Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
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Aleppo was a vibrant and exciting place, primarily due to the diversity of its people, the
proximity of some of the key sites and the great hustle and bustle that never seemed to stop.
We arrived at dusk after a long day and checked into the hotel. From my window on the
fourth floor I was confronted by a forest of satellite dishes on the opposite roofs below and,
just to top it off, half a dozen sheep living amongst the dishes.
After settling in it was agreed we should go to one of the restaurants, the 'Assisi', recom-
mended in the Lonely Planet. It was bit of a walk but fairly simple to find in terms of the
directions. But we hadn't proceeded too far before being hit by the heavy air pollution. This
was in the early evening by which time it would have been expected that traffic pollution
would have largely dissipated, however, that was not the case.
But we pressed on looking for food and drink, finding the Assisi tucked up a narrow side
alley. It was obvious that many others had also read the Lonely Planet and it didn't take too
long for the place to fill up and for the standard of service to decline. Then the lights went
out and the generator kicked in.
Although it was fairly late when returning to the hotel, there seemed to be no let up on the
volume of people on the streets or the traffic.
The remains of the nearby St Simeon monastery dripped with extraordinary symbolism with
the number of different crosses, of all shapes and sizes, carved into the remaining walls. Le-
gend has it that because of the diverse crosses, once you had visited St Simeon Church you
could enter any church in the world and find a cross that you had seen at the monastery.
Saint Simeon Stylites was an ascetic saint who achieved fame due to living for 37 years on a
small platform on top of a pillar. The pillar contained in the ruins of the church is somewhat
reduced, due to the endless souveniring of fragments over the centuries, however elements
of it are still there.
