Old Damascus

Today we went on a tour of Old Damascus. We saw some huge old Syrian houses, which were very beautiful. We also went to Al Umayyad Mosque, which was absolutely amazing. Later we explored the market some more and then got shawerma for dinner. Syrian shawerma was wayyyyy better than the kind I had in Cairo.

A Street in Old Damascus 1. roofs: a lot of the buildings I’ve been in Syria have these retractable canvas roofs that provide shade during the day and ventilation at night. I think they’re a really nice alternative to having the AC on all the time. Plus they let in some light and you can see the sky (which isn’t extremely polluted like it was in Cairo!). Good call Syria. 2. Al Umayyad Mosque: So So So beautiful. All of the girls had to wear these funny cloaks that were reminiscent of Harry Potter, but it was totally worth it. Mary and Zack also got accosted by some walids (our Americanized Arabic word for young boys) at the mosque, which was pretty funny. They tried to take Mary's shoes and Zack's camera. 3. Americans?: people in our group joked about telling people that we’re from Canada, but I really don’t think people care that much that we’re American. A political debate would probably get heated pretty quickly, but I think they find us to be perfectly nice people. Most people have stories to tell about their travels to the U.S. or family members that our living there. It’s nice to see that people don’t hold a grudge against us because of our government’s policies.