home from lattakia

Home in Damascus from Lattakia! There was something kinda poignant about reading "On the Road" during our bus ride through the Syrian country-side :)

Lattakia was beautiful, the beach on the Mediterranean was exactly what you see in pictures; just clear water, white buildings jutting out from the mountains on the coast, ports lined with teal mosques. The city had some great restaurants, but one of the biggest differences from Damascus was that the restaurants actually opened after sun-down, because of Ramadan. Here in the Old City, the rules about Ramadan are fairly flexible.

One more day here fi Damashq (and our Arabic placement exam, gahh), then off to the Dead Sea!

lets get 'er done

Move into the apartment tomorrow, got our mandatory AIDs test for Damascus University yesterday, went to the U.S. Embassy today, all set with passport photos/ copies/ all that good stuff... lotsa progress. We're also planning on going to Latakia, one of the coastal cities, this weekend, and hopefully we will go down to Jordan and the Dead sea after our placement exam on Monday.

It's gonna be sad to leave the hostel. The rabbits (Baba Ghanoush and Fattoush) are sort of amazing. Everyone who is staying in the hostel and all of the staff who work there have been indescribably helpful this past week. Alice, a sweet girl from London who goes to St. Andrew's University, has been the person who we've spent the most time with. She told us exactly how to go about registering with Damascus U, and she showed us around the Old City on our first few days. Without her we would have, literally, been lost here. There are a few other girls who also go to school in Scotland, one from Texas, who will attend the same Arabic session as us. And of course the older woman from Austria, who left today. The night we arrived we had a pretty intense debate about healthcare and immigration policies with her... even in Damascus, we soooo go to GW...

There are about 4 men who work at the hostel who have been so warm to us. Raymond, the owner, is from Australia but has been living here for a long time. He is the quirkiest man, and now that he's realized that it will freak me out, he keeps on "threatening" to cook the rabbits. The others are all Syrian. We sometimes have language barriers, but speaking with them has helped us understand a lot more Syrian amayaa. The day that Myles and I practiced Ramadan, and didn't eat or drink anything for about 17 hours, they included us in their feast afterwards.

We have also befriended the Kabboush family :) They were the ones who helped us find our apartment. We've gone out a few times with their two sons, Simone and Ivan, and the mother, Nada, is going to help us with our amayaa. Nada is coolest woman. Every word we say in Arabic, she makes us repeat it until we have the perfect pronunciation. When she saw me laughing at Adam, she whacked my arm. I feel like she is the classic tough-love yet motherly type of woman. The family has an art shop down the street from us, so I'm sure we will be seeing them a lot.

woot, apartment!

We found housing! It worked out so well. Myles, Adam and I were walking back from a restaurant and stopped to read a sign in Arabic. There was one word that we didn't understand, so an older couple who was sitting under the sign explained it to us. We began talking to them, and found out that they work at a tiny school teaching Arabic and own an art shop as well. We asked them a bunch of questions about learning amayya, and slipped in that we were looking for a place to live for about 4 months. The woman, Nada, walked over with us to a house, even though it was around midnight, and introduced us to the family who owned it. On the roof of the house, there are 3 rooms, a kitchen, and a bathroom, as well as this whole open area with chairs and a table. Myles, Adam and I will all have our own rooms (while still living together), be staying with such a nice, friendly family, in the middle of the Old City.

The family is made up of a mom, dad, at least three girls (I think we've only met two?), and two boys. All of the "children" from the family are actually in their late twenties and thirties. They are exceptionally nice, like basically everyone we've met here. We also met Nada's two sons yesterday, Ivan and Simon, who are probably around our age. We might go out with them tonight... haha maybe we have friends?

Also, facebook works sometimes. And gchat works. So. Happy. I'm talking to Amandi right now :)

Tomorrow Myles and I might actually try to fast for Ramadan. Ramadan began on the first real day we got here, but we've been able to eat inside during the day. The Old City is made up mostly of Christians, so we haven't really faced any barriers in terms of food. I didn't know that even drinking water is prohibited during Ramadan... dunno how that part will work out. No water might be hard when it's like 100 degrees...

in damascuuuuussss

Our flight was. so. fucked. up. The people around us were absolutely crazy, we had to sit on the plane for 6 hours before it took off, and random guys were playing LUTES the entire time. They were literally sitting in their seats strumming lutes. At one point they played "Push It."

We missed our flight from Vienna to Damascus, but it worked out amazingly. We were given free rooms in a luxurious hotel in Vienna for the rest of the day and night. Vienna is stunning, being there once made me want to go back.

And now we are in Damascus!! Getting off of the plane was surreal, knowing that this is going to be home for 9 months. The city is nothing like what I expected. It's better. There are winding streets and vines covering the souks and mosques and intricate details on everything. The people are so nice. It reminds me slightly of Fez, in Morocco.

Our hostel might possibly be the best place ever. Everything about it is eccentric, from the rope ladder that we climbed up to the rabbits and turtles that run around the cushioned sitting area. We have a tiny room, and it looks like a cabin from the inside. Last night after exploring inside the city walls, we just sat around smoking hookah and talking with others staying at the hostel.

Whooooo, Damascus!

it's all happening...

So... tomorrow I am printing off a one-way ticket, getting on a plane, and flying to Damascus. I'll have my two friends sitting next to me, two huge bags filled with clothes and hair gel and other crap, two years of Arabic classes under my belt, which will hopefully get me somewhere... but the rest is pretty uncertain. I'll climb a rope ladder up an ancient holy wall to get into my hostel. And then I'll probably look around at the vibrant beauty that I anticipate will fill Damascus, the city that I'll call home for the rest of the year.

I decided last spring that I wanted to take this semester off and focus solely on studying Arabic; recently, I decided to extend that to a year. Arabic has morphed from an academic interest into a passion for me. I don't just want to learn about wuzens and short vowels; I want to be able to travel around the Middle East and talk to people, learn about cultures through the local language, get to know about an individual's life by speaking to her in her own dialect. The classes at Damascus University are supposed to be intense, and that's exactly what I want right now. I also hope to volunteer with the UN High Commission for Refugees Office in Damascus. We are going to be living in a city that is home to one of the most intense refugee problems in the world. So many lives in Iraq have been destroyed, so many have been uprooted... I just want to do sommmmmething with the purpose of helping these people who have left their lives behind. Through volunteering with the UNHCR, I want to research refugee rights and the social assistance that is given to refugees. I want to try to view human rights from the eyes of those who understand the reality of conflict and its aftermath.

...on a different note. I cannot explain how much I will miss everyone. My friends have become my family. And I am so grateful for my family, my whole family, the one that runs so much deeper than blood. It breaks my heart to leave you guys, but I know that when I come back you will all be more amazing and more beautiful and you will continue to conquer the freaking world. I couldn't forget one moment, one laugh, one story, if I wanted to...

Not to be a tool and quote Kate Hudson from "Almost Famous," but it's all happening!