Articles from this Category
5 November 2025
Damascus to Aleppo Today, I move from Damascus to Aleppo. I had received conflicting information on which of the several bus stations to catch the bus from. The last time I did it, it was from Baramke but that was nearly 20 years ago. And on the remaining visits, I did the journey in reverse […]
4 November 2025
Maaloula & St Thekla I wanted to make an excursion to the village of Maaloula, which I visited in 2002. It is well-known as one of the last areas where Aramaic (specifically Western Neo-Aramaic) is still spoken on a daily basis. That language is believed to be the closest language of Jesus, which was Galilean […]
3 November 2025
Return to Syria Today I return to my favourite country after 15 years, having visited in 2002, 2004 and 2010. Since my last visit, parts of the country have been to hell and back: Over 40% of Syria’s buildings have been damaged or destroyed. Some cities lost over 70% of their housing stock. 13 million+ […]
2 November 2025
I started the day with burek from the bakery across the road, and an instant coffee in my room. Today, I’m moving to Istanbul, staying near the airport at the Arnavutkoy area in preparation for a morning flight to Damascus tomorrow. I left the hotel by Uber at 0915 for the 1000 bus to Istanbul […]
1 November 2025
Uludag cable car The only thing left in Bursa I wanted to do was go up to mountains near Uludag, accessible by cable car. After a burek for breakfast, I took a 5 min shared taxi ride to the cable car station to find it deserted at 0900. The signs indicated that opened at 1100 […]
31 October 2025
Getting started After about 7h sleep, I got out of bed around 0600. I had woken up around 0400 but had fallen back asleep. Despite a 44h day from a rural Fujian tulou to Guangzhou, Kuwait, Istanbul and finally Bursa, I couldn’t sleep any more due to the time difference. I had some tea and […]
1 December 2024
Leaving Iraq With our flight departure of 1420, we had a relaxing morning at the hotel’s buffet breakfast before getting a taxi to the airport around 1040. Erbil airport is a high security zone and our taxi queued up for a check during which we had to alight. Our bags weren’t looked at but the […]
30 November 2024
Mosul to Erbil My flight situation to get from Erbil to Delhi was still top-of-mind for me as I woke up this morning in Mosul, even before having breakfast. For now, I had planned on using standby and loads are highly changeable. We left around 0900 by taxi for garage and hopped into an intercity […]
29 November 2024
Mar Thomas church It was a very foggy morning when we had breakfast at Baron Hotel’s rooftop restaurant. There was a Taiwanese group there. The idea had been to go to Mar Matai (St Matthew) monastery out of town first before returning to see places closer to the hotel. But with the dense fog, […]
28 November 2024
Getting to Samarra After the hotel’s simple breakfast, we walked to the Tikrit garage that had cars to Samarra. Because we wanted to go to both Samarra’s mosque (which is closed for restoration) plus the one at Abu Dulaf, we couldn’t get a straight up fare. It was a hassle haggling with the various […]