The Friendly and the Not-So-Friendly

Today our group of three split up again as Alex headed for Hama, a base for several historical sites in the area, and Beddor and myself left for Raqqah, our first town on a several day trip down the legendary Euphrates. We took a cramped minibus out there that sounded like it was going to fall apart.



Our first destination before Raqqah was Lake Assad, a gigantic project undertaken by Hefez Al-Assad, the father of the current Syrian President, Bashar Al-Assad. The lake dams the Euphrates, providing water in the remarkably arid region. You don't realize the importance of water to civilization until you travel a region as arid as the Middle East. On our way there, we passed a military checkpoint, and a soldier, upon seeing the two Americans in the van from 30 feet away, immediately pointed at us and motioned for the van to pull over, much to the chagrin of our fellow passengers. He asked for our passports and after about five minutes of questioning, sent us on our way. At this point we've become used to the MO of constant questioning by military personnel at all checkpoint and before taking any bus.

When we arrived in the town nearest to Lake Assad, we were immediately, and not coincidentally greeted by more military police who had been called by the former. He took our passports and scoured them for several minutes, grilling us with questions that culminated in the most important question of all - "Have you ever been to Israel." "No, no, no." After that, they apologized and asked us where we were going. After finally getting across to them Lake Assad, they told us that they'd take us there! So we hopped in the back of a Syrian military police car!

I don't know how we would've found this place without them, because it was outside the city over nearly impassable roads. But the lake is beautiful with the most crystal clear water I've ever seen (I'll post pictures when my camera isn't dead). They were so excited to take us there that they ran up the craggy cliffs and allowed us to take some pictures with them. As we got back into the car, they asked where we were going, and we said Raqqah, but they insisted on personally giving us a tour of the town!



The town itself was very small, and not very wealthy. There were some tents pitched on the outskirts of the city, and the driver said, "Poor people. Iraq. Because of Bush." We've learned that we must have the perfunctory stance of Bush- bad, Obama - good. Because the American invasion in Iraq caused extreme instability in the government, many different factions began vying, violently, for power. As a result, terrorist attacks have increased because there is no longer an indisputed leader like Saddam. Consequently, many people fled over the border into Syria. He took us by the local church (Syria actually has a large minority of Christians, and both Christians and Moslems coexist peacefully), the mosque, the cemetery and then through the main square. What was great about it was that it was like a day in the life of the Syrian police, because as we drove around they just went about their business, reprimanding cab drivers and the like. After about and hour and a half with them, and much exchange over families, girlfriends, wives and jobs, they called us their brothers and sent us on our way.

We arrived in Raqqah, but didn't stay long because of a hotel that smelled literally like there had been a very recent crap taken in the hallway and a room with no light and apparent bedbugs. We were flocked by over thirty people in the bus station, all talking to us about different things until we finally got on a bus and bargained them down to half the price.

On our way to Deir Ezzor, we began talking affably with some of the passengers on the bus and found that several were Christian. We picked up a passenger on the side of road in the desert who was dressed very formally, but neither Chris nor myself thought anything of him. One of the passengers asked to see Chris' cross and he complied. They examined it and joked about stealing it. A few minutes later, the tone of the conversation changed when the new passenger spoke up to the other passengers. You have to understand that at this point, we had no idea what was going, because we spoke no Arabic. However, I listened attentively and heard several key phrases as "Qur'an" "Mohammed" and "America." The tone of the conversation was civil but very tense. I had a Christian on my right and the new passenger on my left, and pretended to be entirely oblivious as they warred in words on either side of me.

After about 10-15 minutes of conversation, we dropped the passenger off in the middle of the desert. We asked the only passenger who spoke a little english if he was upset with us, and he said yes. Then Chris held up his cross and asked if he was upset about it, and he said yes again, and then called him crazy.

It was a really interesting conversation, because everyone in the car vehemently jumped to our defense against this obvious Moslem extremist, who was in fact an imam living alone in the desert. Even the Moslem in the car did not speak a word, seemingly because he didn't want to associate himself with the imam. I'm really glad we had the experience, because it later struck me as a microcosm of Syria. To this point, we had encountered no hostility, but rather extreme friendliness and hospitality. But the stereotype could not have arisen from nowhere, and now we've experience the type of person who gives the Middle East its damning stereotype. But the key I think was the veracity to which people came to our defense, two foreign Americans to which they had no association. It seems that a few bad apples have spoiled the whole bunch.

Even with this hostility, there seemed to be no danger, because none of the other passengers were alarmed, but merely dismissed him as a backwater extremist, very similar to our dismissal of some religious extremists in our own country (*cough* Christian fundamentalists *cough*). My point is that we dismiss the Middle East as a bastion of terrorism and hostility towards Americans, because of the stream of consistent news reports condemning terrorist action and reporting American deaths in the war, but I've found the Middle East to be, at its core, not much different than the United States. Of course there is significantly less freedom here, but also the people are much friendlier. There is danger here of course, but there is also danger in Chicago or Minneapolis, where the murder rate is much higher than it is here. In the end, I've encountered no reason to condemn the Middle East as an unstable and unjust region that hates Americans, even with my recent travels to the Iraqi border, and I've spent more time here than most reporters. That's not to say that there is no reason to condemn certain areas, but that doesn't given justice to condemning an entire country.

So that was my day yesterday! Crazy with military police and Moslem extremists but it makes for a great story! Tomorrow I leave Deir Ezzor in the afternoon for the much more touristy Palmyra to meet up with Alex. I'll post pictures in this post as soon as I get the chance, so check back if they're not here, because I've got some great pics!