a conundrum

It is my 3rd day in Amman and I am finding myself in a curious conundrum. I am staying in a (very nice) apartment that is outside of the downtown core - what Leaside is to downtown Toronto in a kind of way. ( Though that comparison really only works in an upside-down parallel Martian universe, because really Shmeisani is nothing like Leaside). There are a number of other ex-pat consultants from the team in the building and on day 2, I ask one of them: "so what's the actual address here?".

Response: "why would you want to know that?"

"well...in case I get lost or am somewhere by myself after dark and am feeling like I need to take a taxi to get back here."

This is when I learn that no one recognizes addresses. Or street names. There is no such thing as mail delivery. There are names on street signs and numbers on houses but they are quite academic and serve no functional purpose. Cab drivers (who rule in a city where there is no transit) know neighbourhood names - Jebel Amman, Jebel Lweibdeh, etc. - and major landmarks. And once you arrive in the general vicinity, you steer the driver in the right direction to get to where you intend to go. For example, the major landmark in this neighbourhood is a 24-hour (!) Safeway supermarket (which, by the way, is currently playing non-stop Christmas Carols -deeply incongruous) that is about 10 minutes walk around the corner and down a hill.

Here's the conundrum: this system only works if you actually know a city ... and you know what your destination looks like or where it is in relation to some other recognizable place that you know. I know nothing. I cannot describe what any place looks like. I also don't know anything that is nearby anything (except for the Safeway in Shmeisani, now my universal point of reference).

So for now, I am paying careful attention when I am being driven by someone else and just trying to figure out my personal way-finding system from point to point. It is a whole new way to decode a place.