Video
$20 Fake Jacket in AMMAN, JORDAN 🇯🇴
· 14 min · Watch on YouTube
$20 Fake Jacket in AMMAN, JORDAN 🇯🇴
A second day in Amman with Mac, built around a practical problem: neither of them packed a jacket, the evenings are cold, and the desert later in the trip will be colder. So they go to the old market.
The shopping is the most instructive part. A seller won’t name a price until the jacket is on, and Mac calls the tactic out loud while it is happening — once you have it on and like it, you have stopped deciding whether to buy. They buy anyway, at 20 dinars against 25 asked, which is the honest version of knowing a technique. In the next transaction Harry mis-hears 16 as 60, hands over a 50, and the seller gives him his change.
The day ends with the best thing in the video and a small regret. At the citadel a guide is offered at 30 dinars and turned down on price; five minutes later Harry is standing among the ruins saying he wishes he could tell you the history and can’t, with Mac agreeing they should have paid. Then the sun sets and the call to prayer comes from every mosque in the city at once, ricocheting off the buildings.
Key moments
- [00:00] A late start; both have been working.
- [00:30] Each street decorated differently — flowers strung over one, buckets over another.
- [01:00] Lunch: chicken, and a baked bread dish full of stringy cheese, brought out steaming.
- [02:05] Harry rates it 9 out of 10 against manakish’s 10.
- [02:35] The bill for two: about 32 dinars, roughly £32 or $35, for two large mains, sides and drinks.
- [03:08] Off to the old market, about ten minutes away, for jackets.
- [03:38] Amman is a very hilly city; and the souk is divided by trade — a quarter for guns, a quarter for pets.
- [04:08] Trying on thobes.
- [04:40] The seller won’t price the jacket until it is on, and Mac names the tactic as it happens.
- [05:42] Harry says 25 is too much and that he had 15 in mind.
- [06:12] Bought at 20.
- [06:42] How to cross a road in Jordan: you simply go.
- [07:59] Mac’s jacket — 16 dinars, mis-heard as 60.
- [08:30] He hands over 50 and the seller returns the change.
- [10:48] A guide offered at the citadel for 30 dinars, and declined.
- [11:18] Panoramic views over the whole city, timed for golden hour.
- [11:18] The regret, stated: he wishes he could explain the history, and Mac says they should have taken the guide.
- [11:48] Ruins dated in the video to 160 AD.
- [12:51] The call to prayer arriving from all over the city and echoing off the buildings, so the same call is heard several times.
- [13:22] The city lights coming on, and how quiet it is up here — the traffic is too far below to hear.