Welcome to Damascus

Hello everyone--And welcome to my new blog for Syria!

As most of you already know, I'm going to be living in Damascus for a year, improving my Arabic in a fellowship program called CASA (Center for Arabic Studies Abroad), as well as using a Harvard grant to do research on Iraqi refugees.

I have temporarily named my new blog "Al-Sarsara" (الثرثارة) which is what you would call someone who is a chatterbox in Arabic. I thought my mom and roommates at least might find this appropriate. But I'm still looking for suggestions, if anyone has them!

A lot has happened since I got here a week and a half ago. I'll start really quick at the airport...so, it turned out I was on the same flight as another late arriving CASA student, named Alex. When we arrived in Damascus, Alex and I started looking around for the program director, who was supposed to be picking us up--but to no avail. Finally, I started asking an airport official for help, who turned me into the "Lost and Found" office (you can't make this stuff up). After making a few calls, the director insisted there was someone outside waiting for us. After looking another time, Alex and I found him--his name was Zaher, and the problem may have been that he was holding the tiny, scrawled "New CASA students" sign upside down...

As we took off in Zaher's rusting, sagging, smoking car, it was a little hard to relax at first, as we exchanged glances and eyed the shotgun stuffed inside his front door...

It turns out that Zaher was really really nice though! He got us settled into our hotel, and then helped us buy new phones. Zaher redubbed me "Rula" when we entered shops, to make sure we got the Syrian prices. He even bought us sandwiches for dinner and took us to a park at the top of the mountain overlooking the city.

The next day, I went to my new home.

Follow the first few twist and turns up the dusty alleyways of the Christian neighborhood Bab Touma, and you will stumble upon the tiny Masbak alley. There, nestled in corner at the end, is the freshly painted door of Beit Abu Nasr, my new home in Syria…. For now, at least.

FYI, if you didn’t know, Damascus is one of the oldest consistently inhabited cities, and, being in the Old City, I'm really in that actual spot!

With its vine covered latticed archways and paved cobblestone streets, it is charming even its state of dirty, rusting semi-decay, and the house is no different. Beit Abu Nasr is a traditional Damascene home—these style homes always involve two or more floors wrapping around a central, open courtyard with a (rarely used) fountain. Some of these homes are huge, and are beautifully restored with their original painted geometric patterns in black, yellow, and red. These usually become restaurants, museums, galleries, or the homes of wealthy families. The rest, like my house, are inherited by normal families, and, I think because of their age and the city’s tightly wound structure, renovations for more modern amenities are difficult. You’ll get what I mean later.

Many of these old homes belong to one or more families, who often rent parts of the upper floor to foreigners. It seems ironic to me that this so incredibly “authentic” looking setting is packed not only with Syrians but a big portion of the foreigners. But it’s easy to see why—despite a certain ruggedness, ancient cities like this always have a certain fantastical feeling to outsiders. You really feel that you are in another world.

Beit Abu Nasr belongs to a family—Huda and Amjad, and their two adorable but completely wild little girls—Rand and Ghazaal. Rand is about 4 and Ghazaal is 8 and I don’t know the last time I saw such feisty little handfuls. They are very sweet, but woe to he or she who denies their demands—a storm of tears and shrieks will be upon you. I cannot even fathom how any living creature has so much energy, and am therefore in awe of their mother. I love Huda, but maybe that’s just because she fawns over me and offers me some of her wonderful homemade mahshy (stuffed zucchini). The Nasr family lives on the first floor, while the rest of us—their boarders, have run of the top floor. There are four of us—Winnie, who just finished CASA, Rachel, a fellow CASA student for the coming year, me, and another Rachel who is just learning Arabic. Living in this setting, we actually get a pretty good deal of interaction with the family, which so far has been a nice thing.

After the first few hours of excitement wore off however, reality set in. And that is: how on earth am I going to live in this house for three months!? In other words—a reality check: Dear Erika, welcome to the third world, you’re actually in it!

Our toilet is a hole in the floor type deal. I spent a great deal of time worrying about and discussing this issue with my friends and family, at first trying to plan my day around potential "regular toilet" locations. But after I got really sick and spent a great deal of quality time in my house's bathroom, I've gotten pretty used to it.

The sink and shower are in the adjacent room. And by shower, I mean a shower head in the middle of the ceiling. I have to reach my hand inside an ancient water heater, and try and light it with countless matches (and curses) to warm the water. The entire bathroom essentially becomes the shower—or boiler room, if you run the water heater too long… When I’m done with the shower, I use a scraper to try and turn the place from a lake back into a bathroom.

There is no air conditioning—which is getting to be problematic. I can only do my homework in my room late at night or early in the morning. Also, each room gets a grand total of one electrical socket. Which forces you to decide—do you want to use the fan, your desk light, charge your phone, or your computer? It’s your choice, but you only get one. In a more genius moment, I attempted to set up my multiple outlet surge protector to increase my options, resulting in a giant “BANG!”, and the loss of electricity in half the house. Needless to say, as Winnie felt her way around the house by candlelight looking for a fuse box, I quickly hid all the evidence.

Syria is proving to be a bigger adjustment than I thought—I don’t know Damascus at all, I have no previous friends, and I took an oathe in CASA to only speak Arabic among my peers. When I’m not feeling frustrated by my clumsiness with this new dialect, I’m struggling with the limited potential for self expression, which is all the more exasperating in this period of adjustment.

Living in this old house often adds to the frustrations. Despite this, I think I will try and hold out for three months. Maybe I’m being too much of a princess—after all, the other boarders are all putting up with it just fine. And there are nice things too: enjoying fresh bread and hummus on the roof balcony with the star studded sky overhead, exploring the tight maze of picturesque alleyways at dusk..Arabic help and practical advice from a friendly family, and cheerful housemates.

Anyway, it’s worth a try…right?