Lowest Man on the Earth

This morning I was beneath all of you.  In fact, at 6:30 AM I was probably the lowest man on the earth.  The way it happened wasn't as planned.  I left Petra, the ancient city carved into narrow canyon rock hundreds of years before Christ, looking for a straight bus to a cheap hotel.  Four bus rides later I was sitting next to a toothless driver going down, down, down a dark highway.
Part of this no-guidebook experiment I'm trying is that you have to rely on the good will of the locals, have a little luck, and hope someone speaks at least a few words of English (or can understand my caveman drawings and crappy charades gestures.)  It's great for meeting people, but you could end up seriously screwed.. especially when you can't read or speak the language.
The last bus dropped me off in a dusty no name town in next to a pharmacy.  I was following a guy recommended by the last guy I followed.  This was supposed to get me there.  But it's twenty miles from my destination, dark, and the lone taxi driver in town has got me in a fix.. I've got no leverage. I turn to the pharmacist for aid and he makes this guy swear on the Koran that he'd take care of me.. lead me to a good, budget hotel.  So we plunge down the road.. it just keeps going down.
"Mister.. you America, me Jordan.. face to face," he says, squinting into the darkness ahead.
"Yeah good.  Jordan very jamilla."
"Jamilla.. oh you speak Arabic.  Mister you America, I Jordan, he Israel, he.. uh uh.. everywhere.  All.  We are all."
"Right.. we are all one.  All people."
"Mister you go hotel.  100.  Maybe you stay two days 500.  Mister my friend... hot water.  you hot water.  you sleep.  you eating.  no money."
"You mean stay with your friend?"
"You say hotel.. ok.. hotel.. you say friend.. ok... you say."
And so I ended up on a busted up cot, under the stars, next to a little family run shack that sells tea to truck drivers making the run from Amman (Jordan's capital) to Aqaba (Its only port).  After an hour of slumber the youngest son ripped the ratty blanket off and pointed to his dad.. hard at work at something.
"Oh.. your dad sleep? I go?" I mumbled, thinking shit.. its the middle of the night and a cold wind is howling
"No no.. you eat"
Dad brings over some flat bread and a tomato stew he cooked up.  We all tuck in under lantern light.  Dad gestures that i go back to sleep.
When I wake they are gone.  The sky is just starting to lighten. I walk 5 minutes down the hill and slide into the Dead sea, 1,385 feet below sea level at the surface.  If you were taking a walk along the beach last night, pants rolled up, waves rolling over your feet, I was four and a half football fields below you... bobbing like a cork in the water (nipple deep with head up and feet down).. 200 meters out (impossible to drown).  I watched the sunlight come up from behind me and slowly wake up Israel across the salty water...  and I thought about all you guys, my friends and family, above me.