Living on the Edge...of Syria

Sometimes the most well-laid out plans are the worst ideas when travelling. Luckily, I laid my plans out rather shabbily when heading to the Middle East. The result, from my notebook the night it all went down:

"After an unendingly brief night on a bus of muffled snores, randomly illuminated lights, and a chubby Turkish head nuzzled against my shoulder, I got my first taste of the sacred eastern practice of holding tourists' passports needlessly for needlessly long periods of time. And so I headed to the border...

"But this was nothing compared to what lay in store for me upon entering the Middle East proper. Syria makes Greece seem like the most accomodating and efficient place on earth. 6 hours waiting for a fax to come through to approve my visa gave me a chance to observe the punchline to the joke: how many Syrians does it take to screw in a light bulb? Except the light bulb was a passport and the "screwing" was entering information from people's passports into a computer (or maybe it was making American suckers like me wait all day on a deep red bench of agony, in which case, the joke is totally ruined). There were plenty of workers who spoke decent English, but the system insisted on having "Arabic only's" at the "Foreign Visitors" line, while anglophone employees' sole purpose was to hover in the background and approach only after sefveral minutes of mutual misunderstandings.

"Needless to say, after hours of being ignored and uninformed, and nearly taking my passport and going "back" to Turkey, I began to learn that Syria is a land of contrasts, at least when judged by the standards of an arrogant (but trying otherwise) American. When the Fax finally came in, I rushed over to the bank to pay the visa fee, only to be fed rice and pita and tea as a welcome to their country. Of course they also told me to put my money in my "boot" (I'm wearing Asics running shoes), which I must say is a challenge to comfortable walking.

"Yet, or therefore, I was still in a wary mood, and when the border guy (he had no "guard" paraphanalia) offered to help me get to Aleppo, the nearest city, while constantly taking bribes from every one who entered his office, I was expecting the worst (and maybe contemplating some kind of Tazmanian devil antics. maybe). So I felt rather bad, and even a bit racist, when he began asking me if I could help him get an American visa (almost impossible for Syrians) and then got me a free ride with another emblem of hospitality. The driver kept tryint to make conversation tho neither of us knew enough of the other's language to say much (did I also mention he looked German...so much for visual stereotypes), and fed me chips and Syrian red bull (true, he did take his hands off the wheel in the rain to do so). And I'm pretty sure he called me "Sir Jeremy" at least once. I'm still trying to schedule the knighting ceremony....

"I wish I could spend more time here, and at the same time I'm dreading ever having to enter the country again (which I may have to do in a few days!). Oh, and I almost missed my train to Damascus, since apparently Syria has already switched to daylight savings without tell me."

That last paragraph was ominous and dramatically ironic, for upon coming back to the border, I learned a couple valuable lessons, although I only had to wait a couple hours this time.

1. Don't apply to get into Syria at the same time as someone on their birthright trip to Israel, even if they don't have any stamp in their passport saying so.
   

Actually, that's pretty much all I learned. Other great things about Syria:
-The one meal I had was delicious, and I got to watch The Scorpion King while chowing down on it.
-Not only do people ride in the back of pickups, but they stand (Texans are amateurs)
-Seat belts are silly. So are lanes.
-If someone is starting to obstruct your path, you accelerate to beat him to "it"
-Never honk, just flash your lights if an accident is about to happen. Even during the day.

Unfortunately I have no pictures because I was afraid to take them at the border and otherwise it was night time and I was in a haze. But Jordan was very visual, I promise...