(Click here to read previous Letters From Damascus.)
Monday 24 July
Last night while waiting for a friend in the shadow of the Ummayad
Mosque, we ended up getting pulled into a conversation with a young
man selling rugs and Damascene souvenirs to tourists. “You’re not
rednecks, are you?” he asks. “There are a lot of rednecks around
here.” As it turns out, he knows a couple of the girls from Ohio State
that came here last summer. It’s a small world.
Unfortunately the rumors of anti-Americanism that we’ve been hearing
bear some truth. We’re seeing more Hezbollah flags and pictures of
Nasrallah everyday, and I’d swear that we’re getting more glares as
the crisis in Lebanon continues. A couple of my fellow students got
into it with a vendor in the souq yesterday. “Fuck you Americans,” he
told them. At the same time, we’re seeing more westerners in Damascus
than ever due to the situation in Lebanon. Many of those who left
Beirut have ended up here, ironically, making it increasingly
difficult to keep a low profile. On that note, my host family rented
my room out today. My replacement — a student from Seattle who was
studying in Beirut — moves in on Friday.
I spent the day waiting around for DHL to deliver our paper tickets
for the flight from Damascus to Cairo. Later, we found out that
they’re still in Ohio and we should expect them to arrive no later
than Wednesday, the day before we fly out. We’ve also heard that
EgyptAir is trying to cancel our tickets out of Damascus. They’ve
oversold the flights and are looking for seats to cancel. Getting out
early has been a giant hassle, I can’t imagine what it would be like
if something actually went wrong.
Arthur Magazine 