Many blog entries, particularly photo posts, are designed to inspire others to visit a particular place. This one is a definite exception. No tourist is likely to being visiting Aleppo anytime soon. As I heard the depressing news from Syria I looked back at my photos of our trip there in 2009. Our happy memories are now tinged with sadness and fear for the city and its people.
At the time of writing Aleppo stands on the brink. The destruction of the city and the massacre of its civilian population is widely predicted. It may be a long time before tourists can ever visit Aleppo again and when they do, it may look very different to how it does in these photos. No-one can say what will happen to Aleppo but it’s reasonable to fear the worst.
Recent visits to Sarajevo and Cambodia remind me that places do emerge from the other side of hell and people eventually become neighbours again with their recent mortal enemies. The tragedy is that the lessons of these horrors are not learned and the cycle of bloodbaths around the world continue.
So I give you a selection of pictures from the city of Aleppo, taken in happier times. I hope the city’s inhabitants are soon again able to offer tourists the warm welcome we enjoyed and for which we remain grateful.
Aleppo Citadel after a fierce spring storm
16th century gateway to the Citadel busy with tourists
Entrance to the Citadel
Enjoying the view from the Citadel. The hill has been inhabited since the 3rd century BC
Theatre within the Citadel
Elaborate interior rooms in the Citadel
Stunning ceilings of the Ayyubid Palace within the Citadel
The domes of the Hammam
Aleppo Citadel by night
Satellite dishes in Aleppo
Shopping in the souk in the old town of Aleppo
Syrian Catholic Church in Aleppo
Dinner (cherry kebabs) in the courtyard of a beautiful 17th century Aleppo house
My God
Reading this post now, pulls deeply at the heart strings and the needless death and destruction that is still continuing there. It appears to late for this once wonderful city of Aleppo that you testified to on your visit there, yes things can be rebuilt but the loss of life cannot. The sheer hell the innocent children and civilians are enduring is truly beyond imagination. God bless them all
I think that adjective “happier” might be substituted with something more appropriate and less…ambivalent in a way that might be interpreted in wider ways than you wish. Maybe, just “quieter” times. Quiet, of course, implies no wider judgment than what it says. I read about Aleppo every day, and have done for some time now. To me, the horror is that it is seeming to shape up along with the rest of Syria, to be another Rwanda or Bosnia. Politicians talk about it in solemn tones, and then do precisely nothing. How it will all play out seems impossible to predict, other than that while a regime will face its death sentence eventually, too many innocent people have to face a death sentence in the shorter term.
It’s a fair point Hal – I did struggle to find an appropriate word to use here, given the scale of the horror taking place. Were they happier times? For many perhaps the horrors took on a different, invisible dimension. Quieter, as you say, presumes, nothing.