Cisterns in the desert and Indiana Jones

My time in Aleppo ended all too soon. I was not looking forward to my taxi ride out to Rasafa and Palmyra, then on to Damascus. I suffered from food poisoning the night before I was due to leave. I got myself in the car hoping not to be sick and somehow made it through the whole day without a drama.

Rasafa is a fortified city from the 6^th century AD out in the eastern desert of Syria. It is surrounded by nearly 2 km of wall (with most still standing today) and is an impressive sight as we approached it in the car. I had been given instructions from Ken to track down the giant cisterns that are built deep into the earth here. There is an old staircase that leads down to the bottom. After some searching, I found a hole in the ground that did not look like something I wanted to go in to without a torch but I did and after a few nervous moments in the dark I felt my way down to the base of these giant rooms designed to hold water for the armies, horses and residents during a siege that may have lasted for months. At 58 metres long and 13 deep it was hard to believe it was built by hand over a thousand years ago. I felt like Indiana Jones walking out in to this amazing place. Light came in from the arched roof above and once through the stairwell it was well lit. The best thing of all was being the only one there. Walking among the ruins was great; the Basillica of Saint Sergius and the main entrance were very impressive. Although a lot of the interior has gone, there is still much to see. Walking along the walls of the city you could imagine how busy it may have once been.

Inside Saint Sergius

The main gates of Rasafa

Wild wheat, cumin and ancient ruins

While at ICARDA I paid a visit to Dr Ken Street, he's better known to Aussies as the

“Seed Hunter”. Ken showed me through the massive seed bank they have at ICARDA which Ken busies himself trying to fill. He collects wild species of wheat and legumes and from this it is hoped to discover useful genes like salt tolerance. These new genes can then be used by crop breeders to enhance the performance of crops we grow today. It was cool to see the parent seeds of wheat; they looked nothing like what we grow today.

After a few days at ICARDA, Ken was kind enough to take me out and see some of the local ruins just north of Aleppo on the Turkish border. Amazing to see buildings, even small villages still standing after hundreds of years. The locals plant crops of olive trees and cereals right in amongst them. On the way out we stopped to look at cumin being planted. To get the tiny seeds to run out evenly it is mixed with urea. Cumin is commonly use in curry mixes and the smell wafting out of their seeders was great.