Well, let me qualify that last statement. I did not quite enjoy being woken up between 4 and 4:30 a.m. every morning by the 6 mosques around our campsite blaring out the early morning call to prayer at top volume from what were quite possibly the worst speakers ever to be manufactured. You can't walk more than 50 feet without seeing yet another mosque, and they all have 5 daily calls to prayer. Count 'em, five. The last 4 are fine, but that early morning call is really, dare I say it, uncalled for. Some days begin with extraordinarily distorted recordings complete with sucked in breaths, hacking and wheezing, and the distinctly annoying sound of the mic repeatedly clicking on and off, while other days are perhaps training days and some 8-year old boy goes live in a tremulous tenor. The one definite thing you can count on every day is 28 of the loudest neighborhood dogs -- and occasional guest donkey or two -- joining in with their loudest howls and brays. The resulting cacophony is enough to either induce murderous thoughts or fits of laughter (and sometimes both). I can't tell you how many mornings I woke up peeved, then started laughing uncontrollably at the ridiculous array of sound piercing the calm morning. To be fair, the singing can be quite beautiful when done live by a professional, but those automated recordings are the closest things I've heard to fingernails grating on a chalkboard since I was in grade school.
Anyway, back to the positives. People in Syria were incredibly generous and friendly and genuine. Perhaps everyone is so well behaved because the secret police is allegedly the largest employer in Syria, but I don't think that can explain a completely random stranger buying me a soda and a shopkeeper giving me an ice cream cone for free. And I had not even talked to them! It was simply a nice gesture on their part welcoming me as a tourist in their country. On multiple occasions people went out of their way to be helpful, such as leaving their shop to assist me when they noticed me having difficulty communicating with taxis (English is not especially widespread).
There are not exactly hordes of tourists in Syria and that may be why people were still so nice. Shopkeepers were friendly and almost always charged the same price as they did for locals. I absolutely loved wandering around Old Town, an ancient, walled portion of Damascus that is a warren of markets, shops, houses, restaurants, mosques, etc, because people were respectful and it was a fully functioning slice of Syrian life. Locals did their shopping there for everything from tires to wedding dresses to forged iron items (smelting on site!) to fake flowers. It was fantastic and I had a blast there with my camera, even going on a couple of night shoots with Diana.
Moon rises over a church:
Pigeons fly around a mosque:
Some Syrian boys mugging for the camera:
Open library door in Old Town:
Night shot in Old Town:
I loved this guy sitting in his shop at night surrounded by bolts of colorful fabrics:
Wedding dress shopkeeper on the phone. I liked the way the dresses form a heart shape with him in the middle:
Cool lights hanging over an alleyway of shops:
Everything this fellow was selling was white and frilly. His posture cracks me up:
A man looks in a necklace shop:
Spices:
Interesting doorway:
The posh part of Old Town at night:
More often than not people were just curious and surprised to see tourists -- especially an American tourist -- and were full of questions. The usual questions involving marriage, babies, and politics (Are you married (safest to answer yes on that one)? How many babies do you have? Obama will win?) were sometimes followed up with more unusual questions. One night Maverick, Diana, and I went to a night club and a fellow asked me if I was Christian. That took me by surprise and I was not quite sure what the proper response might be in a Muslim country. Do locals normally ask tourists if they are Christian? Was it a trick question? I simply nodded, he seemed satisfied, and everyone carried on dancing.
The bathroom at the club also threw me for a loop because the attendant sidled up next to me while I was at the urinal and laid a tissue over the divider. I wasn't quite sure what to do with it. Was I supposed to blow my nose? Use it on my hands before washing them? Uh, wipe? With him watching me expectantly from a discreet distance at the sinks, I settled on wipe and was then immediately unsure about what to do with the tissue. I couldn't very well flush it down the urinal and there were no trash cans near, so I carried it back with me toward the sinks. The attendant held out his hand and it was an awkward moment until I realized he wanted me to give him the used tissue. An even more awkward moment passed until I reluctantly handed it over, unsure if this was standard protocol or I was completely botching the situation and he was simply being tolerant. With a flick of his wrist he dumped the tissue into a nearly hidden trash can, then proceeded to spritz me with rose water. By this time I was so out of my element I merely stood there dumbfounded as he proceeded to wash my hands, dry them, then spritz me with more rose water. Was my shower that morning not as thorough as I thought it had been? I stumbled out of the bathroom confused and smelling like Valentine's Day bouquet, but rather liking the service. Four Seasons could learn a thing or two in Damascus.
The climbing around Damascus was also surprisingly quite good. A core group of expats have been developing a few crags within an hour or so of the city, and they have put up some quality sport routes over the past few years. Once you get past the extra sharp rock (hello bloody fingertips), excessively modest grading (can you say sandbag?), and sound of nearby machine gun fire (military training grounds were near one crag and the military had recently decided to build near another crag), it is possible to have an enjoyable day out. Thankfully BiRT was undergoing some upgrades so we were in Damascus for over a week and could get used to some of those quirks at the crags. It was great to once again do a lot of climbing and even have the luxury of picking out a project or two. As a bonus, the climbing club had put together one of the nicest climbing guides I've seen on the trip, and I bought one as a souvenir.
It was so cold one morning at the crag that Maverick (aka Mark) and I put on rope bags to keep warm:
I look like a complete idiot climbing with the rope bag on, but it did help keep me warm:
Diana's back muscles mean business:
All 6'7" of Maverick on a climb:
Nathan does his best guerrilla impression. Note the snow on the mountains in the background:
Danny gets himself into another odd contortion:
You can just about make out Aidan center far left in this pic doing the classic I'm-so-cool-while-I-reach-into-my-chalkbag pose:
Mav all tuckered out using his quickdraws quite possibly the most uncomfortable pillow ever:
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