The flight from Toronto to Vienna was long, boring, and tiring. And did I mention how uncomfortable the seats are getting? So now I am sitting in a café at Vienna International Airport waiting for my next flight to Damascus, Syria. Thank God for the free Wi-Fi in the airport (something totally unexpected), if that wasn’t available then I would absolutely have nothing else to do. It’s really a boring airport with nothing much to do except to sit down and watch the planes go by from the window. But then again, it’s not like I am expecting a lot more from an airport. At least it gives me a chance to stand up, walk around and stretch my legs after a 9 hour flight.
To be honest, I don’t like going to Syria. Let me rephrase that: I hate going to Syria. I went there once before and it was more than enough to make me decide to never go there again. But here I am on my way there again. ‘Why’ you ask? It’s definitely not a business trip. It’s a family matter. It was urgent and I was forced to go. Something came up and my presence in Syria was required so I had to book the first flight going to Damascus.
Syria is a place full of people who don’t work unless they’re bribed. It’s a country where their government is over employed and under paid. So in order for a single document to pass through government officials you need to bribe at least 20 people. Taxi drivers always overcharge. Stores and gift shops extremely overprice their products which means people there are used to bargaining (which is something I am not used to and never had successful stories with). Pollution is way over the red line and they aren’t even considering or thinking about doing anything about it (every single car, motorbike and bus produces thick black smoke from its exhaust). In other words, the country and its people needs a complete overhaul (which probably will never happen cause someone will probably bribe someone else to bribe some other person in order to stop the overhaul). Seriously, it’s that bad.
