So, we arrived in Syria yesterday morning and luckily they have internet access here at our hostel in Syrias second city of Aleppo. We are only 45kms over the border into Syria from Turkey, but let us tell you its like a whole new world!
(The keyboards in English thank god! Was so worried that it would be in Arabic and that I wouldnt remember where any of the letters are!)
Where do we start?!?! We left our sleepy little village in the Turkish mountains at approx 6pm on Wednesday, we took a bus to a town an hour and half away called Kayseri, we were both for some reason expecting a small town like the one which we had just left, what a shock when we arrived into the cities bus station and it was heaving with thousands and we mean thousands of people, chanting, throwing each other up in the air, whole families there together flying the Turkish flag - it was chaos, and a bit much for both of us! We were absolutly terrified!! We later learned that this is the time when a lot of young Turkish men go into the army for their national service and that is exactly what was happening!!
We left Kayseri and set off on an overnight journey to the Turkish border town of Antakya/Hatay, that was after waiting almost 4 hours in the madhouse that was Kayseri bus station for our connection. We boarded the bus and to be honest we both slept for most of the way, comfortable and feeling much less vunerable than we had at the bus station where we stuck out like sore thumbs!!
We arrived into Antakya late the next morning, as it turned out our bus wasnt direct to Aleppo and so this meant that we had missed our connection! As the bus pulled into Antakya some men clambered on us as soon as we left the bus, they were shouting ALEPPO ALEPPO! So, we just thought that they had waited for us! We gave them our bus ticket which quickly disapeared into the crowds and then they started shouting PASSPORT, PASSPORT...as well as trying to sell us money on the black market!! By this time we clicked that they were dodgy (even though it turned out they wernt!), Matt quite rightly said that we were not handing over our passports and the guy got really funny and shouted that he was only trying to help! Eventually it turned out that he actually only needed our passports to make a passenger list for when we arrived at the border, we reluctantly handed over our passports and kept an eye on them at all times asking many times when we were getting them back!
We got them back on the bus as we left, so it all worked out fine, we arrived at what we gathered was the border, as nobody on our bus spoke English all we could do was assume until we got our passports taken off us and handed back again with a stamp to stamp us out of Turkey. Now the bus drove again through no mans land, until we arrived at the Syrian border post called Bab al Hawa. This time we had to get off the bus and wait, whilst they checked our visas that we already had and were eventually stamped into Syria.
The drama diddnt end there, not 10 minutes after crossing the border we stopped at a skanky little service station, desperate for the loo off we ran, when we came back to the bus the man started unloading our bags and directing us to a 60's comma style campervan, at this point we thought SHITE!! Our bus wasnt direct after all, and we diddnt have any Syrian money with us yet!! We squeezed onto the tiny seats with our rucksacks on our laps as the bus (?!?) drove the 45kms to Aleppo.
As we came into Aleppo it seemed clear that the bus diddnt stop in one particular place, as nobody spoke English we dont speak Arabic and all of the writings are obviously in Arabic we just had to guess as to where we supposed to get off! More people got on and others got off, until eventually we just said to each other right, we had better get off then!!!
So, off we jumped with our bags in tow and luckily the bus driver never asked for any money!!
Here we were, in sweltering heat, in a place where we wasnt understood, with a crappy little map that only had the street names listed in English, yet on the signs they were in Arabic, with no money and nowhere to stay for the night only a list of hostels that we hoped would be available when we found them!! What fun, isnt this what travelling is all about ?!?!!! Hahahahahha!!
We wandered the streets for about 2 hours, the people here really are so helpful, and helped as much as they could, until we bumped into another guy who was a backpacker, can you believe that he was staying in the place we had on the top of our list, he directed us there and said that half an hour ago they still had rooms!!! Luck or what!
When we arrived and saw the sign to the hostel you have no idea the relief that we felt!! Off we trotted up the stairs, and booked a three bed dorm for the two of us, which costs a little more than it should do, but its cheap here anyway so we could splash out!!
We slept for almost all of the afternoon yesterday, we later chilled out on the rooftop with a beer and went out to buy some ciggies....get this 60p for 20 ciggies and not even a pound to sit down and have a beer!! WE LOVE IT!!!
Last night braved it and went out onto the busy streets and found a fantastic restaurant listed in the lonely planet guide, we had a feast! It was a set menu with a choice of meats, we had 9 dishes, bread, drinks, meats dips and then a huge bowl of fruit....just under 7 pound for both of us!! The meal was amazing, and we walked back to hostel later on and slept.
Today we are going to visit the Citadel and look outside the mosques, as its Friday its the Islamic holy day and like at home on sundays when everything used to be closed, thats what its like here, so we are going to visit the few places that are open today and then later maybe go into the Christian quarter where shops and cafes are open.
Our first impressions of Syria are that this really is the middle east proper now, we have to cover up much more and cant walk around in shorts and t shirts, the roads and villages as we drove to the city look just like Iraq does when you watch the BBC, which makes sense as Syria borders it, the people here are really friendly so far, even when you tell them that you are from England!! Its really interesting. Tommorow at some stage we will take a bus further south into the country, maybe Hama or Homs and visit the Crac Des Chevaliers, before making our way over to the desert city of Palmyra and down to Damascus.
Anyway, thats enough, so much to tell you but never can write it quite like it is/was!
Love you all heaps and miss you tons.....much love
Ali and Matt
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