Radio Free Aleppo

Occasionally I'll be posting about some of my experiences in Syria from late 2008. This is one of them...

Damascus' hectic cityscape had now faded into the arid brush and dirt of the high Syrian desert as the sun started its rise from behind the horizon. For most of us, this would be our first time outside of the city borders since our airplane trip into the country, and we had been looking forward to seeing the historic sites outside of Syria's capital. However, the early hour we had to wake - even earlier than most of our workdays so far - left most our contingent bleary-eyed as we loaded up and started off toward the ancient city of Palmyra.

The travel agent had assured us that our vehicle could hold 10 people easy, but that proved to be something of a reach for our group. There was no room to stretch out, so bodies turned askew and legs and feet lay at odd angles as people straddled over belongings as well as each other.

The surrounding land, covered with scrub brush and rolling dirt and stone mounds, brought back memories of the Tehachapis in California on Route 58, right before you reached the Mojave. The otherwise pristine mountains which lined our valley were oddly at times chunked out, as if someone had taken a huge spoon and dug into a big mound of coffee ice cream. Perhaps that was to gather needed building material for the buildings of Damascus, or perhaps to provide the roadbed the very highway we were traveling on at that moment. As the sun brought more light to the blue sky, I caught sight of misty cloud fingers wafting over the tops, snaking down the slopes and providing alluring eye candy for my anticipatory mind.

Someone had told us that camels would be prevalent as we got closer to Palmyra, but it was apparent early on that the true ship of the desert these days was the two-wheeled motorcycle. Even the Beduoin tribes we passed, otherwise nomadic in their ways, seemed to have one or two vehicles handy just in case they needed to make a quick trip into the suburban sphere of the state.

As the landscape grew more sparse, our driver turned on the radio - Palmyra was still a couple hours away. Perhaps acknowledging his Western world contingent, the driver fiddled with the dial and soon we were listening to songs that we might hear back home during our commutes, or maybe populating our iPods.

Even the deejay spoke in English and Arabic - from what I could make out, we were hearing a station out of Aleppo, which didn't seem to make sense distance-wise, but I figured if I got out here in the first place, anything was possible.

Soon, the familiar strains of a Bee Gees tune came on the air. Maybe it was the novelty of hearing 1970s disco in the middle of the Syrian desert, but our still sleepy contingent perked up and tuned in.

And then came the chorus we all knew well, and we all became backup singers.

"More than a woman...more than a woman to me."
"More than a woman...you are, more than a woman to me."

Laughter broke out amongst us all. The driver turned back to us briefly and joined us in our chuckling.

Shortly afterward, many of us drifted back into napland. But for a brief moment, Barry, Robin, Maurice, and a bunch of Westerners far away from home serenaded the mountains of Ajjibal Attadmuriyeh.