I miss Syria

I miss Syria. Here are some things that I find myself missing.

I miss little white service vans and never paying more than 50 lira for a taxi, even for a ride across town. I want to eat Uncle Chips, not Mr. Chips, even if he is sleazier. I miss having a mosque on every corner. I miss the genuinely amicable relationship between Muslims and Christians. I miss the Old City! I miss gorgeous coastal scenery like this. I miss public transportation that criss-crosses the country so you can get anywhere without owning or renting a car. I miss Qadmous buses and, yes, even the obnoxious Egyptian movies they play on board. Heck, I miss Happy Journey buses, too! Or at least seeing them from the outside.

I miss Dance and Ruby and Hum-Hum and Jexy and Metro and Ugarit Cola and those Malto crackers that were always kind of vaguely disgusting but single-handedly got me through my first trimester. I miss that goofy David Beckham poster near Baramke where he's endorsing Casterol (or a similarly random product) and his name is misspelled.

I miss pining away after all those Western restaurants, like Pizza Hut and Cinnabon. I miss being excited when a new Western product showed up at the grocery stores - I well remember the day when they finally got Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. It was all my class at Amideast could talk about the next day.

I miss saying "shu" and "mu" and not feeling like I have an accent.

I miss living in a place where the guy at the corner grocery store doesn't speak English.

There's so many things that I miss. I love UAE and I love Emirates ppl, but that doesn't mean I can't miss Syria and Syrians.