Al Bustan Beirut

... and Vivian and were on our way to Beirut. <br><br>Once again the bus driver let us on without paying, these people are really friendly in Syria. <br><br>Arriving at the bus station Dino wandering around to find out what time our bus was. We were really lucky as he stumbled upon one person who informed him that the bus was leaving now. NOW! He quickly raced back to Shona and told her the same and in a moments recognition she had her bags on and was running in the ...

... isn't as big. The house of parliament is small. Moreover, it is peculiar that it's in the center of Downtown where no car is allowed to enter. Aren't parliaments usually at places that isolate them from the general public? Sat at a cafe in Downtown and watched the people pass by. This part of the city seems to be dominated by the well-off. Reminded me of Nisantasi, Istanbul. The main difference are that Nisantasi is older, this ...

... but I can't afford drinking and it's not cheap here! The next morning I saw some girls coming back home at 7h30am still drunk....so there is really more freedom here......... From Beirut it's easy to do day trips, so I stayed here for a few days and just took the bus to different touristic places. Lebanon is so small it only takes a few hours to get somewhere. Les Cèdres and Jeita Grotto The tree on the ...

... him: where is Hamra, where are we going, where are we, etc. He said, Hamra is over there (as he pointed in a different direction than where we were going), I am showing you Beirut and the sea, ahlan wa sahlan (welcome), don't worry, I am a good man. Well I wasn't in the mood to be shown Beirut by a bus driver I didn't know in a place I didn't know so I started flipping out on him. I told him, in my angry broken Arabic, all I want is to go to Hamra, I told you ...

... and international organisations, embassies, hotels clubs, restaurants, shopping centres, bars, schools, places of worship, outdoor recreation events, public transport and tourist areas. Random shootings continue to occur. * We strongly advise you not to travel to the Tripoli area in Northern Lebanon or to Palestinian refugee camps at this time. The situation is unpredictable and could deteriorate without warning. Outbreaks of violence could ...

... know that you hae read the signals incorrectly and make a quick "Yameen" and stop. Remember that unless you are an undercover agent for the Israeli Mossad or a draft dodging local, you are not the one they are looking for. Move along. Move along. Taxis in Lebanon. As I mentioned earlier we mostly took taxis around Beirut and Lebanon. There are two kinds of taxis; Service taxis and regular taxis. A service taxi is much cheaper and the driver will stop and pick up other passengers ...

... to hear that the airport had been bombed and that other strikes were being made on Beirut. We waited in the hotel nervously and tried to follow the news reports on T.V as best we could with some translation from Saba and intermittent power.Later that day we made a tactical retreat to Byblos, a mainly Christian area which we felt would be less of a target.

Open Letter to the Editor <br>Dear Every Taxi Driver in the Middle East, <br><br>First, I'd like to thank you for following me on my little journey. It means a lot - really. <br><br>I must tell you, there is really no reason for you to honk at me every time you pass. I know you're there and I know I can easily catch a taxi at any point in time that I decide I'd like to take one. "How do you know?", you ask. Well, you all have little yellow lights on ...

... church to mosque to embrace and greet each other. Palpable reminders of enmity remain on every street but, ravages aside, this is where regular folks live, hoping for a decent house, a good job, a better life for their kids and they just want to get on with it. Arabic Lesson Along the way, I tried to learn some Arabic phrases and wrote them down as best I could phonetically. I'll put them in here, but I sincerily apologize for my hideous mispellings and ...

... could publish them. They are career photographers - they had both covered part of Iraq. Stewart showed me photos from a week or so back when he "bushwacked" the current leader of Hamas, in Gaza, to take his photo as he left a mosque after Friday prayers. At a well known bar with a name similar to the city that is currently hosting the Olympics, I met other people with stories to tell. Prairie, an NGO worker, had a friend at the Raddisson when it was blown up last fall ...