My friend Abu Bilal

Looking west from the high point of Tall Umayri down into a small wadi (valley) there are several tents and a large oblong cucumber (fagush) field sloping down towards the east. Each morning, a farmer would be out in his gray gelabia and red kafiya with his wife and sons picking the cucumbers. I inquired to several of the dig veterans but nobody seemed to know anything about the Tall's newest neighbors, nor did they seem to have any interest to know. But I was dying to know. I guess that's why I became a sociologist/anthropologist, I have this insatiable curiosity about people. After several days I just decided to walk out to the field and strike up a conversation using my steadily improving but still limited Arabic. Abu Bilal welcomed me and his sons surrounded me speaking some English phrases. Soon a tray of turkish coffee appeared out of nowhere. During breaks I would walk over to hold conversations. They would usually fill up a large bag of fagush for me to share with the people at the dig. One day they brought over homemade flat bread. If I didn't go out to talk they would send one of the sons with the bag.

With my limited Arabic and the sons' school English, I pieced together something of their lives. Abu Bilal is an elementary school teacher in a village south of Amman, he does this farming job in the summer with the apparent permission of the landowner, the wealthy Abu Jaber. His son's names are Bilal (oldest), Osama, Abdula, Mowan, Sofian. They were always curious about the U.S. "How many wives can a man have?" I spent several evenings at their place drinking tea and attempting communication. On the last night at their tent Graeme was with me and with his much better Arabic it was easier. Rasiah, the wife, made this wonderful coffee cake. Today I said goodbye and gave them some pens for school and several Arabic/English dictionaries. It is being invited into the family life and friendship that I find most rewarding.