Final Day

We set out early to take advantage of our last day of travels, both in Syria and on our trip in general. It is hard to imagine that we will be back to our regular lives in less than 48 hours. But for the time being, we decided to make the most of our time in Damascus, where one still truly feels that Aladdin may pop out from around a corner in the Old City.

Ellen Beth and I wandered through the various suks: spice, gold, textiles. We walked alongside the Umayyad Mosque wall, peeked down alleys and beyond doorways into green and sunny courtyards, the neighborhood hammam, a historic madrasah (school). The morning air in Damascus is clear and cool, though the direct sun warms it quickly. After our walk, the hotel offered to shuttle our bags out of the Old City (or so we thought) in a golf cart. The teenage boy assigned to drive us attempted to shuttle us the wrong way up Straight Street (it appears to be one way). Needless to say, we did not get very far, but we attracted a crowd of arguing Syrians discussing alternate routes out of the city; all, in the end, were impossible.

After lugging our bags to the other end of the Old City, our service driver from two days earlier (with whom we had arranged the return to Beirut) met at us at our pre-arranged rendezvous point. Our first stop on our way out of town was a Shi’ite shrine about 10km from the Old City. We drove through desperately poor, arid neighborhoods of two- story mud block houses and unpaved roads, until we arrived at the Sayidda Zeinab mosque and shrine. The area is a suburb of Iraqi Shi’ite refugees and Iranian visitors. Zeinab was the granddaughter of Muhammad, and the daughter of Ali, who Shi’ites revere as the true successor to the Prophet. Ellen Beth and I wrapped ourselves in out coats, scarves and hoods, and proceeded into the women’s entrance. We were able to enter the Mausoleum even though we later noted in our guidebook that non-Muslims are technically not allowed. The throngs of women praying, wailing, and sobbing was overwhelming. Little children were clutched in their mothers’ arms as they swayed in prayer. The throngs pressed to approach, touch, and kiss the gilt grate surrounding the tomb. Perhaps because we were there at noon prayers, it was particularly crowded. I could see people getting crushed if there had been a panic for any reason.

Our next destinations were two ancient Christian villages perched on cliffs along the Anti Lebanon Mountain range. The first was the village and monastery of Seidnayya, about 40km outside of Damascus. Set on top of a sandstone crag, the monastery was built around a 4th century church, which is one of the holiest Christian sites in the Middle East (outside of Jerusalem) because it houses an icon of the Virgin Mary supposedly painted by St. Luke. Following that, we proceeded another 25 km along the same road to Ma’aloula, another Christian village with a very old church built on a pagan holy site in the 4th century AD at the top of a hill above the village. The approach is through a small gorge that looks like that of Petra but in smaller scale. It is called the St. Thecla Gap, because it was here that St. Thecla (a contemporary of St. Paul) supposedly was saved from soldiers pursuing her. God split the cliff with lightening, enabling Thecla to escape her would be killers. The church is entered through a tiny doorway within the Monastery of St. Sarkis. The altar was reused from the original where pagan sacrifices had been conducted. It is now covered by a small oriental carpet, and lovely 300 year old icons are on the walls. The village of Ma’aloula is also one of gthe only locations in Syria where Aramaic is still spoken. As we walked back down the canyon, a local man greeted us and offered to speak some words of Aramaic. It was hard to distinguish from the Arabic, but the man was cheerful so it was a pleasant interaction. Following a hair-raising ride back to the border and the administrative “who hah” of Lebanese border control (more later) we were back in Beirut for the evening prior to our 3am departure. The day had been crammed full of experiences, giving us lots to ponder.