Discovering Syria

Syria’s truths—its authoritarian repression, its poverty and unemployment—belie its very freedoms, its refusal to succumb to clichés about the Arab world. Far from stereotypes of a nation suffering under the joint purdah of Islamic fundamentalism and Ba’athist socialism, I was overcome with Syria’s joie de vivre, its gregarious, frank generosity. And in defying clichés of an unforgiving ‘terrorist state’, Syria leaves us grasping for them.

Damascus, arguably the world’s oldest continuously inhabited city, is a series of confrontations with history. Its earth is a cacophony of a thousand crossed paths: the Phoenicians, Greeks, Persians, Ummayads, Mamlouks. Their footprints have taken earthly form in the cobblestones, and their cities are laid over and among each other till we see in the faces of the Syrians themselves the shifting handsomeness of much blood-mixing and -letting. Yet, history here is less a frenzy than a stillness, a bien dans sa peau, or comfort in the skin.

The country both suffers and triumphs under a government that has little respect for the past, and yet by virtue of its retrograde policies keeps out both McDonalds and the tourists that seek to escape it. The regime promises timely buses, smooth roads, excellent inter-city transportation, and bans headscarves in schools. Despite all the efforts to instill a culture of fear, Syrians are almost defiantly unaggressive. The placidity of the streets might be as much a result of the regime as despite it and while tourism is seen as beneficial, there are few of the vulgarities of an advanced tourist infrastructure. None of the badgering rudeness or inability to trust.

It is said that the Prophet Mohammad arrived at the gates of Damascus and refused to enter, knowing one may experience heaven but once. And Bilad-il-Cham, the ancient Syrian land that extended across the Levant was hoarse with the shouts of a thousand riches. The fertility of the region gave Damascus its name, from dar meshq for ‘well-watered place’. In the Umayyad Mosque the gold tesserae show a magical garden oasis covered with rivers and fountains. Though the Barada, once a ‘river of gold’, is now a meagre sewer, the desert still bears fruit: delicately fragrant Saturn peaches, lime-skinned figs yielding a gorgeous ruby centre, pomegranates, grapes, green olives like smooth stones.

I was in Damascus as the guest of a childhood friend, and I spent my days there basking in the glow of a disarming warmth. Acknowledged as a great city since the 2nd century, when Hadrian gave it the status of Metropolis, it is a place of bustling markets, of picnics on traffic circles and long feasts followed by spontaneous dancing. The cafés are full of lollers, sipping qahwah and shai or arak, smoking nargila and eating mezze, while grandmothers listen to Mohammad Rafi and fan themselves as 50Cent blares nearby. After the lurching heat and pollution of Damascus days, the ancient Cadillacs paddle through the night streets swarming with families. Jasmine weakened the diesel fumes just as the young girls in veils or halter tops weakened the vigilance of the muhabbarat (secret service).

Despite its very corporeal pleasures, Damascus is held to be the holiest place in Islam after Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem. It boasts a number of important shrines and tombs including that of Saladin, the Scourge of Christendom, and a number of relic-heads: that of St John the Baptist, and Hussein, son of Ali, whose death in Karbala set in motion the great schism between Shiites and Sunnis.

Near the Eastern Gate (Bab Sharqi), one of the seven gates of the walled Old City, is the underground Church of St Ananias, the Damascene who cured St Paul of his blindness. After Paul’s miraculous conversion on the road to the city, Damascus became the first true home of Christianity. Muslims and Christians have existed in harmony for the past 1,500 years and the faiths themselves were influenced by the city’s cosmopolitanism. It is a small, ancient church with a subterranean humidity, moist with the aspirations of worshippers and aged plaster.

The Umayyad Mosque, Damascus’ most glittering site, is the first great mosque of the new religion Islam, a model for other mosques throughout the Islamic world. But it is also a hybrid; conquered and reimagined as a pagan temple to Hadad, a Roman temple to Jupiter, and as a mosque but one that borrowed heavily from Byzantine, Roman and Persian decorative vocabularies. Most evenings its sombre courtyard is more like a park, thronged with pilgrims and chatting Damascenes.

The Souk al Hammidiyeh is the archetypal Oriental bazaar. Streets devoted to trousseau shopping with meringue-puff wedding dresses, or mother-of-pearl inlaid boxes; copperware and tools or damask tablecloths. There are shops selling medicaments, animal bones, slabs of bay leaf soap. Souk Buzuriye is dedicated to spices, perfumes and sweets. Coffee sellers and tea merchants are located exactly where they have been for generations, cheek by jowl with carpet weavers and hummus makers and sellers of dried flowers. You see Bedouins straight out of the desert, and creamy skinned young wives with heavily kohled eyes. All on streets that date from Roman times, as you trip over that tumbled column from a shrine to Baal or walk under this arch from Jupiter’s temple. The vaulted arcades of the Ottomans house the evening flâneurs as they feast on pounded milk ice-cream, or drink toot, a mulberry juice sold by men in full sherwal and fez. One of our Syrian companions, after a brief whisper with an ice-cream malleteer, licked the ice-cream he proffered right off his finger, in the kind of thrilling old world flirtation I had witnessed across the city.

Within this live the families of the Old City, some modest; others built their palaces with all the favours and fervour of Islamic fantasy: jasmine trellises, fountains decorated with mosaics, large courtyards. We wandered by after closing time and were let in by a friendly gateman who invited us to tea.

There are old khans (trading emporia) and caravanserai with huge vaulted domes crumbling under the sky, seemingly still rustling with the intrigue of camels and becloaked, bedaggered traders heaving with the dust and mist of the road. Like the Sufi who is most present when he is absent, the empty buildings seem to breathe the air of a hundred different eras. Many of these places are not tourist spots, but an eye full of wonder can charm a caretaker into pulling open the ancient tiered wooden gates. Nearby the Oriental hammams sold cleanliness, gossip and more, and attracted romantics from Lord Byron to Delacroix to their mysterious, steamy, interiors.

The old Salhiyyeh quarter, located on the slopes of Mt Qasyun, is filled with mosques, madrassas and mausoleums in the midst of street markets. The Hanbila Mosque was built for the refugees forced out of Jerusalem by the Crusaders. Sheltering refugees has long been a Syrian legacy and today thousands of Palestinians call it home. I made a pilgrimage on behalf of a friend to the underground tomb of the Sufi mystic Ibn Arabi, where we sat amongst rocking, whispering women as they prayed. Outside, there are narrow streets with flowered, shuttered balconies so close you can intertwine fingers with a neighbour. Unfortunately the mud brick walls and façades of carved wood are being slowly picked apart to make way for the highrise apartments that will house the city’s exploding population.

Many homes have an oddly nautical flavour—swooping corners and porthole windows that seem to promise a quick sail into the desert. And the holy trinity (Hafez Al Assad and his sons: the lizardly Bashar and the hirsute Basil), gaze down from every building, the omnipresent captain and first mates.

Across the mountains are journeys to the towns of Sednayya and Maaloula, ancient grotto churches and cracks in the earth that formed to make way for Jesus, peopled by villagers who still speak Aramaic. Further still in the plains of Nabek, carved into the ridges and facing an expanse of terrifying rock desert, is the nearmythic Deir Mar Mousa, a medieval monastery, now a utopic ecumenical community. South, amongst the magnificent ruins of Palmyra, I met a man whose grandfather had travelled to Syria from India; he pointed to his swarthy aspect to underline the truth that he was the only tour guide for me, and then to me, saying, “eyes like a Palmyrene”.

A ride up the side of Mt Qasyun is popular with evening lovers and recommended at sunset. This is where Cain slew Abel, and on the way up you will pass the fortress-residence of the Assad clan. There are many cafés tucked into the mountain-side, and from that vantage you see Damascus for what it is: a glittering thousand-light mirage in the middle of a mountainous desert, the diamond in the rough that both attracted and frightened the Prophet Mohammad. Weaker than he, I couldn’t turn away.

The information

Getting around: Taxis are plentiful and affordable; day rates can be negotiated with the driver or through your hotel. But Damascus is perfectly manageable on foot and you need no transport in the Old City. Microbuses are also available but not recommended to those who don’t speak Arabic. You can also take one of the luxurious French bus-coaches to other cities, including Palmyra (but not Bosra).

Where to stay: Five-star luxury can be had at the Sheraton(www.starwoodhotels.com) or at Le Meridien (www.lemeridien.com). A good midbudget hotel is Semiramis (www.semiramis-hotel.com). Budget hotels include Al Haramein (231- 9489), an Ottoman-period house close to the Old City, and Hotel Sultan (222- 5768).The Omayad Hotel (221-7700) offers great service and a rooftop terrace. It’s also possible to rent rooms in the Old City.

Where & what to eat: Food in Syria is arguably the best in the Middle East and feasting becomes customary. Restaurants in the Old City, including Old Town, near Bab Sharqi, serve traditional fare in lovely old courtyards. At Elissar and Abo Alez restaurants one can dine in a beautifully tiled Arab house. El Bal Café, Ash Shams and Nowfara near Bab Touma are famous coffee houses. Qahwah (Arabic coffee) is thick and grainy, and very strong, rarely taken with milk. Frequent the eateries near Martyr’s Square for amazing sweets. Eat everything: falafel, shawarmas, ice cream (at Bekdach in Souk al Hammidiyeh, but many places make it fresh), strawberry shakes, muhammara (a walnut hummus-like dip), kibbeh nayyeh (raw mince lamb), pistachios (fresh and dried), kenafeh (cheese sweets covered in a crispy bird’s nest-like topping), baklava, ma’amoul (buttery pastry filled with dates), shenglish (lebneh or yogurt cheese rolled in spices and eaten with arak). And the summer fruit: figs, peaches, plums, pomegranates…

What to see & do:

—The Umayyad Mosque (with the nearby shrine to Ali, the Sayyida Ruqqaya, and the shrine to Paul the Baptist), Church of St Ananias, Azem Palace in the Souk al Hammidiyeh. Go to a café on Mt Qasyun at sunset.

—National Museum, one of the most extensive in the Middle East, holds many of the nation’s relics, dating back 10,000 years. There is an entire synagogue from Doura Europos rebuilt brick by brick, the hypogeum from Palmyra, and hundreds of sculptures including the famed Tell Asmar figurines.

—Takiyya as-Suleimaniyya, a complex of mosque and madrasas created by Sinan, the great Ottoman architects. The street starting from the St Ananias Church is the famed biblical one called Straight Street. These days it is called Methet Pasha. Nearby is the Arabic-style house, Maktab Anbar.

—Shrine of Ibn Arabi at Sheikh Muhediin in the old quarter, Salhiyyeh. Al-Nouri Hammam, a 12th-century public bath. Nearby is Khan Asaad Pasha. The Silver Souk, near the somewhat absurd Military Museum, is a single street and the place to go for silver objets d’art. Old houses such as Beit Nizam and Beit as-Siba’i.

What to buy: Damask tablecloths and dresses, robes, carpets and camel-wool cushion covers, mother of pearl inlaid backgammon boards. Also mirrors and tables, brass and silver beaten products, antiques, Aleppan silver, leather shoes, nargileh, fezzes and shirwals, boxes of sweets, incised ‘damascened’ metalware, antique Damascus swords.