“Brother Mahmoud, what happened to the star?”

Mahmoud looked up in the sky wondering why was I looking for a star in broad daylight. He realized I was pointing to the Jordanian flag at the port.

He was a bit confused too. Without the star, that looked like the flag of Palestine.

“Perhaps it is on the other side?”, he said.

“Unlikely”, I said. We checked. There was no star on the other side either.

Mahmoud was as curious as I. He went around asking the local folks at the port. He finally came back with the answer – “This is our old flag.”

I was a little confused. What do you mean – old flag? The star got washed away during the rinse and repeat of the old flag?

Wikipedia to the rescue. This is indeed the prior flag of Jordan – more accurately that of the “Hashemite Arab Federation”!

Again, learnt something new.