Halab

Yesterday, I set out to visit St. Simeon which isn’t as close to Aleppo as I thought it was. Someone told me it was about an hour away, but I thought it was only 15-20 mins from here. Shows what I’ve learned over the past eight and a half months.

Anyway, not only is it farther away, but there’s no bus that goes there. You have to take a sarvees - something I’ve never done. I didn’t know where to find the sarvees to St. Simeon (and had many problems trying to find out where to go with my lousy American-accented Arabic), so I just went to the garage and hopped on a bus to Tartous.

By this time, it was already 1:30 - not the best time to start a 3-4 hour journey down south, but hey. That’s how I roll. (read: stupidly) Since it was so late, I only spent a couple of hours in Tartous, but I didn’t really care. All I wanted was to see the Mediterranean. Tartous didn’t disappoint and the weather was fantastic. It wasn’t even crowded (except on the buses), so that was swell too.

Last night, some of us went here. It was my first time. Unsurprisingly, everyone else had been here at least several times. I’d been inside before, to see the decorating - I was shown by the guy who decorated the stage area and where we sat last night. I was told that the food was average, but I didn’t have any complaints. I don’t know how anyone could screw up kibbe sharjia and kabab halabi, though. At least not here. In the States, sure.

They had entertainment last night. Sadly, not the Darweesh (which I’ve been told only gig during Ramadan - sadly, I was told that afterwards). Last night, it was just some guy singing with his backup band of one. We didn’t stay too long because someone fell ill, but it was still enjoyable. Considering that that may well have been my last restaurant experience in Aleppo (I don’t count Arabica or al-Attar), it was happiness.

So, I’m outta here in a few days and wondering whether or not I should keep this blog in the off chance I might actually post something else after I leave, or if I should put it out of its misery and do a Dr. Kevorkian.

I can’t imagine I’ll be too interested in keeping this going if I’m shifting my focus back to Russia or living back in Balad al-Kafeer. But I pride myself on being unpredictable, so who knows what will happen.

At the very least, I’d like to have another post or two discussing other observations about life here as an infidel. Not that I felt particularly infidelish these last nine months, but you know….

OK. Finally got around to getting a new pic. This time I even used a flash so that you can see it better.

I saw this the other night in Furqan on my way home. It’s near the mosque, which needs to be photographed as well, but I feel self-conscious. If I can get a better pic, I’ll replace this one which is “eh”.

I think I speak for all of us here in the Middle East when I say how excited I am that MBC Action is going to be showing the Indiana Jones trilogy, but enough with the damn commercials already!