Salaam Alaykum!

here is a snippet from yesterday.

four of us walked down the street from the monastery and found a little pastry shop - we had been given a tip from some of the other students of a shop owned by two Syrian men who were very nice and tried to speak English. They had these chocolate desserts for 5 Syrian pounds (which is literally like - a penny. or less.) And so the four of us found this little shop and went in. The two men (George and ... Faisal? We can't remember the second man's name) gave us the pastries for free. We tried to pay three times and they refused our money. They kept saying "Welcome to Damascus!" We tried to talk (using our 50 or so Arabic words) and they talked back in broken English. It was wonderful. Partway through the exchange, one of the girls with me noticed a picture of Mary on the wall and pointed to it. She asked, "Mary?" and they said, "Ah, Margaret!" and after a brief pause, pointed at themselves and said "Christian." We smiled and pointed at ourselves and said "Christian."

They called their niece up on the phone and had her come over to help translate. She invited us to come to her house at some point; we weren't sure if we would be able to and responded with "Inshallah." (if God wills).

I've decided that I have two wishes that are equal and opposing - I wish that everyone could visit Damashque. I wish they could see the friendliness of this city; the marriage of ancient and modern; the way East and West coexist; the way Christians and Muslims live in peace and respect. I also wish that foreigners wouldn't come here. I wish that tourism would never ruin this place; that people would not be jaded out of their worldview; that money and its host of ills would not corrupt the crooked streets of this city.

But how does that saying go? If wishes were horses...
I suppose rather than wasting time on wishes I will just go walk through the Old City or play a game of Hearts or read a book. :)