Syria...
I had such a lovely -much needed- vacation lately, which I was supposed to write about since I came back, a week ago or so, but never had the chance to.
And NO, unlike many of you might think, I wasn't in any terrorists' training camp, I was just having fun! :))
And I was planning to write to you the details but I am going to put it in few lines so you can go back to doing whatever you were doing before coming here:)
It was such a lovely trip, I spent some time in Dimashq, the capital, and most of the time in Halab, which is to the north, about 55km away of the Turkish borders only.
Halab is a city that after spending 24 hours in it, you stop find it strange that you are praying in a 800 years old mosque, walking beside a 500 years building, or wandering inside a 4000 (yes, four thousands) years old castle, it is an amazing place to see, one of the very first cities built in the world, and you can never stop looking at all the old buildings and ruins in it, that most of them are still functioning till now, and you can never stop making fun of the accent of the people there too, but you wouldn't know the defference anyways so let's not worry about that for now:)
The other best thing you can see in Halab is, Food!
if you haven't eaten in Halab before, you have missed alot, i mean alottt, i mean it.
it has some of the best Sheesh kabab and other eastern dishes that you would ever taste, Halab is famous for it's good food.
People are just so nice, reminds you of Iraqis, very very friendly, after I left the Halab castle where i spent maybe two hours with a guide explaining to me all the defferent things in it (which was wonderful), it was prayer time so I went to the mosque right in front of it, after praying people left, and I was very tired and cold, and it was so warm inside the mosque, so I took off my jacket and used it as a blancket and laid on the rug-covered floor (as in all mosques usually), it was my first day in Halab and I was travelling during the night. after a little while the mosque keeper, a very old man came to me and said " you were travelling during the night? " i have no idea how he knew that, or how did he know that I was a stranger in the first place but I smiled and nodded yes, he asked me to go lay down on a certain part of the side of the mosque, and then after a while, he came back to me holding a pillow!
Everyone you meet in Halab is so nice and friendly like this old kind man.
When I left the mosque, almost an hour later i found him standing at the door, he asked me where I was from, and when I told him I was a Palestinian Iraqi, his voice followed me as I left, praying for Iraq and Iraqis...
Oh and the sweets, yummmmie...they have more sweets shops than we have supermarkets here, there are so many of them, and they all are amazing. After few days I left Halab going towards Dimashq and then to Amman, as soon as I was in Dimashq I stopped the first guy I saw and asked him how do I go to Amman, so he asked me where I was from and I told him, he turned out to be from Halab too, and not only he insisted on taking me to the Amman-busses garage himself, paid for the transportation from his own money inspite of all what I said, but he also spent over an hour with me while I was shopping, because he wanted to make sure that noone would sell me things for high prices since it was obvious I was a stranger this time, my big bag was a big - I am a tourist - sign.
And this is what you should do if you go to Dimashq, if you are a tourist and you wanna buy something, and they tell you it's for 2000SL (Syrian Lera) and then you talk to them and take it for 1000 and you think you ripped them off, then you discover usually afterwards that you paid twice the usual price!! but they have very beautiful traditional clothes, Syria is famous with that, and of course the sweets too.
Prices in syria are cheap compared to Jordan.
I had a very good time, I advice you to visit Syria if you came to the ME.
Khalid*
Ps: this is NOT a paid commercial!
Ps2: this turned out to be much longer than i intended, anyways, you can go back NOW to do what you were doing.
Ps3: Thanks for the -where are you?- emails :))
And NO, unlike many of you might think, I wasn't in any terrorists' training camp, I was just having fun! :))
And I was planning to write to you the details but I am going to put it in few lines so you can go back to doing whatever you were doing before coming here:)
It was such a lovely trip, I spent some time in Dimashq, the capital, and most of the time in Halab, which is to the north, about 55km away of the Turkish borders only.
Halab is a city that after spending 24 hours in it, you stop find it strange that you are praying in a 800 years old mosque, walking beside a 500 years building, or wandering inside a 4000 (yes, four thousands) years old castle, it is an amazing place to see, one of the very first cities built in the world, and you can never stop looking at all the old buildings and ruins in it, that most of them are still functioning till now, and you can never stop making fun of the accent of the people there too, but you wouldn't know the defference anyways so let's not worry about that for now:)
The other best thing you can see in Halab is, Food!
if you haven't eaten in Halab before, you have missed alot, i mean alottt, i mean it.
it has some of the best Sheesh kabab and other eastern dishes that you would ever taste, Halab is famous for it's good food.
People are just so nice, reminds you of Iraqis, very very friendly, after I left the Halab castle where i spent maybe two hours with a guide explaining to me all the defferent things in it (which was wonderful), it was prayer time so I went to the mosque right in front of it, after praying people left, and I was very tired and cold, and it was so warm inside the mosque, so I took off my jacket and used it as a blancket and laid on the rug-covered floor (as in all mosques usually), it was my first day in Halab and I was travelling during the night. after a little while the mosque keeper, a very old man came to me and said " you were travelling during the night? " i have no idea how he knew that, or how did he know that I was a stranger in the first place but I smiled and nodded yes, he asked me to go lay down on a certain part of the side of the mosque, and then after a while, he came back to me holding a pillow!
Everyone you meet in Halab is so nice and friendly like this old kind man.
When I left the mosque, almost an hour later i found him standing at the door, he asked me where I was from, and when I told him I was a Palestinian Iraqi, his voice followed me as I left, praying for Iraq and Iraqis...
Oh and the sweets, yummmmie...they have more sweets shops than we have supermarkets here, there are so many of them, and they all are amazing. After few days I left Halab going towards Dimashq and then to Amman, as soon as I was in Dimashq I stopped the first guy I saw and asked him how do I go to Amman, so he asked me where I was from and I told him, he turned out to be from Halab too, and not only he insisted on taking me to the Amman-busses garage himself, paid for the transportation from his own money inspite of all what I said, but he also spent over an hour with me while I was shopping, because he wanted to make sure that noone would sell me things for high prices since it was obvious I was a stranger this time, my big bag was a big - I am a tourist - sign.
And this is what you should do if you go to Dimashq, if you are a tourist and you wanna buy something, and they tell you it's for 2000SL (Syrian Lera) and then you talk to them and take it for 1000 and you think you ripped them off, then you discover usually afterwards that you paid twice the usual price!! but they have very beautiful traditional clothes, Syria is famous with that, and of course the sweets too.
Prices in syria are cheap compared to Jordan.
I had a very good time, I advice you to visit Syria if you came to the ME.
Khalid*
Ps: this is NOT a paid commercial!
Ps2: this turned out to be much longer than i intended, anyways, you can go back NOW to do what you were doing.
Ps3: Thanks for the -where are you?- emails :))
posted by Khalid at 8:37 PM
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