Set, Passport, Go!

It's been four years since I've been back to the beloved Syria, and it looks like a fifth will also pass before I can go there. The combination of non-stop study/work program and very short breaks in between leave little opportunity for me to make a meaningful trip back.

But recently Sinan reminded me that making a trip back isn’t as simple as buying a ticket. Other than renewing my long expired passport, I also have to get some papers that prove that I am a student; otherwise the army will be knocking on my door when I get back. These papers will probably have to go the Syrian embassy in Ottawa, hopefully without me having to go there.

To make matters worse I don’t even my ‘haweye’ (identification card), the papers of which I started but due to the lack of computerization and just plain slow service I didn’t get done last time I was there. So before I go back I will make sure that all those papers are done, and that everything is fine and dandy. The last thing I want to do is to be stuck in Syria, wasting valuable time in government buildings trying to get my papers through.

So why would I go through all this trouble to go there?
Well aside from seeing family, I am eager to meet all of my blogger friends whom I feel so close to already. And who wouldn’t miss smelling Damascene air from Qassioun, shopping in Sla7ieh, seeing the wonderful historic sites, passing through ‘el 7amadieh’ only to end at the Umayyad mosque, hearing people speak Arabic in the streets, eating falafel and shwarma sandwiches, walking in streets that are merely faded images in my memory, and of course taking a taxi with the driver blasting ‘el 7asoudeh’ ;)

It’s been 1825 days since the last time I’ve been there, 300 days to go