It wasn’t the call to prayer that pulled me from my Sominex induced slumber this morning but the clang, clanging of a bell. The bell sounded right outside my door and ancient and I had no idea where I was. The bell stopped and I remembered I was in the al-Jasmine hotel in Bab Touma. A beautifully restored Damascene house, the al-Jasmine is posh without being pretentious and the guy at the front desk remembered me from my stay last August.
Standing in the crisp morning air, blue dome Syrian sky above me, the air is full of the playful sounds of children. Which explains the bell – the call to school. Bab Touma is the Christian quarter of the old city. Squat churches sit about every other corner; shrines, soot black smeared from votive candles are wedged here and there, with doleful Madonnas staring heavenward behind thin wire mesh.
After breakfast – crepe with banana and strawberry jam, chocolate croissant, bread, yogurt, hummus and Nescafe – I wandered about. Today is my day to get my footing before getting to work so I wanted to wander around a bit. After walking through the old city, around the Umayyad Mosque and back to Bab Touma to see if the illusive Firas had woken up – he had not – I walked up a random street away from the old city into the city proper. This part of Damascus reminds me of the shopping strips in the outer boroughs of New York – a swirling blend of commercial energy put to the endless task of selling ticky-tack stuff like designer clothes and perfume.
Everyone is very intent; focused on the task at hand. The sidewalks overflow into the streets. The short sharp blast of the car horn keeps everything flowing along. There are no Walk-Don’t Walk signs at the intersections – you just nudge out into traffic and make your way across. It works.
Heading back to BabTouma, I passed a crowd waiting in line at a bright green truck with a huge Nestle Milo logo emblazoned on the side. I saw they were handing out free samples so I joined the queue. The Milo was delicious – steaming hot and sweet. Welcome to Damascus.
1 response so far ↓
Ben Saltzman // January 9, 2008 at 9:26 am
God, what a breakfast! Then to enter the city, buzzing with life, jolted from Nescafe – I remember what that feels like, and it feels really good. I’m glad you found a place to stay!