Syrian Memories

A visit to Syria

If someone told me when I was a little girl growing up in Reading, Massachusetts that one day I would peek into a Bedouin tent as sheep grazed nearby or that I would watch the Syrian army on manoeuvres near the Iraqi border, I’d have told them they were totally nuts. 

But thanks to my Syrian neighbor M. in Geneva, Switzerland, who became a family member of choice,  I didn't do just the historic sites but lived for two weeks within another culture so different from my own. I was lucky enough to go back once more before the war. These are my memories of the first tripl

Palmyrian’s Roman Ruins, etc.

M. hired a car to take us through the dessert to some of Syria’s most historic sites. I’ve gotten use to seeing traffic signs for Paris and Milan, but Beirut and Baghdad were something from news casts. Amusingly, a common billboard with a totally veiled woman and the slogan in English was “German Fashion for you.” 

Our driver stopped at a little rest stop called Baghdad café. It so resembled the movie  of the same name, that I expected to hear the plaintive title song come across the desert sand. 

Palmyria is a restored ruin going back to before and during Roman times.

 

Unfortunately, I was in the Valley of Tombs, the Tomb of the Three Brothers (which holds 360 graves) dating back to the two centuries B.C. when Saladin’s revenge struck. I desecrated the stairs and would have been perfectly content to have become the 361^st body laid to rest. 

I told M., as she steered me across the street to the toilets at the Cham Palace that the VIP on our car stood for Vomiting in Palmyria. 

It was good the luxury hotel was there. Syrian toilets are often a key shaped ceramic hole, tiled in with a hose for cleaning yourself and then the area. If it's public, a person outside hands you ONE tissue in return for money to pat yourself dry.

Although I can really understand how the floor toilets may be more sanitary then our toilets, I really appreciated the support of a seat for the next few hours.

St. George’s Monastery

The monastery has been on a green mountain side since pagan times. The Ottomen killed all the early Christians, who’d taken it over. In the last century, the Syrian Orthodox Church reclaimed it. M. booked us into cells for the night. Mine, fortunately, was next to the toilets. 

As I lay on my cot I could hear the Gregorian chants of the monks at Easter prayer. I felt I was in a movie or a novel.

Dinner in the refractory was a silent affair except for the Bible reading. The priests fast during lent eating only once a day and without meat or oil. However, the hummus, beans, salad they were eating looked good, but M. insisted until my system adjusted I was to eat only cooked foods preferably boiled potatoes and pita bread, which the monks provided. She relented, however, to let me chew fresh mint.

The monastery has a beautiful icon which was stolen and recovered by Interpol. 

The next morning when we were about to leave, the Bishop asked to see her. The monks prepared me a breakfast just because I was sick and M. stood guard to make sure that no parasite from the boiled potatoes would join any of its friends that might be lingering in my system from the previous day. 

I sat in on her audience and was thinking they were discussing weighty religious subjects related to both their work until I heard “internet, web and keyboard." They were discussing setting up a web site for the monastery.

 Ebla

Throughout the trip I was aware that I was in an ancient civilization. Walking in old Damascus on Straight Street, I knew it was mentioned in the Bible. To stand in the church where the head of John the Baptist is allegedly buried, reinforced this.

Nothing prepared me for Ebla. Discovered in 1964, they’ve been excavating ever since. So far they’ve uncovered three civilizations going back 4000 B.C. and some 15,000 cuneiform letters on clay tablets. (Later, when I was planning to write a historic book, I met the Italian professor who had translated them giving me so much information on life so long ago. The civil war put an end to those plans.)

The guide was a Bedouin who spoke both French and English, called me madam, and showed me where the olive oil had been pressed and an example of ancient Greek graffiti.

Transportation

Syria was where old American cars were reincarnated. I saw the ghost of the 1950 green Chevy that my ex-husband used to pick me up in when were in high school and my first car's ghost, a 1951 grey Pontiac and many an old Dodge with fins. In fact I saw ghosts of every car I ever had. 

Many became yellow taxis. I rode in more taxis those two weeks then I have for the rest of my life. To cross Damascus cost under $1.00.

Aleppo

In Aleppo we visited a mental hospital from the Middle Ages. It's methods and rooms showed an understanding and methods that modern mental hospitals might incorporate. Discharged patients had to use a different exit from the entrance to protect them from any bad memories of their arrival.

We took a bus from Aleppo to Damascus, a four-hour trip. I had to show my passport or identity card to buy a ticket. Buses can be described as from contagious to quite modern. Ours was equipped with a movie, a sort of Egyptian Laurel and Hardy.

Restaurants and Singers

Once M. said I could eat more than potatoes and bread, I discovered wonderful food especially a dish made with brown beans, chick peas, olive oil, garlic and yoghurt. 

Unlike Switzerland where 10 p.m. is considered late, many restaurants have singers who start at 10 or 11 p.m.. The first one we heard sang all the old tunes made popular by the likes of Englebert Humperdink, Dean Martin and Elvis Presley. The second did Charles Azanavour. After that we had Syrian songs. Since I’d become accustomed to the Arabian sound of French pop singers Faudel and Khaled who combine rock and Arabian music and what M. has exposed me to, I really enjoyed them all. 

I tried a waterpipe. The waiter brought me an extra mouthpiece and strawberry flavored tobacco. Young boys go around with a brazier, adding hot wedges of tobacco to the pipes. 

A five-course meal for six of us came to $35 which would not have bought one dinner in Geneva. But then I have to remember as a doctor M. only made about $80 a month.

Veiled and mosque sitting

One of my Muslim neighbours in Geneva said that she really believed as part of her religion she should be veiled. As a feminist, I’ve always found the concept difficult. Damascus, which has a large Christian community, the veil is not that common. Older women are usually covered in black while younger women may wear long coats and scarves and the youngest scarves and normal clothing. There were even mini skirts.

To enter the large mosque in Damascus, I had to be scarved, veiled and barefoot. The Mosque itself was beautiful and there were many areas where I could walk or sit, which I did. My feet were well aware of the soft carpet. 

I tried to understand what was so emotional in the religion. Some Iranian pilgrims were sitting listening to Koran and crying. I couldn’t feel it, only feel them feeling it. Yet the atmosphere was peaceful and I didn't want to leave for a long time.

Good Friday and Uncle Peter

Each of the churches had a parade starting with the Flag of Syria followed by church flags, the church band (some which have 100+ musicians of all ages) and finally statues.

I was with Y. (who came to Geneva  to see M. twice, once when my daughter Llara was here, and we invited our friends Sara and Tara just to be perverse with the rhyming names). 

She grabbed her Uncle Peter to translate for me. In his late 70s, as he told the story of the resurrection, his face lit from within. He was balding with a few grey strands and a fringe, but it was a beautiful face. “I hope you understood my bad English,” he whispered at the end and insisted I go downstairs with the rest of congregation, where the minister glommed onto me. He had read English Literature before becoming a minister (I began to think half of Damascus studied English and American Literature from the number of former students in the subject.)

Another American

V. hailed from Waco, Texas and was a member of the Church of Christ. She taught with Y. at the American School. After two years her vocabulary in Arabic was less then mine. I’d seen more of Damascus and the rest of Syria and have eaten more Syrian dishes than she had. 

Y. had invited her home for Easter so she wouldn’t be alone, but she didn’t want to participate in anything including the food. She was going to go home in June and vowed never to leave Texas again.  Y. stressed most of the teachers weren’t like that.

Y's family explained to me that girls only leave home for marriage. They cannot live alone even in the Christian community. If they are divorced or widowed they move back with the family and there is little hope for remarriage. M. told of a widow who raised two children then moved to the States and found a husband at 45. She’s still called the whore by many.

Tooing and froing

M. had tried to prepare me for the women, but nothing could have done that. No one is ever alone. 

There seems to be an A, B, C, etc. friend lists. The A list of usually two or three women who see each other daily. If two think the other is alone, they correct it by visiting. During the visits they prepare food, talk, listen to music, etc. I spent one wonderful afternoon in Y.’s mother’s courtyard with several of the A and B list. We were all opening nuts to use in baking Easter sweets. 

The fountain in the courtyard was bubbling, the jasmine hung heavy on the air and their three turtles were scoffing down what vegetation they could find. I was told this was a totally normal day except the sweets preparation for Easter. 

And as people come and go there are meals usually ready for whomever. Sometimes the women visitor arrive with the meal. It doesn’t matter what time of day, lentil soup, foul, hummus, pita bread, kibi, tabouli, etc. is always ready to be served.

Maté

And they drink maté. A small glass is half filled with a grass-like herb. Sugar and a few shakes of cardamom are added and a few shakes of cardamom. A silver straw is used to sip. Water is added several times before the maté is deemed no good and the procedure starts over. The support the women give each other is incredible. Even working women are usually done by 2 p.m. when most offices close for the day. Stores/souks reopen after 5.

For Easter, visits are extended up to the J list.  Little old alone-loving me, found this a bit difficult, because I was alone only about an hour in the two weeks I was gone. M. kept asking me how I was holding up. I did manage to walk alone to Y.’s one day, despite the offers of three people to accompany me.

Ladies from the English Class

M.’s Auntie has been taking English lessons to speak with me. She encouraged several of her friends in their late 60s and 70s to do this also. 

They decided to show me old Damascus. We saw the window where St. Paul was lowered in a basket, the souks, etc. What was funny there would be much discussion on what to tell me and how to say it in English, but usually the part that I got was, “Very old. Very, very old.”

The friend was a genius, however. She took me into the atiliers where they were making the furniture, the rugs, blowing the glass. Not the ones for the tourists, but the real ones.

Products

Except for cars, appliances, and Benneton (who makes many of their products in Syria) I saw no brand names. No McDonalds, No Coca Cola (yes folks, I did survive two weeks without a Coke), no Pepsi, no Nikes, etc. Almost everything is bought from small stores or the souks. And yes, I did get a chance to bargain. Y. and I went down to the souks to help me do my Christmas shopping. I also bought Y. something she wanted. She thought she was picking a scarf for my friend Susan. I told her they had identical taste. The gift cost less than $40 after bargaining which is a month’s salary for Y.

The National Museum

“You can’t leave Syria until you see the synagogue in the museum”  M. insisted. Y. and I popped into the National Museum on the way to the internet café to set her up on email. When we got to the museum ticket booth we were told we didn’t need them. Someone in Y.’s French class worked there and saw us walk up the path. He called ahead for them to let us in. At closing we were walking out with the rest of the people. He pulled us aside and took us on our own private tour of the museum after it closed.

Politics

M. had given me firm instructions not to speak politics with anyone, Christian or Muslim, but almost everyone pulled me aside at one point to talk about what it is like living in a dictatorship. 

Pictures of the old dead president are everywhere and the fact he lost his oldest son and decreed successor is deemed justice for the massacre he ordered in Hamas in 1982. Each city has statues of both the dead president and the dead son. The new president, the one who didn’t want to be and went to medical school with M., has less photos and no statues. He’s trying but the old guard still has too much control.

Four people told me this joke in a whisper. “An American says to a Syrian, ‘I come from a free country. I can stand in front of the White House and say terrible things about President Bush.’

‘So what,’ says the Syrian. ‘I can stand in front of the Syrian president’s house and say terrible things about Bush also.’”

Syria is one of the seven countries in the world that still has capital punishment. The hanging place is down the street from M.’s Auntie. I can’t list the other seven, but I know Iraq and Saudi and the U.S. are among them.

Misc.

To shake your head no, you tilt your head backwards instead of shaking it side to side and/or make a tittitit noise.

No one should call anyone older by their given name. Therefore Auntie L. remained Auntie to me. Many of M.’s friends had already met me in Geneva and knew me as D-L.

In a restaurant ladies room, a fully veiled Moslem woman touched her scarf and pointed at me. I thought she wanted me to cover my head with the scarf I was wearing around my shoulders. Then she touched my red hair and smiled. The woman with her said, “It’s beautiful.”

In one town they only speak Aramaic, the language of Christ. There was a sign that said “Sandwiches, Cassettes” in English. I loved the juxtaposition. The Pope visited shortly after I did.

What I found was a desperately poor country, people living in a dictatorship, but incredibly generous with time and affection. It made me count my blessings for what I have in Switzerland and also for what they gave me, which was of themselves. I told M. as she shoved me through the airport gate telling me to go eat a salad at last, that she had given me a great gift in sharing this part of her life with me for I saw a view of Syria that no tourist could.

I would have visited regularly after a second visit more to see the people, many who became family of choice, except for the war the broke out. So far none of the people I know have been killed.

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