Day 37: September 30

Woke up today to the crackling of the loud speakers. However, the call to prayer never came on…. Seems they malfunctioned today. Blessed Silence, how I missed you. We did however, get out of bed at 8 to make it to the Crac De Chevaliers. We went downstairs and wolfed some food before catching a taxi to the bus station.

At the bus station we were swarmed by people trying to get us on their busses. We eventually found the correct bus and boarded. It took us out to a small city in the countryside of Syria. From there we had to catch a minibus to the Crac De Chevaliers. It was amazing driving through the countryside of Syria. My preconceived notion of Syria and the rest of the Middle East was a desert. However, the countryside could have easily been mistaken for California. It was covered with farmland, forests, and meadows. Not at all what I expected.

After three hours of driving (2 in the big bus and 1 in the minibus) we arrived at the Crac De Chevaliers. The Crac de Chevaliers is a Castle that was built by the Crusaders during their attempt to retake the Holy Land. It was held by the Crusader’s until they were driven from the land. It was then held by the Muslims until the 19th Century when gunpowder made Castles obsolete. Now it is considered the best preserved Crusader castle in the Middle East.

Most of our group was very excited to see the castle. Except for Jasmine… who just wanted to shop back in Damascus (honestly she is a nice girl but her attitude is occasionally annoying). Anyways, we payed the entry and went in.

It was amazing to walk through the castle and see where the Crusaders lived and fought for so long. Very impressive and well preserved. I spend most of the time walking around with Jake and Henry. We spent our time walking around the exterior of the castle and then worked our way into the citadel. The citadel was an impressive structure and larger than many I saw when in Ireland. It’s always crazy to think about people making these huge rock structures without modern power tools.

We spent the next three hours walking around enjoying the history. The best part for me was climbing the three towers and looking out over the surrounding countryside. From there you can almost imagine what a lookout would have seen hundreds of years ago. The land just seemed to spread out all around us.

Unfortunately we eventually had to leave to make it back to Damascus. We caught the minibus back to the bus station and again found a public bus back to Damascus. Once back in Damascus we made our way back to the hostel.

Mike and I decided that it was time for us to push onto Lebanon. We made a quick run out to the souqs so Mike could do some last minute shopping. After grabbing a few things we made our way back to the hostel to pack and leave. We grabbed our last Syrian Schwarma on the way and gobbled it down. Half an hour later we were all packed and ready to leave.

We made our way downstairs and caught a taxi to the bus station. We made our way to a small section of the station dedicated to travelers going on to Lebanon. It was kinda sketchy. It was pretty much a poorly lit parking lot with cars and taxi’s willing to drive people across the border. We put our feelers out and found what we thought to be the best cabbie and got in.

We were sharing the cab with three Arabs, ourselves, and the driver. Most of us were quiet on the way to the border, kinda an awkward tension between people that don’t know each other and have a language gap. We got to the border without any issue and paid our exit fee. However, we were running seriously low on Syrian currency and were hoping the entry fee wouldn’t be too high.

We walked into the entry station and went to the foreigner line. We were greeted by a Lebanese army officer who inquired about our stay, etc. He found out we were only going to be in the country for a few days and put us down for a free transit visa… I love this country already. With that taken care of we went back to our awaiting taxi.

The Arabs at first were complaining about how long it took (assuming that we didn’t understand what was being said.) However, they were shocked when I responded and apologized in Arabic. Their jaws literally dropped. Pretty funny. They were really excited to meet a white person that spoke Arabic and were quick to jump on the opportunity to ask me anything and everything that I understood. It made the cab ride allot more interesting, and in my opinion really fun. It was the first time in awhile I had not been surrounded by Americans and it allowed me to practice my Arabic a bit more.

Anyways we arrived in Beirut with no problems. The taxi driver even took us to an exchange to trade my remaining Jordanian Dinar to Lebanese pounds. This is good because I’m not sure I would have been able to pay the driver otherwise.

One of the guys I met in the taxi was a banker from Damascus doing training in Lebanon. He spoke German, English, and Arabic. Really nice to talk to and very helpful. He volunteered to stay with us in the taxi until we were dropped off. This turned out to be really useful because apparently our drivers original thought had been to drop the two Americans at the bus stop and let them fend for themselves. However, with a little coxing from our new friend, the driver took us straight to our hostel (The New Talaal Hostel).

We got there and made our way into the hostel. At this point we were flying by the seat of our pants because we didn’t have a reservation or a backup plan. And wouldn’t you know… there was no room at the inn. However, they decided they could fit us on the balcony. At this point it was near 1 am and we were more than willing to take anything. They showed us out to the balcony. The balcony was actually the size of a big bedroom and more than accommodated the two of us. We also got a nice breeze….

We were both exhausted and decided it was time to head for bed. While getting ready we ran into some other AUC kids outside the bathroom. Some guys we knew decently, John, Jordan, and Paul. An unexpected surprise, but nice to see some familiar faces.

Anyways, finished getting ready and passed out.