The Mosque

The Ommayad Mosque seems to be full of Iranians on pilgrimage at the moment. The picture above, of a young boy watching a group of pilgrims in the main chamber of the Mosque, was taken a week or so ago but since then then the flow has been pretty heavy. As I understand it the building itself has a particular Shia'a significance, having been built by the under the Shia'a Ommayad Caliphate under Al-Walid II.

With the arrival of the Iranians has come the beginning of spring. Damascus now feels Middle Eastern again. The warm lick of the sun has returned the blue canopy of the sky to its rightful context. The melting snows in the mountains are feeding the river, now a veritable flow, and the fields are lush with green. The end of my time in Damascus will be in the prime of the year, before the oppressive heat of the summer drives people back inside, and rearranges their working hours to accomodate the scorch of the midday sun. The once cold houses of the Old City have found new purpose and the tired and hungry looking horses that drag diesel for the stoves to heat its walls will be relishing a long-earned rest.

My housemate's, Matt's, girlfriend was out this week. She asked me if I had enjoyed my year. A pause. Or was my opinion skewed by the cold. Most probable. I am certainly glad to be ending my year in the sun. Its just a shame I can't take my shirt off.

Damascus Revisited

After a quiet few weeks, a visa run and a smackeral of work, it seems like we have hit the final straight. With approximately six weeks of university left and May approaching very rapidly it feels rather like we are being slowly rehabilitated into English society. A steady trickle of visitors, girlfriends and friends bringing with them Sunday newspapers, sausages and Pimms and taking home in their place jumpers, books and our paltry collection of Syrian artefacts are slowly reintegrating us with the West.

The pressure is now on with brushing up on Arabic, visiting and taking photos of all the things that we have put off for seven months. Guy is even planning to take a week off university in order to complete his tour of Syria and suddenly, having bemoaned aspects of life here as boring, there is so much for us left to do. That seems to be the way with Arabic though. Everytime you find yourself improving something makes it harder. One friend of mine likened it to learning a train timetable. Difficulty, 'nerdy' but not without its ultimate satisfaction, when you leave the classroom you discover it has little relevance to the reality of the situation.

Plenty of photographs to follow as I catch up on the things I wasn't doing while I was learning my train times.