Syria-sly? Are you Syrias??
Yeah, after 65 days in Greece and
32 days in Turkey, we are off to Syria. We leave Adana (southeastern Turkey) after
3 days of R & R as Paul needed to recover from a really bad flu. When we were in Istanbul we tried to get a
visa from the Syrian consulate, and were told that it was “impossible, unless
you go back to your country”. So,
instead of giving up, as we had to do with Iran, we decided to try again at the
Turkey-Syria border. We left the hotel,
and at the bus stop we met a very nice lady who spoke Turkish and German, and
we had a long and interesting conversation, as we don’t speak either… She paid for our bus ticket and made sure we
got to the bus station all right. Nice
start to the day!
When we arrived at the border bus
station, a guy who works for the bus company said it would take 5 minutes to
get a visa for Australian passport holders, so Syria, here we come!! We get
to the border and it’s simpler than we expected. US$90 each later and after having to see 5
different officials, we got our visas. Pretty cool!
On to Aleppo (a four thousand
year old city). We end up in a fucking
awful backpacker’s hostel (backpacked with Aussies, who by the way are the new
English, they – we - are everybloodywhere). The staff are very nice and helpful, but, to
cut a long story short, we’re 47, not 22
anymore. The hotel is from the 18th
century and you can feel every year of it… Whatever, we go out to dinner, Ramadan
special (a lot of food, not so special, but the restaurant is gorgeous and the
staff really nice). Got some wine from Lebanon to drink in the room, not too
bad and had a nice rest at the noisiest place ever. The hostel was very well located if you are
determined not to sleep at all.
Next morning, Grand Baazar, the Umayyad Mosque and the Aleppo Citadel. At the
Mosque, I had to put on a full-on skirt/veil/top/sheet on top of my
clothes. Paul is laughing so hard he has
a coughing fit, and here we go into the Mosque. I think I look pretty cool, but you should know
the size of the self-esteem by now… One
old guy beckons to Paul and makes signs that I look pretty hot in the
sheet. People are really nice and fun
around here. The bazaar is great and we get 3 pashminas to send to the girls
back home. The Citadel is also great, big and imposing over the nice city of
Aleppo. All pretty cool as per pics. In the evening, we go out in search of the
Christian Quarter, in our eternal quest for a cold beer. After hours and hours walking, completely
defeated, we go back to the same restaurant for some a la carte Indian kebab
and saffron rice, not too bad indeed… No beer in sight, we go back for another
night at our favourite hostel from hell. Ciao Aleppo!
We get up early and I follow my
man to see “the Crack” (Crac de Chevallier – Crusader Castle), he said we had
to see “the Crack” and I just follow… So, we take a taxi to the bus station and
a bus to Homs. In a chaotic bus station,
guess what happens? A guy comes to the rescue, “can I help you?” they seem to always appear when you need them
in Syria, we are EVER so grateful, even if you know you’ll end up paying for it
$$$ somehow, it’s always a big relief to meet one of the “can I help you” guys.
No worries, here we go.
It’s midday,
the next bus is at 3pm. I “spit the dummy” and say “fuck the crack” (sorry, had
to use it). But then, the nice guy, who
speaks English well, also happens to be a cab driver who can take us there for
just double of what the bus would be anyway (about $20)…
Anyway, the price is ok and off we go (Syria
is not that expensive yet, not overflowing with tourists, people are very nice,
friendly, fun and chatty and it’s not too hot. Hey, did I mention it’s quite nice over here? You
should come over before everybody else does).
We go to see the famous “Crac de Chevalier” (no K) and it’s an amazing
medieval Crusader Castle, so well preserved, people say it’s as close as it’s
gets to the “real thing”. We wander
around the place for a few hours and then go to yet another bus station to take
an (alleged) bus to Palmyra.
