On the way to Syria, me and a couple of other guys that I met almost caused a homicidal mess in the border town of Antakya (aka Antioch). Like any border towns, this one is as dusty, swarmed with touts, and have an atmosphere of being nowhere. A black market currency exchange guy came up to us and offered an excellent rate, hence siphoning the opportunity from his competitor, a legit guy. The legit guy cried foul and started to abuse the black market guy. Once we got our money changed, we let them be. But within minutes, the arguments became physical - the two started to push each other. The legit guy went into his shop to return only with a knife ready to plunge it into the black market guy. In a matter of seconds, whole community of touts, bus drivers and bypassers intervened and rescued both of them from themselves. Nothing happened apart from them two exchanging vicious abuses - but from a healthy distance.
This is where freemarket economics makes perfect sense. We had the best deals for absolutely everything. The competition was fierce, all we had to do was to make a gesture of displeasure and we get a price reduction. In the end we paid next to nothing for bus tickets and other things. Not sure whether I should be proud of myself.
And then it's the Syrian border checkpoint. I was slightly anxious because I was one of the only three in the bus who didn't have a visa applied beforehand. All the horror stories picked up from travellers sure didn't make it any better. As it turned out, it was a piece of cake for me. Malaysians get free entry to Syria and no other questions apart from a smiling "Ahlan wasahlan". Whereas the Kiwi and the Aussie who were with me at the time had to pay a hefty USD100 for entry. Years of having to deal with hassles of all sorts from a lot of countries I visited before, I felt like the Malaysian passport had finally became useful!
For once the bright red passport was viewed with envy.
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