My first impressions of Syria were twofold: They must love Bashar here(he's the president), and Crossing the street is a deathtrap.
Near my hotel there was a large boulevard park with a statue of Bashar, and one of his father, as well as numerous massive banners down the sides of some buildings with his face on it. His face was on everything, I really wanted to get a "I love Bashar" T-shirts, but low on cash and low on space in my bag I had to resist the temptation. He may not be as bad as Stalin or Saddam for personality cult, but the people genuinely like him. Many of them "adore him", a local in Homs attested, "but it's the people around him who are corrupt and we hate them".
There was an "intersection" near my hotel that I had to cross. First of all it varied between 5 and 10 lanes depending on how impatient drivers were at the time. A map of said intersection can be found here, with the highlighted location being my hotel. I ended up crossing it upwards of 20 times, and by about the fifth time I decided enough was enough and I was just going to pick a local crossing farther up the traffic from me and follow him. Crossing was stressful, having to stop halfway and have to wait in between lanes was worse.
Aleppo is a very old city, is among the oldest in human history, dating back to before we started recording the passing of time. Cities have been built upon cities, it has seen civilizations come and go, withstood sieges, and been conquered. Basically it's seen it all, the current "Old City" dates back to the early-ottoman era. It's not just an Old city on display like many places. The Old city is still lived in, some buildings have their foundations over a thousand years ago, and they are still being lived in. I popped into a couple courtyards to take a peek and they look as if they were taken out of the Crusades, it was pretty cool.
Aleppo also has things called Souqs, basically a market, where everything is traded, you name it someone there either buys it or sells it. Aleppo's Souq was my favorite of all the Middle East, it was massive, authentic, not like a tourist trap like Istanbul's Grand Bazaar. It was a place where everybody did their shopping, did business, it is a part of everyday life.
I entered the main Souq at the butchers area, it gave a whole new meaning to Meat market. And then I got hit in the back of the head by what I suspect was formerly the Leg of a Lamb, delicious to eat, not so delicious to get hit in the head with.
The rest of the Souq was impressively sprawling, branching off in tons of different ways, I feel the best way of taking on Souqs, Bazaars, Markets and other such things is to simply get lost, thus far it has never failed me, in Istanbul's Grand Bazaar I found the Mannequin district and got offered Hash. In Aleppo I found a Medresa with class in session in the courtyard, a Taxi losing it's side mirror trying to get through an arch that was just about big enough, I got held up having to follow a donkey down an narrow alleyway, and I found the Grand Mosque.
The Grand Mosque is almost 1000 years old, and is magnificent, beautiful and thoroughly earning the title "Grand". The courtyard had children running around, playing games, old men sitting in a corned debating the Koran, women scolding children, and pilgrims washing before prayer. I decided to check out the prayer room and stay and watch the 2:24 prayer. It was unlike anything I have seen before(except maybe every other prayer system I have seen, but different), the call for prayer rang out, the study group in the corner packed up, Korans were shelved, and people began to file into the room and line up. They did their prayers and then went on their day.
I had a bit of a conversation with a man who wanted to know where I was from about prayer and how it's a relaxing break to the day. 5 times a day these people took time out of their day for something other than themselves, taking time to reflect, think, and maintain discipline. And almost everyone in the city did it, the streets were noticeably less crowded at prayer time.
After the Mosque I ventured towards the Citadel, but before I could get there a woman stopped me and asked me if I spoke French, I replied in the affirmative, and she called her son over because she wanted him to practice his French, the second time someone asked for a language other than English, second time it was French.
I then got to the Citadel, at this point I stopped caring exactly how old everything was, I did however take note that the mound the Citadel stands upon was man made and was thousands of years old, which was pretty cool.
Because of no sun and the pollution of a city of 5 million the view's weren't all that great but it gave a good view of the Old City from above.
It had a great Amphitheater which incidentally has great acoustics, I could hear almost everything the people on the stage were saying, it was pretty cool.
Another fun thing was that there was only one place that had railing, about 10 metres of it. other than that you could basically wander and climb wherever you wanted on it, right up to the edge, at one point I saw a group of boys climbing trying to climb up the side of it.
At that point security then came by and told me the place was closing, so off I went. I didn't go far, the plaza in front of the Citadel in fact to sit drink tea and write some post cards home while the sun set.
The day was almost over, just enough time to go eat some food, and head to the Baron Hotel for a quick drink, where TE Lawrence(Lawrence of Arabia) stayed while he was in town. Dinner consisted of donair wrap, 50cents, from a stall on the street, more than enough to fill me up.
At the Baron Hotel I got there, and a guy sitting in the corner calls me over, turns out this is the local haunt of the owner of my hotel. So he invited me over, we drank overpriced beer($2.75 for a half litre, highway robbery!) and swapped stories he gave me some places to see in Damascus, Palmyra and Latakia. In the end he had no money, I paid his tab and he cleared my hotel bill, which gave me a nice discount on my stay.
That night I called home for the first time from the hotel, and my mother the person who had been beckoning me to call home since I left wasn't even home.
All in all I really enjoyed Aleppo it was a bit chilly, but manageable, it rained a bit. The Souqs remain a highlight, as does the Grand Mosque. It is a place I defiantly need to get back to, and a place I highly recommend, sooner rather than later.
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