Checkin’ out the Dama-scene
Our service taxi dropped us off at the international bus terminal, well east of the Damascus city centre, so we had to take a taxi into the city. The driver was a pleasant fellow, and with our meagre skills in one-another’s languages we managed to have a bit of a chat about our time in Syria, and Lebanon and what we thought of each.
Our drive into town showed us at least a little of what we could expect from Damascus (in the new city at least.) It was surprisingly clean and modern looking, and was at least on par with Beirut and Istanbul in both of these respects. At the same time, it managed to look a bit sterile (in a metaphorical sense. Despite its RELATIVE cleanliness, it was far from spotless.) All of these impressions of Damascus would be turned on their ears by the time we spent in the Old City.
Our taxi dropped us off at Al Merjed, near the centre of Damascus’ new city, from where it was a simple matter to find our way to the lovely hotel (a former Ottoman mansion with a beautiful and shady courtyard) that would be our home for the next few days.
Me and the statue comemorating Salah ad Din Himself and his many victories
Our time in Damacus was fairly short, and consisted of one general and two specific activities.
The National Museum. This place was almost the precise opposite of the national museum in Beirut. It was large, cluttered with indifferently presented objects, and in need of a good cleaning.
The National Museum had several of this type of “display.”
In spite of all this, it was still pretty enjoyable. If you could get past all of its faults, there were a lot of beautiful and interesting pieces inside and it was well worth the visit. Interestingly, the two highlights of the museum the Duros Europa synagogue and the Hypogeum of Yarhai (both of which are famous archaeological sites that were dismantled, brought to the museum and reassembled) were closed when we visited. Fortunately as we left we got chatting with a man who said he was a French tour guide who wanted to practice his French and get us into them in return. Why he wanted to practice his French with us is beyond me, but he was a nice guy and we got to see a couple of lovely spots.
A portion of one of the mosaics on display in the Syrian National Museum’s garden
As old as many (and older than some) of the exhibits in the museum was Old Damascus. It was very similar to Old Aleppo, but smaller, brighter and louder. Wandering around the bustling souq (which, despite what our guidebook said is LESS touristy than the one in Aleppo) was just fabulous. It looked a bit more modern, and while it didn’t cover as much ground, some of the passages were almost cavernous in size, reminiscent of a less fancy version of Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar. Perhaps best of all was the almost total absence of people trying to sell you on their goods or drag you into their carpet/jewelry/souvenier shop.
Souq al Hamidiyeh in Damascus. Note the bullet holes in the ceiling caused during fighting in the Arab revolt against French rule in 1925
Bakdash ice cream shop in the Damascus souq. Their menu was simple: Three flavours of ice cream (cone or bowl, each coming smothered in slivered pistachios) and one flavour of pudding. This didn’t stop a staggering number of customers (including us, once a day for each day we spent in Damascus) from dropping in to satisfy their dessert cravings.
The streets outside the souq were lots of fun as well. All the people we met were very friendly and universally happy to chat for a bit, if occaisionally surprised to see us. (This was rather odd given that some parts of Old Damascus were the most heavily touristed places we saw in Syria. At one point I found myself walking down the street, surrounded by perhaps a dozen people, none of whom were arabs!)
Buildings and Minaret, Old Damascus
The Umayyad Mosque
Despite all the wonders of the old city, the clear tourist highlight was the Umayyad mosque. Constructed in 706 by the first of the great Muslim dynasties, the mosque has survived relatively intact for the past 1300 years (with occaisional renovations, additons, etc.) The building draws crowds from around Syria and around the world. Its architecture is beautiful (if not truly spectacular) and has been used as a model for both mosques and secular buildings since it was built. The mosaics, despite some fairly serious damage by various natural and manmade forces, remain some of the most beautiful in the world. Its religious significance is an even bigger draw than the bricks and mortar as the head of John the Baptist (revered by Muslims and Christians alike) is said to lie within a shrine in the main prayer hall.
The Shrine of John the Baptist inside the Umayyad Mosque. Women and men were separated into two streams as they walked through the prayer halls and past the shrine. Sarah and I lost one another for half an hour or so following this, but managed to find one another as the call to prayer started and all the tourists headed for the exit.
My very favourite part, however, was the huge marble floored courtyard. Hundreds of people sat in the courtyard during our visit. Families were picnicking, soldiers resting, and most noticeably, children playing were everywhere, shouting, laughing, running, slipping and generally having a great time. The courtyard of the Umayyad Mosque felt like an oasis in the old city, and struck me as a perfect example of what a public space SHOULD be.
People enjoying the courtyard of the Umayyad Mosque
Mosque (and Sarah) seen from the Roman ruins, Bosra
After four days there we left Damascus behind and headed south for our final stop, the town of Bosra. Bosra is home to one of the largest and best preserved Roman theatres in the world (which interstingly, has had a military fortress wrapped around it along the way) along with all manner of other ancient buildings, virtually all of them built from the local black basalt. We had a lovely time in Bosra, which, like so many places in Syria managed to be friendly, welcoming and relaxed despite the throngs of (mostly Syrian) tourists and attendant businesses.
As capital of the Roman province of Arabia, Bosra was a pretty important place. Its theatre held 15 000, and is still in such good shape that it’s used as the venue for a music and drama festival every second year.
We spent the night there in an old restaurant, sleeping on the bench seats (the only alternative was the 5 star Cham Palace hotel [you could spend weeks in Syria only staying at Cham Palaces… they’re everywhere.]) It was actually a lot of fun, especially as it meant we got to hang out with the restaurant guys and souvenier stand folks after the tourists had gone home and they had put away their sales schtick for the day and were just relaxing. In many ways this was a fitting end to our time in Syria.
The stairs at the Bosra theatre. By the end of the day the place was absolutely filthy with litter left by (almost exclusively Syrian) day-trippers. Sarah and I had been muttering about the common Middle Eastern practice of throwing rubbish any and everywhere, so I figured I ought to put my money where my mouth was, and helped the lone caretaker clean the place up. (The whole point of this story being to illustrate how good and virtuous I am, of course ;))
Before concluding, I’ll just mention a few other things I’ve forgotten to say about Syria in previous entries, but that still need to be talked about:
Honesty. It was so pleasant to be able to walk into just about any shop, restaurant, hotel… business of any sort really, and be certain that we were being quoted correct and fair prices. Just about the only time we were overcharged for anything was in taxis (though to be fair, attempting to scam passengers seems to be pretty much universal trait of taxi drivers everywhere) and occaisionally on microbuses (though in these cases we never overpaid by more than $0.20, so it was really hardly worth fussing over.)
The cars in the narrow streets of old Damascus were bad enough, but the cyclists in the souq were even worse. One moment you’d be happily strolling along, and the next the crowd in front of you would part to reveal a 15 year old boy, hurtling in your direction on a nearly antique bike, at which point you had about half a second to decide whether you should move, or anticipate HIS moving by standing still… Harrowing.
The Arabic language. It’s a tough one alright. Before we left Canada, I’d tried to learn a few Arabic words and phrases. Unfortunately I’d used a Saudi website as my teacher, and not realized how VASTLY different the various Arabic dialects are from one another. This isn’t even just the difference between Houston, Texas and Cardiff, Wales. We’re talking the difference between Spanish and Italian. When you add to this that the writing is fiendishly difficult to read things were pretty tricky for a while. In the end, I managed to learn a few key words and phrases, as well as to read arabic numbers. (Interestingly, although Arabic is written right to left, the numbers are read as “four and twenty” for 24, so they actually look correct to Latin eyes.
Old Damascus Buildings. The projecting balconies and carved screens on the window were a common feature.
As well as plenty of Roman ruins, Syria also had plenty of Roamin’ hands. I gave one example in the Deir ez Zur entry, but unfortunately it wasn’t the only one. Perhaps half a dozen times while in Syria we’d get chatting with a (seemingly) nice fellow only to have him try to grope or kiss Sarah as we said our goodbyes. A common ploy was to ask for a photo with me, then to ask for one with Sarah, at which point an arm would be wrapped around (waaaay around) her back so that he could cop a feel as the photo was taken. The fact that Sarah was usually dressed quite modestly, and even the fact that we were “married” did little to change this behaviour. (We claimed to be married for most of our trip in Syria… Sarah wore a “wedding band” and over time we even developed a fairly elaborate backstory.)
An odd juxtaposition of women headed out of a Damascus mosque/shrine and the dolls for sale across the street
Bashir al Assad. The president of Syria, Bashir is the second son of the country’s first president, Hafez (whose first son, the heir apparent, crashed his sports car into a tree, dying and forcing Bashir to change careers from opthamology to politics.) Bashir’s picture is EVERYWHERE in Syria. His ubiquity rivals that of the king in Thailand and Ataturk in Turkey. The silhouette stickers that were pasted onto the rear windows (and sometimes the windshields!) of cars would’ve made very entertaining souveniers, but try as we might, we couldn’t find them for sale anywhere.
Bashir al Assad… The man was everywhere! (Some Syrians might also describe him [or at least his secret police] in the same fashion.)
All in all, Syria was a fabulous place to visit. It’s a far cry from the place CNN and Fox News might lead you to imagine, and is in fact right up there with my favourite countries I’ve been to. And it’s definitely a place I’d be happy returning to any time.
One of the coolest moments in Damascus came as we peered into one of the city’s many bread-dispensing-holes-in-the-wall (i.e. bakeries.) One of the bakers spotted us and dragged us in to see how they made pitas. The bakery consisted of perhaps a half dozen machines of bewlidering complexity, each of which completed one step in the process. As we left he gave us each a delicious pita hot out of the oven.
Tags: Bosra, Damascus, Llew Bardecki, Syria, Travel
