There was a time last week when the prevailing wind announced that spring had arrived to Jordan. The desert had bloomed into swaths of green emerging from the previously lifeless soil. Flowers had appeared on the olive trees. Kids could be seen and heard playing outside. And the weather warmed. For three consecutive days I did not turn on my heater, a first for me in Jordan since my arrival in October.
To take advantage of this warm weather, I have developed the habit of bringing a mattress out onto my front porch in the afternoons. I sit in the sun and listen to music, eat lunch, study Arabic, and read. I also receive guests this way. By being outside and visible, neighbors and passerby's stop by to visit and chat.
On one such day I was walking home from school and saw my new neighbor walking down the hill towards the bus stop. We spent a couple minutes going through the standard greetings and inquiries of health and happiness before I asked him where he was heading. He told me was going to Mafraq to look for a new house. I asked why and he merely said that he did not like living in our small and quiet village. I was sad to hear that he might be leaving, but wished him luck in his search for a new house.
That was the second to last time I ever talked to him.
Later that afternoon I brought my lunch and a mattress outside to relax and enjoy the weather. The six (of eight) oldest children (ages 2-10) were out playing and running around. They saw me and waved and said hello. After a while a couple of the younger girls walked over to sit with me, though they were too shy to speak. Before I continue, however, I must make the aside that this was the first instance of a female being on my front porch since I moved in over 2 months ago. Soon after, the boys and oldest daughter joined us on the porch. The children told me, and I could see the evidence on their faces, that their house was infested with mosquitoes and they couldn't sleep at night. The six-year-old boy explained, in more complicated Arabic than I am able to understand, all the reasons why Bashar is bad. The two-year-old girl would walk up to me, giggle, and run back to her four year old sister. The nine-year-old boy demonstrated how Bashar's soldiers attack and kill civilians and families. The ten year old boy asked if I wanted to take their picture.
Not long after, their father arrived and shooed all his children home. I asked him if he found any good houses and he responded that he couldn't find a one. He reiterated the fact that he did not want to live in our village anymore. He then told me that he was going to get his gun and go back home to fight. My immediate response was "No, that's not good."
After all, I am a PEACE Corps Volunteer and, despite the fact that I live in the world's fourth most militarized country that is also surrounded on all sides by countries currently or recently going through war and/or revolution (Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine/Israel, Egypt), peace is still a fundamental value and ideal that I uphold. For basically my entire adult life my country has spent billions of dollars engaging in two wars in which thousands of lives have been lost. I do not know what our world would be like now if neither of those wars had happened. I cannot, however, imagine how the United States, Iraq, or Afghanistan would be worse off if those wars had not happened.
As the uprising in Syria culminates its first year, dozens of Syrians are continuing to die everyday. Bashar is refusing to back down; rather, every time the global community speaks out against him and his regime, he only amplifies the violence. The opposition groups in Syria appear to be no match for Bashar and his military. The innocent families hiding in their homes also appear to be no match. Yet Syrians insist they do not want international intervention in their country. I can only wonder if the almost constant presence of occupying forces in the region (Americans, British, French, Turks, Romans) has something to do with why the Syrian opposition wants to fight on their own. I do not understand, and I probably never can understand how people can reach the point of constant and sustained violence. I am here for Peace.
But I didn't say all this to my neighbor. All I said was, "No, that's not good." And to my surprise, he had no response and changed the subject. To this day, I do not know if he seriously plans to return to Syria to fight.
That was the last time I ever talked to him.
The next day, when I got home from school, their house was empty and the only sign of their presence was the three bags of trash sitting in the street.
Winter has returned to Jordan. I'm wearing six layers again. I'm careful to close all my doors to keep the heat in. The wind is howling. The rain is coming down. The skies are dark and gray. No trace of children playing can be seen or heard.
