Never been to the Middle-East before? Well, if you think there’s nothing but war and suicide terrorists, try this – a brief overview of what we saw and experienced in Syria and Jordan.
Our journey to the land of hospitable people began in Estonia the 1st of September 2007 and lasted for twenty-five days, during which we rode more than 12 000 kilometers, experienced true heat and cold, and gathered some precious memories. Some of the more exciting are contained in the thematic chapters below. However, we strongly suggest you get there yourself!
People
It is not too difficult to see who is the most important person for the Syrian people, because wherever you go, be it a border check-point, a gas station, a road-side kiosk or a square in the city centre, you will find there a photo of their president. One can even see his holographic image attached to the cars‘ rear windshields. When entering the country, we spoke to the border officials, and learned that the people love their president very much since he is a very intelligent and well-educated man who had obtained both his education and his wife in the UK.
Although, compared to Iran for example, both Syria and Jordan are very liberal (the women do not have to hide themselves under headscarves and baggy clothes, it is OK to have covered one’s shoulders and knees; the local female singers present themselves on their album covers the way that could easily qualify as eroticism in our cultural space), and very open to the Western influence (we had never seen so many fake Armani, Gucci and Dolce&Gabbana clothes before as in Syria), little is known about the outer world, and thus any tourist appearing on the street induces a great deal of excitement, especially if he/she has arrived on a huge motorcycle (the superiority of our bike over the local hardware found proof several times
when the locals wanted to exchange their Chinese for our German, which, of course, never happened since they were not willing to give us ten of their Chinese for exchange ;)).
Every time we stopped, a crowd gathered around us – those that were more modest did not even dear to look at us, while the more courageous made their way through the crowd to shake hands with us and to say hello, the empty looking canteens were packed with customers soon after we had sat down – it is easy to imagine yourself being a superstar. Very often a stranger is asked to have a cup of tea with the locals – it is just that the Western tourists are such a rare thing there that the local people enjoy just the staring at you. The knowledge of the English language is very poor though – of course there is a small number of those who understand and speak it well (the Bedouins for example, for whom tourism has become an increasingly important source of income), the majority’s vocabulary is, however, limited to such expressions as „Welcome Syria“, „Hello mister“ and „No problem“ – which, of course, does not mean that there really is no problem – the people only wish you to feel comfortable, but they simply lack understanding of what you are speaking of.
Way of life
Although the Turkish traffic culture gave us a good glimpse of what was yet to come, we soon realized that we had not been fully prepared – riding the bike gave us a true feeling of Russian roulette. The road from the Turkish/Syrian border check-point to the so-called capital of the Islamic culture, Aleppo, is sure to scare the hell out of everyone who has a relatively weak nervous system. We tried it at night, so... imagine a road of bad quality accommodating every kind of vehicles you can think of, starting with multi-color neon-lighted trucks, ending with mopeds with no lights at all, and add some suicidal pedestrians.
Turn signals must be a whole strange world to them, since no one really uses them, and so the traffic did seem a bit chaotic to us. Our adrenaline levels dropped significantly by day, although it was still quite difficult to get used to the fact that the traffic police does not give a damn about cars driving in whatever direction they wish on one-way streets, or to see someone drive on the motorway in the opposite direction, because it was the case every single day! As said before, the police do not react to the crazy traffic in any way – it is a rare thing to hear a policeman blow his whistle, but we hardly believe that it has any effect. One thing we loved about the police was that their transponders made this cool Star Wars‘ sound ;)
„Ramadan!” Although our digestive systems had, by the time of arrival to Syria and Jordan, already adapted to the travel-related chaotic input, we were still quite surprised to see that almost all canteens and restaurants (except for some tourist-oriented ones) were closed in daytime indeed as the Muslims’ fasting period began. During Ramadan, no Muslim is allowed to eat or drink something, not even to swallow a thing in daytime, but as soon as the sun sets and Allah does not see anything (since it is too dark), the party begins! The restaurants open their doors and the hungry crowd occupies every single table. The waiters are so busy that we hardly pronounce our wish as the food, figuratively speaking, flies onto our table.
So what do the locals eat? Kebab seems to be the most popular food, as you can find it everywhere. Of course, every restaurant serves the kebab, that is made of lamb, beef or chicken, its own way. You will always have some bread with your kebab, and very often it is accompanied by a generous stack of fresh salad. The French fries and olives are also popular, but a really good finding for us was hoummous, a chick-pea and sesame seed paste sprinkled with olive oil included in mezze, the local standard set of starters. The food was simply gorgeous, and although we had to starve (read: fast) during the day, the portions were really generous..
The stomachs stuffed up with the spicy kebab, we felt the need for something sweet. Thus we were really pleased when in the city of Homs, after having exited a road-side canteen, the waiter came out running with some funny local sweet tucked on a plastic fork. We never realized what it was, but it was sure to consist of semolina, rose water and pistachios. One could not imagine a local dessert with no pistachios, because they are present in almost every pastry, ice cream and marmalade candy. Should you arrive in Syria in time of harvest, you will see locals selling fresh pistachios along major roads – you will recognize them by their pink shell.
Talking about the drinks, everybody knows that it is forbidden to consume alcohol, but you can buy cola, tea and coffee everywhere. Both tea and coffee (Turkish coffee, with cardamom) are served in small glasses. The tea is most often very sweet and sometimes has been added some mint, so that its taste reminds a bit of cough candies. The most interesting experience for us was, however, to drink tea under the stars by the fire with the Bedouins – it even had a smoky smell!
Ruins
Since Syria and Jordan once were part of the Roman Empire, many ruins of this era can be found in both of these countries. Ones of the best known are those at Bosra (Syria) and Jerash (Jordan). Both played an important role in the Nabatean kingdom, until it was invaded by the Romans in 106. This, however, only contributed to the wealth to those cities, and allowed to construct such buildings that look amazing even nowadays. Bosra is well known for its amphitheatre that is considered to be one of the best preserved Roman theatres in the World. Jerash, for its part, is famous for the magnificent triumphal arch erected in the honor of Emperor Hadrian’s visit, but also for the oval-shaped forum and the cardo maximus (the colonnaded main street, originally consisting of some five hundred columns). There are, however, many other places where you can find well-preserved buildings dating from that era. For example, we visited Qanawat (near Bosra), that once enjoyed its status as a Roman city of commerce.
Both Syrian and Jordan’s governments have imposed relatively high entrance fees for the local sights (and, of course, the foreign tourists pay a lot more than locals). The sight that cost us the most (21 JOD per person per day) was Petra (meaning „stone” in Greek), the capital city of the ancient kingdom of Nabatea. The city was first discovered by archaeologists in the 19th century (until that, this naturally well-isolated city was inhabitated by Bedouins who kept its existence in secret), and became famous for its buildings (the Treasury, the Monastery and the tombs) carved out of rose-red sandstone. However, even there you can see remains of the Roman amphitheatre. Some say that only 5% of the ancient city has been excavated to this day, but this only seems to excite the crowds of tourists who arrive there from all over the World. In fact, for us they only ruined the potentially amazing experience of Petra.
One more interesting site is Palmyra. It is an oasis in the middle of the Syrian desert, which means that once it had a great strategic value – the commerce from the East to the West assured great benefits and allowed to erect magnificent buildings. When the city became one of the Roman colonies, the wealth even increased. The city itself holds a special place in the era’s history because of its ambitious queen Zenobia who once had decided to get rid of the Roman domination and who, in order to do that, even got her hands on Egypt before she was stopped by Emperor Aurelian, the fact that was followed by the degradation of Palmyra.
In conclusion, we found that different ruins dating back to the Roman age each and every one had a similar look, the main difference lying in their level of preservation. In addition to the columns and temples, many castles and citadels are worth a look both in Syria and Jordan.
Nature
Syria and Jordan are Middle-East countries, which means that their nature is very different from that of our own. Here and there you can find some fragrant pine groves. In general, however, the local plant life is, due to the harsh weather and soil conditions, quite dull – most of the countries’ surface is covered with different deserts. It really rains only in winter, when you can even see desert in blossom. Otherwise it is dry and hot – even in September the normal daytime temperatures stayed around 35 degrees Celsius. Few are the plants that survive to these conditions – in the gravel desert between Aleppo and Palmyra we only found some peaky cacti (the diameter of which did most often not even exceed 1 centimeter). In some waterside areas and oases even olives and dates are being grown, that make up an essential part of the area’s food culture.
One of our most unforgettable experiences was our trip on a 4WD to the Wadi Rum desert in Jordan that is known for its strange looking sand stone formations. It is right there that Jordan’s highest peak, Umm Adaami (1830 m), is situated, right at the border with Saudi Arabia. We even tried to get to the top of it, but due to the intense heat, we returned after having got to some 75% of its height. After an exciting day in the desert we were delighted to arrive, just before the sunset, to the Bedouins‘ camp and to savor the juicy chicken stew with rice. Since it was no longer the season of snakes and scorpions we decided to sleep under the stars – never before had we seen a sky so full of stars!!! In the early morning, the silence and the stone formations around us, painted in pre-sunrise colors, made an impression of a true illusion. In its whole extremity and loneliness, Wadi Rum stayed in our memories – a place we would like to return to someday...
A less enchanting, but still an interesting experience was delivered to us by the Dead Sea – the deeper we descended into the valley, the bigger the seemingly small „piece of blue“ became. It really looked like a normal lake, but very soon we realized that the talk (and the photos of course) about people just lying on the water are really true – the deeper you get into the water, the more difficult it gets to hold your feet on the ground – the water just pushes them up as if they were filled with air. It is also impossible to swim lying on your stomach – your feet just rise high up in the air. The water is salty as hell, so try not to be too restless – it really hurts when it gets into your eye!
If you should still desire to have a real swim, you should head to the southernmost city – Aqaba. It does consider itself as a resort, but lacks a bit the atmosphere, although it suits well for snorkeling.
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