Even though her husband, Vince, died in
September 2010, my sister decided that she still wanted to go on a trip to the
Middle East they had planned together.
It was with OAT (Overseas Adventure Travel) and began in November 2010. They had invited Diane and I to travel with
them. After spending a night in St.
Louis, we flew to the JFK airport in New York.
The next day we joined my sister for our overnight flight to Egypt. After landing in Cairo, we immediately
transferred to another gate for our flight to Amman, Jordan.
The next day was the beginning of the five-day
Feast of the Sacrifice, so traffic was light, and the Citadel, an archeological
site at the center of downtown Amman, was closed. While standing on the street opposite it, we
still had good views of the site. As we
left Amman, our van drove through a ritzy area with many embassies and then
headed to the Dead Sea (really more the size of a lake). Diane, Earlene and many others went floating
in the salt water, but not me. I just
enjoyed watching them and the view of the mountains on the Israeli side of the
Dead Sea. On the way there, Mohammad,
our tour leader, told Bible stories including the one about Lot, Sodom and
Gomorrah, with reference to bad homosexuals.
It was probably the same one he told every tour group, but it did not
endear him to us as we felt that the members of our group were just adjusting
to Diane and me. At least on the way
back to Amman he stopped at a Christian liquor store where the group could buy wine.
Me with frustrated tourists at the Citadel with
Roman ruins in the background
Earlene floating in the Dead Sea
Israel seen in the hazy distance across the
Dead Sea
The next morning, we went north to Jerash,
an ancient Roman city. We were finding
out that the Middle East was full of Roman ruins. At Jerash, there was a show in an open coliseum
with horses and chariots and staged gladiator fights. After lunch we continued to Ajloun Castle, a
12th-century Muslim hilltop castle built to protect the area. It was a great example of military
architecture. That night, we had a
home-hosted dinner with a Jordanian family in their very comfortable
apartment. The husband was
ex-military. We sat in the living room
and were served several courses by his wife, son and daughter. They were very cordial.
Jerash Roman ruins with modern city in
background
Chariot race
Looking down from atop Ajloun Castle tower
We left early the next morning to travel on
the King's Highway to Petra. Stopping at
St. George’s church, we saw the Madaba Map.
It is part of a floor mosaic crafted in AD 560 that depicts all the
major biblical sites of the Middle East.
Although much of the mosaic has been lost, enough remains to sense the
complexity of the whole. Next, we visited
a school that trained artisans to make mosaics.
We left there and stopped at Mt. Nemo where Moses died. Then we toured the Shobak Castle, this time
built by the crusaders.
A mosaic showing St. George slaying the
dragon
Portion of the Madaba Map
Mount Nemo
Shobak Castle
We finally arrived at a miniscule hotel
room for our Petra visit. The next day, I
had diarrhea starting at 3 A.M. That
left me feeling very tired and dehydrated, but I was determined to keep
going. We left early for the
archaeological city of Petra. It was
built by the Nabataeans who might have settled in what would become the capital
city of their kingdom as early as the 4th century BC.
Women who have struggled against the glass
ceiling might be interested in the early history of this kingdom. Around 100 AD when the Nabataean kingdom was
annexed by the Roman Empire, it was known for its extensive trade routes. The Nabataean kingdom grew very wealthy and
prospered in the 1st Century AD. Petra,
its capital city, was a thriving commercial hub. The widespread worship,
prominence, and importance of female deities throughout the kingdom and within
Petra itself, showed that women must have been respected and able to reach very
high status in Nabataean society. There is evidence that they had far greater
rights and privileges than women in Europe or the Roman Empire.
UNESCO has described Petra as "one of
the most precious cultural properties of man's cultural heritage." It has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site
since 1985. Famous for its rock-cut
architecture and water conduit system, Petra is also called the "Rose Red
City" because of the color of the stone from which it is carved. Access to the city is through a gorge called
the Siq, which leads directly to the Al-Khazneh (Treasury) structure. Overlooking the center of Petra are the “Royal
Tombs,” a series of mausoleums hewn from the rock. From where the van let us
out, we had to walk 2.5 miles to get in (downhill) and 2.5 miles to get back
out (uphill). My sister spent time
buying lots of jewelry. She also walked
up all the steps to the Monastery.
The Siq
The Treasury
The Royal Tombs
Jewelry Display
We were up early the next morning for the
drive south to Wadi Rum. Once there we
boarded pickup trucks for a tour of the desert with stops at Bedouin tents for
tea and souvenirs. We had lunch at the
Wadi Rum visitors’ center, and then we headed back to Amman. They were
installing a water pipe along the side of the road, as Jordan was already
worried about their future water supply.
Wadi Rum transportation
Preparing tea at Wadi Rum
At the Amman airport the departure for
Cairo was late, so we didn’t get to our Cairo hotel until 10 P.M. where we were
able to have food in the bar. Diane and
I had read all of the books by Elizabeth Peters about Egypt. Even though the books were fictional, they
were also historical as she had a PhD in Egyptology from the University of
Chicago. The series of books featured
Amelia Peabody who is the wife of Egyptologist Radcliffe Emerson. They had one child, Walter "Ramses"
Peabody Emerson who married Nefret. Peabody
and Emerson had a home in England but spent much time in Egypt discovering and
excavating Egyptian tombs. We were more
than ready for this part of our trip.
Early the first day, our group took a
guided tour through the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities in Cairo. It houses
the world’s largest collection of ancient Egyptian artifacts featuring the
famous Tutankhamun collection. In the
time we had, we just glimpsed the surface of its holdings, but felt it was a
great introduction to the ancient history of the country. On the way to the airport for our trip South,
we stopped at the tomb of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat who was assassinated
by Islamic terrorists in October 1981 because of a unilateral peace deal he
made with Israel. There was an honor
guard of soldiers and it was a very peaceful and moving site.
Anwar Sadat memorial
Honor guard at Sadat tomb
A funny thing happened at the Cairo airport. From our previous flights we had grown
accustomed to the security measures at airports in these Muslim countries. Upon entering, travelers were required to
take their luggage to a scanner adjacent to the ones that the passengers walked
through. Men were sent to one set of
scanners and women to another. I went
first, and after I left the scanner, I heard loud shouting behind me. I could see that a female guard was motioning
to Diane that she needed to go to the side for the men, and Diane was yelling:
“I am a woman! I am a woman!” Because of
her short hair, her drooping and not obvious breasts, and, most importantly,
her demeanor, she was often addressed as “Sir” on our travels. Diane understood why these events happened
and had a very playful disposition.
Our destination was Luxor, south of Cairo
on the Nile, where our group spent three nights. It was a city often visited by the fictional
characters Peabody and Emerson. We
boarded motor boats and rode across the Nile to the West Bank. Our first visit was to an elementary school where
we were shown classrooms of different ages, separate for girls and boys, and
shown the Arabic language material provided by USAID (United States Agency for
International Development).
Luxor village classroom
I really enjoyed the next stop at a family
farm. We saw the outdoor oven where the
daily bread was baked. The story I found
interesting was about how each year there are controlled floods of the Nile. This provided an opportunity for the farmer
to catch fish in his fields using the baskets he made for that purpose.
Oven for baking bread
Bamboo basket made by farmer to catch fish
Next, we toured a woman's sewing workshop that
employed poor women and widows so they could earn money. After lunch at a rooftop restaurant, we took
the motor boats back to Luxor. It was
dusk and the exterior of the Luxor temple was lit splendidly. This temple has served as the backdrop for
several films, including Hercule Poirot’s Death on the Nile and James
Bond’s The Spy Who Loved Me.
Women’s sewing workshop
Luxor at night
Diane and I were very excited to start the
next day’s visit to the Valley of the Kings.
This time our van went on a bridge over the Nile. Since the tombs are small, our tour group was
divided up into smaller subgroups, in our case, Diane, Earlene and me. We were
then told we could visit three tombs, KV14 (The She King), KV11 (Ramses III),
and KV2 (Ramses IV). Taking pictures inside
the tombs was forbidden. Thankfully none
of us got “funny” feelings inside the tombs like Diane and I had inside El
Castillo, the Mayan step-pyramid at Chichen Itza in Mexico.
Entrance to the Valley of the Kings.
On the way back, our van made a surprise
stop at the Howard Carter house and museum.
He was the Egyptologist who excavated the tomb of Tutankhamun, or King
Tut, and made appearances in Elizabeth Peters books. We visited the temple of Queen Hatshepsut, the
second female pharaoh of Egypt. We all
wanted pictures of the Colossi of Memnon made
during the 14th century BC. The statues, which are each about 66 feet in
height, are made of quartzite sandstone.
Each depicts Amenhotep III in a seated position with his hands resting
on his knees and his face toward the Nile. When Egypt became a part of the Roman empire,
the Romans felt that the facial features of Amenhotep III were a bit like the
facial features of Agamemnon, one of the heroes of the Trojan war.
The Colossi of Memnon
After lunch, we visited the Luxor
archaeological museum. Their collection
is much smaller than the museum in Cairo, but the quality was exquisite. We stopped at a Papyrus Institute where they
described the process of making paper, of course offering some for sale. We rode in a horse-drawn carriage during a
Luxor by Night tour. Diane and I purchased
a bottle of Omar Khayyam wine from a Christian wine shop.
Carriage ride
The next morning, our group met at 5 A.M. to
depart for a hot-air balloon ride on the West Bank. It was not a fun experience for Diane and me. The basket and balloons were huge, not the 80
Days Around the World size. The
basket was loaded with as many tourists as they could squeeze in, with only a few
in the front at a railing able to see much.
My sister, who was at the railing, thought it was fantastic. A few weeks later we heard about one of the
balloons landing on an electrical wire, killing many tourists.
Balloons getting ready for departure
Crowded conditions in balloon
We returned to the other side of the Nile and
visited the Temple of Karnak, the ruins of the largest complex of religious
monuments from the ancient world. Before
we boarded our ship for the cruise up the Nile, we were given the task of
acquiring some food. Each team was given
the same amount of money and list of items to purchase at the market. It was a competition to see which team had
the most money left over. Since Diane
was our food guru, she was nominated to be the one to communicate with the food
sellers at the market for the food items she wanted and the price she could
negotiate. She thoroughly enjoyed
herself and our team tied for the top score.
Market vegetables
Fortunately, during our three nights on the
Nile, nobody was murdered. Our boat went
through the only locks on the Nile, and after dinner our group walked around the
river town, Esna, by night. I’m sure
every boat that stops at Esna routes its passengers by the man who uses his
foot to hold and guide the iron.
Our boat on the Nile
Man ironing with his foot
The next morning, we arrived at Edfu to
tour the Temple of Horus, an incredibly well-preserved monument to one of
Ancient Egypt’s most important deities. He
was depicted having the head of a falcon, as the ruler of the skies and the
deity of the pharaohs.
Entrance to the Temple of Horus with engraved
images
On board that afternoon we were given an okra
cooking lesson and an opportunity to have an extended discussion with Hesham,
our Egyptian tour guide. Diane and I
felt very fortunate to have a guide as educated and knowledgeable as
Hesham. We grew to trust him and his
judgment, since he anticipated every situation and prepared us for it. We also appreciated his conversations about
modern Egypt. That evening we had okra with
our Thanksgiving dinner along with the other vegetables purchased at the
market.
The next morning, we saw one of the most
unusual temples of Ancient Egypt, Kom Ombo.
It is unique because it is dedicated to two different deities: the local
crocodile-headed god Sobek, and the falcon-headed god Horus. We had tea in a tent at the model farm we
visited. Arriving
in Aswan, we toured the Botanical Gardens on Kitchener's Island, home to
thousands of birds and exotic plants imported from many parts of the world like
the Far East, India and Africa.
Falcon-headed god on left and
crocodile-headed god on right
Aswan Botanical Garden
We spent one more night on the boat before
departing the next morning to tour Aswan and the Philae Temples dedicated to Isis, Osiris and Horus. The
temple walls contain scenes from Egyptian mythology of Isis bringing Osiris
back to life, giving birth to Horus and mummifying Osiris after his death.
Scene at the Philae Temple
I thought about our visit to the dam on the
Yangtze River in China as we toured the Aswan High Dam, the world's largest
embankment dam constructed of rock and clay, not cement. We stopped at a memorial to those who died in
the building of the dam. Motor boats
took us through the first cataracts below the dam to have lunch on an island and
then back to land to check into our hotel.
We even had time to visit a spice market before dinner.
Looking up inside the Aswan Dam Memorial
The next morning, our group left the hotel
at 5 A.M. for the drive to Abu Simbel and the temples for Ramses II and Queen Nefertari. These temples had to be relocated to avoid
being under the reservoir created by the Aswan Dam. The Abu Simbel Temples had been carved into
the mountains and dated back to the reign of King Ramses II in the 13th century
BC. The largest temple was dedicated to
three deities and had four large statues of Ramses II carved into the
façade. The smaller temple was dedicated
to the Goddess Hathor. We returned to
the hotel and had a free afternoon before our home-hosted dinner with a local
family.
Statues of Ramses II
Proudly presenting dinner
In the morning, motorboats took us across
the Nile to visit the Monastery of St. Simeon.
Diane and I weren’t particularly interested and became even less so when
we were greeted by the camels. We were told
that we were supposed to ride them up a sandy hill to get to the Monastery. Diane didn’t like animals in general and particularly
disliked camels. She refused to get on
one. I wasn’t about to leave her by
herself as she had no sense of direction.
We had a standing joke that if Diane said “Go Right,” then “Go Left” was
the correct decision. The others left us,
and we slowly slogged up the hill through the sand. By the time we got there, everyone was coming
out and ready to go. Then we watched the
race of the hungry camels ready to be back at their homebase and food. Although my sister enjoyed her galloping
camel, Diane and I were very relieved that we hadn’t ridden one. We walked down the hill instead where we met the
rest of our group for a visit, and much needed tea, at a Nubian village house. The Nubians are the people that live in Southern
Egypt and Northern Sudan. They are
darker skinned than most Egyptians and often discriminated against.
My sister Earlene on her camel
Nubian family that hosted the group for tea
For lunch the next day, we took motor boats
to Elephantine Island where we were served at a very nice hotel. After motor boating back to Aswan, we visited
the Nubian Museum near the hotel. We had the afternoon,
evening and the following morning on our own.
We flew back to Cairo the next afternoon and were driven to Giza for
our three-night stay at the Pyramids. We
spent the evening on the balcony of our hotel watching the lit-up pyramids
through the hazy sky.
The next morning, we walked around the
Pyramids of Giza, built to honor and contain the remains of pharaohs. There are three pyramids, the largest of
which at 471 feet is called the Great Pyramid. Built in the 26th century BC
over a period of around 27 years, it is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the
Ancient World and the only one that still exists today. Noone is allowed to climb the pyramids. I enjoyed visiting The Sphinx, a limestone
statue of a reclining sphinx, a mythical creature with the head of a human and
the body of a lion, symbolic of strength and intelligence. It isn’t huge like the pyramids and I was on
a walkway which enabled me to get quite close to it.
Me and Diane at the Great Pyramid
The Sphinx and me
After lunch the group members who chose
this optional trip drove through the countryside to Saqqara to see a step
pyramid. It had flat platforms, or
steps, receding from the ground up using several layers of stones, to achieve a
completed shape similar to a geometric pyramid.
Most of us did go through the inside of the pyramid even though it
required crawling through some short entryways to reach the next room. Once we started, we had to keep going to get
out. It really wasn’t worth it.
Step Pyramid
When we got back to Cairo, the traffic was
unbelievable. It had always been bad,
but this was true gridlock. It did make
watching the people and surroundings easier. Of course, when you live close to a desert,
there is always a layer of sand. Here,
there were no street sweepers in every block like in China, but there was the
same mixture of motor vehicles and animal carts.
Cairo traffic jam
Our last day in Egypt was spent making a
spiritual tour of Cairo. At age 16, all
Egyptians are required to obtain a national ID card. The card states their religious affiliation,
and since 2000 there have only been three options: Muslim, Christian, and
Jewish. The cards are necessary for accessing almost all aspects of life in
Egypt, from opening a bank account to immunizing children. Egyptian Baha’is, atheists, agnostics, and
others who don’t want to claim one of three approved religious options lose
these rights.
Our eclectic tour included: 1) The Citadel (Mosque of Ali), 2) the Coptic Hanging
church, 3) the Ben Ezra Synagogue, and 4) the St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church. Because of the holiday in Jordan, we did not
visit a mosque there, so we had our first experience in Cairo. Women were required to have a head
covering. We kept on our hats and took
off our shoes.
Our first visit to a souq (name for a
market in Northern Africa and the Middle East) was at the Khan El-Khalili souq in
the Muslim section of Cairo. It seemed
like a maze to me with a wild array of anything you might want to spend your
money on. We carefully followed our
guide to find our way out. Our very
fancy farewell dinner was held in a floating restaurant on the Nile (The Blue
Nile). It had big windows to view the
scenery of the city as it lit up the night.
We were so glad to have been able to visit Egypt and were also looking
forward to our trip to Syria the next day.
Get your souvenirs here!
In February 2010 the US travel advisory for
American citizens traveling to Syria was lifted. We were going to be among the first Americans
to visit Syria in many years. After arriving
in Damascus on the afternoon of Dec. 10, 2010, we shared a welcome dinner with
the few others who had signed up for this post-trip. They included a man who seemed very
conservative and an unusual couple. The
husband had actually lived in my hometown, Wichita, Kansas, while attending the
Catholic high school there. He was very
protective of his friendly and pleasant wife, but she seemed to have some
cognitive difficulties. Our guide, Mohammad Al Khousi, was a very observant
Muslim. We observed that our driver was
not armed with a pistol like our drivers in Jordan and Egypt had been. We suspected that meant we were being
surveilled and protected in other ways.
Our lodgings were always in the Christian part of the city.
In the morning, our group went on a walking
tour of Damascus. It was a great
opportunity to “people watch.” It
included the Chapel of St. Anania (said to be where Paul the Apostle was
baptized) and the Nassan Palace.
Damascus food truck
Chapel of St. Anania
Inside the Nassan Palace
Along the Eastern gate we were shown the
St. Paul window. According to legend,
this was where St. Paul was lowered in a basket by his disciples while fleeing
from Roman soldiers. Next, we drove by
the railroad station that was put into operation under the Ottoman Empire in
1907. We arrived at the National Museum
of Damascus whose exhibits cover the entire range of Syrian history, a span of
over 11 millennia. We drove by the
Turkish Mosque on the way to the Al-Hamidiyah Souq, the largest and the most
important souq in Syria.
This souq was much different than the one
in Cairo. It reflected the standing of
Damascus as a very wealthy city and destination for the moneyed inhabitants of
the Middle Eastern region. The souq was
2,000 feet long and 49 feet wide, with the modern shops covered by a metal arch
that was 33 feet tall. I spied some female
mannequins wearing very classy Western dresses and gowns in the front of the upper
floor display windows. There were men in the long robes of Arab dress who had
the demeanor of the very wealthy.
Al-Hamidiyah Souk
Our guide helped us buy lunch in the souq to
eat in the courtyard of the Azem Palace.
Then we walked to the Umayyad Mosque, one of the largest and oldest
mosques in the world. Diane and I found
that the gowns we were required to wear were very uncomfortable. This mosque featured a minaret described in
Muslim eschatology as the place where Jesus will return to earth, the Jesus Minaret. While
our tour guide was telling us about the mosque, I noticed some women looking at
us from the lobby. They were clearly
unhappy about our presence. We were told
that they were some of the Muslims from adjacent countries who came to visit
this mosque. None of them spoke to us,
just gave us disapproving looks. We rode
in pick-up trucks back to our hotel.
Jesus Minaret at the Umayyad Mosque
Attire required for women
The next morning our group was supposed to
leave early. However, there was a delay
as my sister’s suitcase had been put on an already departed OAT van going
somewhere other than our destination.
Once her suitcase was retrieved, we left for Palmyra in the desert.
On the way to Palmyra
Outside the city of Palmyra, we visited the
Valley of Tombs. These were not pyramids
or caves, but rather towers. When we
left our van, we encountered several men on motorcycles selling t-shirts. I thought it best to buy one. Our next stop was at The Three Brothers Tomb
where we walked down steps to enter the underground tomb. The contents of this tomb gave testimony to
the fact that Palmyra was an oasis on a caravan route. It contained funerary paintings of the
highest significance, incorporating images of Parthian and Greco-Roman
origins. Next on our tour was the Temple
of Bel consecrated to the Mesopotamian god Bel, in triad with both a lunar god
and a sun god, making it the center of religious life in Palmyra. ISIS didn’t like its pagan origins and
dismantled most of it in 2015. ISIS also
demolished much of the ancient Roman Amphitheater we visited as well as The
Tetrapylon and the facade of the Roman theater.
Palmyra – Valley of Tombs
Old City of Palmyra
Temple of Bel
Roman Amphitheater
During Rome’s 3rd-century crisis Queen Zenobia
briefly elevated Palmyra, making it the superpower of the Near East. She faced a power vacuum following the death
of her husband and the disintegration of Roman influence in the Near East. She led her army as a “warrior queen” and
conquered territory, including Syria, Lebanon and Palestine, creating an empire
independent of Rome. Zenobia was a
cultured monarch who encouraged intellectual discussions at court and ruled her
multilingual and multi-ethnic subjects with fairness and tolerance. Yet after
ruling for only a short time, this dynamic female monarch was defeated by a
resurgent Roman Empire.
After lunch we visited The Archeology Museum
of Palmyra which housed collections from the 2nd and 3rd
centuries AD including four mummies. We
drove up to visit the Fakhr-al-Din al-Ma'ani Castle or Palmyra Castle on a high
hill overlooking the city. It was
thought to have been built by the Mamluks in the 13th century. We were thrilled to see a magnificent sunset
as we left the hilltop on our drive to our hotel in Palmyra. Our dinner that night was quite enjoyable, as
well as the belly dancing performance for our entertainment.
Palmyra Castle
We made a couple of stops on our way to
Aleppo, the largest city in the north of Syria. We visited Homs, a city which had a historic
past serving as the gateway to the interior of the country from the
Mediterranean. In 2012, it was almost
completely obliterated in the Syrian civil war as it was home to a large rebel
contingent. Along the road to our next
stop, we were shown some mud or “beehive” houses used for storage. They were originally built for human
occupancy to ward off the desert heat. In
Ma'ara we saw the largest collection of ancient mosaics at a Mosaic Museum.
“Beehive” houses
I was intrigued by the geometric patterns
in this mosaic
After arriving in Aleppo, we spent a long
time walking around the Aleppo Citadel along with a large number of school
children of all ages. This structure
also received significant damage in the civil war and repairs have since
started to be made as it has such historic significance. It is considered to be
one of the oldest and largest castles in the world, dating back at least to the
3rd millennium BC.
The Citadel
Me among the school children
Earlene taking picture of Aleppo from
Citadel
I loved our hotel’s location. I’m sure it was strategically chosen in the
Christian district because we were given complete freedom to leave it and walk
about. In the evening, we walked to a restaurant
where we saw women, often in western dress, dining with men and each using a hookah
at their table. At least there was no
second-hand smoke. There was a liquor
store directly across the street from our hotel where we purchased wine.
Sorting bread on the sidewalk
Fish market open to the street (the cats
loved it)
We drove one hour the next morning to visit
the St. Simeon monastery. To escape his
supplicants, pray and meditate, Simeon climbed a pillar that was 60 feet tall
and six feet in diameter. He remained
there for the final 30 years of his life, chaining himself to it while he slept
to prevent falling. After lunch back in
Aleppo, our group was scheduled to visit The Great Umayyad Mosque of Aleppo
near the Citadel and the nearby Souk Al Sakateyya. As we stood outside waiting, we actually saw a
car full of young, laughing women drive by, driven by a woman who looked at us
through the window and smiled.
Diane at the monastery
The Great Umayyad Mosque seen from Citadel
Our tour guide told us that after the visit
to the mosque, the group would be on their own.
He said we could tour the adjacent souk and then walk back to the hotel
and gave directions to our hotel. Diane
and I declined another mosque visit, briefly visited the adjacent souk, and
started walking back. We stopped at a
shop and purchased a box of Middle Eastern sweet pastries. I was glad I had a good sense of direction,
and had no problem taking us back to our hotel.
However, my sister did not return for hours. I became increasingly worried after everyone
else in our group was back, but she was still missing. I asked the hotel staff to call our group
leader who didn’t seem concerned. She
finally showed up and told us her story.
Earlene loved the souk, particularly
jewelry shops. While in one, she started
a lengthy conversation with two men who were showing her necklaces. Once they discovered she was American, they
closed the shop door to bargain privately with her. A cause for concern? She bought some jewelry from them and then
was able to leave and do more shopping.
Stopping at another shop she got into another conversation with the
clerk, and found out that he was a homosexual.
He said he knew a New York Times reporter who had written a book about
the situation of gays in Syria. He asked
her to be very careful about who she talked to about this.
By the time Earlene left the souk, it was
dark outside and she had no idea how to get to the hotel. She finally saw a policeman, but he knew no
English. A taxi stopped and she told him
the name of our hotel. He drove around
and around the city, and she concluded he didn’t know where it was. Finally, she found a card with the hotel
phone number and asked him to call and get directions. Whew!
What an experience. Earlene
didn’t seem upset about it. After all,
she got a great tour of the city.
However, I was furious that the group leader took so little
responsibility for his people. He told my
sister to pay the taxi driver “whatever he wanted.” I also got upset with one of the men in our group
who thought my sister was entirely responsible and the group leader’s behavior
was fine.
The next morning, we started back to
Damascus, stopping at the Ghost town of Serjilla. It was an ancient town which was probably
abandoned because of changing trade routes. At the city of Hama, the history of the wooden
water well was very interesting. The
current of the river moved the wheels, and wooden buckets on the wheels picked
up water from the river and emptied it into the aqueducts or other channeling
systems at the summit of the wheel’s rotation. Gravity led the water along the
aqueducts to its destination in various parts of the town such as mosques and cisterns
connected to houses. Continuing on to
Damascus, our last stop was at the Krak des Chevaliers,
or the “Castle of the Knights,” the greatest fortress built by European
crusaders in Syria and Palestine. It is
one of the most notable surviving examples of medieval military architecture.
Ghost town of Serjilla
Hama Water Wheel
Krak des Chevaliers
The three of us (Earlene, Diane and I)
signed up for an additional trip to the Golan Heights. It was part of Syria until the Six-Day War of
1967. After that, the western two-thirds
of the Golan Heights has been occupied and administered by Israel, whereas the
eastern third remains under the control of Syria. Syria tried to regain the Heights in the 1973
Yom Kippur war, but was thwarted. Israel
and Syria signed an armistice in 1974 and the Golan has been relatively quiet
since.
That made it safe for us to visit the abandoned
buildings that were once a hospital and church, and view from a restaurant roof
the bullet holes and destruction that resulted from the earlier conflict. Of course, we were supposed to interpret this
as reflecting badly on Israel. In the
aftermath of the 1973 War, a United Nations peacekeeping mission was tasked
with maintaining the ceasefire between Israel and Syria. We were able to view
one of their checkpoints from the roof of the restaurant. They were decontaminating the wheels of a
jeep, neither side trusting the other not to do something sneaky and contaminate
the vehicle.
Golan Heights
UN observation post
We went to the Damascus airport for our
flight to Cairo. I had been observing
the behavior of the security personnel at the checkpoints. There was always one at the gate prior to
boarding the plane at which point your water was confiscated. I offered some gum to the woman who was
checking my backpack. I didn’t even give
her the whole pack. I just opened it and
told her to take some, which she did.
She then motioned to the next guard down the line to let me keep my
water. That is what is called Baksheesh,
or bribery. We had a great dinner with Earlene in the
Cairo hotel before our departure home the next morning.
We arrived back in Columbia on December 11,
2010. Soon after our return, the Arab
Spring started, beginning in Tunisia and spreading to other countries, changing
the complexion of the Middle East. In a
little over a month after we left, demonstrations were starting in Egypt, building
up to the one most of the world watched in Cairo’s Tahrir Square. We were so lucky to have made this trip and
returned home when we did.