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A Syrian Journal
Olga Kravets
A soldier was proudly accompanying me, the holder of the “friendly” Russian press-card in the Damascus suburb of Sayyidah Zaynab that hosts one of the most important Shia shrines. He told me over lunch he was very happy about Russia becoming “a great, mighty country again”. I replied that in my opinion, no country could be considered mighty as long as it was suspected of killing civilians. “Why so?!”, a minder, provided to me by the Syrian Information Ministry, exclaimed emotionally. That very moment, the conversation was over before it started. The soldier turned away from me and started to tell my driver how he had almost died in a car crash the day before. This was by far not the first time when Syrians chose not to have uncomfortable conversations with me during my time “on the Assad side” of the war-torn country.
After more than 2 months of waiting I was granted the regime permission to come to Syria for two weeks in September 2014 and was able to visit Damascus, Homs, Maaloula and Krak de Chevaliers. From the very first day I couldn’t escape the surreal feeling of being inside John Steinbeck’s 1948 A Russian Journal produced in collaboration with Robert Capa. A minder, a feeling of loneliness inside a luxurious hotel, ruins of Homs instead of ruins of Stalingrad – there were just too many coincidences. I photographed days and nights, knowing what a rare chance I got and also kept a diary which I used as a basis for this short story.
Text by Olga Kravets. Full version is available upon request.