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Tafila Wind Farm in Jordan

With no appreciable amounts of oil or natural gas, Jordan, like Syria is a Middle East anomaly when it comes to its fossil fuel rich neighbours like Saudi Arabia and Israel. But new energy is blowing into Jordan. The Tafila project for the wind

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Obamacare: Amman, Jordan Style

Green Prophets burn lots of calories trying to make the planet a better place, but you can’t do much do-gooding if you’re dead. I’ll share a day in my week as a cautionary tale (and offer a peek into Amman’s excellent, and sometimes culturally surreal, medical system). 

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Amman, Jordan Named World’s 3rd Ugliest City

My hometown of Amman, Jordan has just been slammed as one of the least attractive cities on the planet. Online travel adviser U.CityGuide posted their 10 Ugliest Cities of the World, with Amman nabbing third place. I have to concede that in the urban looks department, and as much as I love Amman, Jordan’s capital […]

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Deadly Lake Natron Turns Animals into Ghostly Statues

The Middle East boasts some of the world’s saltiest waterbodies, but none approach the horror of Lake Natron in Tanzania, one of the harshest environments on the planet.  It’s hot, chalky waters can turn birds and land animals into calcified statues, spookily captured by photographer Nick Brandt in his new book, Across the Ravaged Land.

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Mysterious Sinkholes Threaten to Sink the Dead Sea

Watch your step, kibbutzniks and spa-mavens! Diminishing water levels in the Dead Sea are causing changes to surrounding groundwater flows.  Freshwater moves through the aquifer, dissolving subterranean salt deposits and creating underground voids, which cause surface collapse. Dramatic and unpredictable, sinkholes appear at the alarming rate of nearly one a day. First observed around the […]

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How Do You Know That Big Eid Is Coming?

Eid Al Adha, also called Big Eid and the Feast of the Sacrifice, is an important Islamic holiday celebrated by Muslims worldwide to honor the willingness of the prophet Ibrahim to sacrifice his first-born son as an act of submission to God’s command. Everyone knows the story: God jumped in with a last-minute substitution and […]