Married to a Bedouin

"'Where you staying?' the Bedouin asked. 'Why you not stay with me tonight--in my cave.' He seemed enthusiastic. And we were looking for adventure." Thus begins the story of how Marguerite van Geldermalsen--a New Zealand-born nurse--became the wife of Mohammad Abdallah Othman, a Bedouin souvenir-seller of the Manaja tribe, and lived with him and their children in a community of 100 families in the ancient caves of Petra in Jordan. Marguerite and a friend were traveling through the Middle East in 1978 when she met the charismatic Mohammad and decided that he was the man for her. Their home was a lofty 2,000 year-old cave carved into the red rock of a hillside. She became the resident nurse and learned to live like the Bedouin--cooking over fires, hauling water on donkeys, and drinking sweet black tea--and over the years she became as much of a curiosity as the cave-dwellers to tourists. This is her extraordinary story.

Marguerite van Geldermalsen was widowed in 2002. She now divides her time between Sydney, Australia, and Jordan.