question about Syria

ArjanDirkse.......If you don't want to be hassled by touts and beggers, come to Syria. There was only one guy at Palmyra, who asked me if I wanted to buy jewellery. Thats was the only incident I had, in one month truckin' around Syria.

Syria is probably the best place to visit if you dont want to be hassled!

Nothing like Egypt or Morocco.

Bit more hassle in TK in tourist towns but nothing like Egypt.

I once was talking to an (Arab) Jordanian who went to Egypt for a holiday- he said that he couldn't stand it. I said, but you're an Arab- he said even visiting Arabs get the hassle!!

Thirded. Syria (and Lebanon and Jordan) are nothing like Morocco and Egypt. From my experience of Turkey, I'd say you'd have far more problems with 'faux guides' in Turkey than in Syria!

I'd say around 99% of the time in Syria, if someone comes up to you and strikes up a conversation with you, it'll either be totally innocent and done out of curiosity/friendliness, or a very low-pressure attempt to sell something or to tell you about a shop that they own. Syrians are the best thing about Syria, so do make an attempt to engage with them whenever you can.

I know that most Moroccans are lovely, and that the guides and beggars there are only doing what they do because of poverty, and that I'm very rich compared to them, but I also found Morocco very hard work - after a week there, I just ignored pretty much everyone, which I really don't like doing, and which made me feel like a bit of a bastard.

Syria's not like that. I've ended up in strangers' homes many times, and sharing cups of tea and cigarettes with strangers more times than I care to count. Even in the touristy-souk bits of Damascus and Aleppo, the traders are pretty good natured, and will usually just ask you how you are, how long you're spending in Syria, where you're from, tell you a little about themselves, and then tell you that they have a shop. If you're obviously not interested, it's usually not a problem - it's not like Morocco, where you're often forced into shops more or less against your will, or sometimes quite deviously.

Beggars in Syria are few and far between - if you spend a whole day walking around Damascus or Aleppo, you'll probably only see one or two. And the locals will always give very generously to them. I think I give far more to beggars, and tip far more, and spend far more in shops in places like Syria and Jordan, due to the comparative lack of hassle.

Touts can sometimes be a bit of a problem in Palmyra, Apamea and Bosra, but they generally aren't too persistent, and will usually only bother you for a couple of minutes if you're good-natured but firm.

In four trips to Syria, I've never once encountered a 'faux guide'. You will get real guides of varying degrees of competence offering you their services at tourist sites, but if you say no, it's not like Morocco where they'll follow you around for the next hour and then demand payment in order to go away. A lot of guides are actually excellent value, know their history, have superb English, and are well worth engaging.

I'm not saying that Syria is totally 100% hassle-free, or that the country is completely free from persistent touts. But the level of hassle is so low, and the overwhelming majority of Syrians are so lovely, that it's somewhere where you really should just relax and make an attempt to engage with the locals as much as you can.

Ah fantastic. Syria sounds like a great place.

:-)

I found in Palmyra touts could be VERY pushy. One taxi driver was constantly at us to drive us to remote sites, in his beater of a car. Visiting the temple or towers /underground gravesites, had to put your hands up and literally gently push the postcards out of your face. We could not shake one guy at the temple, even though he was not able to provide any more information than what we had read ourselves, at which he got upset.

Still Palmyra was a wonderful site in itself, and we did meet a lovely family there and enjoyed an evening visit with them at their oasis compound. But given the wealth of other sites to visit, once was enough.

Aphamea wasn't too bad, just a few guys on motor bikes trying to sell you antiquities, but they quickly understood when we told them we were traveling back through Turkey, and then did the handcuffs motion to display what would happen if the Turks caught us with antiquities. They didn't persist.

On the whole, Syria is pretty free of the high pressure offers, though.

I found that in SE Turkey, unsolicited offers to guide us were a little more frequent than I remember having visited before. Urfa could be like running the gauntlet in some spots. We visited Urfa a few years ago, and were never bothered then.

Agree with the above comments. Syria is pretty quiet and things can be easily sorted out with a smile and a brief discussion if a guide becomes a little too pushy.
However I have noticed a real negative trend in Palmyra. My first trip to Syria was in May 2005 and I just came back from my second one 3 days ago. I don't know if there is an "off season" effect (less tourists then more fucus and more agressiveness from so called guides, taxi drivers...), but I felt a different atmosphere. The tourist is becoming a target in order to make money, I left the place with a feeling of constant rip-off (am I getting older and less able to negociate???) until the very last minute. Even the guy who sold bus tickets to Homs wanted to charge us twice the price paid by locals, and someone even tried to make us pay 50 extra syrian pounds per bag !
But nevertheless Syria is a great place, with friendly people.

Eric: I found the same thing, but in reverse! I first went to Syria in March 2006, and I found Palmyra a bit Morocco-esque - it really jarred with the rest of the country for me, and I didn't really enjoy it. When I visited Palmyra a second time, about 12 months ago, I found it quite low-pressure, and totally different to my first experience. I think a lot of it must depend on how busy things are. When I first went, I seemed to be the only tourist in all of Palmyra, which meant that I copped all the heat. However, it was quite busy there last Christmas, and we were more or less left to our own devices.

I've been to Syria four times, spending about three months there in total. I've been ripped off a couple of times (but only for relatively small amounts, which, truth be told, are pretty inconsequential for a westerner) and subjected to very hard sell or persistent touts and scammers a few times. But I've also been shown far more genuine hospitality and no-strings-attached friendliness by Syrian strangers than by anyone anywhere else in the world I've visited. Syria is by far my favourite country out of the 33 that I've visited. For me, the occasional annoying hustle is a very small price to pay for visiting such a fantastic place.

Truth be told, I've probably encountered far more hassle and actual and attempted scamming in Italy than in Syria.

Basically I agree with you, but I had a single - very different - experience outside the Muhiyy ad-Din mosque in Damascus. First a young woman with a baby on her arm asked me for some money, which I gave to her. Then people seemed to be crowding around me. An elderly poorly looking man asked for help to buy medicine. After that I started to run out of small notes. Another woman with a baby came up to me, and I told her that I would give her something if she walked further down the street away from the crowd. There I gave her some money, but she returned it aggressively, saying that it was too little and good for nothing. I regret that I didn't just take it and walked away, but I was really taken aback by her aggressiveness. She was veiled, and I suspected her to be the same person as I had given before (unveiled). She swore by everything sacred that she wasn't.

From Egypt I'm used to have some change at hand when walking in the street so that I can give something to beggars, like the Egyptians do themselves. Small amounts, but everybody is satisfied. This was quite a different experience, I really felt halfway surrounded and that I had to get away from the crowd.
I have seen on Syrian television that there is a tendency of more people begging which the government is strongly opposing.

Anyway, this was just a single experience and not typical to my picture of Syria.

I went to Syria with a mate and our 6 kids (4 of mine 2 of his). You don't get any hassle from false guides etc. My friend (who's been to Egypt) commented favourably. I've enountered these false guides in Delhi / Agra and can confirm I found none of them in Syria. Our route was North from Damascus then back down South throufg Lebanon; we didn't visit Palmyra.