Sufian was there to pick us up after our wanderings round the ruins of Jerash and was struggling to suppress a look of shock when I asked to go to the market stalls down near Hadrian’s Gate Arch (currently undergoing restoration) at the other end of the Jerash complex. He obliged with never a murmur, though I could tell he was mentally groaning as to how long I might spend shopping! Promised faithfully to be 10 – 15 mins, though he had that 'long-suffering man' look on his face as I jumped out of the car.
One young vendor caught my attention and introduced himself as Mohammed and then elaborated as to how it was his own father who was the official photographer at Jerash ruins. On further investigation and a few well-directed questions it turned out that his father was actually the one who sold film and postcards near the South Tetrapylon. Kinda sorta the same :)
Haggled good-naturedly, as is expected, over some pottery plates labelled 'Jerash' , that came in a range of sizes. Settled on 3 only – one teeny, one medium and one a largish medium size - despite Mohammed’s best efforts at imploring me to take 'many many' more. Really only wanted the medium one for my collection to go with the Dilmun plates from Bahrain, and the rest were merely placatory so as not to appear a bad customer, but nonetheless, things like that usually make good traveller's treasures to take home for gifts, so it was happily a successful transaction all round.
Decided on a whim to buy some Islamic prayer beads made from red agate - 'real' agate stones Mohammed insisted - and with an obviously well-practised flick of the wrist, he produced an indisputably real flame from a lighter that must have been in his pocket and attempted to burn my intended purchase mere centimetres from my face, just to prove they weren’t plastic or glass. Point taken. Couldn’t then renege on the deal and still hope to keep my honour!
Finally chose a silver and turquoise bracelet to add to the haul, though hastened to add that I was more than sure it was 'real' turquoise and so, if it was alright with him, he could skip the fire test.
All this time Sufian had been loitering about the little souq area waiting for us – timing me perhaps? True to my word, the shopping was done in 10 minutes and we were then back on the road, and there was a hint of a pleased smile to his face. Think Sufian was secretly impressed to have finally met a woman who could shop to a time limit – a lot of Arabic women are notorious shop-aholics and can spend whole days and the equivalent of the GNP of a small nation in the relentless pursuit of that must-have item!
On the return journey to Amman, no one spoke – all lost in private thoughts about the day and perhaps just too tired to share them.
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