| Gilhooley - Jordan and Syria March-April 2005 |
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26 March 2005 Leaving for Jordan/Syria the day after tomorrow. Tomorrow's Easter, and family is coming. Still a few things to get ready. 27 March Tomorrow: Metro North => #6 train => E train =>Plane to Train => JFK => CDG => Bus into Paris for a few hours? (7 hour layover). 29 March The flights were good. I had a seven hour layover in Paris and made the most of it. I took a round trip Air France bus into Paris (lots of tunnels � reminded me of Diana) and got off at the Arc de Triumph. Walked down the Champ Elysees at about 7:00a local, and it was dead quiet. A few street cleaners/washers, and that was about it. It was still dark and only started to brighten up just before 8:00. Paris is slow to waken. I went quite a ways down and started to drift towards the right, where I could see the top of the Eiffel Tower. I came down to the Seine to find a very pretty view. Walked down along the Seine and went left at Winston Churchill Ave. Great view across Seine (Pont Alexandre � bridge) at Hotel des Invalides. Back up to Champ and started back to the Arc. Went down a couple of side streets and ducked into a small caf� and got a ham sandwich, which was very good (French bread with a little butter and a little ham). The Coke cost more than the sandwich (about $5). Back to Champ towards the Arc again. Now it was just before 9:00a and the streets were humming. Rain had been forecast but I was pleased that it was sunny. Got my bus and returned to CDG with plenty of time. The bus was $28 total, a good deal. Paris is reminiscent of Washington DC, which I guess shouldn�t be surprising (L�Enfante). Good fun, however short. At the Air France lounge I tried to update this webpage but the pc�s wouldn�t allow Java, which I guess was required. Got off an email to Patti and Katie. The flight to Amman was uneventful. I got what I think was a third hour of sleep (total) but felt good when we landed. (Air France food was quite good). In Amman, visa ($15) and customs were easy. I had a little trouble finding the bus into the city but some guy came up and escorted me first to the Sheraton bus, and then to the city bus when I corrected him. He wanted to carry my bag; I wouldn�t let him. When we got to the bus he asked �teepz?� I said no, and regretted it a little. As the bus was leaving I saw a man almost dragging a little kid by his earlobe. It brought back memories. The bus ($2.25) was very good. When the driver would see someone walking on the highway he�d flash the lights, beep the horn and if the guy raised his hand the driver would slam on the breaks and pick him up. The guy gave him some change, which I�m sure went into the driver�s pocket. Another man on the bus was very helpful in getting the driver to let me off where I wanted (4th circle). I then needed a cab and immediately one pulled up (they�re everywhere in Amman). The taxi man did not know where my hotel was and didn�t speak English very well. He left and within a minute another pulled up (this was about 8:30p). He knew where the Hisham hotel was and I was there in 3 minutes. The hotel people were very friendly, escorted me to my room and 30 minutes later fed me some mezze and Kubbah (ground meet in a bulgur coating). Too much food actually. 30 March Wednesday Got a post off to Katie first thing. Simple breakfast in hotel (croissant, oj, tea - the instant coffee had no appeal). I took a cab to the Citadel, a 2000 year old community atop the highest jebel (mountain) in Amman. At least as good as the forum area in Rome, and very similar in many ways. The Umayyad Palace was the best � at one time (2 millennia ago) it was the home of the rulers. Got good pictures, and a rock. Then went to the Roman forum, with an amphitheater, which was reminiscent of the Coliseum in Rome, smaller though. Seats about 6000. Walked up to the top (walking up those stairs at Grand Central paid off today). Cool place, but the restoration 30 years ago was not well done � looks patchy. Adjacent was a smaller amphitheater, which probably seats 600. Both are still used for events. I really liked the design of both; not least the way people can efficiently exit. Better than Shea. Spent the afternoon walking around downtown Amman. Ate a falafel, which was very good ($1). Past a striking mosque and asked someone outside if I could go in. He said yes, just take the shoes off just after going in. I did and went to the front where many men were praying and some were just sitting around, resting. I sat and rested. Shortly, a man came up and chatted with me for about 45 minutes. Charming. We talked about his brother in Jersey City, people (he didn�t think much of black people and was surprised when I told him I was ok with them), Islam, the certainty of one God, his family and mine. He introduced me to his friend who didn�t know a word of English. Very pretty mosque: the King Hussein Mosque. He told me that the current King comes to the mosque once a month. He seemed very patriotic about Jordan, and said that a man should live a straight life, and if he doesn�t in Jordan they slice his throat (and that�s a good thing, he said). Amman seems very law abiding. After a while I left and walked through lots of markets in downtown Amman. Very, very active, but it looks pretty poor. I spent a lot of time finding the Internet caf� I�m sitting in now, and spoke to a lot of people in order to find it. Most do not speak English. This is really not a caf�; just a dirty place hidden off the street where they photocopy your passport, and then let you use this old 486 with a very sticky keyboard. I understand there are better, and more numerous Internet places in the better neighborhoods. Anyway, that�s enough. I really had intended to be brief. It�s 5:30p local and I�m going to get a cab back to the hotel. Cabs all cost about $3 here. Traffic, by the way is wild! It�s survival of the fittest. Pedestrians survive it by just walking into traffic. It seems to work, in that the key seems to be a willingness to be daring. Similar to what Patti described in India. Tomorrow to Damascus! Note: To read this you might need to click off the ads on the right. Another note: My cellphone is NOT working - yet. I'll keep trying to get it on. 31 March Took me an hour just to get to the point that I can reach this page. Lots to talk about, not least my 5 hour bus ride to Damascus with a very educated and well-spoken lady who lives in Baghdad. More to come tomorrow...... 01 April As I came into this Internet shop I was introduced to a young guy, probably 18-19, who I was told was a Baghdadi here as a tourist. As we talked, with a translator, it developed that his mother had relocated his family to the United Arab Emirates. As we talked more I heard the word mujahadeen, and when translated to me, I learned that his father had been a paid translator for the US Army and was killed by the insurgents for cooperating. What could I say? I am going to try to give a flavor of what's happened the last couple of days without going into too much tedious detail. The experiences have come fast and furious, even to the point where I am consciously taking it slow today just to get back my overworked senses. First, a couple of observations: � Damascus is safe. They are so friendly, and so proud of their friendliness. � They are also proud of the way they live together, Muslims/Christians/Jews. There has only been one slightly negative comment, about the Kurds. � They have been remarkably genial with me, and also with each other. � The men lack any noticeable sense of macho. As I walked through the Old City last night I saw dozens of pairs of men last night arm in arm, or holding hands. That said, being gay is strictly forbidden, so it ain't that. � The women, while most often veiled � sometimes in the full chador � do not seem the least unhappy with their situation. This really is just an initial observation so I could be off. We'll see � especially if I get opportunities to interact with them (that's been rare so far) � Much of the architecture is at least as old as Rome's, but often in disrepair. Little is modern here. Wednesday night after I last updated the webpage, I ate at a pretty westernized place because the place I wanted wasn't open yet. It was at that point that I realized I had my watch fast by an hour since I arrived. Travel is weird; I find I really have to think through what day it is. After dinner I walked around the Iraqi Embassy, which was very heavily fortified. There were about 7 soldiers with rifles, all collected together joking around with each other. Around the corner there was an alley that I walked part way up, onto the Embassy grounds, that I'm sure they should have been watching. Pretty haphazard. Thursday morning early (6:30a) I took a bus to Damascus. I found myself sitting next to a secular, intelligent, educated 57 year old Iraqi lady. She went "whew" when I told her I'm an American, and we both laughed. I asked if she were Sunni or Shia, and she said that she was Sunni, but no one used to ask that. She said they all lived in harmony, and agreement that Saddam was bad. That started what turned out to be a 5 hour dialog about current events, religion, and more. As she realized I wouldn't be easily offended she opened up. Very polite, likeable lady but extreme in her outlook (not obviously without some justification). In short, these are some of her opinions: � All dictators in the Middle East do the bidding of the US. Even Saddam was a puppet of the US right up to the end. � Who wouldn't fight if their country was occupied? Wouldn't the Americans? (good point) � American people are good; government, dominated by Israel, is bad. Did not buy into the concept of political representation, although she thinks it will be good for Iraq, if it ever comes. � All powerful people are corrupt (political, business leaders, etc.) Obviously, this from a woman who has lived her life under absolutely corrupt leadership. � Israel will cease to exist and the US will fall. History shows that power always falls. Once Israel falls, Muslims and Arab Jews will live in peace; but only Arab Jews. The others have to leave. They have no right to be here. � Arabia is all one country; divided by the colonizers. It will rise to be a superpower competing with the US and Europe (Europe by then will be as strong as America). As polite and charming as she was, she would not consider any other point of view or even notion. She was evangelical in her method. I was delighted for the opportunity to talk with her, and delighted the trip was over. (She was visiting family in Syria with her son � sitting elsewhere in the bus � and worried that the US and/or the Iraqi authorities would give her a hard time for going to Syria). Through the trip we stopped repeatedly either for rest or for the Jordan/Syria border. I kept doing the wrong thing: getting on the wrong line, going into the wrong building, not getting the proper passport stamp). Sometimes you really feel like an idiot when you have no idea what's going on (!). Finally arrived, and took what turned out to be a gypsy cab to my hotel. Nice old guy with a car that was ready to break down at any moment. I spent the rest of the day first walking my immediate neighborhood, and then last night walking quickly through the Muslim section of the Old City, and then extensively through the Christian section. I'll spend much more time in the Muslim section over the next few days. I ate at Elissar, the restaurant recommended to me by Joshua Landis, the professor from Univ. of Oklahoma that I had swapped email with. The restaurant was beautiful, food was good but the portions were huge, wasteful. I walked a little more and wandered into a sheesha cafe, and was immediately invited to sit down by a man who looked like Saddam would probably have wanted to. He was great. He was the owner of the place, and called out to me as soon as he heard my American accent. We talked for an hour or so on many of the subjects that I had spoken with the bus lady earlier. This guy was sensible though: violence will soon be yesterday's news. Syria has a big military because Israel has beaten them up several times, and they're scared of them and have no interest in going head to head with Israel again. He spoke with feeling about the Syrian people and their demonstrated desire to live peacefully with each other and their neighbors. He spoke proudly of the Muslim/Christian relations in Syria and said he was sure that was the future (although he also had big reservations about Jews who have moved from Europe and elsewhere to live in Israel). He was funny: he said that Syrian Jews did not want to relocate to Israel, but Israel provided special incentives to the Jewish butchers (meat butchers, of course). Once the butchers left, everyone else followed. He was the co-owner of the place (with his son). I left and continued walking. Very narrow streets and alleys. Think Chinatown, times 500. Took a cab back to the hotel. I have to remember to write about the taxi drivers here. They're really a scream. This morning I walked around Martyr's Square, kind of a seedy area. While most shops are closed for the Sabbath today, the live bird marked was thriving there. Thousands of pigeons, chickens, turkeys, and more, some caged and some loose, were available for purchase and immediate slaughter. It was mayhem! 3 April (I like this un-American method of dates) Damascus is everything I came to the Middle East looking for. There is way too much to write about here. But: � From my hotel room at certain times through the day, I hear the call to prayer broadcast from three different mosques. It's cacophonous, but I'll bet in certain places, next to mosques that put some bucks into good sound equipment, and have the best prayer callers (there are competitions for this), it would sound awesome. � NYC traffic is rural by comparison to Damascus. � Often when you ask someone where something is they insist on walking you there, even if it's hundreds of yards. � Best thing I've eaten here is matabal: mashed eggplant with yogurt and olive oil, and some spices of course. Check it out. � I scored some of the desert truffles that Ali (in Astoria) asked me to look for. Yesterday, I spent a good bit of time in the big souqs (old-time market places). Big time commerce with small time prices. Fantastic to see. You have to be careful staring at anything because, A) someone might think you're staring at a woman � dangerous, or B) you might get run over. Almost all the Damascene women wear at least the veil. Many (most) wear full loose covering, even when it's warm. The women not wearing this are usually either Christian (there's a good-sized population), or foreigners. I've also spent a couple evenings in cafes, meeting a lot of people. They are easy to engage, and most are happy to learn about me, or practice English. By the way, EVERY cabdriver claims to speak English, but once you're in the taxi it's a very different story. (More on taxi men to come). PG Rated: The night before last I came back to the hotel and wanted something alcoholic to drink. As you'd imagine there aren't too many places serving booze here. I saw a place with flashing lights and music so I went up to the guy in front. 500 Syrian pounds ($10) to get in, he says, then you pay for your beer. Syrian entertainment now, and a Russian show in an hour. Being the adventurer that I am, I said ok. I paid him and went down the stairs to find a big room with men and slightly dressed women sitting, not together, facing a stage. The entertainer was very outgoing, energetic,effeminate and awful. They sat me at a table behind 4 girls, and told me $4 for a beer, and $22 to buy a drink for a girl, any girl, and have her sit with me for 30 minutes (There were about 15 girls in all). I said no thanks. As he tried to talk me into it, he made it clear that what I talk to the girl about and what agreements/arrangements I might come to with her were none of his concern, as long as the girl would not miss any of her work schedule. I said thanks, but I gotta go (!). He had said, by the way, that all the girls were from Romania and Russia. The next day (yesterday) as I was leaving my hotel I saw what looked like one of the nightclub girls go into the seedy hotel across the street. A minute later a big BMW pulls up and a gorgeous girl gets out and goes into the same hotel. Slave to curiousity that I am, I went over and into the hotel. As soon as I walked in a guy got up to greet me. I say "How much for a room in this hotel?" He says "sorry, sir, this hotel only for artists." I asked him to repeat that. He did, laughing. I laughed also, and left. I think I found the underbelly of Damascus. Tomorrow to Palmyra! 5 April Yesterday, as I was waiting for the bus to Palmyra, I took a few pictures of the array of bus ticket sellers. As I took the third picture, a plainclothes policeman came up to me and took the camera out of my hand. He was immediately joined by 4 or 5 additional policemen. In broken English they made it clear that pictures were not allowed in this area. I said � quickly � "no problem, I'll delete them." But I couldn't remember how to delete the damn things. Being surrounded by these guys didn't exactly help focus my concentration either. After a few tries I did remember, inshalla (!). One of them watched carefully as I got rid of all three. Then he repeated "no pictures." I said "yes sir boss." There had been a security check at the station as I entered, so perhaps I should have sensed this. On the bus the majority of the people on the bus were, men dressed in the traditional Arab clothing: full robe, head covering with the round black halo-type thing (don't know the name of that). I suspect that I had as much money in my pocket than all of them combined. Most were headed beyond Palmyra, so I thought perhaps they were headed to Iraq. Someone, however, told me there are numerous cities beyond Palmyra in Syria. Amazing desert views on the bus � moonscape. Midway, we stopped at a small oasis to put air in one of the tires. As I got out to stretch, I saw a few of the men walk away about 30 yards, to pee, and I joined them. Now I feel that I have fully communed with the Arabian desert. Three of the men in full Arab dress approached me. Two of them were very friendly, and one seemed wary (almost like he had never seen a non-Arab before). We tried to talk but all we managed is that Palmyra is the English name for the city; Tadmor is the Arab. They let me take their picture. As I was about to ask someone else to take a picture of me with them, the driver called us to leave. Shame. We continued through the desert to Palmyra. I'd see a few hundred sheep with one or two people, then 1000 yards later, more sheep and a person or two. Another 1000 yards, a boy with more sheep and then a mile later there would be a cart. Emptiness otherwise. The trip costs 125 Syrian pounds - $2.50. When we arrived there were many "touts." They really can be annoying. Several people wanted to take me to their hotel (they would get commission), but I decided to walk. Someone told me it was a 10 minute walk, so off I went. Within a few minutes I was joined by a few young boys, and minutes later I was joined by about 10 more. I was like a celebrity arriving in town. One of the boys walked with a really terrible limp, and I asked him what happened to his leg. He told me he had broken it some time ago. He was a good, sincere kid so I let him take me to the hotel. I tipped him about 25 Syrian pounds, which is a pretty big deal to a kid like him ($.50). Tomorrow I'll write about the extraordinary ruins, and the lousy hotel. 6 April It took me one hour to get the software up to update this webpage, because some guy is down loading a multi gig file in this small room. It has slowed everyone down and the manager is really annoyed. I've run out of patience so I'm going to be brief. The awesome quality of the ruins would be very difficult, if not impossible to describe. So I won't; you can find plenty of info on the Internet or elsewhere. I came here primarily for the people anyway, so here goes. On Monday at the hotel, which turned out to be a fleabag, I arranged for a car and tourguide for that afternoon and the next morning. I splurged - $30. Before it started I took a walk around the town and found a great little store selling carpets, brass jewelry. I saw a stringed musical instrument, so I asked the guy about the bone rosetta for the oud that Bob Maloney had asked me to look for. The boss was Muhammed, who said that he had a friend who might be able to scratch one of these things up. In the meantime, thinking I was a musician, he starts banging away on a drum, and sounded pretty good. Maloney had told me that he'd pay for a phone call if it seemed worthwhile, so I called him on my now-working cellphone. I woke him up, and I let him listen to Muhammad playing his drum. Maloney then played his drum for Muhammed, all through my cellphone: Palmyra, Syria to Astoria, New York. Pretty neat. They talked and Maloney promised to come to Palmyra soon. Best friends! Gotta go. Much more to come! Note: My cellphone is actually working. But remember it's $2.50/ minute! Text messages are (almost) free, so be my guest 07 April Yesterday, I had gone back to the Old City to see what is certainly Damacus's most renowned site: The Umayyad Mosque in Damascus is considered the fourth holiest place in all Islam, after Mecca, Medina and al-Quds (Jerusalem). I�m told that prayers said here are considered to be more valued than those said elsewhere. It is an extraordinary representation of man�s capacity for spiritual devotion. I am no expert in architecture, or art generally. But I know beauty when I see it, and this was magnificent. Leaving the far end of the renowned Hamadiyya Souq, and entering through a high ancient arch, I saw enclosed within handsome, tall stonewalls, the outdoor shiny-clean marble floor reflecting the extraordinarily colorful wall mosaics. The size of a soccer field, this space apparently is used for gathering, and cleansing. I removed my shoes before entering, and copying others, carried them. There was a cupola with benches and water spouts for washing feet. I later learned that another cupola covers the tomb of John the Baptist. This place was like an outdoor Grand Central Station, but cleaner and populated by women, all veiled and many in full chador, and pious looking men. On the far side of this elegant space, I was drawn to a series of doors. Looking inside I saw an enclosed room the size of a football field, with Persian carpets overlapping other beautiful carpets everywhere. There were many men praying, and others leaning up against walls or pillars. I saw pairs of shoes near my door and I added my shoes to them. I walked in, and sat up against a pillar. After a few minutes a man approached and we talked. He asked me where I was from, about family, about my travel and my impressions of Syria. He told me about this astonishing mosque, its history and details of its architecture. He was obviously educated, cultured, and friendly. He told me about an area north of Damascus where people speak only Aramaic, and offered to show me the Jesus minaret, as well as a view of ancient Roman baths nearby. I got up and headed back to get my shoes. But, they were not where I left them! The man suggested that they might have been stolen. He helped me to look in other places, me thinking that I had just forgotten where I had left them. No way, my shoes were gone. The man led me to an area of the mosque where there were about 5 pairs of very old and ratty shoes. It seems that (poor) thieves leave their old, very cheap shoes when they boost tourists� shoes. The first pair I tried on was a tight fit, but good enough. It got me the 300 or so meters to a shoe store in the souq. On my behalf, the man, who I think was a little embarrassed at this point, bargained the merchant down from 250 Syrian pounds to 200 ($4.00) for a very poorly made pair of sandals. The man pointed out the Jesus minaret (one of three at the Umayyad Mosque), and then led me down an alley outside of the mosque to an old building. Hoping to see the ancient ruins he had promised, I climbed three flights of stone stairs and looked out a glassless window down on what were clearly old ruins. I couldn�t really tell if they were baths, or a forum, or whatever, but they were certainly old ruins. As I�m taking this in, the man says �oh, my friend had awakened from his siesta.� I am then introduced to an elderly man who is eager to show me his picture of Jimmy Carter visiting his place. It�s at that point that I notice the Mastercard logo on a wall and realize that I am entering a shop. I�m also realizing that this whole thing, from the moment the man approached me until now has been a scam (the stolen shoes were probably not part of it, but who knows), designed just to get tourists like me up to this third floor shop. All the refined talk of the mosque, and the noble references to Roman ruins, were baloney. As the elderly proprietor points out the Christian section of his shop (inlaid boxes), and the Jewish section (brass objects), and the Muslim ones (textiles), I�m getting really annoyed. I tell them I�m leaving. They try to keep me there, but I walk out. As I go down the stairs the man asks what my schedule is for tomorrow. I say I�m busy. He calls out that he could take me to the Aramaic area, north of Damascus. Now I�m really feeling that I�m being squeezed. I leave the old building and head back into the souq. It would have been a bad time for a particularly aggressive tout to approach me, but fortunately as I walked the long souq, they must having been resting. I got to the end, found a taxi and went back to my hotel. I was not angry about the shoes; that could happen anywhere. Poor people are going to be poor and hungry anywhere. I even thought that was kind of amusing. What really bothered me about this experience was that a seemingly sophisticated man would approach me in a place so important to a lot of people for crass purposes. And, I fell for it. Oh well�. 07 April (more...) Back to Monday in Palmyra. Late in the afternoon my ride was ready, so I came and met my driver, a Bedouin-looking man named Ewen. We got into his 1965 Austin, and drove through the Palmyra ruins, in particular the Valley of the Tombs and the Citadel. I climbed to the top of the central building in the Valley of the Tombs (very high and dangerous), and there was considerable anger with me when I didn't come down at closing. I didn't know it was closing, and they had to send my driver up to get me. Too bad; they should have told me on my way up. This was the center of Eurasia for a few centuries AD (outside of Rome and the far East), and there is much still here spread out over miles. Much of the damage over the years has been due to earthquakes (I was shown a series of pillars, with one slanted � a result of the last major earthquake 10 years ago). See your encyclopedia for more details. Ewen told me that we'd go for tea, so he drove off the road somewhere amidst all this antiquity, and came up to an ancient building with big steel doors. He knocked and we came into this big courtyard, with turkeys, chickens, camels, ducks and a few obviously poor people. We sat on pillows under a big Bedouin tent, and drank this fabulous sweet tea. For a moment I thought back on the bustle of New York, and how different this is: not better or worse for me, but different and nice). I sat with 3 or 4 men and one boy. I don't think these people have changed much over the centuries. There was little English spoken but we communicated nevertheless. I put my hat on the boy, and he's wearing it in the picture I had someone take of all of us. After a while the English speaking boss came in, and told me that they were trying to set up a business that would offer overnight camel trips to tourists, sleeping in the desert amidst the ruins of Palmyra. Cool. Unfortunately, sundown in the ruins was blocked by clouds. So no good pictures of that. We returned to the town. Outside of my experience with Muhammed (who I wrote about yesterday) and his brother who ran another shop in town, the rest of the place was cheesy. Lots of people approaching me for tips, tours, shops, etc. Apparently, when someone refers a tourist to a particular business a commission gets paid. That's fine, but it gets tiring and is not going to help their tourist business in the long run. (Tourism, by the way, is about 20% of what it was before 9/11 - amazing). I did get into a pretty good political discussion with Muhammad's brother, and a little later Muhammed and I spent a good hour waiting for his friend to come (he never did), talking over tea mostly about Syrian gender culture: women, marriage (usually somewhat arranged), veils, men's and women's expectations of each other. It was a good talk. He told me with wide eyes about two western female tourists, in their 60's, who recently propositioned him. Unbahleevaple! Back to the seedy hotel, with a dirty room, no hot water, no phone. The next morning (Tuesday) there was no water at all for the first hour or two I was up. I gave up on a shower in Palmyra. As scheduled, at 8:30a I appeared in the lobby, ready for Part II of the tour. I met my seedy-looking tour guide, Muhammad who promptly said "we have tea now." I had had about enough at this point. I told him firmly that we were going to go now, or not at all. After going back and forth a few times he said "you're not in American now, you know." That was the wrong thing to say to me. I told him very forcefully that I knew very well where I was, that I wanted to get back to Damascus early. Now or never. He said ok, and out we went to his car. Only he didn't have a car, but a motor scooter. Again, I was tempted to say to hell with this, but this is all about adventure so I got on! But, there was no where to put my feet, so I lightly rested my right foot on the exhaust pipe and held my left by the cuffs of my pants. That is how I rode out of Palmyra that morning. Great ruins, and seedy-looking Muhammad, it turns out, is something of a scholar. He's traveled all over Europe viewing archeological antiquities, spent 8 days at the Louvre (too short, he said), and spoke knowledgeably of Shakespeare, Melville, Twain, and Hawthorne (even I, Claudius). His dream is to visit America and Mexico; Mexico first of course, for the Aztec ruins. The depth of his knowledge, his passion for what he was showing me, and his skills at expressing these were excellent. He used a piece of glass like a laser beam to point out detail on the arches way overhead. Towards the end of the tour, he says "now we have tea, and it's free!" I laughed and he laughed. He took me into the bowels of the old Roman theatre to a small room with a few guys with great tea. Very nice. They tried to sell me a book on the ruins for $10, but that did nothing to dampen my friendship with my new buddy, Muhammad. As we were leaving the theater, we saw a camera crew filming. Muhammad stopped and listened to the man narrating something. As we left he told me that the man was from Jordan and was saying bad things about his queen � Zenobia. He said it's the state's job, but they should cut his tongue out (!). Checked out of the lousy Tower Hotel in Palmyra, and the bus ride back to Damascus was uneventful. Wednesday morning my first priority was to replenish my cash. I have not been able to cash traveler's checks, and neither my Amex nor my Citibank card works here. I'm told this is all because of American sanctions on Syria. However, I was also told that the main bank would do the traveler's checks, and it turned out that that bank is close to my hotel. I went, and spoke to 3 people before I found the right one. He asked me for the receipts for the checks. The problem there is that you are not supposed to have the checks and the receipts together when you travel, for security reasons. I did, however, bring the first receipt for each of the 3 packets of checks. I thought I might get away with this but he questioned it. Before giving into only cashing the 3 checks that I had, I showed him a pc printout of my travel information listing the series of check numbers, along with the hotels I had reserved, my itinerary, etc. He actually took this as official documentation and approved the transaction. He sent me to photocopy all the documents, including my passport. (This was going to get me about $300 in Syrian pounds). But that was only the first of 4 approvals I was required to get. I was sent to a lady (Madame Marie), who sniffed and nodded to the lady next to her. That lady looked over all the papers, stamped them and sent me to Mdm Marie again who also approved. Then I was sent into the branch managers office who looked everything over and approved. Then back to the first guy, and then finally the cashier. Geez Next: the good, the bad and the ugly of the amazing Umayyad Mosque. 08 April Yesterday was my last day in Damascus and I spent a leisurely afternoon walking, and ducking into shops. In the evening I went to the MarMar nightclub (disco) in the Bab Touma area of the Christian Quarter of the Old City. I had been invited by a group of young folks that I had gotten to know in one of the Old City�s cafes. The club was very much like a western one. No veils in this place. This was Thursday night, which is the Arab equivalent of Saturday night. So it was very crowded, and very loud. I didn�t enjoy it much, but I�m a little past the age where I would. I did spend the time though with some very nice and interesting people. At one point I saw about five 8 or 9 foot tall black men come into the place. They were young, well dressed, and wide-eyed. So I went up and said to one of them "Hey, you from America?" The guy said "No, but he is," pointing at one of his friends. So I chatted with his friend and found out that they were basketball players, mostly from America, playing in some kind of Europeon subsidiary of the NBA. Nice guys. After leaving I found that I was feeling a little down that I would be leaving Damascus in the morning. I started walking, and just kept going for several hours. It is utterly safe in Damascus at night � just ask any of the women walking alone, or any one of the machine-gun-toting police. I got back to the hotel very late and was just falling asleep around 4:30am when I heard the call to prayer. This time there was no cacophony; it was only one mosque broadcasting, and the singer/speaker was superb. It was quite enjoyable and I happily don�t remember the end of it. Today I taxied to the station to catch my bus from Damascus to Amman. Omar, my terrific hotel valet/assistant, had been so kind as to go to the station yesterday afternoon after his shift, to purchase my ticket for me. Even with my ticket though, I was unprepared for this bus station (a different one than the one I used to go to Palmyra). The moment I got out of the cab, I was surrounded by grown men (touts) who were all trying to sell me bus tickets. They were ridiculously insistent. I�d say �no� or �la� but they�d just keep saying �Amman?� or �Aquaba?� As soon as one would finally give up, two more would start in on me. It was particularly confusing because while all I wanted to do was find my particular bus there were no signs in English, and no evident central location for information. I just kept walking saying �la!� to these guys until I found someone who seemed not to have a partisan edge, and was willing to help me. Before boarding the bus a company representative told me that I might have a problem with the Syrian authorities on leaving because I did not have some stamped card that I had been given when I entered the country. I figured I had lost this; probably left it on the bus that took me into Damascus. The crossover from Syria to Jordan was crazy: there were about 8 stops in all, and only one of them was for the duty free shop. I can�t remember the purpose of each, but in Syria it was something like: a stop to let an official get on to check papers, another to let him off, another to get out and pay a departure tax, another to have the passports checked and stamped. It was at this point that the Syrian immigration official tells me that I need this card. �Card very important� he repeatedly said. I just said that I didn�t have it, and what could we do? After a (nervous) while he says � repeatedly � �I help you.� As he said it 4 or 5 times I just thanked him. Finally, he stamped my passport and I was off. After that experience, it was very nice to see the huge picture of King Abdullah�s smiling face just over the border. I immediately felt safer, and happy to be in Jordan. (That is not to say that I wouldn�t go back to Syria in a heartbeat. And I hope I will). There were at least 4 stops during the entry process into Jordan. I had to buy a second visa. The last stop was the most interesting: all baggage was removed for a check. However, they only checked a few of the bags (the official looked me square in the eyes, and passed right on by); it was the bus they were interested in. They spent the better part of an hour taking out panels, looking behind the battery, etc. A very friendly, but worried, Jordanian lady who spoke English very well guessed it was because of yesterday�s events in Cairo. She told me that a suicide bomber had driven his motorcycle into a well-known souq there and killed several people � at least one American included. Notwithstanding, my guess is that they had some specific intelligence that let them to check the bus the way they did. The leader of this security group, the guy who had looked me in the eye, wasn�t dressed very well, but he was very, very sharp. Fortunately, my bus was clean and we were off to Amman. We arrived, the bus door opened, and I saw goddamn touts outside pointing up into the bus at me. I hadn�t expected it, but I stepped out to another barrage of these guys. I grabbed my luggage and just walked through these really obnoxious men until I found a taxi, with a driver just sitting in his cab on street. Feeling confident that he didn�t want to rip me off, I got in and found a man who was about 80 years old. Friendly, and with just a little English, we headed off on an adventure to find the Marriott (I had decided to treat myself on my last night in the Middle East). When we pulled up to the Marriott front entrance a bellboy/doorman opened the taxi door and asked me if I wanted help with my luggage. Another goddamn tout! �No!� said I, as I grabbed my own stuff. I walked through the revolving door, and I was back in America. For the moment, it felt good. Still more to come.. |
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