The Dead Cities

Damascus, Syria

Friday morning started off on the wrong foot with me feeling a little upset but nothing major. I just chalked it up to some of the food from the fruit vendors the previous night and figured it would wear off throughout the day. Michelle, Bramwen, Inigo and I all had breakfast at the hostel before getting picked up my Samir, our tour guide for the day. Turns out he was more of our chauffeur for the day, as we all piled into his personal 4 door sedan and headed out of Aleppo towards out first stop, some Roman burial site.

We never really did learn all that much about Samir other then his favorite singer is Michael Bolton, followed by Bryan Adams and then Madonna. Oh, and he likes Britney Spears, but only her body. Seems like Michael Bolton is pretty big in Syria since his name has come up more then once to that same question. As for Bryan Adams? I can only say... Go Canada!

The Romain burial site didn't really impress me. It was just some rock carvings and some small caves along a residential road way out in the country side. What was more impressive was the landscape itself. I'm pretty convinced Northern Syria is just one large rock. The vegetation is scarce and everywhere you look the landscape is so rocky. How they manage to farm this I don't know but you do see small fields being plowed along the road, though each field is littered with thousands of tiny rocks.

Roman burial sites, apparently.

From the Romain burial site we continued north towards some ruins that once represented a small city. I really don't recall the history of them but I'm sure a Google Search will tell you everything you need to know. The just of it is that these cities have all long since been abandoned for unknown reasons. Like most things that are hundreds or thousands of years old, the ruins are in varying degrees of decay. Some "buildings" are nothing more then a pile of stones, while others at least have a wall or two standing, with the odd arch or pillar still present. As I wandered around the site, which by the way has an awesome view across an open plain towards the Turkish mountains, I accidentally stumbled into someones yard that wasn't so dead after all. I guess some locals integrate their house with the ruins and get a sort of two-for-one deal on lodging. This local guy didn't really speak English, but he seemed friendly enough and let me wander around. He ended up following me back towards the larger concentration of ruins and even pointed out a few of the more impressive areas to take note of. Knowing that the others were probably waiting in the car for me, I started to head back down the hill towards them just as the local began insisting that I join him for tea. (That much I could understand). Sadly, I had to turn him down, but thankfully he followed me all the way back to the car where Samir was able to thank him him in Arabic for me and explain that we were on a tight schedule and genuinely didn't have time to socialize. He seemed pleased with that and wished as well, as the five of us headed over to stop number three.

Ruins of one of the Dead Cities.

Arguably the "highlight" of any Dead Cities tour is the visit to the St Simeon Basilica, or Qalaat Samaan as the locals call it. The St Simeon Basilica is now in ruins but there is still enough of it standing to get an idea of the layout and scope of it. It too lies on top of a hill that provides excellent views north towards Turkey. This is your typical tourist-friendly ruins and other then the great views didn't really impress me all that much.

Thinking how great it was that my "student card" worked again.

Basilica arches.

The fourth and final stop on the tour was at the remains of an old church, it too in ruins but with at least four walls still standing. Like the preview two stops, the views from the hill top were splendid, though this one looked towards a Syrian military base (apparently) and thus Samir strongly suggested that we do not take any pictures while touring the church. Things looked ok to me so I took a few pictures, fearful only of Samir and not of the locals nor the Syrian military, who I didn't see at all.

One thing you need to keep in mind when doing a tour like this is that to the Syrians, the Dead Cities are a pretty big deal and therefore when you look at any "Things to do in Syria" book, they are prominently listed. However, they don't get much attention when you start to look at books that cover all of the Middle East or Europe for that matter. In the context of other ancient ruins, the Dead Cities, are well, dead. (Unless of course you studied ancient Middle Eastern history in school, in which case I'm sure the Dead Cities are alive and well and surely the highlight of any trip to Syria...) As always, your mileage may vary when it comes to touring ruins. My mileage doesn't go much past one decimal point on the odometer...

By early-afternoon we were back at the hostel and I could tell that my little stomach problem wasn't getting any better. Regardless, I still decided to join the others for a lunchtime snack of felafel's and kebabs, which definitely did not improve the situation. As I headed back to the hostel at a faster then usual pace, I decided I'd lie down for a bit and let this little problem, uh, just pass through... Feeling a bit better after a few hours of lying down, and not wanting to spend even more hours in my room, the four of us headed back out towards the cinema, as the other three were intent on watching "Stepford Wives" at the local cinema (in English with Arabic sub-titles).

I might have been more interested in this movie...

Tom Cruise is still doing impossible things in Syria!

Somehow, just outside the cinema, we "lost" Inigo. No idea where he went (he probably thought the same of us three) but we couldn't see him. Needless to say, three westerners clearly looking for someone or something on a street corner in Aleppo attracts attention and it didn't take long until "Gorge" (George), took an interest in us. Well, I should say he took an interest in the two girls. Turns out he's from Armenia and since that's where Bromwen lives, she said a few pleasantries in Armenian, which was probably a mistake since now Gorge was really interested in getting to know the girls. Since Gorge was a) about 5'3 b) from Armenia and c) way out of his league, the girls obviously weren't having any of it. Time for the signal girls... Time for me to do a little cock-blocking, or "big brother" protection. Sorry Gorge, but you get to talk with me now. That didn't go over so well as Gorge kept trying to end out conversation to get back to the girls, but I don't give up all that easily and wasn't about to be stood up that night. So I persisted.

Ideally we would have just left the street corner, but since we didn't know where Inigo was we figured we'd just wait for him to return to the last place he saw us. That meant entertaining Gorge while the girls kept an eye out for Inigo. I learned that Gorge actually had wanted to visit Canada for some reason need to show that he had 10,000 dollars in his bank account to get the visa. He, apparently, only has 4,000. So in order to occupy his mind, I set about going through all his monthly expenses to figure out where he could find another 6,000 dollars. Turns out he bought a laptop recently for 1,000, pays rent which I just budgeted at 1,000/month, figured he had a budget of 1,000/month on food and the rest he spent at clubs entertaining girls (since he mentioned that he liked to drink with girls). With a lot of arrows and diagrams, reminiscent of some of my math exams in university, I managed to completely screw with his mind and show him that if he just cut out all that partying, then he too could visit Canada. Thankful for my help in clearing up his financial position, we exchanged addresses and wished each other well. He never did get much further with the girls and if anyone actually lives at "145 Jackson St, Moose Jaw, AB", then you might get a visit from some Armenian guy named Gorge, because that's the address I gave him off the top of my head... Why that address? I have no idea, but remember, I was already feeling way under the weather with, uh, problem....

By now, both my head and my stomach were hurting and I figured that instead of going to a movie, that I maybe what I needed was to just walk around and get some fresh air, so off I went while the others tripled the attendance to Stepford Wives.

Not long into my walk I realize that that was a bad idea. For those readers who've been in that unsettling position before, you know what I mean. I immediately start making back-up plans in your head, looking at every dark alley or small bush as a potential, uh, spot, should things really take a turn for the worse. You walk slowly, take deep breath and never relax. Step by step, I slowly mad it back to the hostel without incident, but that was the longest kilometer I've ever walked. At the hostel, someone who seemed to know what they were talking about suggested that I take a spoonful of salt with a can of Sprite. I did and it was disgusting, sort of like a poor mans tequila, only there was no lime and no one else in on the shot.

Maybe it was psychological, but I started to feel better within the next hour or so and thought my troubles were behind me, only to see things take a much bigger turn for the worse around 10pm or so that night. Long story short (or somewhat shorter then I could make it if I tried) with lots of visits to porcelain world over the next few hours, culminating with a final "oh my god this feel like my 28th birthday but isn't" vomit I finally got some shuteye and hoped that by morning my troubles would be gone...

Kenny