I should have a regular feature titled "Reactions to the message about American students and visas in Syria." I received this response to one of the responses. (I cite with her permission): "

In response to your writer's request I must say that yes, I have been harassed and discriminated against while in Syria. There were numerous men who were obnoxious to the point of making situations very uncomfortable, we were cheated out of money by a few people who sold tickets at the sites. At the Great Mosque in Damascus, women must pay a fee to wear one of the cloaks in order to enter the mosque. There were two soldiers collecting the money and they most definitely cheated my friend of money when giving change. When I tried to point out they had made a mistake, it was not very pleasant. We were even subjected to weirdos looking through our keyhole in several hotels and attempting to open the door in the middle of the night!. While on a bus from Homs to Hama, a man got on the bus with a pistol in a holster, sat on the driver's gear box, and proceeded to stare at us the entire trip. While he was doing his very best to intimidate us, a man old enough to be my father was goosing me under the bus seat and grinning about it when I turned around to tell him to stop! When we left the bus at Hama, the guy with the pistol followed us to our hotel and we then saw him over the next two days when we visited various sites, always staring at us. My friend believes we were monitored during our entire time in Syria. Too often when taking the train or bus, the guy collecting the tickets would deliberately position himself so that we would have to squeeze by him brushing up against his body. After it happened more than once, I simply got into the habit of pretending to drop my suitcase on the man's feet so that he was forced to step back! Really obnoxious stuff like that happened all the time during the entire trip. And YES, we were dressed in a very modest fashion! We also met with overwhelming kindness and courtesy from many Syrians and absolutely loved the country. For us, those incidents are such a small part of the experience and we laugh about them now. We prefer to remember the family, complete strangers, who invited us to their picnic and the many people who helped us on our way. If you can, please pass this along to the reader who made the inquiry. I travel a great deal and could tell quite a few stories about my experiences waitng to enter countries or going through security. I am always pulled aside for further screening or questioning when I travel. I do not know why. Perhaps it is my coloring or some of the stamps in my passport."