A nice place to visit
According to the NYT:
Ahlan wa sahlan bi Sham: Welcome to Damascus. During a weeklong visit in May — during which I explored the Old City of Damascus (including its proliferating nightclubs), the Silk Road bazaars of Aleppo and the ruins of ancient Palmyra — unexpected welcomes seemed to erupt from every corner of this ancient nation of Bronze Age, Classical, Biblical and Islamic history. No matter where I was or whom I encountered, local greetings were never long in coming.
Though most Americans might be wary of sojourning in a country whose authoritarian government stands accused of some serious charges — financing Hezbollah, allowing foreign fighters into neighboring Iraq and assassinating the former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri — a week among the regular citizens of Syria and its cultural riches is eye-opening.
When I boarded Syrian Air in Paris, I knew only that Damascus claimed to be the oldest inhabited city on Earth and that some favorite writers — Mark Twain, Gustave Flaubert, Agatha Christie — had been swept away by the country’s lore-filled past and landscapes. Many people told me vaguely to be careful, though none had ever been to Syria. My few acquaintances who had braved the country despite its tarnished reputation assured me that all would be fine. Head straight to the legendary Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, they said. Fill up whenever you can on excellent grilled lamb, baba ghanouj and pomegranate juice. And leave your preconceptions at passport control.
The country I discovered, in addition to being friendly and largely free of crime and related hassles, even showed glimmers of creaking open to the West after decades of closure. Under its London-educated, 41-year-old president, Bashar al-Assad, Syria has instituted private banking, removed a number of long-standing import barriers and passed measures allowing foreigners to own property. A Four Seasons hotel opened in Damascus with great fanfare in 2005; a five-star Inter-Continental is under construction.
Question: is Hama on the itinerary?
June 26th, 2007 at 9:28 am
No matter where I was or whom I encountered, local greetings were never long in coming.
This is not surprising. Human nature in civilized societies is usually benign when no threat is perceived. It makes little difference to what a coherent US policy should be (not that we have one).
Unfortunately, it’s the thugs, crooks and fanatics in the tails of the population distribution that seize control of an undeveloped country.
(And unfortunately, it’s the amoral spineless shmoozers, kleptocratic pharisees and self-deluding fools who slither into power in a developed one.)
June 26th, 2007 at 3:51 pm
What GS said. I enjoyed my visit to Syria and Damascus.