7ELA Week of Nov.30-Dec.4
For those left in Syria, life among ruins takes on a ghostly air
By Los Angeles Times, adapted by Newsela staff on 10.29.15 Word Count 900
Children rest after their arrival on a ferry from the northeastern Greek island of Lesbos to Athens' port of Piraeus, Oct. 29, 2015. Greece is the main entry point for people from the Middle East and Africa seeking a better future in Europe. Well over half a million have arrived so far this year. Photo: AP/Thanassis Stavrakis
HOMS, Syria — Talal Barazi is seated in the pleasant outdoor restaurant of a hotel in Homs. The hotel is heavily guarded, and as for the city, there is not a lot left of it. Much of it has been destroyed by Syria’s brutal civil war, which has been grinding on for five long years.
The city is now like "Berlin after World War II,” says Barazi, who is the governor of Homs province.
“We have to face reality,” he says. “Some of Homs will be rebuilt, but some will have to be torn down completely. We can’t just look at all the ruins and feel sad.”
Much of his province’s prewar population of 2 million has fled, either to safer parts of Syria or to other countries. For those like Barazi, left behind by choice or necessity, life here has taken on a strange and ghostly air.
Russian Planes Now Targeting Rebels
The nation is now defined by images of bombed-out buildings, rubble-strewn streets and refugees on the move.
Now the war has entered a new phase: Russian warplanes backing the government of President Bashar Assad are targeting rebel positions in Homs and elsewhere in Syria.
The great majority of Syrians still live in government-controlled zones, where something slightly resembling normal life still persists. Various armed groups hold sway in broad swaths of the country, but much of the rebel-controlled terrain is thinly populated desert.
More than 4 million people have left Syria since the civil war began, and 8 million are internally displaced. As dramatic as those numbers are, they hardly hint at the physical and psychological destruction of Syria, which was once a cultural and intellectual hub of the Middle East.
Still, ever-resilient Syrians try hard to maintain both some degree of normality and ties with family and friends.
Apps Help People Track Friends
Daily conversations on Skype, WhatsApp and other social media apps help people stay in touch with those scattered around the world. One exile has developed a cellphone app to show where his friends are, with lights on the screen indicating far-flung locales.
“Every night we spend at least an hour on WhatsApp trying to catch up,” says Elia Samman, who runs a waste management business in Damascus, the capital. Samman grew up in Homs, once the country’s third-largest city but now dramatically depopulated.
Of nine Homs families his family was close to, he says, only three remain in Syria. The rest have left for Sweden, Germany, Egypt, Persian Gulf nations or other destinations.
One of his close friends, a successful engineer, had built his family dream house in Homs, completing it just before the war broke out.
“He was only able to live there for about 20 days; then the conflict came,” recalls Samman, who was a member of the peaceful opposition but says the movement was “hijacked” by violent extremists. The house is now in the hands of a rebel group, he said.
Gunfire Near Business As Usual
Syria today is an often surreal place of contrasts: Damascus’ fabled Hamidiya covered market is, as ever, full of seemingly carefree shoppers. The storied ice cream emporium Bakdash does a brisk business; its workers pound away theatrically at crafting fresh, Arabic-style ice cream topped with pistachio flakes.
Just a few miles away, however, on the highway north toward Homs, a visitor encounters a nightmarish tableau: Block after block of bullet-riddled apartment buildings and blown-open shops are now the face of once densely populated suburbs such as Jobar, Qaboun and Duma. The echo of gunfire and the thud of artillery are heard in the distance. Soldiers staff small outposts along the highway. Motorists are advised not to let up on the gas pedal.
Trucks skirt rebel positions as relief convoys ferry food and other supplies in a zig-zagging route north to the government-held zone of Aleppo. Its population has swollen to 2 million, officials say, many of them displaced from oppositioncontrolled zones.
Half of Aleppo remains in the hands of Islamist rebels, who continually launch mortar rounds and rockets across a no man’s land into the government zone. The army, in turn, pounds the rebel side with artillery and aerial bombs. The barrages kill mostly civilians, human rights groups say, while adding to the rubble piles.
Rockets Kill Students At University
At first glance, the sprawling campus of the University of Aleppo, with some 80,000 students, seems as if it could be a school anywhere in the West. Students on benches read books and scribble notes while others scurry to and from classrooms.
Look closer, though, and one encounters craters and fenced-off areas marking sites where shells and rockets have fallen. Scores of students, staff members and passersby have been killed.
Aleppo’s Old City is a sinister maze of charred storefronts, mortar-round impact zones and sniper alleys best crossed at great speeds. Nonetheless, Mahmoud Badawi still keeps his small shop open. Almost all his clients are Syrian soldiers who line up to purchase snacks, cigarettes and soft drinks, and to share a chat.
Gone are the days when tourists and window-shoppers strolled along the winding alleys. Back then the Old City was the lively core of Syria’s economic hub. Only a few families remain, loyal die-hards, including Badawi, who cannot imagine living anywhere else.
“Why would I leave?” Badawi asks, offering a rare outside visitor a cold juice on a sweltering day. “Aleppo is my home.”