The Road to Damascus

Today is my first free time in a long time, so I hunted down an internet cafe in Damascus and now I can finally give an update.

Travel component has been amazing. AMAZING.

It's crazy to think that I am seeing all of these things. Sometimes I get tired and forget to be enthusiastic, but then I remember doing cool things like exploring Crusader castles and seeing the oldest inhabited city in the world (yeah Damascus).

Turke was beautiful. Istanbul was much cooler than Egypt and in the middle of a wonderful autumn. It was so nice to explore the city. Our hotel was near the Hagia Sophia, so the sights were beautiful. I learned so much about the history and political and religious situation in Turkey from our speakers as well. I gained quite an appreciation for Ataturk.

We visited an underground city near Cappadocia where early Christians lived for refuge from persecution. And we explored the aforementioned castle in Syria (passing the Danger: no crossing signs only once), and visited the only town in the world that still speaks Aramaic. And last night we vistited the hamem, or Turkish bath.

Syria is so different from Turkey. Although Turkey is devotedly secular, 99.9% of the people are still Muslim. In Syria, about 10% of the population is Christian. These Christians are treated much better than the Copts are in Egypt too. We've really only met with Greek Orthodox fathers for speakers, though, so I'm excited to visit the embassy tomorrow morning to engage the politics going on here.

We went out for ice cream last night, and the guy who owned the place gave us all free cones because he was happy that we were studying arabic. And that made me happy enough to include here.

Our bus crashed in Turkey a couple of days ago; the whole windshield was shattered and the front part was smashed in. Fortunately, no one was hurt (but we're all a little skittish when we hear horns or feel brakes now). It's definitely a blessing to stay safe on all of these roads and it's a reminder that traffic is always more of a danger here than bombs.

Tomorrow we leave for Jordan, then a couple of weeks in Israel/Palestine. And all of this is going way too quickly. Hopefully I can keep absorbing everything at the rate we encounter it!