25 December: Christmas Day

Language in Jordan

The official language of Jordan is Arabic. But you need not worry as English is widely spoken.

What to Pack for Jordan?

This is what I suggest you to include while packing for your trip to Jordan from my experience:

1) Good walking shoes: You need to walk a lot....be it Petra or visiting any castles or Wadi Rum

2) Good sunscreen

3) Take a medicine kit( for fever, cold,stomach upset), in case you need it.It is always good to have your medicines ready then searching to buy in a foreign land.

4) Sun glass

5) Hat

6) Lip balm/Vaseline

7) Clothing:Jordan is a Muslim country.Though a tourist place,try to wear keeping in mind their sentiments. So better to wear capris, pants,long skirts....I mean cover yourself instead of over exposing yourself.Leave your mini skirts, halter tops and short shorts at home.

8) A Knapsack to store your money, passport, water bottle, snacks, maps, etc. in it while you're touring.

9) Facial Wipes

10) A note book/pen to jolt down anything important

11) A map of Jordan(easy to understand)when you travel around Jordan

12) "Change" to give as tips. They readily take dollars

13) Mineral water bottle and small snack packets

14) If you are going at winter time, then be sure to bring some WARM clothes! It can get really cold in the evening and night. Freezing!!Even in summer better to have a pullover/scarf as it can be very windy.

15) A swim suit for Dead Sea

16) Binoculars: You will need it if you visit any nature reserve.I felt the need while visiting Dana Biosphere Reserve

17) Last but not the lest, don't forget to take your camera to capture your beautiful memories.

Mineral Water Bottle in Jordan

Often, when you’re taking a trip, drink lot of water as it will help you stay fit.Being well hydrated helps counteract some of the problems of travel: fatigue and jet lag, altitude, and hot and cold environments, to mention a few. Minimal dehydration occurs even before you feel thirsty, subtly affecting your mental and physical abilities.

But available drinking water is not always fit to drink. Micro organisms that cause intestinal upsets may be present in tap water so always drink bottled water when traveling.

In Jordan, there are lot of mineral water bottles available in the market.The two famous brands in Jordan are Nestle's Pure Life and Aquafina.

So what is the cost of 1.5liters mineral bottle??? There is no fix rate....SURPRISED!!!

Yes that's the fact. Shop keepers charge anything they want from tourist. Never buy any water bottle from the shops near Petra Gate. They charge just too much. Also if you stop at any shops without your guide or driver, then you will have to pay more. So try to buy from a pharmacy or any super market.They never charge anything extra.

The cost of 1.5lit mineral water bottle in Jordan is 0.350JD. So if they ask for more then remember they are asking/taking more price from you.

Tipping In Jordan

"How much to tip in Jordan?" You must be thinking if you are planning a trip to Jordan. It happened to us also. I checked the internet for it and realized that it is integral part of tourism sector like any part of Middle East.But I found a huge difference when compared with my Egypt trip.Unlike Egypt, the people associated with the tourism sector in Jordan are very professional and never we met anyone (except the horse boy) asking for tip. They "wish for a baksheesh" but will not ask for it.Or maybe we were lucky enough to meet so many nice Jordanian's.
Tipping is your way of showing your satisfaction and gratification. So there is no hard and fast rules as to how much you need to pay. But do keep in mind that most employees are paid very less and they depend on "tips" to run their families.
This is what we paid.....
Bell Boys/Porters : 1JD

Restaurants: They charge 10% service tax but still you can give them/waiters the change(if you are happy with the service)...that's what we did

Glass Bottom Boat : We paid the charge they demand/ask. So we didn't pay him anything extra.

Tour Guide: We paid 5JD to our tour guide in Petra.You can pay according to his service.

Horse Cart: The driver didn't ask anything extra and so we didn't pay him.We paid him the charge he demanded.You may need the service of horse cart in Petra

Horse Ride: Though we paid him(the horse boy) the amount he asked/demanded still while paying him he was asking for tips. So we paid him 3JD extra. He demanded 7JD as his service and 3JD as tips.

Driver: During our 5days stay in Jordan we had the same driver. From welcoming us to Jordan at the airport to dropping us back, Nedal was with us.He was clear to specify that he is not a guide, but his insight and contribution in making the trip enjoyable and interesting turned out to be even better than having a guide.Nedal was full of interesting information including the history of the places we saw, knew all the best places to stop and went out of his way to make sure we saw the real Jordan. We think he did a good job. We was a perfect gentleman.So we paid him 100JD for 5days(20 JD for each day).I feel we paid him really good because most travelers pay between 5-10JD each day.Read in two-three websites suggesting to pay 2-3JD per day. We really felt very bad that during Eid he was with us leaving his wife and 3beautiful kids at home.He would get lot of calls from them and said it was nothing unnatural because his job demands 24x7 duty.But they are paid really less with only around 400JD per month as he informed us.

Jordan Visa Form

Here is a copy of the VISA Form you will have to fill and submit along with the visa fees,passport and your passport size picture(1copy) to the Jordan Embassy to get your visa.............