Martini Aleppo

... privacy' is in short supply here. I bet they can even hear me taking a **** with my diarhoea. I have my own toilet, its pretty small but functional. The shower curtains are disgusting though as at the bottom there are black stains. I couldnt bare to even look at them, afraid to notice what they actually are. But for 9USD per night, I knew I couldnt expect more.<br><br>It was still pretty early when i checked in and after some rest, I decided to go to the local museum. It was ...

... beckons us in the distance. We decide<br>to make our way to the citadel through the souk. The Souk of Aleppo<br>is dates from the 16th century and has remained unchanged<br>since then. It is celebrated as the most medieval of all Souks in the<br>Middle East. It covers 12 hectares, and the longest section is 12km.<br>It employs 35,000 people, and is still the place where Aleppans come<br>to shop for anything and everything. Thus it the traditional<br>structure of ...

... the 11th and 12th century AD. Although this is considered to be the finest Arab Castle I was not as impressed as I was with Karak Castle. Restoration is continuing at a good pace hampered by continual important finds of earlier castles, true layers upon layers. Karak was ...

... I decide to go straight to Aleppo (Syria) from Aqaba (Jordan). I take the first bus at 6AM and it is not until 1AM from the following day that I don't get to my final destination. I am extremely tired and in the need to sleep in horizontal position, after desperately trying any horizontal / vertical combination on the bus sit. At the bus station we (me and Helene, a french girl I have shared the ride with) argue with the taxi drivers that are trying to rip us off ...

... which commerates St Simeon Stylites, one of Syria's most eccentric Christian. In AD423 Simeon climbed onto a 3 metre pillar and spent the next 36 years on top of it (or moving to a higher pillar). After his death a Church was built around the pillar and it became a pilgram site. The area offers great views of the surrounding villages. Heading back into Aleppo the rest of the group headed off to visit the citadel but as I was ...

... American dollar. I rummaged through my backpack and managed to find 2 Euros. I handed it to the tourist office guy and he managed to buy some Syrian money with it then he paid the cashier and I received a slip. Next I had to wait at yet another window in a huge cluster of people to get my passport stamped. There was no line-up at the stamp window, just a bunch of people from the bus companies pushing to get their handfuls of Russian and Turkish passports stamped ...

... grosse somme dans une ruelle du souq, me faisant arnaquer de manière assez étrange (c'était évident mais, curieusement, je ne parvenais à trouver la force nécessaire à l'habituelle négociation). Ce lundi matin, donc, ayant un peu de temps avant de rejoindre le train, je partai tôt en direction du souq, retrouver le type avec qui la transaction s'était faite. A 8h30 ...

... but seemed to be having trouble with the front door of the bus. We pulled over while the three bus employees looked and talked and looked and talked. Rolling again for about 10 minutes until we pull off the main street and stop. The bus manager is having a loud discussion with some greasy guy. Eventually the greasy guy comes out with a welder and begins going to town on the bus door. Weld - grind - weld - grind - weld - grind - polish - and we're on our way again. We ...