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Published: April 14th 2010
Driving carefully, getting used to the Syrian traffic (defies all description...), I enterred Aleppo. The signs were pretty good and directed me to the center of town. Finding the Baron Hotel was a bit of a quest, but all in all not bad.
I checked in, parked my motorcycle in the parking lot and got my luggage off. A small Syrian guy insisted he carry my bags and two panniers to my room on the 3rd floor, where I saw a mystery suitcase and a German guidebook. "Here is your suitcase sir". Euh. Back down with everything to the 2nd floor to a room that was actually free :-)
The room is quite nice, all a bit run down but you stay at the Baron for the history, not the luxury. The atmosphere is quite unique. And there is a bath! Yes! After repairing the system for draining the bath (it could't plug the bath properly) I settled in for a nice warm bath before heading into town.
I just wanderred around a bit when I spotted a little girl with a kitten, and asked if I could take her picture. She was very shy, but some passers by
explained to her and it was OK. There were some kids jumping around in the background of course, incuding on particulary irritating little guy, and after some photos of the children I was rescued by two young men who took me into their workplace: a sweet making factory!
I was promptly treated to various sweet and little cakes, and we sat around and chatted. More or less as they only spoke Arabic and I hardly speak a word. Nice guys though, one of them was named Zacharias, a beautifull name. We had some tea, and they smoked a lot dropping their ashes all over the place... Ah well, I guess they clean out before they start making sweets again in the morning. And the sweets were yummy :-)
After a while and some photos I wanderred off again, towards the souk. This is apparently the most authentic souk left in the Middle East, and it is quite amazing. I have been in souks before, but this was all narrower and bussier, with haggling a shouting going on all around. There is nothing like the smell of a souk, I think you can find your wasy to each different
area just by following the scents.
While gawking at the sights, I was invited into a stall for some coffee by the owner M. He was quite into me, lets just say he burned the closet down to the ground. He's into 'butch'. I guess I'm butch. M is so over the top it is ridiculous, but he is a very nice fellow with an interesting familly too (8 brothers, 3 sisters). The best comment he made was "I wish I was your motobike. You could ride me and hold my ears.". Oh-kaaaaay..... I am wasted on women, and my wife is very lucky and I should tell her so.
Also there was and English guy, Paul, who is on sabbatical for a year travelling around the Middle East and Europe. I agreed to meet him and a friend for dinner later. I drank some more coffee and smoked nargile with M before wandering around the souk again till it was time to meet Paul in the restaurant. After a nice dinner (full dinner with side dishes 7.50 euros) with Paul and his friend Dina (she is doing a Lebanon - Syria - Jordan tour for three weeks)
we went to the Barron to hang in the bar and drink some beer. The place is quite un-Syrian, unchanged since the 30's. A few beers later we admired Lawrence of Arabia's hotel bill which is displayed in the bar and I went of to get some sleep.
Happy to be here at last, Syria, just gotta love it!
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