Bosra and its Basalt

In the late Spring of 2007, I took Mara to the Nabatean, then Roman, now Syrian town of Bosra. We left Amman after work on a Thursday and found the border crossing at Jaber jam-packed. It was the start of a weekend. Eventually we were able to get our various pieces of official paper stamped. By the time we had squeezed the car through the sea of randomly parked automobiles it was dark. We were happy to be in Syria, though, and did not drive far along the highway toward Damascus when we turned East on a straight and quiet, provincial road. It was completely dark, except for a few villages that we passed through. Eventually the lights of a town indicated that we had arrived somewhere larger. It wasn't much of a town, but it had to be Bosra. A colleague based in Damascus had recommended the Sham Palace Hotel which I had looked up on the internet. There were no signs. Mara, usually so sure-footed when it came to directions, was at a loss. We had not gone far when I turned up the long driveway of what looked like a large 1970s municipal building with elaborate gardens. There was no one there, though a few lights were burning. Why should anybody be there? It was after hours. Mara wondered why I stopped the car in front of the glass doors. I took our luggage out of the trunk and persuaded Mara to follow me into the deserted lobby. The lobby did have a hotellish aspect. I knew I was in the right place as I had recognized it from a tiny picture on the website. Eventually a friendly staff member arrived. The hotel had a grandly decorated atrium and the walls of the corridors were covered with carpeting. It felt Eastern European to us and we weren't sure whether there was a single other guest. The big treat was the view the next morning: When I opened the curtains I saw the still water of an unused swimming pool behind the hotel. Beyond that was a large field, behind which the black wall of an enormous fortress loomed. These photographs were taken inside that structure, the great amphitheater of Bosra. The entire thing is made from black basalt.