Lebanese Blonde

I might say it the first thing I do; Beirut is amazing. I've just been there for two days but I'm already in love. I'll go back there soon again, that's for sure.

We were a group of five people going, me, three Germans and a Kiwi. All good people and then me...

I also got a little taste of Syria's judicial system as we were crossing the border, or trying to... Apparently they changed the amount of time foreigners are allowed to stay in the country without going to the ministry of interior. It has at least for as long as I've been here been a month but now it's only 15 days. So of course the guys at the border didn't want to let me leave but after a lot of nagging they did. It didn't really seem to occur to anyone that I would have been late had I even left on the day the new law was published. It's good to know that you can become a criminal by default here... Then they didn't want to let two of the Germans leave because they only had temporary passports and wouldn't be let in to Lebanon. Our driver might or might not have given the guy some money to let them go though because after a while they were allowed out and the driver went on about wanting an extra tip for the rest of the ride... Of course there were no problems on the Lebanese side...

I might have pointed it out before but Syria is mostly desert. Except for the Golans then... It must really feel like shit to have all the nice and green parts of your country taken away by others. Lebanon is on the other hand very green and beautiful with the greenness starting almost as you cross the border. After that it only gets better.

In Beirut we went to a hostel recommended to me by a friend of a friend but it was full. The guy in the reception did offer us two rooms in another hotel though. But after a lot of tea drinking and sitting around in silence for a long time after that he told us that there were no free rooms in that hotel either. Thanks for telling us that a little earlier. So we were off to the mean streets of Beirut for at least five minutes before finding a hostel that did have a room with five beds. Nice enough we said and took it. Not that it was nice at all but we might have been a bit tired after the long, long trip from Damascus, or we might just have been lazy and lost.

The good thing about having a shitty hotel-room is that you don't waste a lot of time in it. There are lots of things to see in Beirut. Most prominent being the clean streets and the painted houses. Maybe they could stop running drugs in to Syria and start smuggling house paint instead, I for one would appreciate that a great lot more. We also checked out Rafiq Hariri's grave. That was a strange place I say. It's kind of in the middle of the city, covered with fake grass and pictures and a bunch of peoples graves then...

After that we went to one of the most important places in town; the Virgin Megastore. It was like this shop with four floors. Selling everything from toys to English books. I could have easily spent a couple of days there but others wanted to go to lunch. Boring people i say.

Walking around in Beirut is quite nice as well. The beautiful buildings are mixed with all the old shot up ones. But you got to remember that they're really building and also painting the houses. In Damascus there are roughly two painted buildings, in the entire city... People here just doesn't seem to care about anything.

Walking by the sea is also possible and depending on which route you take it can be quite nice, other routes aren't...

We also did try out the Beiruti nightlife. They do have a lot of really nice bars over there. Smoky, dark and filled with good music, just the way I like them. Another time I might check out the clubs but I was happy with the bars for now.

Leaving Beirut was a bit of a hassle since we almost got kidnapped by a cabdriver with a way too small car for five people. Getting away from him wasn't too hard though and we managed to get to the garage instead and the driver we got there liked to drive really fast. But at least he got us back in one piece so he was ok in my book. At the syrian border the two same Germans at the border got a bit of a lecture for being so stupid and only having single entry visas which meant they had to buy new ones at the border. Since I also thought it's a stupid thing to have I was both translating and agreeing at the same time. Good times indeed.

In the end it was really nice to be back in Damascus. Despite being smoggy and unpainted it's quite the good place to be...

Generation Terrorists

Ok so we had a "terrorist attack" here in Damascus yesterday. Some guys carrying way to many guns for their own good was spotted trying to "infiltrate" en empty building. Since they even failed to do that I guess it wasn't the Al-Qaida masterminds that were out last morning. What I've read and heard four of the terrorist and one guy from the security forces were killed and some others were wounded. No bystanders though, thanks God.

The only Syrian newspaper to come out on Saturdays is Tishriin but I only read the frontpage and it didn't say so much since they had to use half of it showing pictures of dead bodies and weapons. It seem like the terrorist were carrying everything from M-16s to nunchakas. No wonder they got shot, I would guess that they had a hard time walking around carrying all that shit.

The paper did make a point of them carrying American made weapons though and so did Syrian tv yesterday. I wouldn't care to much about that when you consider the extensive smuggling that goes on between here and Lebanon though. These days it's probably easier to come by an M-16 than an AK-47. Not that I would know though.

All in all I'd say that thing in Canada seem to be way much worse so Syria is still quite high on my list of safe countries. The traffic and the heat not considered then, of course. Sometimes I also feel that the alleys of the old city might kill me to. Just getting lost and dying of starvation seem to be so possible...