Back to school for many children in Damascus

DAMASCUS: Uniformed children could be seen returning to school in Syria’s Damascus on Sunday, attending class for the first time since the fall of president Bashar al-Assad a week ago.

The festive atmosphere in the Syrian capital following group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s (HTS) takeover on 8 December has now given way to a gentler pace of daily life.

“The school has asked us to send middle and upper pupils back to class,” said Raghida Ghosn, 56, a mother of three.

“The younger ones will go back in two days,” she told AFP.

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An employee at one school said that “no more than 30 percent” of schoolchildren were back in class on Sunday, but that “these numbers will rise gradually”.

Universities also reopened, but only a few administrative staff were at work on Sunday.

“Most of the students come from other provinces, so it will take time for things to get back to normal,” said one university staffer who asked to remain anonymous.

Business life has resumed as well, with many people going to work as normal early on Sunday, the first day of the working week in Syria.

An AFP journalist saw around a dozen people queueing outside a bakery in the city’s Rokn-Eddine district.

Street vendors selling cans of petrol were also plying their trade.

In Damascus, as in the rest of the country, power cuts remain common with some outages lasting up to 20 hours a day in some areas.