Cult of personality in Jordan

Tarek sent me this:  "I saw your post on the laws against criticizing the King of Jordan and just wanted to share a brief story with you. I was in Jordan a few years ago, and was frankly shocked at the level of personality cult being cultivated, which I hadn't expected, since as you observe it is rarely if ever mentioned in Western press. Anyway, I was at the airport on my way home and had a few Jordanian coins left, which I was holding in my hand. I dropped one on the floor accidentally, and it started to roll away, so I stepped on it to stop it. Immediately, an elderly man who worked at the airport in some capacity came over and started yelling, in a hurt and shocked tone, that I was "stepping on the face of the king", which was emblazoned on the coin (as you may have heard, throwing your shoes at someone or stepping on their face is considered offensive in Arab culture). Since my Arabic was not so great at the time (plus the fact that the whole thing was insane), I was genuinely confused and unsure what the fuss was about--it seemed hard to believe that anyone would care about something so arbitrary. But when the airport police were called over, a small scene ensued and I was made to understand the gravity of my crime, a large group now extolling the virtues of the king's face. I managed to extract myself from the situation by playing the ignorant foreigner card and insisting that it had all been a mistake, apologizing profusely. The whole experience had a theatre of the absurd quality to it though."