Meeting a person

Met a local guy outside the police station today. He also happened to be guarding the station, and was toting a big gun. (We had to register with the police: give them fingerprints, photos, the like, to obtain our permanent residency cards—which are awesome, you get into any Jordanian tourist site basically for free). Anyway I was leaning against the station’s fence, waiting for the university bus to come back, and he walked right toward me. Uh oh, I thought, what did I do. But then he smiled, offered me some water. Something about his face just relaxed me. He didn’t speak much English so we kinda skidded through a conversation in Arabic—lots of him standing there expectantly and me searching for the right word(s). Did well enough to learn he was only a year older than me, from a small mountain town to the north, works six days in a row then goes home for a five day break. During an awkward pause I asked if he liked movies (al-cinema), his face lit up and he verily nodded “Avatar, Avatar”. That seems to be a jackpot topic here; every Jordanian loves to tell me about Avatar’s merits. I still haven’t seen it, and told him that, and he looked confounded. “Next day, we go with me”. I smiled, said I would enjoy that, and was about to take down his cell number when another guard called him inside. My bus pulled up then, I had to get on. I didn’t see him come out until the bus was pulling away—I turned and waved, and he waved right back.