Lights out!

As hard as I try, I can't seem to pin down the sentiments or attitudes of the Lebanese people. An older woman may point at me while shaking her head for wearing shorts on the street, but two minutes later I will pass a group of girls in micro-minis to whom no one pays one bit of attention. I just can't figure it out. My aversion to attention and deep need to be respectful makes it SO hard to decide what to wear to the gym.

In this land of inconsistencies, one regularity is that power outages happen ALL THE TIME. Every single time I've been to a restaurant, we've all been plunged into momentary darkness for a few seconds until the generator has kicked in. They've become a normal part of life in this city.

Until today.

After munching on last night's stir fry for lunch with a group of coworkers, three of us decided to treat ourselves to an elevator ride back up to our offices. One is pregnant, so she had an excuse. I guess I'm just lazy! We piled in and pressed the button for our floor. Halfway between "-1" and "0," the number panel started to flash a bright red question mark. Nervous, one of the women pushed the alarm button and filled the building with a continuous, shrill siren. The doors made a feeble noise like they were trying to open, but they quickly closed again.

"Are you nervous?" the pregnant woman shakily asked.
"No..." I managed to squeak.
"Me too."

Suddenly, darkness fell and we couldn't even see our own feet. I resisted the urge to scream, telling myself that since we were in the basement already, we couldn't fall too far.

The lights flickered on again and the elevator eased down to "-2," even lower than when we started. I was so happy to see the world beyond that tiny cube. Instead of waiting to ride back up to the first floor, I ran out of there as fast as I could.

Needless to say, I'll be opting for the stairs from now on. That's what I get for not wanting to walk up two flights! I think it'll take me a few more weeks to get used to the power outages again. That's my favorite thing about being in a foreign country...learning to adjust. Then again, it's always easier to say that AFTER something scary has happened. This is truly a different world, but I'm not so sure it's worse than the old one.

How was my day, you ask?

My internship at a dynamic, friendly, fast-growing public health company began at 10 am sharp.

I surprised my boss by editing their entire website in a couple of hours. What can I say? Grammar makes me giddy.

I met enough new people to make my face throb from smiling so much.

My lunch (a huge, puffy, spinach calzone and fresh bottle of water) from a charming hole-in-the-wall cost me a whopping $0.66.

My boss let me go early, so I came home to do some laundry and watch an episode of Australia's Next Top Model.

When my dad arrived, we collaborated to make a scrumptious feast of chicken tacos--Lebanese style--with labneh instead of sour cream.

Setting out to find some ice cream, we lost ourselves between intricate stony ghosts of abandoned buildings.

It is midnight. Dad's snoring on the couch, and I'm struggling to keep my eyes focused. I'm about to crawl into bed before doing it all again tomorrow.

How was YOUR day?

Eh eh...yalla bye.

I've managed to escape work for yet another week...but that stops tomorrow. I have a meeting with the editor of a magazine in the morning, then I get the scoop from the public health company's HR department in the afternoon. I start my short "internship/let's-see-what-you-can-do" position soon after that. I'll have to say goodbye to sleeping in until eleven every morning, but I'm looking forward to having somewhere to be and to have people counting on me. After all, I am almost a college senior. (ohmygoodness)

If this week were a pizza, the toppings would be plentiful and the crust would be stuffed with delicious memories. Baked in, there would be a birthday celebration with new friends, some Spanish spices from the Cervantes Institute and a fiesta to celebrate the language, two separate trips to the quaint city of Jbeil (Byblos) late at night and in the sweltering afternoon sun, and a taste of authentic Arabic sweets from Tripoli in Northern Lebanon.

Today, my dad and I are spending this Father's Day afternoon drinking mango smoothies at Costa Coffee. Italy is playing New Zealand, and every face is turned hopefully toward the television on the wall in front of me. It seems we're all unwinding before turning back into responsible adults tomorrow.

For lunch, I tasted the schawarma that's supposed to be the best in the city. I believe whoever made that decision. The thinly-shaved chicken, sour yogurt sauce, crisp pickles and salty fries wrapped in soft bread was the perfect explosion of simplicity. I could really go on forever. Food is my favorite subject to think/write/dream about.

Yikes, my thirty minutes of internet access is whittling away fast. My dad and I are planning to walk the along the seafront at sunset before munching on some homemade tacos later this evening. A relaxing end to my second exhilarating week in Beirut.

Mmmmm, weekend.

I've seen and done so much these past few days that I feel like I'll burst if I don't write it all down. From the slick to the rugged, I've experienced a few more sides of Lebanon.

On the shiny side, my dad and I enjoyed some drinks at his favorite bar, Cayenne, close to the apartment. We sat on wooden stools in the crowded hangout and laughed with the bartenders as we all basked in the long awaited Friday afternoon ease. We walked through Gemmayzeh, a region famous for its roaring nightlife, to arrive at a cozy Italian restaurant to share some homemade lasagna and crispy pizza under the moon. The red and white checkered tablecloth had teeny black ants sewn into it. A whimsical touch. After dinner, we came nose-to-nose with a fuzzy Pomeranian puppy in a pet store window. His quizzical look stole my heart immediately, but my dad wasn't so enthused. Don't worry, Butterscotch. We'll come back for you.

Saturday morning was l-a-z-y and wonderful. I slept in until around 10:30, and we decided to pack up for a day at the beach. Seemed like everyone in Beirut had the same idea, too. While sampling nearly every radio station, including a static-ridden Portuguese channel, we inched alongside honking Mercedes' to reach the sunny, secluded Lazy B beach. My equally pale dad and I wafted between the rocky waterfront and the shade of the wobbly umbrellas covering our chairs. We read our novels side-by-side until the sun took a dip into the horizon. For dinner, we shared a grilled garlicked and hot-peppered grouper with hummus, cauliflower and eggplant. Uh-mayzin.

This morning, we woke at the crack of dawn to support Beyond Beirut's very first alternative tourism jaunt into the villages outside this city. My usual terror at the thought of walking across

busy streets was pleasantly unwelcome. NO ONE was awake. This is definitely a stay-out-late and sleep-in-even-later kind of culture. Reminiscent of Spain, a place I still have nostalgic pangs for.

This was a day of Roman temple climbing, fuzzy green almond picking, homemade Lebanese lunch tasting, new friends meeting, and warm sun-soaking. We also spent quite a bit of time on a bus whose cool air was a welcomed refuge from the beating yellow orb. I have some cheery pictures from today, including a series of pleasantly-surprising macro shots after finally discovering this setting on my trusty red Canon, but I'm so droopy-eyed that they will just have to wait for another time.

While I would love my time in Beirut to only consist of beach trips, sightseeing and sampling the mouthwatering local cuisine, I actually came here to gain some work experience with a Public Health company. I have a meeting with the CEO tomorrow afternoon. He sounds like a kind man from his email voice, which I'm told mirrors his true personality. I'm looking forward to adding a new dimension to my time in Beirut with this opportunity.

Now, with grateful feet and a belly full of pillowy Tiramisu ice cream, I'm enjoying a low-key evening with the Australia-Germany game playing in the background. It's a pretty close game (not). Poor Aussies...you're good at much more than football. You have really groovy accents, and I'm sure you fare better on the rugby field. Don't be sad.

Goodnight!

Leba-oui

I'm spending the morning in my Dad's office listening to melodic French-Arabic chatter. The three women in this office with me have wide smiles and colorful, vivid clothes. Some of the friendliest people I've met, but also very professional. I'm amazed how they flit from being shocked that I've never been to New York City to discussing fruit tree exportation.

Directly in front of me, outside the floor-to-ceiling window of this small office, I see a four-story tall advertisement of a scruffy, suited dark-and-handsome man. The slogan reads "Creating Your Suit is Creating Your Self." Are we all just insignificant, fleshy bags whose self-expression only takes on the identity of the threads we clothe ourselves in? Sometimes, it seems that way. That's about as deep as I can take my thoughts this morning. Forgive me.

Maybe my randomness has something to do with staying inside for the past two days. I was sick with some sort of stomach bug (I guess I should brush my teeth with bottled water from now on) and just recovered yesterday morning, but then my dad caught the same thing. We didn't leave the apartment because he wasn't feeling well. I'm not complaining at all; it was actually kind of nice to sleep in and recover from jet lag while watching reruns of American TV and catching up on reading about pop culture. There go my guilty pleasures, exposed to the world. But I'm glad to have some human contact today. Both of us are feeling much better. And laughing with these cheerful women is MUCH more fun than revisiting Rachel's famous 1990s haircut on Friends. Biggest understatement ever...um...stated.

Still loving Beirut! More to come. Also, photos will be uploaded in the next few days. Have a terrific day.

I made it!

After about 20 hours of plastic airplane food, cramped knees, endearing seat partners and rushing through passport control, I found my dad in the airport lobby in Beirut and watched through jetlagged eyes as we motored through the city to his apartment in Ashrafieh. At first I was appalled at his driving, but I soon realized no one else follows the rules either. Or, more accurately, that there aren't any. To stay alive, you have to keep up and rest your hand permanently on the horn. I don't even remember the driving being this crazy in Amman. I found it better to close my eyes and sway with the jolts instead of gasping at every risky overtake or vision of a dusty red truck heading straight for us on the wrong side of the road.

Besides the crazy driving, there are other quirks and qualities of Beirut that pleasantly remind me of my middle and high school years in Jordan. My fingers remember exactly how to pull off the top of an aluminum soda can instead of popping it backward. Everyone cuts in line. Beautiful, tall mosques can be seen from the highway. A thin layer of rock dust coats everything outside and in. Mouthwatering local foods like shish tawook (grilled chicken kebab) and fatteh (a dish of fried pita bread, chickpeas, meat and spices in a flavorful yogurt sauce) satisfy my long-felt cravings. The countless roadside cafes are stuffed with people clouding the air with slow puffs from hubbly bubbly or argheela pipes. Drivers with their left arms draped lazily outside rolled-down windows blast lively tunes sprinkled with the word habibi, or "my beloved."

But many things about Beirut are completely different than Amman.
1. Green, lush grass is actually pretty common here. As are trees. My dad and I drove to a Cedar Reserve today and witnessed a 2,000 year old tree growing on the side of a huge mountain.
2. Dressing conservatively is not widely practiced among women. The summer heat calls for sun dresses, tube tops and shorts. On a trip to a sport/pool club in the city, local women strutted by in bikinis, high heels and oversized Chanel handbags. My perception of Middle Eastern culture has been flipped.
3. Nearly everything is written or spoken in French. Eager to hear the melodic Arabic I was dreaming of, I was thrown off guard when the pilot of my flight from Athens to Beirut called out "Bonjour!" as I sprinted past him to claim the last empty seat. My Spanish definitely helps a little when trying to translate signs, but I'm amazed at the way people switch effortlessly between French, Arabic and English in their conversations to create a seamless mosaic of rhythms.

Maybe my preconceptions of Jordan have changed in the four years I've lived outside of the country, but even so, Lebanon has a similar but still distinct vibe that makes me want to learn and experience more. Today, after visiting a palace and touring the cedar forest with a verbose and exuberant guide (we said hello to Bette Midler on the trail donning a red Chinese sun umbrella!), my dad and I met one of his colleagues, her mother and some friends for lunch at a restaurant called Chalet du Lac overlooking a lake on the side of a mountain. We laughed and shouted over the relentless singer's drawn out melodies. The kindness and hospitality of the women made the delicious meal even more enjoyable, while the fresh air and unbeatable view topped it off. My second full day in Beirut was even busier than the first, but I loved every minute of it.

I had been worried about losing my Spanish as I learn new Arabic words to fill up my brain. Ironically, I'm sitting in the living room listening to a reporter on a Spanish TV channel talk with an author from Palma de Mallorca. I can still understand every word. So far, so good.

Right now, I'm looking forward to resting a bit after a long day in the sun. If the rest of my time in Beirut is even half as eventful as it has been up until now, I'll have plenty of crazy stories and (hopefully) engaging commentary for you soon. Hope you've all had a wonderful weekend!

"There is no moment of delight in any pilgrimage like the beginning of it." -- Charles Dudley Warner

It seems like I just got finished neatly stowing my suitcases and hanging up my clothes after my semester abroad in Spain. Well, if you know me at all, that situation truthfully involved throwing my bags on top of a treacherous pile of clothes and shutting the door to my closet. Same thing.

I'm filling my trusty red companions with Jack Link's beef jerky, Peet's coffee, Clif Bars and A-1 steak sauce to bring to my dad. I, on the other hand, cannot WAIT to taste my first bite of authentic Middle Eastern cuisine in four years. Baba ghanouj, labna, falafel and kunafi are calling my name. I don't think I'll have cravings for stateside junk food anytime soon.

I am mostly looking forward to hanging out with my dad, picking up some Arabic, working with a public health company on their website, meeting new people, and focusing on finding out what it is I am supposed to do after I graduate from college. I'm also excited that my mom, and hopefully my brother, will be following me to Beirut in a month.

My little Yorkie, Rusty, is trotting around my room in a nervous state of confusion. He gets anxious whenever one of us breaks out the suitcases, which happens quite often in my globe-trotting family. He just hopped right in...maybe I can stick him in my carry-on. No one will know!

Better go finish packing. It's already five o'clock! Keep coming back, and soon I'll have a much more exciting entry for you to read.

Ma'a salama (Goodbye) !