Blogs from Hama, West, Syria, Middle East - page 3

At the hotel I book a tour to some of the region’s famous sights - the Crusader castle of Krak des Chevaliers, the Roman ruins of Apamea - having listened to the serenade of Hama’s creaking norias and utterly gotten the point. There’ve been cloudy skies all week, periodically opening and dumping a prodigious downpour while everyone goes scurrying for the nearest awning. The women hitch up their chadors and the men hitch up their gelabbiyah and everyone’s got a wary eye on their hemlines while they wait for the rain to let up. The sky’s an inauspicious gray when I peek out the window from under the covers, a few pigeons circling over the rooftops. There’s a slight break in the clouds as our minibus pulls out a half-hour later, the sky punctured by ... read more

So, here I am down in a very nice little hostel, compared to the previous I did down at Aleppo. Hama, famous for its water wheels. Hama, suppposed to be the most religious one in the region or even the country, but where I have seen the most smiles returned back at me from both men and women. Some kids have the most sparkling green eyes I have ever seen. For those interested, I have been dragging since I left Istanbul a little sore throat that is getting bigger, but since I haven't been to a pharmacist yet, cause I am too lazy and since the fever is gone and I am in a very confortable bed (I'll be in a couple of minutes anyway), I'm using this time and the stop we made to ... read more

The next few days we cruised around the pretty town of Hama. It is famous for its massive waterwheels that are still in operation today- but just as a tourist attraction! Hama prooved to be full of super friendly people- as always the case in Syria. While I was fairly spanked with a tragically humerous and fantastic case of the runs (tragically humorous like when a clown dies). Apart from the cool school water wheels we discovered numerous cheap and hearty juice bars- which were frequeneted almost as many times as I went to the toilet. We took a day trip out to see the spectacular crusader castle of Crac De Chavelliers. When researching what to see in Syria, Crac De Chavelliers was high on my list. While my energy levels werent at their normal Tiger ... read more

Arrived in Hama with a grumpy husband in tow. We left Beirut on a servis (essentially a shared taxivan) and the driver had charged us USD10 each whıch we stupidly agreed to wıthout negotıatıon. 10 dollars would be consıdered faırly good value for a 4 hour journey anywhere ın the developed world but thıs beıng Lebanon, we found out latterly from the other passengers we shouldn't have paıd more than 7 dollars. I couldn't be fagged going after the guy after a 4 hour journey and those who know Rob wıll know how much he loves confrontatıons. Not. Anyhow ıt didn't stop him bristling about it (almost) all night. You'd thınk we would have learnt by now that ın the Mıddle East you never, never, never take the fırst prıce quoted EVER. On our fırst day ... read more

Since the times spent on the bus do not really count for any particular geographic region, and the random places stopped at along the road do not warrant their own entries, they have all been combined into one, entered under Syria because this is the middle of the three countries (Turkey, Syria Lebanon) that constituted the travel portion of the semester. If this entry is too boring for you, let me know. “Pete, if you keep writing like this you should really consider an advertising contract with NoDooze®” will do. Keep in mind that these entries are just as much for me as for any readers, but if they are really trying… Our first random stop in Turkey (about 3 hours from Istanbul) lead to a leaf fight. Remember, we had been in Egypt since August, ... read more