The weekend comes early (2/6-2/7)

Much like at Georgetown, Thursday is the new Friday here! Friday is the holy day for Muslims and since Syria is 90% Muslim (though its government is secular) the weekend is Friday and Saturday, hence classes starting on Sunday.

I planned to sleep in Friday morning, but that didn’t work out. But at least with nowhere to rush off to, I could take my time in the morning getting ready and eating breakfast. Around 11 I left the house to find my way to the old city, entering through Bab Touma (Gate of Thomas), as Oubai had shown me a few days earlier. The streets were much quieter with hardly any cars out, and most of the shops were closed. Much of the appeal of the old city is in the shopping for the handmade crafts, so although I could only do a limited amount of window shopping, it was also nice to walk around the (relatively) quiet streets and see the old buildings, sneaking glimpses of interior courtyards and signs of life off the street. I didn’t go in any of the mosques or churches or sites listed in my Lonely Planet book, I figured there will be plenty of time for that next time. Apparently I was walking south because I reached Bab Sharqi (the Eastern Gate, there are 7 gates to the old city) and was pleasantly surprised by the change in décor. The buildings were whitewashed with rooftop gardens, wider streets, beautiful painted tiles and carved wood inlaid with mother of pearl on their doors and windows. This is the city where I want to live—in the picturesque renovated representation of life a hundred years ago!

Turning around I walked in the other direction, reaching the entrance to the Ummayyad mosque in the western end. By now it was around noon and families were flocking to the mosque for the midday prayer. Next to the mosque is the entrance to the souq al-Hamadiyya, the famous stretch of covered market where you can buy almost anything. Again the vast majority of shops were closed, though I was pulled in by one shopkeeper to see his selection of jewelry made by his Bedouin mother. He poured me a cup of tea and showed me the goods, but unfortunately for him I was not in the purchasing mood.

Somehow I found my way home again, in time for lunch. After a nap I spent the afternoon reading. While I am anxious to meet people to explore the city with, I don’t feel guilty about enjoying a few leisurely afternoons, especially knowing that I have 4 months ahead. At school I don’t have the time or the peace of mind to take a nap or read a book outside of class, and I did take this semester off for the break from the fast-pace of Georgetown as much as I did for the exposure to Arabic. But I’m nearly done with my book, its only been one week, and there are no libraries to be found to restock my supply (I’m pretty sure they doesn’t exist)! Perhaps this will offer me a new source of motivation to improve my Arabic so that at least I can find something to read. It’s like being hungry and being surrounded by food you can’t eat.

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Saturday my day was on a similar schedule. I wanted to walk a little further west than the old city into the city center, where there is not much to see by way of tourism but there is at least a cinema and a few bookshops worth investigating. I surprised myself and found the right roads, walking for the majority of the time along Sharia Faysal al-Malik (Street of King Faysal) and finding myself in a neighborhood of metal workshops with sparks and anvils and hammers galore. A little further down it became a food market with sacs of nuts, spices, fruits, vegetables and raw meat on display, and as I reached the end and crossed another main road, I walked through a bird/goldfish/rabbit market and found Al-Merjeh (Martyr’s Square) marked with people lounging in the green grass.

The city center is mostly government buildings, big banks and other unappealing structures, though I found the cinema and was disappointed to see that the only movies playing were goofy looking popular Arab films, probably from Egypt. From there I sought out one of the two libraries (aka bookstores) recommended by LP as the best bets for English books, one of them located in an area owned by the tourist and travel agent industry. The streets were lined with every Middle Eastern airline in existence and when I found the spot where I thought the library should be I looked up and saw an arrow with the name of the bookstore pointing in the other direction. Confused, I wandered with LP map in hand until a man stopped me and asked me in Arabic what I was looking for. I explained I just wanted a bookshop but he didn’t understand me and took me around the block to a travel agency so I could ask the woman at the desk in English. We returned to the exact same spot where the arrow stood, pointing in the direction from whence we came, and he directed me across the street to the store. But of course.

The bookstore’s English collection was unfortunately limited to coffeetable art and interior decorating books and bad paperback novels. The next one was slightly more fruitful with its collection of classic works though not necessarily worth buying for more than their listed price. I left with one book in hand and decided it probably wasn’t worth coming back to see how often they update their inventory.

The only other stop I had was the French Cultural Center, likely to have the most interesting schedule of events, though I decided to forego it on this trip and check out the schedule online. Instead I returned home for lunch and such.

In the evening I met up with a friend of a friend of a friend of my sister’s, Reem, the only person I know so far in Syria. She called me to let me know she was in the neighborhood for a meeting and we could meet up after she was finished. Around 830 I left my house to meet her and waited at a nearby gas station so she could pick me up, though I ended up waiting for more than 20 minutes because she got lost on the way. It turns out she grew up in San Diego but spent her summers with the whole family here in Damascus, and surprised herself by moving here last year and finding a job. She now lives with her grandparents and works for a distribution company, but confesses that its not a place she could ever imagine living longterm, after growing up in the US. We ended up literally driving in circles around the square near my house while we talked as she didn’t want to get lost again and had to meet another friend in just a few minutes. Although it was a brief, and somewhat random, meeting, I was glad to finally meet someone else who lived here so the next time someone asked me if I knew anyone here, at the very least I could claim, yes! One!