Mother of Sharks

"3-2-1, Go!"

On Marco's command we roll backwards out of the zodiac and into the water. As we begin free-falling into the depths I look down, my eyes straining for some kind of visual reference with which to judge the clarity and depth of the water. I see the rough outline of the edge of the reef plateau some 80 feet below, and beyond that, nothing but inky darkness. As we sink further the water suddenly drops, only by a couple of degrees, but enough to be noticeable nevertheless. I shiver involuntarily; partly from the cold, though mostly from excitement. Cold water means one thing in these parts: sharks.

When we reach the plateau, we briefly halt our descent to swim horizontally for a short distance. As we reach the edge of the shelf, the sheer depth of the water beyond becomes apparent. I don't ever recall seeing water this dark before, and for a second I'm gripped by fear. I swim over the edge anyway.

As I drop deeper and deeper into the blackness my fears are eased by the reassuring buzz of nitrogen bubbling through my veins. Nitrogen Narcosis, "Rapture of the Deep", is an occupational hazard of diving beyond about 70 or 80 feet, at which point the usually inert gas (which makes up some 70% of the air we breathe) suddenly becomes powerfully intoxicating. The effect is hard to describe, though personally I'd compare it to a cross between alcohol and morphine; the relaxation and confidence of the drink twinned with the euphoria of the opiate, all the while underpinned with a barely contained terror. For despite the narcotic thrill from the tank on my back, diving this deep is a potentially hazardous endeavour, especially with the dulling of reaction times that goes with getting "narced". I try to breathe slowly to restrain my pounding heart and conserve the precious supply of air I carry.

I'm startled from my reverie by the sudden bleeping of an alarm; it takes me a moment to realise that it's the computer on my own wrist which is making the racket. I stare at the screen, for a moment not comprehending what is happening. The number "130" flashes repeatedly, alerting me to the fact that I have now reached the internationally- accepted depth limit for recreational diving. I push a button to silence the infernal beeping and kick myself downwards.

Ten feet below me Marco, the divemaster, points into the distance. Slowly an unmistakable shape emerges from the gloom. A shark. As it swims lazily towards us, its colouration becomes apparent, glistening in what little light penetrates these murky depths, the dark upperside contrasts beautifully with the pure white underbelly. It approaches to within fifteen feet, then turns to flank us, all the time keeping one eye focussed on these strange intruders into its world. As it moves past, great tail slowly flicking from side to side, I try to make a mental measurement of size: somewhere in the region of 7 or 8 feet. At this point I realise with a start that the shark's head is grotesquely deformed. This is no reef shark, it is a scalloped hammerhead. My joy is unbridled. After some 300 dives across the globe, in locations as diverse as Australia, The Bahamas, Egypt, Tahiti and Thailand, I have finally seen this most beautiful and mysterious of sharks. And what's more, two more of the majestic fish appear in the gloom, circling in evident curiosity. "Just like buses", I think to myself, "I wait ages for one, and then three come at once."

Before I can fully savour the nitrogen-enhanced euphoria of the hammerheads, however, I am once again startled by the alarm bells ringing on my wrist. The computer tells me I am now at 152 feet, and have incurred seven minutes of decompression time. In short, this means I cannot return to the surface, even in the event of an emergency, for at least seven minutes, or I will almost certainly suffer decompression sickness: "The Bends". This is not a scenario I wish to consider: the bends is an excruciatingly painful condition, often leading to paralysis or death, particularly in the absence of immediate remedial treatment in a recompression chamber. There is no functioning chamber in Sudan. I swiftly obey the computer's instruction and start to move to shallower depths. I look down and realise with horror that I can no longer see Marco, some fifty feet below; only the trail of bubbles from his regulator betrays his position.

As I drift back to shallower water, and head towards the plateau, I spot two more hammerheads below. One is a juvenile, no larger than two feet, and is dwarfed by what I presume to be its mother, swimming protectively alongside. The two swim directly beneath me, and I marvel at the perfectly formed miniature version of this beautiful animal. While I explore the shallower reaches of the reef wall as part of my decompression time, I keep one eye to the blue in search of more sharks. While there are no more hammerheads, the water being too warm at these depths, a few grey reef sharks cruise casually past, sometimes coming closer for an inquisitive look at the divers. While not as exciting as their bizarrely-headed cousins - I have seen reef sharks countless tiems before - there is always something special about every encounter with a shark. Their power, beauty, and mystery never fails to inspire awe among divers, and though few would admit to feeling actual fear, there is always a certain increase in heartrate associated with the sight of that unmistakable shape in the water.

Sharks are the main attraction of diving in Sudan; the reefs may be pristine and relatively unexplored, and this may be the site of Hans Hass and Jacques Cousteau's pioneering forays into the underwater realm back in the 1950s and 60s, but ask any diver why they are in Sudan, and the answer is invariably the same. One site in Sudanese waters even bears the name Um Gerosh: "Mother of Sharks". This being the wrong seson, however, I did not visit that particular location; in many ways though it is an apt description of Sudanese diving as whole, this being one of the increasingly few areas of the world where it is still possible to view sharks in relative abundance. For despite the widespread perception of sharks, due in no small measure to Steven Spielberg's Jaws, sharks have much more to fear from us than we do from them.

Nobody actually knows how many sharks are killed globally each year, though estimates range from 25 to 100 million. What is not in doubt is that shark populations are declining at breathtaking speed. The Shark Trust, a British charity which campaigns for shark conservation around the world, estimates that the populations of most of the 300+ species of shark have declined by a staggering 70% in the last 20 years. Some species have been reduced to 2% of their original size; many individual populations have been decimated even further. The culprit is not hard to identify: shark fishing is largely unregulated, particularly in Asian waters. The Chinese, ever-rapacious in their wanton destruction of the planet's resources, have a seemingly insatiable appetite for shark fin soup, and a simarily mystifying obsession with the non-existent medicinal and aphrodisiac properties of sharks. A single whale shark fin can fetch $20,000 on the Chinese market; there are no shortage of fishermen willing to hunt such valuable fish. Perhaps most disgustingly, the Chinese do not eat the rest of the shark, only its fins, and thus millions of sharks are subjected to the gruesome process of "finning": hauled aboard a floating fish processing plant on longlines, the sharks, still very much alive, have their fins sawn off with a hot metal blade before being thrown back into the water to drown.

Yet the plight of sharks is widely ignored, as environmentalists strive to protect more photogenic, ie "cuddly", species, or jump on the bandwagon of Al Gore's crusade against global warming. Within a few years there will be no sharks left, and few will mourn their passing. They will be just one more sad casualty of mankind's relentless destruction of the planet. It's entirely possible I will never be lucky enough to see hammerheads again. In which case, at least I will always have the memory of the sharks of Sanganeb; I have absolutely no doubt that the next generation of divers will not be so fortunate.

The Dervish Hordes of Omdurman

The drums beat louder and louder, the intoxicating rhythmn quickening. The setting sun casts a golden light across the scene, and the unmistakable aroma of marijuana drifts through the dusk air. A brightly-dressed man in yellow robes marches gaily around the edge of the circle wafting clouds of incense from a brazier swinging aily by his side. Hundreds of voices cry out in unison, singing the first line of the shahada, the Muslim declaration of faith, "la illaha ila-llah, la illaha ila-llah, la illaha ila-llah, la illaha ila-llah". There is no god but Allah, there is no god but Allah. Everyone dances wildly, limbs flailing, heads thrown back, dreadlocks swinging. The chanting continues incessantly, "la illaha ila-llah, la illaha ila-llah". Even my feet are twitching now, as everyone in the crowd begins to sway in time to the music. A man breaks out of the circle and dances into the centre. Suddenly he is up on one leg, spinning manically, all the while chanting. "la illaha ila-llah, la illaha ila-llah". All around me, other dervishes break out of the circle and begin to spin around, chanting, always chanting, lost on their personal path to God.

This is about as far away from most people's image of Islam as it's possible to get, more Woodstock than Wahabi, in many ways closer to an ecstasy-fuelled Shoreditch rave than a veneration of Allah in one of the world's most strictly Muslim countries. Yet Islam it is, and hardly could there be a better example of Sudan's perplexingly contradictory attitude to religion than the Whirling Dervishes.

As has become well-known in the West, and particularly in the UK, in the last few days, Sudan is officially an Islamic republic, with Islamic Sharia - "street" - Law in operation, at least in the Arab north of the country. Indeed, prior to his now infamous sojurn in Taliban-controlled Afganistan, a certain well-known Saudi construction magnate and outspoken religious cleric spent five years resident in Sudan in the mid-1990s, departing only after intense American pressure forced the Khartoum government to expel him. From what I can discern, Sheikh bin Laden is a hero to the majority of Sudanese, as much for his unpublicised (in the West) philanthropy as his better known slaying of infidels. Most of the tarmac highways in Sudan (of which there are not many) were financed and built by Osama and his construction firm, as was the Port Sudan International Airport.

Yet perversely, bin Laden's strict Saudi Wahabi interpretation of Islam would be anathema to the Sudanese, who tend towards the much more laidback, mystical, Sufi strain of the religion, and incorporate many traditional tribal beliefs and practises into their faith. Such "un-Islamic" ideas as witchdoctors, exorcisms, and saints are apparently common in Sudanese Islam, while women openly converse or shake hands with unknown men (including strange white men with backpacks) without apparent fear of reprisal. Amazingly many Sudanese love having their picture taken, and unsolicited offers of pictures to unwary travellers are common. Local children in particular are often openly enraged at polite refusals - unable to believe that a khawaja (an affectionate term roughly equivalent to the Spanish "gringo" or the Thai "farang") could possibly ever venture outside without a camera. Most perversely of all, at least in the eyes of orthodox Islam, the Sudanese are apparently rather partial to alcohol, and despite the strict ban on the importation and sale of booze, homemade moonshine is apparently a big hit with locals, particularly in rural areas. (Suffice to say I have not tried it myself - a Spanish traveller I met who had, assured me that he was lucky to escape with his life. He was talking about the hangover, but the consequences of being caught don't really bare thinking about. Being arrested once in Sudan was careless, twice would surely be foolish.)

But as the unfortunate Gillian Gibbons and her teddy bear "Mo Mo" have found out this week, despite all the eccentricities of Sudanese Islam, it is after all a very important part of life here. Perhaps more so than any other Muslim country I have visited, Islam is a very public facet of Sudanese society. Walk along any street or sit in any hotel at one of the five allotted prayer times each day and there are countless hundreds of Sudanese, uniformly clad in their mostly immaculate white robes and skullcaps, kneeling on a mat or carpet in supplication to Allah, quietly muttering the shahada to themselves. This can pose a few logistical problems for the unbeliever, as it is supposedly considered very bad form to walk in front of a praying Muslim. No problem when said devotee is kneeling on the pavement of a wide street, but it is a different story when he is blocking the door of your hotel room, from which you need to exit at some speed in order to reach the bathroom down the corridor to deal with what you fear may in fact be a new and virulent strain of cholera. Allah apparently took pity on my pathetic state and has, as yet, neglected to smite me for the rather ungainly manner in which I hurdled two of his faithful on my way to the disgusting hole in the ground which doubles for a bathroom in the "Namarg" Hotel in Wad Medani earlier this week. Happily his mercy has also extended to granting me a reprieve from the more unpleasant symptoms of my mysterious stomach ailment. Allahu Akbar!

As I watched the dervishes twirling and whirling, my thoughts drifted back through time, and came to rest in roughly the same location a century or so earlier, with the brave men of the British Army who faced down a force of some forty thousand "dervish" devotees of the Sudanese Caliphate at the infamous Battle of Omdurman in 1898. Despite their vastly superior numbers, and their absolutely fervent belief in the power of Allah to bring victory, the dervish army were massacred in their thousands by the well-trained and crucially well-equipped forces. The Sudanese were a formidable foe: 15 years previously their fearless infantry charges had defeated the British and allowed the Mahdi - the self-appointed Islamic Messiah - to expel the anglo-Egyptian rulers of Sudan and famously to murder the Governor General, Charles "Chinese" Gordon in Khartoum. So impressed was Rudyard Kipling by the heroism of the Sudanese warrior-mystics, he eulogised them in his poem "Fuzzie Wuzzy". His admiring description, "You're a pore benighted 'eathen but a first-class fightin' man" might appear grimly familiar to modern British soldiers fighting Muslim foes in Afghanistan and Iraq.

After the performance had finished, I was approached by an array of curious locals, with whom I sat and drank tea. Some were Arab Muslims, some were not (the ethnically African south of Sudan is overwhelmingly Christian and/or Animist in its beliefs), but inevitably given our surroundings, the conversation eventually turned to religion. While the majority were simply curious about "Christian" ways (like most westerners in Muslim countries, when asked I pretend to be Christian, the concept of atheism not being well understood or well-regarded), it soon became apparent that one had a more sinister agenda, and he quickly began trying to back me into a corner. Despite my attempts at evasive diplomacy, the questions were relentless.

"What do you think of Islam?"

"Do you know that if you convert to Islam you will go to Paradise - if you don't you'll go to hell?"

"Why do Christians not believe in the Prophet Mohammed, Allah praise him?"

"Why do Christians allow their women to whore themselves?"

"Why do Christians...?

And so on and so forth. At this point I was getting a little flustered. Luckily, my audience shared my discomfort, and rounded on the interrogator angrily. Such was the vehemence with which he was condemned, my would be saviour slunk off into the night. The remaining Sudanese were appalled at this extremism, and clearly ashamed at the implied insults to a visitor in their country, and what's more to what Muslims call "people of the Book" - Christians and Jews. The apologies were sincere and profuse, and typical of the relaxed attitude to religion I have overwhelmingly found in Sudan. I finish with a quote from the Bradt Guide to Sudan, by Paul Clammer:

"More than just a religion, Islam is a social code that presents a specific way in which society should be run. As such, visitors have a particular responsibility to behave in a manner that's sensitive to local traditions, although the Sudanese are very tolerant and foreigners are usually forgiven for minor cultural gaffes."

Just be careful what you call your teddy bear.

Sudan: Pyramids, Permits, Porridge

The police officer grabs my arm roughly and tries to drag me behind him. Being Arab, rather than African, he's extremely short in stature and I tower over him. I resist. He shouts roughly in Arabic - I don't catch the exact meaning, but the sense is clear. He squeezes my arm tighter, so tight I can feel his nails digging in and drawing blood. For a second I consider smashing his face with my fist - perhaps wisely, I restrain myself. He pulls himself up to his full height, around 5 foot 5, and brings his face very close to mine. I mime as if to bite his nose, and he backs off, cowering in fear. "Inta mejnoon, inta mejnoon", he shouts in Arabic - "You are crazy, you are crazy", and unmistakably mimes a handcuffing maneouvre. My German travelling companions, Peter and Tariq, laugh contemptuously at him. "There's nothing he can do, we have done nothing wrong", says Peter, grinning. For all my external bravado I don't quite share his optimism, in fact I feel quite frightened. We are, after all, under arrest in Sudan.

Ah, Sudan. In his epic account of the British reconquest of the Sudan in 1898, With Kitchener to Khartoum, the Victorian journalist G.W. Steevens memorably described the country as "a God-accursed wilderness, an empty limbo of torment for ever and ever". The ancient Egyptians knew it simply as "Kush" - "the wretched"; both are descriptions with which I have more than a little sympathy. In many ways Sudan is exactly as might be expected: very big, very hot, very dusty, and very poor. The roads are awful. The hotels are awful. The food is awful. The bureaucracy is simply staggering. Barring a few broken down pyramids scattered across the desert, there isn't even much in the way of things to see. And yet...

When locals engage travellers in conversation, which they do with an incredible regularity, one of the first questions they ask is invariably, "why are you here?". This is usually followed by a verbatim regurgitation of the country's well-publicised ills: poverty, war, government-sponsored genocide, famine and the like. The question is quite a difficult one to answer - and one I have asked myself regularly in the last ten days, usually following a muttered exhortation of "fucking Sudan".

Yet Sudan is charming. It might take ten hours to travel 100 miles, it might be impossible to eat anything except felafel and laughing cow cheese, and it might need two hours a day just to negotiate the bureaucratic jungle of travel permits, photo permits, security registration, and army checkpoints, but... Sudan is like a woman who plays hard to get. Coquettish, manipulative, evasive, sometimes downright unpleasant, but every so often, just as all patience is finally being exhausted, she does something so beautiful, alluring, and beguiling that she reels you right back in again.

And so it proved with the saga of my arrest in the exquisitely-named town of "Dongola". The town itself sits on the west bank of the Nile, while its bus station is on the east; the two are linked by a small ferry. Upon arrival at the bus station the previous day, I had simply boarded the waiting ferry and crossed. After a couple of hours jumping through hoops at the town's security office, I had the requisite permits to stay in town, and was able to check in to a hotel and go about my business unmolested. Leaving, however, was a different story. A jumped-up little man with a moustache (why do third world government officials always have a moustache?) demanded a permit. Sensing a scam - aside from the previous day's successful ferry crossing without any such permit, he wore no uniform and carried no identification - I ignored him and boarded the ferry.

Enter another jumped-up little man with a moustache, a hugely umpleasant-looking growth on his cheek, and the light blue uniform of the Sudanese police. I was in no mood to cooperate with him, and his aggressive demeanour and physical man-handling did not help matters. Upon reaching the east bank of the Nile we were hauled off to a nearby police station, harangued in Arabic (which for once I made great theatre of not speaking a single word of) and intimidated by a very public production of handcuffs and a tour of the cells - all the while my assailant bristling with indignation in the margins, strange growth quivering with unrestrained outrage.

Finally an English speaker was produced. This man was not an official, merely a bystander from the nearby market who has been commandeered to act as an interpreter. In full earshot of the assembled police and army officers, who, unusually for heavily anglophone Sudan, did not understand a word, he offered reassurances.

"I am sorry you have been treated like this. You see what we must deal with from our government? You must have a permit to cross the Nile - without it you cannot board the ferry. If you do not argue, accept the permit, you will be released. If you do not, they will keep you here. This will be bad for you I think."

Despite the fact that this would indeed be "bad for you", my German companions and I were not to be placated so easily, however.

"But yesterday we crossed the Nile on this exact fucking ferry, without a permit. So what the fuck are you talking about?"

"Ah but that was crossing east to west. For this you need no permit. Crossing west to east is a different story. For this you must have permit. I am sorry. You must wait here, the man with the permits will come from the office in Dongola, and you will go with him back to the office, to get a permit."

The man duly arrived, half an hour later, permits in hand. Could he not just issue the permit there and then, to save us two more crossings of the river, one with permit, one without? Of course not. That would be unforgivable. We must accompany him back to his office forthwith. Peter, who has not been to Venezuela, took his turn to vent his feelings of disgust at Sudan's Monty Pythonesque bureaucracy:

"This is the worst country I have ever been to. This is just ridiculous. We will return to Europe and tell everyone how terrible Sudan is and no-one else will come here. Why do you victimise us like this?"

Our interpreter just smiled sadly and shrugged.

"This is the Sudanese government, not the Sudanese people"

An hour later, permits in hand, and fresh from a lecture from the chief of police about the extreme danger of crossing the Nile from west to east without a permit (presumably he was not referring to the likelihood of assault by his officers, though that appeared the only remotely dangerous aspect of the crossing to me), we approached the ferry ticket office, muttering curses on Sudan and all its ridiculousness. Our interpretor appeared from nowhere, and in a stroke reminded us of what's so great about this country.

"I am so sorry for what has happened. I have bought your ferry tickets for you. Please do not think badly about Sudan and its people."

How could I disagree?

Into Africa

Every once in a while, perhaps every couple of years or so, somewhere in the world, in a far-off country populated by brown people about whom we in the west care very little, a grossly overloaded passenger vessel sinks, with huge and tragic loss of life. Amid much local wailing and gnashing of teeth, western journalists begin the tut-tutting and condascension, while we voyeuristic viewers revel in the horror. "Surely there couldn't really have been 7,000 people on that decrepit little boat?", we sigh, aghast. "What kind of fool would ever board such a ship?"

Make no mistake, one of these days such a fate will halt the Aswan to Wadi Halfa ferry across Lake Nasser. Thankfully, however, no such tragedy befell the creaking vessel last Monday, when I was aboard for the 20 hour cruise from Egypt to Sudan.

The number of people on board, and the amount of personal cargo they bring with them, is simply staggering. Sleeping on the top deck, under the stars,I had expected to be largely alone. Crucially, I found a spot next to the lifeboats, "just in case". After all, surely everyone else would be in their first class cabins,or in the second class seating area below decks? Wrong. There is not a single square inch of floor space that is not occupied by tired limbs, Sudanese or Egyptian, or a random assortment of cargo. As well as personal effects, a bewildering array of import-export merchandise appears to be making the cross-border journey: televisions, mobile phone accessories, fruit and vegetables, bedding, women's underwear, ballpoint pens; all of it unceremoniously piled high on deck. Even my clever worst-case scenario planning lies in tatters: were the ship to start sinking, even those people currently situated within five feet of the lifeboats would render them fatally overcrowded; god knows what would happen to the cast of thousands marooned below decks.

As night falls and the sky reveals a shimmering blanket of stars, the crowds stretch out and try to find sleep. There is no time for squeamishness or qualms about personal space; everyone bunks down together in extreme proximity. All manner of bodily functions occur all around me, with a noxious array of odours and excretions filling the night air. Pleasant it is not.

Just as I dose off, I am rudely awoken by one of the few other khawajas -Sudanese Arabic for "foreigners"or "white man" - on board, as it seems the powers that be require our passports for immediate processing. As I am the only one of the ten or so khawajas to speak any Arabic whatsoever, I have been nominated to act as interpreter. I reluctantly make my way around the upper deck to each group of travellers, picking my way clumsily through the knots of slumbering bodies on the floor, tripping over some, standing on others, until I have collected all the necessary passports. I am then led back across the ship, this time taking the direct route along a pipe on the outer edge of the top deck. The pipe sways unsteadily under my weight, and as I peer down into the dark waters of Lake Nasser, it occurs to me that should I fall, no-one will hear my screams above the roar of the engines as I drown. Worse still, nine other khawajas will face an even more unpleasant fate, as devoid of passports and visas, they too are swallowed up by the murky depths of Sudanese bureaucracy.

Despite my unease with heights, I try not to look down, focus on the other side, and eventually make it across without a hitch. For the second time in two days I feel that rush of gratitude to God, Allah, Buddha, or Fate - whichever higher power - or more likely blind chance - has kept me alive. For yesterday I was involved in a terrifying bus crash at close to 100mph. Our lunatic driver, doing 160kph while sitting less than 2 metres behind the vehicle in front, actually saved our lives with his sheer idiocy and incompetence: had he seen the small car sized container come cartwheeling off the pickup truck flying past in the opposite direction and swerved, I would undoubtedly have come to a sticky end on the Aswan-Abu Simbel desert highway. As it was, he never flinched and just drove straight through the bouncing pallet, obliterating the container and most of the front end of our minibus in the process.

Sitting just behind the hapless chauffeur, I saw the whole thing unfold in slow motion; for a couple of seconds time seemed to stand still as I struggled to comprehend what was happening. As a couple of girls behind me screamed, I had time to notice the confused look on the driver's face as a huge box cannoned off the windscreen. Amazingly the glass didn't shatter, though I have no idea how, and we were able to slow to a standstill as people around me by turns sobbed, cursed, and laughed nervously. Never one to pass up the opportunity to practise my linguistic skills, I mustered a few choice insults in Arabic for the benefit of the moronic driver who had just nearly killed us all. In the circumstances I wasn't really satisfied with "donkey"; luckily a corpulent Kiwi sitting just behind me spoke for the whole bus with a tirade of agricultural anglo-Saxon, delivered in a peculiarly amusing Auckland accent.

Upon repeating this grim tale to one of my fellow passengers on the ferry, a 73 year old Hungarian-Swiss dentist from Zurich, (who incidentally bore an uncanny resemblance to an aging Robert Redford), I was treated to a similar tale from his first trip to the Dark Continent in 1962, a journey he is now retracing as a sprightly septegenarian grandfather. Studying dentistry by day, he drove a taxi ay night to raise enough money to fund his course, and also to buy a one way flight to Nairobi, from where he intended to hitch-hike all the way back to Europe. His duffel bag stuffed with cheap canned foods and old clothes, he set off across East Africa from Kenya's notorious capital. To his evident horror, still palpable 45 years later, his very first ride caught fire, incinerating all his belongings, and forcing him to hurl himself into the road from the fast-moving inferno. Bruised, battered, penniless and not a little demoralised, he picked himself up, dusted himself down, and continued regardless.

He laughs about it now, and it certainly makes for a great story, even half a century later. Perhaps in time I'll feel the same way about the Egyptian bus crash and walking the plank on the overloaded Sudanese ferry. Just not yet.

Sahara

I sit on the crest of a giant hill, watching the far-off orange disk of the sun sink below the horizon. As far as the eye can see, in every direction, is nothing but the purest white sand imaginable, formed into huge undulating dunes like the roiling surface of the ocean. Once again I experience the eerie silence of the desert. Aside from our trusty Toyota Landcruiser, not a single sign of life is visible. This is the largest expanse of sand on earth: 2.8 million square kilometres of vast, desolate emptiness. The ancient Egyptians knew it simply as deshret, or "red land". The Arabs call it Sahara. We use both names: this is the Sahara Desert.

It's perhaps fitting that the generic Arabic word for desert, "Sahara", has come to refer in English specifically to the great desert that spans the width of north Africa. As the British explorer Ralph Bagnold observed in Libyan Sands, the Sahara, and particularly the Egyptian Sahara, is the greatest expanse of desert on the planet: "There are deserts and there are deserts. But the Western Desert, a vast expanse that starts at the western banks of the Nile and continues well into Libya is the desert of deserts."

Like the visceral fear that gripped me as I flew over the endless expanse of green of the Amazon, I find the sheer scale of the Sahara queasily un-nerving. It's disconcerting enough to be unable to see anything beyond the endless repetitious dunes in all directions, but the knowledge that in some directions the landscape continues in this vein for a thousand miles is truly terrifying. I don't stray far from the Landcruiser driven by our affable Berber guide, Ibrahim; though the way he pilots the vehicle up and down seemingly sheer walls of sand does little for my nerves. He laughs at his passengers' obvious concern, and with a couple of silent prayers to Allah we're off again, careering across the sand at an improbable angle, trying to build up sufficient speed to mount the crest of the next vertical dune. I'm starting to understand why it's called the Great Sand Sea, as it's all rather reminiscent of The Perfect Storm, though with sand instead of water, and a grinning nomad in a keffiyeh in place of George Clooney.

I visited the Great Sand Sea from the small oasis town of Siwa, close to Egypt's western border with Libya. Despite its incredibly remote location, Siwa has an ancient history dating back to Pharaonic times, when it was famed as the site of the omniscient Oracle of Amun. After invading Egypt in 525BC, the Persian king Cambyses sent an army 50,000 strong to take Siwa and destroy the Oracle, which had - presciently as it turned out - predicted his imminent demise; in a mystery which endures to the present day, the entire force was simply swallowed up by the vast emptiness of the desert and never heard from again. Following his own conquest of Egypt in 332BC, the legendary Macedonian General Alexander the Great made a personal pilgrimage to Siwa, where he was acclaimed by the local priests as the son of a god. In this respect Alexander was a little more successful than a certain Jesus of Nazareth; unlike the rest of the country, Christianity never reached this remote corner of Egypt. Though it did eventually fall to Islam, Siwa's remoteness ensured its unique culture, religion and language endured.

In many respects Siwa is more akin to Libya than Egypt: the people here are Berbers rather than Arabs, and while most locals speak at least some Arabic (certainly more than me), the Berber dialect of Siwi is still very much the lingua franca. Such is Siwa's remoteness in fact, the oasis was only connected to the rest of Egypt by road in the mid-1980s. In many respects Siwa's isolation allows it to exist in a timewarp of mudbrick houses, donkey carts, and candlelight; a display about local culture in the Tourist Office features the immortal phrase: "before the coming of television in 1988".

Siwa is very much an African, rather than Egyptian town, with a grinding poverty the like of which I can scarcely recall seeing before. Although I have now returned, briefly, to Cairo and the Middle East, my sojourn in Siwa very much set the tone for the rest of my journey: I depart tonight by sleeper train to Aswan, from where I will sail across Lake Nasser, bound for Africa. The Sudan.

Moses, Mohammed & The Mother of the World

"It's always the same in Egypt isn't it? Always baksheesh? It's not like this in other Arab countries - Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine - only in Egypt. I think perhaps there must be some problem with the people here - why are they like this? Perhaps they are keffirs?"

The massed ranks of the black berets, white uniforms, and starched moustaches of the "Egyptian Tourist and Antiquities Police" stare at me in angry disbelief. They are almost as surprised by my tirade in Arabic as I am. By the looks of things I managed to communicate my meaning clearly enough, though I'm beginning to think that accusing these officers of being keffirs - unbelievers - was perhaps a bit much. It's easy to detect a devout Muslim in Egypt; the purple-black bruising on their foreheads attests to some committed and regular time kneeling on a prayer mat. Still, I'm pretty sure that these officials are trying to steal from me, and going by the Book (all three Books in fact) at least, that would make them unbelievers. "Thou shalt not steal". (Exodus 20:15)

The towering rocky outcrop of Mount Sinai, believed to be the site at which Moses received the Ten Commandments from God, has long been a destination of pilgrimage - for Jews, Muslims and Christians - from all over the world. Now, however, the vast majority of pilgrims are of a distinctly secular bent. With charter flights from all corners of Europe and ludicrously cheap all-inclusive hotel deals, the Sinai Peninsula has become a veritable Mecca for the sort of tourists that generally make me shudder. In opting to climb Sinai at sunset, instead of sunrise, I was hoping to miss out not only on grotesquely half-naked gargoyles from Eastern Europe, but also the kind of sleazy local rip-off merchants who habitually follow them. Now, however, it seemed I would be thwarted by the mustachioed dimwits of the Egyptian Tourist Police, who insisted I hire a "Bedu guide" for 50 Egyptian Pounds. Given the state of some of the large blubbery mammals staggering out of the gates after successfully completing the climb, I was highly sceptical about my need to be accompanied, particularly by a walking cliche machine who would doubtless try to foist upon me any number of stuffed camels, "traditional" jewellery, and other such tat, all at "special prices". So I protested some more.

"Look, he's clearly not a fucking Bedu, and I don't need a fucking guide. Just let us go."

While Arabic is undoubtedly a beautiful, expressive, poetic language, some things are just better said in good old-fashioned Anglo-Saxon. Unfortunately this did little to calm the situation. At this point reason, in the form of a nice young Australian girl with whom I have a, shall we say, "passing acquaintance", stepped in.

"James, this really isn't helping matters, and it is only five quid after all..."

I demurred, and off we walked, our by now very frightened Bedu guide Mohammed keeping a safe distance ahead, and casting the odd furtive glance back to check he wasn't in mortal danger. Of course he was an authentic Bedu, about as authentic as it gets in fact, and a thoroughly nice bloke too. For four hours I had a free Arabic conversation partner with whom I could discuss the three topics closest to every man's heart, namely politics, sex, and football (possibly not in that order). Upon reaching the summit we found it blissfully free of Lithuanian bodybuilders, beach towel-toting Germans and alcoholic Brits, with only the slightly deranged hymn-singing of a group of French Christians to disturb the spiritual peace.

Down at sea level, it was a different story. Sinai is a veritable paradise for hotel developers, and hell on earth for anyone with a backpack. While the tourists are distasteful, many of the locals are just appalling. I can quite understand the negativity of anyone whose opinion of Egyptians, and Arabs in general, is based on experiencing the awful hassle prevalent in the Sinai Peninsula. Since my first visit to Cairo eighteen months ago, I have fought a largely unsuccessful battle to persuade friends, family and colleagues of the inherent friendliness and hospitality of the Egyptian people. After visiting Nuweiba, Dahab, and Mount Sinai - which together with the abominable Sharm el Sheikh is the extent of most people's experience of Egypt - I can understand why people are so reluctant to believe me. Indeed, I even began to doubt myself. Could Cairo live up to my rose-tinted recollections of drinking tea and smoking sheesha in scenic backstreets with charming, friendly and unfailingly hospitable locals?

The answer is equivocal. While the hassle factor around the heavily-visited Pyramids, Egyptian Museum and Khan al-Khalili Bazaar is undeniably immense, away from the tourist traps the "Mother of the World", as Cairo is known here, is still a wonderful wonderful place. The overcrowding is chronic: 20 million people living in what is, in parts, the most densely-populated area on Earth, and the pollution is appalling: at this time of year especially the city is shrouded in a dense brown carpet of smog. The traffic is simply incredible: crossing the road in Cairo is an adrenaline sport to match anything I have ever experienced: bull-running, skydiving, swimming with sharks, none can come close to the terror of stepping into the streets of Egypt's capital.

Yet for all its undoubted faults, the "Arab Manhattan" (as one Australian I know referred to it) still has some incredible sights, a magical atmosphere, and some of the friendliest people I've encountered anywhere. For all the glory of its museums, ancient mosques and Pharaonic monuments, my abiding memory of Cairo will always be the side of the city that the hotpant-wearing, camel-toe showing package tourists never witness [for pictures of Russian girl with camel toe outside Egyptian Museum, click link to "Egypt" photos above right]. Sitting in a sidestreet drinking tea and smoking sheesha, the gentle bubbling of the waterpipe and the staccato clatter of dominoes competing with the cacophanous soundtrack of car engines, never-ending horns, and the sound of twenty million people taking time out from their daily lives to practise the only English they know: "Hello. Welcome."

The Sound of Silence

I sit in a Bedu tent, made of goatskin and old sacks, drinking tea. As the sun sets, the desert air cools rapidly, and we huddle closer to the camp fire. The wind howls, our resting camels low softly in the distance, but otherwise there is only silence. Despite my limited Arabic, and the limited English of my guide, Suleiman, I chat with our hosts in their immaculate white robes and red and white chequered headdresses. Their questions are endearingly naive.

"Are there Bedu in your country? Deserts? Trees? Birds?"

Each answer is considered carefully, as if it were the sage advice of a prophet, rather than the observations of a slightly scruffy backpacker. Then the line of questioning switches from my far off exotic homeland to my suddenly not-so- personal life. How long am I travelling for? Where is my wife? How many children do I have? With the aid of Suleiman, who as a guide has been exposed to Westerners before and obviously knows a little of their strange ways, I explain that I am unmarried, that in the West people tend to marry later, that I have no children. This is greeted with sceptical laughter.

But what of, ahem, sex? Suleiman and I explain about the concept of girlfriends, dating, pre-marital sex. My audience sits in stunned silence. It's clear that despite their mobile phones and pickup trucks, their exposure to Western culture has been exceedingly limited. They look at me as if I had just told them I'd been to the moon. (As that particular heavenly body illuminates the sand, I briefly consider telling them about Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin. After some reflection I decide not to - I fear my credibility would evaporate instantly). Slowly a sly grin creeps across the faces of the younger ones as the implications of sex before marriage become apparent. I feel guilty. As they trudge piously away from the fire to pray, I feel a bit like the serpent in the Garden of Eden.

As Suleiman - he does not pray - and I sit in silent contemplation of the odd exchange in which we just participated, an ancient radio set hums quietly. I cannot understand the dialogue from the chat programme, but the music is familiar enough. As if to emphasise the surrealness of the situation, the unmistakable saxophone notes of Kenny G drift across the sands. I cannot contain my laughter. Dinner is served in traditional style. A communal bowl of sticky rice into which we all dip our (right) hands, fashioning a handful of rice into a congealed ball with the fingertips, before gracefully consuming without a hint of spillage. At least that's what the Bedu do; in no time at all I closely resemble an autistic five year old let loose on a rice pudding, with a sticky mess all over my face, hand, and lap. Everyone politely pretends not to notice.

I had long hoped to meet some "non-Westernised" Bedu, and here, in the red desert of southern Jordan, I found them. Suleiman and I had travelled alone, by camel, for two days to reach them. Wadi Rum is not particularly remote and many toursits visit every day. Yet the overwhelming majority do so by 4 wheel drive; early on our first morning we saw literally dozens of them roaring past us, slowing down briefly to take photos of the two eccentrics riding fully laden camels, now in the 21st Century. Part of me wished I was wearing Bedu robes instead of khaki trousers for the full Lawrence of Arabia effect.

Once they had screeched past us in some crazy catch-me-if-you-can race from sight to sight, Suleiman and I settled down to the gentle rhythm of travel by camel. We spoke little, often sharing no more than a couple of words for hours. Suleiman confided in me that he only travels in the desert by camel - he hates large groups of people and goes to the desert in search of silence and solitude. And, oh, what silence there is to be found in the desert. On our first night, having not seen another soul for the best part of six hours, we made camp in the shade of some giant red boulders. After unsaddling the camels and collecting firewood, I scrambled up the rocks to get a better view of the fast-approaching sunset while Suleiman set about preparing dinner. As the sun sank lower in the sky, the already vivid colours of the desert were tinged first orange, then red, and finally purple. Darkness came quickly, and soon an impressive canopy of stars illuminated the cloudless night sky

After a simple enough dinner of rice, potatoes, and bread (Dr Atkins would clearly not approve of Bedu living), washed down with gallons of sweet black tea, we settled in for the evening. As I lay in my sleeping bag on a mattress of desert sand I stared up at the sky and listened to the deafening, echoing silence of the night. As a habitual city-dweller I had always imagined that the phrase "the sound of silence" was a product of Simon and Garfunkel's drug-addled minds; a function of LSD or pot, or coke or whatever else long-haired types with guitars were dropping, smoking or snorting back in the Sixties. Yet at Wadi Rum I finally registered what they were talking about. Granted, it could perhaps have been something to do with the the thick clouds of distinctly "herbal" smoke drifting from the quietly grinning Suleiman, but I like to think it was something more profound.

Of course, the pursuit of silence, solitude and the elusive Bedu were not my only motivations in trekking from Rum to Aqaba by camel. T.E. Lawrence, the enigmatic, almost mythical figure immortalised in David Lean's epic film, Lawrence of Arabia, famously made the same journey in 1917. Unlike Lawrence I was not accompanied into town by a legion of irregular Arab cavalry; nor did I in fact arrive in Aqaba on my trusty humped steed, instead hitch-hiking the last few kilometres into town in the flatbed of a pickup truck driven by a pious family heading home to Saudi Arabia. Yet in some small way I liked to think of myself as following in Lawrence's footsteps.

One of the most enigmatic and most-romaticised figures in modern history, "El Awrens" as he was know in Arabic, made his name by living with the Bedu, speaking their language, adopting their customs, wearing their clothes. By virtue of his acceptance by the Arab leaders, Lawrence was able to assist, advise or lead (depending on who you ask) the Arab Revolt against Ottoman Turkish rule during the First World War, securing a legendary reputation for himself, and in the process doing a great deal to ensure an Allied victory over the Axis Powers of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Ottoman Turkey. Lawrence's promises of Arab independence, subsequently broken by the Allied governments at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 (much to Lawrence's disgust), still haunt the Middle East today as the artificially-constructed states of Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, Palestine, Syria and Lebanon, struggle to maintain their existence.

More than once the Bedu remind me of the total artificiality of the national borders in this region, replying with a shrug when I asked where they are from. "Some call it Saudia, some call it Jordan. We call it the desert." Theirs is a tough existence, eked out from some of the harshest conditions on earth; indeed, T.E. Lawrence famously called it "a death in life". Yet as I lay down in the sand, gazed up to the heavens, and listened once more to the awesome, deafening roar of total uninterrupted silence, I found myself starting to dread the return to civilisation. As the great desert explorer Wilfred Thesiger wrote in Arabian Sands: "No man can live this life and emerge unchanged. He will carry, however faint, the imprint of the desert, the brand which marks the nomad; and he will have within him the yearning to return, weak or insistent according to his nature. For this cruel land can cast a spell which no temperate clime can match." I know what he meant.

Roses Are Red

It's often said that prostitution is the oldest profession in the world. While I can't comment on that, after my visit to Petra I can definitely confirm that the art of striptease has a venerable pedigree indeed.

As you saunter down the Siq, the two and a half kilometre long narrow canyon that leads to the ancient rose red Nabatean city, the excitement builds to a new crescendo with each twist and turn. "It's round the next corner, I'm sure", and still, no, no sign of the famous Treasury. And again, "It's round the next corner, I'm sure", and still no. Then, just as bemusement is replacing anticipation, "where can it be?", suddenly there is a glimpse of naked red rock, in the unmistakable form of the left breast of Al Khazneh - the Treasury - familiar from a thousand photos, not to mention the climatic scenes of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. More tantalising glimpses are revealed through the Siq's lacy lingerie, then suddenly you are there, the canyon sheds the last of it's clothing and the canyon opens out to reveal the glory of the Treasury. The Full Monty as it were.

Jordan's number one tourist attraction was recently voted one of the "New Seven Wonders of the World", placing it in such illustrious company as the Taj Mahal, the Coliseum, and Machu Picchu. Of those three, only Machu Picchu can rival Petra for sheer spectacle; while I have not yet visited the others: Chichen Itza, Christ the Redeemer, or the Great Wall of China, I'm not sure any of those sites could come close to the rose red city. For while the Treasury's much- photographed delights capture all the plaudits, the city itself is breathtaking in scale: a vast collection of ruins, the majority directly carved, somewhat improbably, from the series of remote desert canyons and mountains in which Petra is so spectacularly situated.

It would take days to explore the site in its entirety; as well as the size of the place, the heat, the dust, and the steep inclines make it a foreboding place to visit. To avoid the worst of the environment, not to mention the enormous crowds, I made an early start, and was at the Treasury just before 6am. For ten glorious minutes I was totally alone, contemplating the giant facade of columns, urns, and statues in absolute awe. The silence was deafening, eerie; I was alone with the ghosts of the mysterious and long-vanished Nabatean Empire. It was a magical, almost spiritual experience.

And then, the spell was broken. A busload of Slovak tourists arrived, loudly chattering and giggling, reeking of sunscreen, cheap perfume, and the strange canned meats seemingly so beloved of all inhabitants of post-Communist bloc countries. I fled at a brisk pace, actually breaking into a run at one point, and after an hour or so of merely passing contemplation of ruins of such glory as to put the whole of Turkey's wealth of archaeological treasures totally in the shade, eventually reached the Monastery, at Petra's remote northern reaches. Situated high on a bleak mountainside, and blessed with spectacular views over the mountains and desert to Israel in the west, the Monastery is every bit as breath-taking as the Treasury, and that much more special for its relative inaccessibililty to the roaming hordes of tour groups that throng most of Petra each day.

Alas, such is the popularity of the site with travelling halfwits, that Petra is also overrun with "enterprising" locals of the sort who have memorised every tourist pickup line in fourteen different languages. With such gems as "lubbly jubbly" (I say it again, has any Brit, except Del Boy Trotter, ever actually said this phrase?), "Asda price", and "cheap as chips", how could I resist? Resist beating them to death with my dog-eared Lonely Planet, that is.

Still, some poor unfortunates from Mexico fell for the Spanish sales patter, and promptly handed over (I know, because I sat and watched them, in open-mouthed awe) US$150 for a necklace of such staggering tackiness and low grade craftsmanship that it is by now certainly lying forgotten in a wastebin somewhere between Amman and Mexico City. The self-styled "Bedu" (who incidentally have about as much in common with the semi-mythical desert nomads after whom they shamelessly name themselves as I do) could barely contain their mirth at getting away with this outrageous piece of daylight robbery.

The sellers aren't the only ones making a killing at Petra either. The local young men, dark skinned and long-haired, with intense dark brown eyes and exotic-sounding names sit ominously, like vultures, at the edges of the the throngs of sunburned tourists, probing for signs of weakness. And they do not have to probe too hard. I saw numerous young women, some of them attractive, though most heinously fat, ugly, and with a strong suspicion of inbreeding, strolling around in outfits that I would usually classify as underwear. Skimpy underwear at that. Strappy, low cut vests, see through tops, hot pants, skirts so short as to show leopard print thong: all these, and more were on display. People have asked me in the past why so many Arab men regard Western women as whores. The answer is simple. Because by Arab standards, they are. As I watched my second striptease of the day (for the most part, much less aesthetically pleasing than the first I might add), I mused that most of these visitors are whores by Western standards too.

I lingered long after most of the others had left. 12 hours after my first tantalising, breathtaking glimpse of Al Khazneh, I once again walked the quiet, shadowy path through the Siq, glancing back occasionally to catch a last lingering look at the ancient splendour that had so captivated me earlier. It wasn't quite the same. As a number of virile young Bedu would probably be finding out a few hours later, watching women dress is not nearly so exciting as watching them undress. The old lady Petra might be old, and have been around the tracks a bit, but she still hasn't lost her looks, and she puts on one hell of a show.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The last word goes to John William Burgon, whose famous sonnet, "Petra", immortalised the mythical lost city back in 1845:

It seems no work of Man's creative hand,

by labor wrought as wavering fancy plnned;

But from the rock as by magic grown,

eternal, silent, beautiful, alone!

Not virgin-white like that old Doric shrine,

where erst Athena held her rites divine;

Not saintly-grey, like many a minster fane,

that crowns the hill and consecrates the plain;

But rose-red as if the blush of dawn,

that first beheld them were not yet withdrawn;

The hues of yough upon a brow of woe,

which Man deemed old two thousand years ago,

match me such marvel save in Eastern clime,

a rose-red city half as old as time.

Just Another Brick In The Wall

"Okay, get off the bus. NOW!"

So this is what it feels like. The large automatic gun is not pointed at me, per se, but a young finger is most definitely poised on the trigger finger lest I try to make a run for it. While I'm not exactly scared, it's safe to say I'm starting to sweat a little.

I am at the infamous Calandia checkpoint, the only gap in the 8m high brick wall around the West Bank through which it is possible to pass into or out of the Israeli capital, Jerusalem. I knew the young IDF soldier, no more than 20 years old, was looking for trouble the moment he stepped onto the number 18 bus from Ramallah to East Jerusalem. Unfortunately for me, none of the Palestinians on board had provided a suitable pretext for his aggression. I, however, am a prime target, as I do not have an Israeli stamp in my passport.

"Ok, go." He waves the bus off. His colleagues surround me. They look even younger, and yes, even more aggressive than him.

I've seen armed men almost every day since June now: in Colombia, Brazil, Venezuela, Syria, Lebanon; yet none have seemed quite as intimidating as this mob. The South Americans are typically Latin: laidback and friendly. The Syrian army are bored, listless, malnourished and poorly-equipped conscripts; liable to be overrun by a well-trained troop of boy scouts. The Lebanese are well-built, well-equipped, professional soldiers who mean business. The Israelis are a nightmarish combination of brash youthful arrogance and religious zeal. These are God's chosen people, defending their homeland from non-believers. They seem desperate for action, desperate to pull the trigger. While they'd probably prefer to gun down a Palestinian or two, they won't hesitate to execute foreigners, safe in the knowledge that they have legal impunity in the event of any "accidents".

Rachel Corrie, an American aid worker, was run over by a bulldozer in Gaza in 2003. Just to make sure she was dead, the driver reversed back over her already grossly wasted body. Her last words were "my back is broken". British activist Tom Hurndall was gunned down by an Israeli sniper in Gaza in the same year, while shielding children from Israeli gunfire. After nine months in an irreversible coma, his parents turned off his life support machine in January 2004. You could say I'm starting to get nervous.

"Where is your visa?"

"Check the computer system, I have a visa. I came in from Jordan at Allenby Bridge yesterday."

"If you have a visa, where is the stamp?"

"They didn't stamp my passport, they stamped a piece of paper. If they stamp the passport, I will never be able to go to any Arab or Muslim country again."

"Where is the piece of paper?"

"They take the paper off you when you leave the terminal at the border. Check the computer system."

"I don't even know how to check the fucking computer system. Why would they do that? Why would they stamp a piece of paper and not give it to you?"

"I dunno. You're the one that works for the Israeli government."

"Well, you're not coming in without a stamp, I'm sorry, but you're just not."

We have clearly reached an impasse. He is getting more and more annoyed. So am I. He won't budge. Neither will I. He has an M16 and a licence to kill. I have a bag of apples and a devastating array of sarcasm. It's not really a fair fight is it?

"Ok, I guess I'm not coming in then..."

"Yeah, that's just the way it is"

"Ok, no probs. Just one question."

"What?"

"Do you know a good real estate agent in Ramallah?"

"What?"

"Well I need to find an apartment don't I?"

"What?"

"Because if you won't let me through pal, I guess I'm just gonna have to live in Ramallah for the rest of my life aren't I?"

Game over. His colleagues collapse in hysterics. Win the crowd and you've won the argument.

Of course it was funny for me, but for the average Palestinian it's no laughing matter. The Israelis call the giant concrete wall they have constructed around the territories they have illegally occupied (in contravention of numerous UN Security Council Resolutions) since 1967, the "Security Fence". The East German government used the same terminology to describe the wall they built around West Berlin in 1961. Just like that wall, the "Security Fence" divides families and communities, and leaves thousands of people virtual prisoners, trapped in their towns and villages and unable to move around in what, nominally at least, is their own country. For Jerusalem is the transport hub of the West Bank; to travel between Bethlehem and Ramallah by public tranpsort, say, is virtually impossible without changing buses at the Nablus Road terminal in East Jerusalem. The only way for Palestinians to get into Jerusalem is to apply for a permit from the Israeli government. This can take weeks to issue, if indeed it is issued at all. The result is that most residents of the West Bank haven't visited Jerusalem since the new regulations were introduced seven years ago.

Somewhat surprisingly then, walking around the West Bank towns of Ramallah, Jericho, and Bethlehem, the Palestinian people are mostly cheerful, friendly, and hospitable. I drank tea and coffee with them; we chatted about football. They support Manchester United, Arsenal, Liverpool. (Incidentally no-one mentions Chelsea - owned by a Russian Jew and managed by an Israeli, their popularity is probably not at its highest here in occupied Palestine.) These are eminently normal people. They have homes and families, hopes and fears, dreams and nightmares. Yet they are treated like animals. And we in the West ignore their plight at our peril. Make no mistake, the ludicrous oil crusade known by the White House as the "War on Terror", most definitely has its roots here.

At the Allenby Bridge border crossing the previous day, I had waited for close to five hours while the army of young girls that bizarrely form the entirety of the Israeli immigration staff processed my application. My recent visits to Lebanon and Syria, combined with my request to avoid a passport stamp, did not ease my progress. As I waited, I chatted to some of the young Palestinians undergoing a similarly thorough background check. Khalid spoke the best English, but his friendliness was by no means unique. Well-dressed, in designer jeans and fashionable shoes, he was the archetypal modern Arab youth. Yet after exchanging the usual pleasantries, buying me a coffee, and offering me countless cigarettes, he showed me a video on his state of the art Nokia mobile. The content was soberingly familiar from countless news broadcasts. A military funeral, a baying mob carrying a coffin, a photo of a young man in fatigues and a chequered keffiyeh brandishing an AK-47. Khalid's brother was a member of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, shot dead by the IDF.

I looked around me at the hordes of Palestinians waiting patiently to be allowed through the border into their own country. These were a broken people, their spirits extinguished by decades of oppression. The bowed heads, the skulking demeanour, the total acquiescence in the face of overwhelming power; the Palestinians have been crushed by a mighty military and political machine. The Israeli girls, all flirtatious smiles for us Westerners, bark orders at the Palestinian untermensch. The odd unfortunate youth is dragged off for interrogation by sadistically grinning Israeli men. One of Khalid's friends, apparently a member of the Palestinian Authority's Mukhabarat, or secret police, returned silent and shaking from an hour long "interrogation" by Israeli officers. He wouldn't discuss what happened or what was said in the cell. When my turn came to be questioned, in the main hall in full view of everyone, Khalid and his friends laughed at me.

"Today you are Palestinian, like us, terrorist like us".

Khalid made sure the word terrorist was given the sarcastic sneer it deserves. I am no more a terrorist than he is: the only difference between us is that I am free to walk away from this nightmare of checkpoints, soldiers, prison walls. Khalid and the others are still there, still living in this warped world of Israeli colonisation. Perhaps one day Khalid will strap a bomb to his chest and eviscerate himself and countless Israelis on a bus in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem, like his brother apparently intended to. I will see his vaguely familiar face on CNN or the BBC, condemned as "evil", "warped", "a terrorist". I will remember a friendly, charming young man, much like me, except that stripped of his freedom, livelihood, and land by the apartheid regime in Tel Aviv, he feels he has nothing to live for.

I visited many historical and religious sights in Jerusalem: The Dome of the Rock, the Wailing Wall, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the Garden of Gethsemane. Yet I did not visit the Holocaust museum at Yad Vashem. Instead I took my voyeur's curiosity to the West Bank, to view a crime against humanity which is not a part of history, but is taking place now, in 2007. The historical and spiritual significance of the Holy City is undoubtedly a part of the global "clash of civilisations" between Islam and the West: the incredible physical proximity of the Wailing Wall and the Dome of the Rock attests to that. Yet a much bigger part of this new Cold War is the unjust and inhumane subjugation of the Palestinian people by an Israeli government financed by the UK and US.

Just don't say no-one told you.

Love Thy Neighbour

"Sprechen Sie Deutsch?"

Slightly taken aback by this somewhat incongruous opening line, I rack my brains for the remnants of my now long-distant A* at GCSE German.

"Ja, ein bischen. Warum?"
"Bist du Deutsch?"
"Nein, Ich bin Englisch"
"Well why dintcha say so ya Pommie bastard?! Ya don't look like a Pom anyway. Spose that's a good thing right mate?"

At this point, I think I did well not to have a heart attack. Here in a small mountain town in northern Lebanon, I am being (playfully) abused by a fair dinkum Aussie bloke. Life is truly full of surprises.

Fred is Lebanese, born here in Bcharre, but spent 27 years living in Sydney. He speaks English fluently, with a strongly Antipodean accent. It turns out he's by no means alone around here. Bcharre is the stronghold of Christianity in Lebanon, the historic seat of the Maronite sect who have ruled this tiny country for almost all of its short history since independence from the French. When the bloody civil war, initially at least fought on sectarian lines, exploded in 1975, thousands of people from this area fled Down Under. Now, after 17 years of peace, they're back. Indeed, there are so many of them that "G'day mate" seems a more common greeting than the "Salaam aleikum" or "Bonjour" usually heard in Lebanon. There are so many of them in fact, that Bcharre, a small yet staggeringly beautiful town overlooking the Qadisha Valley, even boasts its own "Kangaroo Supermarket".

Fred invites me to walk with him. We stop at the Kangaroo to pick up a chocolate bar.

"I'm diabetic ya see. Must be all them barbecues! Nah mate, let me get it, it's my shout."

We stroll the length and breadth of the town, taking in the spectacular views, munching our Galaxy bars and talking: sport, politics, history. Like almost everyone in this area, Fred is a Christian. His views on his Muslim compatriots, while not as hostile as some I'll encounter today, do not imply a harmonious future for this divided country. The treatment of women, the ascetic eschewal of the good life so beloved of many Lebanese Christians, the huge families: these will become familiar anti-Islamic refrains as I meet the people of the Qadisha Valley.

Yet it is not easy to stereotype these views in one way or another; political and religious feeling here is a complex and multi-faceted phenomenon. Fred is no Christian proselytiser; his condemnation of Islam's inequities is mirrored by a deep distrust of the Church. Despite his own personal faith in God, he disdains organised religion as "brainwashing", and rails against those who would twist peaceful teachings into instruments of war and violence. However, this condemnation of violence, specifically suicide bombers, does not preclude a deep sympathy for the plight of the Palestinians and a visceral hatred of the many iniquities visited on them by the Israeli occupation. Unlike those in the south of Lebanon, for whom Israeli incursions have proved a very painful reality, however, Fred is more sanguine about Lebanon's belligerent neighbour.

"This country has a choice ya see, either we go with the Americans and the British and the Israelis, or we go with the Syrians and the Iranians. It's quite simple really. And I tell you what, I don't like what the Israelis are doing to the Palestinians, and I don't like what the Americans are doing in Iraq, but I know who I'd rather live like."

Fred's relatively pro-Israeli symptahies are by no means unique in this area. He introduces me to a good friend of his, "Ron", who "lost his arm in the War, fighting with Samir Geagea and those boys". In "From The Holy Mountain", author William Dalrymple comments on his sudden realisation that the friendly and hopsitable people he met in Bcharre were doubtless among the perpetrators of the infamous massacres of thousands of Palestinians in the Beirut refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila in 1982. Now I know how he felt: Geagea's Lebanese Forces militia were among those implicated in the Israeli-orchestrated atrocities.

After chatting about his Brazilian wife over a strong sweet coffee in his living room, I left Fred to go explore the major local tourist attraction, the gallery and museum of renowned Lebanese poet, artist and mystic Khalil Gibran. Some 200 surreal paintings later, the naked female form featuring prominently in most, I emerged into the sunlight, and walked back towards the main square to catch the bus to Tripoli, from where I would return to Beirut. I had only gone a few paces, when a car pulled up.

"Bonjour! Ca va? Tu es Francais?"

"Bonjour, ca va bien. Je suis Anglais"

"Ah, English, very good! I'm going to Beirut, you want a ride?"

"Yeah, sure, why not?"

And so I met Pierre, another local Christian, and another member of the Australian connection; his girlfriend, while of Lebanese extraction, hails from Sydney. Despite the distance, he is convinced she is the one for him - she visits a couple of times a year, and speakl for at least four hours a day on the phone. How sweet. Pierre's faith is so devout, he insists on visiting a local shrine before we depart; after much self-crossing and prostration we head off down the mountains. The sign of the cross makes a couple more appearances - each time we pass a Church in fact - but before the fears of kidnap at the hands of an evangelical grow too large, conversation turns to some rather unChristian topics. Had I, for instance, yet visited a "super nightclub" in Beirut? Thinking that BO18 was indeed "super", I replied in the affirmative, whence I quickly discovered that "a super nighclub" is in fact Lebanese code for what we Brits rather less euphemistically call, "a brothel". For a mere US$250 it seems that one can procure the services of a charming Russian or Ukrainian lady for a full six hours, which Pierre assured me would be the best six hours of my life. And to think I'd settled for a retracting roof and loud trance music!

Pierre, however, despite living the good life like any Lebanese Christian, also has a serious side. He works as a "detective" for the Ministry of the Interior, specifically "looking after" prisoners. I don't push for more details, though he does conspirationally share with me the rather dubious statistic that 90% of Lebanese prisoners are Muslims, of which most have committed heinous crimes of rape, murder, secual abuse etc. Of those few Christians currently doing bird in Lebanon, the vast majority are guilty of only "minor things, less than 10 years in jail like". There then follows the familiar invective about mistreatment of women, unrestrained procreation, and predisposition to violence.

Like Fred, Pierre fears for the future. Rather ominously he warns me that "Lebanese Christians are nice people, very friendly and kind, but if you try to fight them, they will never forget, never let you go." As I drink a graciously-offerred free beer, while enjoying a free lift back to Beirut (a journey of some two hours), and reflect on a day of unparallelled, humbling hospitality at the hands of Bcharre's Maronites, I think back to one-armed Ron and the massacres at Sabra and Shatila. If it comes to war - and after the Presidential election in a few weeks it just might - the Christians of Lebanon will not shirk a fight.

You couldn't hope to meet nicer people anywhere. But you wouldn't want to cross them.

Beirut: Bombers, Beers, BO18

"Oh my God, it was scary down there man, there were bombs going off, bullets flying, that was some pretty darned crazy shit going down, man!"

The American is sweating, visibly shaken from his daytrip to Baalbek, the fabulous Roman ruins for which Lebanon should, by rights, be famous.

"At Baalbek?", I answer, somewhat incredulous. For while Baalbek does indeed lie deep in the Hizballah heartland of the Bekaa Valley, it's Lebanon's number one tourist attraction, and a most unlikely venue for a show of strength from Hassan Nasrallah's battle-hardened guerillas.

"Yeah man, it was like scary!"

"Today, at Baalbek?"

"Yeah doood, dontcha ya believe me or something?"

"It's not that, it's just I was at Baalbek today. Those were fireworks you heard - for Eid."

I'm afraid to report this conversation really happened, in the foyer of a hostel in Beirut.

Aside from the apparently disappointing (to some) absence of gunfire and shelling, hostile guerilla activity in the Bekaa is all-too evident. The fearsome souvenir salesmen outside the entrance to Baalbek are truly a force to be reckoned with. Perhaps if Israeli PM Ehud Olmert had visited for himself, he might have thought twice about attacking a force clearly so doggedly persistent and determined as Hizballah. I personally escaped with only one Hizballah t-shirt; others were not so lucky. All manner of flags, caps, posters and the like are on offer, all in the tasteful shade of yellow with which the "Party of God" advertises its services to the world. I will certainly never wear that t-shirt outside the house, but personally I think it's a small price to pay for having escaped with my life from the gunfire, shelling, and bombing at Baalbek that day. Erm...

There is a great irony, of course, in an ascetic Shi'ite Muslim sect basing themselves, and their souvenir sales, outside the Temple of Bacchus, famed as the God of wine. The ruins of Baalbek are so spectacular and so exquisitely preserved it's really not difficult to imagine oneself surrounded by concubines, engaged in some Bacchanalian hedonism of the sort so abhorred by the "great" monotheistic religions (what's great about them I'm really not sure, but anyway).

For those whose powers of historical imagination don't extend to drunken orgies in honour of Roman gods, Beirut provides plenty of opportunities for nocturnal enjoyment. In fact I'd venture to say it has the best nightlife in the world. Yes, even better than Bogota. Though much of my weekend in Beirut remains little more than a slightly hazy recollection, a few memories endure. The Lebanese reaction to flaming sambucas was priceless, as was the awed response of a couple of English teachers who currently reside in Irbil, northern Iraq. These people may have endured war, terrorism, invasion and the like, but clearly nothing had prepared them for the sight of two drunk blokes from Leeds setting fire to alcohol in their mouths. From now on I think I shall call my party trick, "Shock and Awe".

Yet while John and I may have surprised the locals with a little sleight of hand and tolerance for flames, Beirut had the last laugh. Around 3am, I strolled back from the bar at BO18, Beirut's most famous nightclub. A fresh breeze wafted across the dancefloor. "Wow, they've turned on the airconditioning" I thought to myself. As I looked around for my friends, I glanced at the ceiling, where much to my surprise I saw a spectacularly realistic projection of stars and clouds. It's difficult to describe my shock when I (finally) realised the roof had been retracted to create a massive open air club, soon to bathe in the warm orange glow of the sun rising over Beirut, beautiful people (and nowhere can people be so beautiful as Lebanon) moving to the beats as a sonic wall of trance music enveloped the club and the streets above.

It was a very long night. As we sat recovering in a cafe on the beautiful Place d'Etoile in Downtown Beirut, surrounded families sitting enjoying the Sunday afternoon sunlight, children playing happily in the pedestrianised square, the British government's advice to avoid "all but essential travel" to Lebanon seemed patently absurd. But wait, what's that? Suddenly a rocket hurtled from the sky into a table at the next restaurant. Two more followed in quick succession. Then more. They were raining down from the sky. Everyone burst out laughing. They were children's toys, made of foam.

Rocket fire in the main square. Just another day in wartorn Lebanon.

Lost...

I wake with a start as the bus halts suddenly. "Where am I? Shit, I think I missed my stop. There's a tank pointing at me. What the hell?"

I've fallen asleep on buses before of course.

When I'm incredibly drunk, a kind of reflexive self-preservation instinct takes over, and despite being almost unconscious, I somehow manage to stagger to the night bus stop on Tottenham Court Road, from where my alcohol-sozzled mind knows with absolute certainty the bus, any bus, will take me home to Islington. A cab would never work - only a bus will do. Any bus. Of course this is not strictly correct - only one of the buses goes to Islington - and in any case I haven't actually lived in Islington for three years. No matter. I inevitably fall asleep and wake up some hours later in a remote, and inevitably hostile, corner of the capital, from where I will battle my way back home through the mean streets of north/east/south/west London.

Despite these early hours experiences of locations as unfriendly as Walthamstow, Wood Green, and Leytonstone, however, I've never found myself confronted with a mobile artillery piece. Not even in West Ham. Things get worse when I notice the sign by the side of the road. "Trablous, 1km". Great, I missed my stop in Byblos. I'm in Tripoli.

I wasn't intending on visiting Tripoli at all. Lebanon's second city is supposedly off-limits to tourists since the recent, well-publicised violent hostilities between the army and Sunni militants in a Palestinian refugee camp to the north of the city. Indeed, the ever-cautious British Foreign and Commonwealth Office, who currently "advise against all but essential travel" to Lebanon as a whole, specifically recommends avoiding "war-torn" Tripoli. Still, as I'm here...

In the event, the FCO were probably correct about Tripoli. Not on the grounds of safety or security of course - aside from tanks and roadblocks on the outskirts, Tripoli seemed less edgy than Beirut even - but because it's mostly quite dull. The contrast with Beirut, especially the upscale areas, is quite staggering. A wonderful medieval souq, a Crusader castle, a mostly conservative Sunni Muslim population. No Chanel boutiques, cleavages, or cafe lattes here: visiting Tripoli was like taking a daytrip back to the Middle East.

After passing a pleasant, though unremarkable afternoon wandeing the labyrnthine alleyways of the old city, I picked up a share taxi for the 90 minute drive back to Beirut. And from here my transport difficulties began once more. As the aging Mercedes cruised along the seafront highway into Beirut, a beautiful sunset dying the sky a verdant crimson, my driver asked where I wanted to be dropped off. The conversation clearly did not go as well as I thought - minutes later I found myself in an unfamiliar neighbourhood in South Beirut. No matter - this would afford me the opportunity to explore some more of the city - if I walked long enough in roughly the right direction, surely I'd find my way eventually?

An hour later, it is now pitch dark. There are no neon lights on this street, no Lebanese Army checkpoints, no German sportscars parked outside plush apartments. There are, however, hundreds of posters of a dimly familiar, bearded, bespectacled face, and countless yellow and green flags bearing a logo with a Kalashnikov. I've seen that flag before. I struggle to read the Arabic inscription on one of the many banners. "Hiz...Hizb...Hizba...Ah. I know what it says. 'Hizballah'." At this point I must admit to feeling a little nervous. I'm lost, after dark, in a Hizballah neighbourhood in south Beirut. While I'm not at all convinced by the Western media's oversimplified demonisation of Nasrallah and his army as Iranian-sponsored terrorists, while I know they are a respected political party as well as a highly effective guerilla army, while I know all about their hugely effective social and community work among the poorest of Lebanon's citizens, still...

Suddenly there is a huge bang and a bright flash of light. A rocket screeches into the air just in front of me. For a moment I am totally transfixed with fear. Just for a second I come very close to losing control of vital bodily functions. Then I hear the children's laughter. I look to my left, from where the missile just launched. In place of the cadre of keffiyeh-wearing, AK-47-toting mujahideen I fully expect to see, three small boys argue over who will light the next firework. Yes, that's right. A firework.

Just as I'm digesting this revelation, I am tapped on the shoulder. My still slightly nervous Arabic greeting "salaam aleikum" is met by a smiling response. "wa leikum a'salaam". Five minutes later I am sitting in a taxi, conjured from thin air as if by magic by a couple of charming men who simply couldn't do enough to help the lost foreigner. Not for the first time I feel more than a little guilt about my misplaced assumptions.

Fifteen minutes after that I sit in a pizza restaurant in the upmarket suburb of Hamra, listening to the excited English chatter of fashionably-dressed students from the nearby American university of Beirut, sipping an ice-cold beer and munching some excellent bruschetta. 20 minutes ago I was dodging Hizballah "rockets"; three hours ago I was wandering a four hundred year old souq.

Just another normal day in Lebanon.

Welcome To Lebanon

"Where are you from?"
"England. You?"
"Jerusalem."

I do an obvious and not very subtle double take. An Israeli, in Syria? Never!

"Jerusalem, Palestine".

Aha. That makes more sense. Omar is a 24 year old Palestinian Christian, who works in his family's "import-export" business, splitting his time between the West Bank, Dubai and Beirut. We're sharing a taxi from Damascus to Beirut, and he's very kindly helping me through the border formalities, which are complicated by the fact that visa fees must be paid in Lebanese Lira, unavailable outside the country itself. In effect, therefore, to obtain Lebanese currency to pay for my visa to enter Lebanon, I have to sneak accross the border into Lebanon, change some currency, then return to obtain my visa and enter legally.

Omar and I approach the smiling, heavily-armed border guard and explain my predicament.

"Where you from?", he asks me with a grin.

"Britain"

"And you"

"Palestine", Omar responds casually.

"Syria, or Lebanon?", the guard asks.

"Palestine."

"Yes, yes, but are you Syrian Palestinian or Lebanese Palestinian?"

"Jordanian Palestinian".

My confusion at this point aptly sums up the wretched plight of the Palestinians. Omar is Palestinian, lives in Israel, but has a Jordanian passport. The guard, however, is satisfied.

"Ok, you British. British are trustworthy and honest - I let you go. Don't run away now..."

And with a wink, he waves me across the border. Omar doesn't comment on the savage irony of British "honesty": the decades of betrayal, broken promises, and lies with which Britain damned his people to eviction, occupation, and persecution at the hands of the Israelis. No, instead Omar is much more interested in talking about Beirut's legendary nightlife, "the best in the Middle East", he calls it. While I'm saving that particular brand of hedonism for the coming weekend, I have to say that Beirut is something of a culture shock after 5 weeks in Syria.

My initial joy at finding cafes and restaurants not only open during daylight, but packed with customers actually eating and drinking, was tempered slightly by the discovery that prices here are even higher than in London. In fact in many respects downtown Beirut resembles London, Mayfair to be exact: its 19th Century architecture, plethora of ludicrously expensive designer boutiques, exquisitely dressed women tottering from cafe to cafe on their impossibly high heels, giant sunglasses protecting them from the Autumn sun. The large mosque at the end of the street seems rather incongruous amid its opulently Western surroundings; with conversations in French and English far more common (in this area at least) than Arabic it's easy to forget this is the Middle East.

Yet this is the Middle East; in many ways more so than anywhere I've been thus far. Beirut's mass of contradictions and confusions is a microcosm of the cultural schizophrenia that afflicts the region as a whole. For 17 long years those contradictions found expression in a brutal and bloody civil war in Lebanon, in which Beirut was both the symbolic heart of the conflict and the physical epicentre of the fighting. After 16 years of relative peace and stability, the Lebanese capital was once again turned into a warzone by the failed Israeli invasion of 2006. Tensions from that catastrophe and the ongoing campaign of political assassinations still simmer here; you don't have to walk more than a few blocks to find clear evidence that this is a city on edge. While Damascus has its fair share of armed soldiers on the streets, the young men with machine guns here seem a different proposition entirely. Unlike their poorly-equipped, lethargic Syrian counterparts, the soldiers here seem professional, well-trained, and ready for action. Unlike the Syrian youths and their rusting weaponry, the Lebanese have tanks, barbed wire, and roadblocks on the streets.

Yet while I may find it odd to see a couple of artillery pieces parked outside McDonalds, the locals don't seem to notice. Equally they appear to happily ignore the odd bombed out building that clutters the otherwise impressive skyline, picking their way past the rubble to get to their valet-parked BMWs, Porsches, and quite unbelievably, yellow Lamborghinis (of which I've seen two already). In the circumstances, there seems little else for it but to follow suit. For all its political turmoil and violent history, this seems a beautiful, engaging city populated by beautiful, engaging people; it's hard to believe that somewhere so chic, so consumerist, so Western is little more than a couple of hours from Damascus.

Of course not all of Lebanon, or its people, resemble Park Avenue or Belgravia; countless thousands of Omar's Palestinian kin live in squalid refugee camps outside Beirut, Tripoli and other major cities, while south Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley are home to mostly Shi'ia populations, natural supporters of the much-maligned Hizballah. I doubt Hassan Nasrallah will be joining us for an all-night rave at BO18 on Saturday, but you never know...

For those that are interested I have finally managed to upload my remaining photos of Turkey and the first batch from Syria. Al hamdu lillah for Lebanese computers.

Lies, Truth, and Propaganda

"I loove history feelm. Gladiator, Braveheart (you know, with Mel Jeebson?), Troy. You like history feelm Jeems?"

"Yes, I like history films too. Have you seen "Munich"?

"No, what ees thees feelm?"

I proceed to explain the plot of Steven Spielberg's Hollywood epic to my 24 year old Syrian Arabic conversation partner: the kidnapping and subsequent massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics by the Palestinian Black September group, the resultant Mossad death squad that hunted down and executed the perpetrators, the growing sense of unease and regret among the Israelis, the parallels with the modern "War On Terror".

"Why? Why they make up such oreeble storee? Why they say thees bad thing about Filistinian? Israel always keeling people, not Filistinian, they never keel people."

"This isn't a story, it really happened. More or less at least."

"No, thees never happen. It ees lie."

Somewhat fittingly, this surreal and somewhat sinister conversation took place on October 6th, a national holiday here in Syria, commemorating the famous "victory" in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. A rough equivalent in Europe would be Germany celebrating their famous victory in World War II in 1940, or Bayern Munich celebrating their famous victory in the 87th minute of the 1999 Champions League Final against Manchester United. But just as many of the Syrian populace seem unaware of the reprehensible actions of their Palestinian brethren in Munich in 1972, they are also, rather conveniently, apparently not informed of the successful Israeli counter-attack in the October War a year later.

Like many Arabs, my Syrian friend (who shall remain nameless for his own safety - discussing politics with foreigners can be a tricky occupation here) also holds forthright views on a number of truths, apparently self-evident to us in the West. The Israelis were behind September 11th - a cunning ruse to draw the Americans (and their humble servants in Britain) into a global war against Islam. This I've heard before of course, and while clearly absurd, it at least has the benefit of plausible motive, unlike the claim that the same Zionist government was also responsible for the assassinations of Princess Diana and Dodi al-Fayed. My source doesn't elaborate on the logic of this assertion; I can only speculate it's part of a fiendish plot concoted between the late Robert Maxwell and his comatose friend Ariel Sharon to boost the sales of the Daily Express, a publication which seemingly exists solely to print outlandish theories on the demise of "The People's Princess".

Encountering the products of brainwashing is a frustrating experience. It's virtually impossible to explain to someone that something they've heard a thousand times is patently false, or that some major event they're totally unaware of actually happened, particularly when that event might pose some uncomfortable questions about their worldview. Yet meeting the brainwashed can also be enlightening and thought-provoking. Who is brainwashing who? Who has been lied to and who knows the truth? Is it possible that I am the one who has been misled?

As I read Robert Fisk's epic history of the Middle East, The Great War For Civilisation, told through the quite staggering scope of his own experience as foreign correspondent in the region for The Times and The Independent, I am reminded of the extent to which we in the West are lied to just as much as - perhaps even more than - the Syrians whose naivete I gently mock here.

How many Americans still believe Saddam was behind the atrocities of September 11th? How many Brits still believe Libya was behind the Lockerbie bombing? How many remember the US Navy shooting down Iran Air flight 655, with the loss of all 290 passengers and crew, in July 1988? (An action Margaret Thatcher described, incidentally, as "totally understandable". She seemed less understanding five months later when the Iranians and the Palestinian Abu Nidal - not the Libyans by the way - returned the favour by blowing Pan Am flight 103 out of the sky over Scotland, with 270 deaths.)

Whose government speaks the truth and whose government tells lies?

How many in the West are aware of the "First Holocaust", the Turkish genocide of 1915-1920 in which 1.5 million Armenian Christians were systematically annihilated. A genocide which, incidentally, was keenly observed by the Turks' German allies (among them a young Rudolf Hoess, later Kommandant of Auschwitz) who learned such innovative techniques as the use of cattle trains and gas chambers from their Ottoman compatriots. Yet despite the parallels, indeed the direct causal linkages between the two genocides, denying the Jewish Holocaust is a crime, while denying the Armenian Holocaust is official government policy in many countries, including Britain.

Who is brainwashing who?

My young Syrian friend and I also debate the indiscriminate use of the word "terrorist" - irhabi in Arabic - and its slippery definition. It's a well-known truism that "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter": such now-revered figures of the Twentieth Century as Nelson Mandela, Lech Walesa, and David Ben-Gurion were all "terrorists" at one time or another. Nevertheless, most in the West would baulk at ascribing the label of "freedom-fighter" to everyone's favourite Pakistani cave-dwelling bearded Saudi, yet here in the Middle East it's a sobriquet by which Osama bin Laden is widely-known, even by many liberal Muslims. What is the difference, they ask, between the Allied slaughter of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq and Al Qaeda attacks on Western cities?

The issue of "terrorist" versus "freedom fighter" was brought home to me with particular resonance this weekend, as I visited the picturesque Syrian town of Hama. In 1982 the peaceful sound of the gently spinning water wheels on the Orontes River was shattered when Syrian army and intelligence forces converged on the town to crush a putative uprising against then President Hafez al-Assad by the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. Estimates of fatalities vary between 10,000 and 40,000; the centre of the town was razed to the ground by artillery fire and hundreds of political prisoners disappeared. Today the peace is restored and a pretty park and elegant new apartment blocks stand where once fire rained from the skies.

Hama is no stranger to violence. Its environs boast two of Syria's greatest tourist attractions, the last stronghold of the Crusaders at Crac de Chevaliers and the castle of the legendary Assassins, a mysterious Ishmaili Islamic sect famed for their unparalleled efficiency at executing the leaders of any enemy. (From their name, derived from the Arabic word for the marijuana they smoked in copious quantities, hashish, we get the English word "assassin".) These sights provide a picturesque reminder that the clash between East and West, Christianity and Islam, predates Osama bin Laden and George W. Bush by some thousand years. (The Saudi construction magnate might play up his similarities with Salah ad-Din; I can barely bring myself to mention Richard the Lionheart and George the Buffoon in the same sentence.) Yet the events of 9-11 colour our relationship with the Middle East, our relationship with Islam, perhaps even our relationship with truth itself, to an enormous extent.

In 1982 the West condemned the atrocities in Hama as gross breaches of human rights against a legitimate political opposition movement. Today the Muslim Brotherhood and many of its offshoots - among them Hamas, Jammat al-Islamiya, and various Mujahideen groups in Afghanistan - are proscribed in many Western and Western-allied Arab countries as dangerous extremists. Freedom fighters to terrorists in 20 years.

I'll let my anonymous Syrian friend have the last word, however. Totally unaware (of course) of the Hama massacre he brushed it off with the observation that:

"in Amreeka and Britaan there have two parties which both same, and many people not like. Thees is not democrace. In Syria we have real democrace. I love my President, I love my government, so do all Syrians. Thees is democracy."

Tony Blair and George Bush might well agree.