Decaying Roman Splendour in the Midday Sun

Yesterday Becka, Emlyn, Everitte, another Edinburgh student from Nashville, and I all went to Bosra for the day to see the old city and the Roman amphitheatre, which is apparently one of the best preserved in the world. The Lonely Planet called it ‘an easy day trip’, but as always it didn’t turn out quite as planned, and we ended up having a bit of an adventure both ways. On the way out, instead of catching the bus for 60 SYP and booking a return bus at the same time we got bundled onto a bus we were told was going to Bosra and would arrive at 12. They then collected 80 SYP from each of us and told us we couldn’t book a return bus, and then after around two hours, the time it should take to get to Bosra, the bus stopped and we were told it was the end of the line. As we got off the bus the driver said to us ‘Bosra? You take a service’ and we realised that the bus in fact terminated in Daraa, on the Jordanian border, so were forced to spend 30 minutes and another 25 SYP (about 30p) on a service taxi to Bosra, packed in with loads of local women and their chidren. Luckily we left Bab Touma at around 9.30, so we were fine for time and the whole thing was a bit of an adventure, rather than being as frustrating as it might have been.

The taxi dropped us right by the amphitheatre and we managed to get in for only 10 SYP using our Edinburgh student cards, which made up for all the earlier havoc. We spent a couple of hours wandering round the almost deserted, perfectly preserved ruins, exploring little dark cave-like rooms full of dust, and climbing old crumbling staircases, and reciting Shakespeare from the centre of the empty stage. It was wonderful to have such a huge beautiful place all to ourselves, instead of being surrounded by millions of other tourists, and there was an amazing atmosphere of peace and sense of history, unlike many such places where all the atmosphere is destroyed by warning signs and roped off areas and tacky souvenir shops and the sheer volume of people and noise.

We had lunch at a restaurant just outside and met another group of four students who told us that they were going back to Bab Touma too, but that all the buses back were already booked up. The restaurant owner offered to call a service to take all 8 of us back, but told us it would cost 3500 SYP between us (almost £50). We were not impressed, as the bus costs 100 SYP per person, so took their number and went off to explore the old city in the afternoon sunshine. We climbed about on the old ruined walls and Everitte spent hours looking for scorpions under the stones (apparently the one we found in his flat did not put him off, as he has now decided he wants one as a pet). The Old City is first mentioned in Egyptian texts in 3100 BC, and we were the only people there, enjoying the fact that you can just wander in, and there are no maps and very little information, just ruins, a few of which have been occupied by local families who now live among the crumbling old buildings and pillars.

In the end we did get the service taxi back as bumped into 4 more people from the university, which meant that between 12 of us we only had to pay 300 SYP each, and we got taken right to Bab Touma, instead of to the bus station on the edge of town. Twelve of us squeezed into what was grandly described to us as a ‘minibus’ and opened all the windows as wide as possible, but still felt like sardines in a microwave for the first hour of the trip. The poor driver was obviously a friend of the restaurant owner though, as in Ramadan it’s almost impossible to get transport during Iftar, and he didn’t know where he was going at all, and kept phoning friends for directions. I felt quite sorry for him when after a two hour drive he finally dropped us in Bab Touma and then turned to the German girl sitting in the front and said ‘How do I get home?’

All in all a pretty good first trip out of Damascus, and a good place to go on a day trip, as there is only really one area of interest to visit. Next week is Eid al-Fitr, the end of Ramadan, which means we get 5 consecutive days off university while everybody parties. We’re planning to go travelling a bit further afield, either in Syria or maybe on a trip to Lebanon, or even Petra.

On a more mundane note I went back to university today after our weekend (Friday and Saturday) off. I went back to the scary class and it was okay, better than the first day, although we had the original teacher and I definitely prefer the one we had on Thursday who makes everything much clearer. However the scary teacher has told me to take my time before making a decision about moving down, so I told him I’d let him know what I wanted to do at the end of the week. Becka got placed in the group below me though, and her speaking a least is certainly better than mine, which makes me even more certain I should be in that group. But at least now I can see what they’re studying and make an informed decision.

Hiba took Becka and I to church with her today, so we got to sit through a Catholic service conducted entirely in Arabic. It was pretty interesting, except for the Hail Mary (or rather salaam alaikum ya Miriam) malarkey at the beginning which went on for about 50 million and a half years and nearly caused me to fall asleep, which I’m pretty sure would have been frowned upon! She is lovely to us though, yesterday she gave us each a necklace because we were saying we wanted to buy some jewellery, and she has said that if I want to buy silver (which I do) she will come with me to make sure I get a fair price. It’s her 23rd birthday in a couple of weeks, so we’re going to have to get her something really nice, and we’re thinking of buying her a piano-shaped cake to go with her present, for no real reason except that it’s pretty cool.

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