No sir, Delayed!

We are at the Damascus International airport, our flight has been repeatedly delayed, now by four hours. Contrary to the hospitality and kindness we have experienced among Syrian locals, the airport police remain comically useless and annoying. We keep asking for explanations, information and whether our flight from Abu Dhabi will be there for us and they just sit their, serene in their little vestibules of power, chain smoke and point left and right mumbling something sweet in Arabic. The only place to eat or drink here is the Cham Palace Airport Cafeteria so it seems that 'Scam Palace' like I call it will follow all the way until take off, we are unhappy Vikings. Its during bleak times like these that you start noticing the minor imperfections in the third world that you didn't notice before while you were v. happy. Such things like washing your behind with cold water in stead of paper in turkish holes in the ground (the only option here in this airport), the abundance of filthy teeth and gums, the f. endless switching from the arabic keyboard to the english... I could go on and add to our dejection but I wont, we're going to the bar...

love

rutur

(p.s. I wanted to go over my short post on 100days...com but I can't, censored. This has happened v. often here, but that's alright, after all this post wasn't v. jolly)