Damascus is the capital of modern day Syria and in a historical context is seen as the centre of “Sha’am”. Here, you could still feel the old world. Local tradition and culture is still alive here even with the abundance of satellite TV and Internet cafes.
Damascus is said to be the world’s longest continually inhabited city (I think there are even biblical references). At one time it was the capital of the Umayyad/Arabian republic.
More importantly, I use to regret not having studied in Damascus (before the problems). I had been put off by the racism in immigration against the Asian diaspora in Europe and America, and the lack of improvement for the most impoverished in Syria. Having said that, more recently the ‘animals’ stationed at the borders had been replaced with more cultured men, who warmly welcomed foreigners learning Arabic and would speak to them in standard Arabic.
Surprisingly, by returning to Jordan, I perhaps still attained some of what I originally wanted. Interestingly, one of my teachers in Jordan was a Syrian, who had been teaching Arabic to foreigners at the Damascus university before the civil war started in his country.
He did not like the Jordan university centre’s style of teaching and apparent lack of grammar in the textbook. He loved grammar and although we found it difficult at first, he eventually drilled it into us. It use to be that the only real benefit from Jordan was the vocabulary, but this Syrian teacher gave us that and much more. It’s even possible that he taught more than what the students in the level above us were learning. He had a unique and effective way of teaching.
A few of the students wanted less grammar in class and complained about him to the director. The teacher felt that we were weak in some of the basics and so he spent some of the first few weeks blitzing through what he thought we should already know. Most of us were content with that, but some were clearly not. I did not mind, since I believed he was really trying to help us, and it worked. The real issue for me was that he gave me that look of ‘why did you not complain to me first’ when actually it was not me who complained to anybody.
He would also go irate when I went in late for class or when I did not do all my homework (even when I was sick). I sometimes felt sorry for him because he was getting paranoid, he believed that there was some conspiracy against Syria. He use to share some of the horror stories regarding the conflict in his country.
I did not always understand his religious and political opinions, but after the lazy summer, this was just what I needed and I felt he gave a very good introduction to Arab culture.
After he left for Turkey, we really missed him. Those of us who remained in Jordan were left to face the UJLC bullshit and we quickly realised that we had not valued our Syrian teacher enough.
Arabian Misadventures 