Leaving Syria

Leaving Syria

It is with an air of sadness that I write this blog, sitting, waiting for my bus to Amman, Jordan. Having completed (and passed - YAY!) my Arabic course, now is the time to meander my way towards Sharm El Sheik airport in Egypt from where I will, inshallah, fly home two weeks from now. I will be travelling through Jordan, hoping to see Petra, Wadi Rum, The Dead Sea and as much else as I can squeeze in to 8 days and then through Sinai hopefully including some relaxing by the Red Sea and a trip up Mt Sinai. As exciting as all this is, I'm feeling rather melancholic about leaving my friends in Damascus and the wonderful city itself.

This morning as I walked passed familiar haunts, the hammam, the barber shop, the local grocers and waved goodbye to those whom I had, as much as our limited arablish would allow, befriended over the past 5 weeks, I remembered why I loved this city soo much. The people are friendly, the living cheap and relaxed (barring taxis and a very unbritish approach to work as a student!), the souks lively, the houses havens of peace and the juice bars (ok, the one juice bar that I stuck to due to it's brilliance) incredible! As a place to study Arabic for a month, Damascus has been perfect and it will certainly be on top of my list when I get a chance to continue my studying!

I realise I've rather neglected the blog over the past couple of weeks. I'm afraid I have been completely snowed under with work. After my illness I felt very behind on a course which was also at a pace designed for people with much more prior experience in Arabic than myself (we were told it was fitting in 3 months worth of material in 1 month) and so I had to work into the evenings to catch up!! Thankfully the work has paid off as I escaped the humiliation of failure and actually began to feel rather comfortable in the class as opposed to the confused class dunce that I had become in the week following my tonsillitis!

Last weekend a classmate and I went to Crak de Chevalier (pics to follow) which is an old crusader castle up in the mountains. This was a 7 hour round trip and did feel like quite a bit of a mission by the end of the day but it was certainly impressive. Built at the top of a large hill which overlooks the flatlands between two mountain ranges (and therefore the strategically crucial point through which goods from the sea were taken to Damascus) the castle provides splendid views and is, in itself rather incredible. That such vast amounts of rock and stone were heaved up the mountain by medieval men so far from home and that the construction was so ingenious that is still stands in almost perfect condition ensured an awe inspiring trip. Although, with no signs or explanation it was difficult to grasp the exact strategic brilliance of the structure and I left with many how, who, what, why and where's...

The other adventure of note came on the night after our final exam as we celebrated late into the night at a friends house, pushing ourselves to stay awake to watch the sunrise at 7am. I was so so SO glad we did! Thankfully, we found a taxi willing to take us up the mountain from which Mohammed apparently looked over Damascus and refused to enter because he "only wanted to enter paradise once". Even before the sun had risen it was clear we were in for a real treat. For those of you who are Londoners, imagine if Ally Pally was 3 times as high and there wasn't Highate and Muswell hill to spoil the view to the west. And then imagine that London was plonked into the middle of the desert with another breathtaking mountain range in the background. Then replace Canary Warf, St Paul's and The BT tower et al with beautiful green capped mosques and all of London's parks and foliage with chaotic constructions, uncharacteristically silent in the soft glow of the pre-dawn light. It looked something like this! And then the sun rose.

A beautiful aura of red and amber burst across magnificent Damascus as though the city was yawning and stretching in preparation of this new day. I was, quite simply, blown away by the scene. My friend Alex summed it up when he said 'I just don't really know what to do with that'. It was just something that could not be fully taken in. But I'm sure I will never forget that morning.

Half dead, we stumbled towards a taxi who couldn't be bothered to move for less than 4 times the going rate, so we started to hike down the mountain. Thankfully a kind old Syrian man who, I think, was up there for the same reason as us, offered to take us to the bottom from where the taxis were less lethargic and greedy! I fell into bed at gone 7 believing that Mohammed probably passed Damascus at sunrise!


Hopefully my friend who took a camera up the mountain will send me some pics soon.

Gavin

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