Gone Skiin'

Too busy to blog; the weather is too good!

Rainbow over Beirut

Okay, so the quality isn’t great, and the stitching didn’t work well either, but here is a full rainbow that just appeared above Beirut (although I wonder whether a full rainbow isn’t supposed to be a full circle instead of a half circle) at 17:32 local time. I don't get to see full rainbows very often.

Now that's a change from the usual sunsets, no?

First Signs of Spring

Somehow, when the first backgammon players appear on the sidewalk, that’s a sure sign of an upcoming spring.  They are still in their winter jackets, but the 'tawleh' is outdoors. On the right, hidden by the awning, you see someone lurking on a water pipe.

Bad weather is still predicted for this week, but even though there’s plenty of snow on the mountains, it’s will be too warm for skiing, unless you show up on the slope at 8 A.M. And that is very unlikely to happen with an 18-year old.


That’s it. Spring 2012 is in the air. Do I see a pattern here?
Spring 2011
Spring 2009

On Days Off, Road Rage and Zen

My children had the day off on Friday. Teacher’s Day. It’s because we do not have enough holidays in this place. I mean, we only have 18 official days off, and that’s cutting it a bit tight. So we need another one.

Plenty of snow to keep us going til the end of March

I am not complaining, because I got to ski on a Friday, which is a rare luxury for me. Friday is better, because they charge you weekday prices, and it isn’t as busy, since there are still some poor folks in this country that do work (for a living). A friend of mine links the number of public holidays to the state of the economy, since in Holland we only have 11 days off, and we do significantly better. I disagree. The Greek have 14 days off, and they don’t do much better than we do these days.

Friday also means the traffic isn’t as heavy. Or so I thought. Turns out that doesn’t make any difference at all. People that ski obvisouly don't work. I sort of had that impression already.

Which gets me to the next topic; road rage.

Last week my daughter and I observed a fantastic scene while picking her up from school. We crossed Hamra street at a green light, but since nobody really pays any attention to the color of the traffic light, we had to do quite a bit of ‘car dodging’. One young man even had to knock on someone’s car hood to draw his attention to the fact that it was green for the pedestrians and to make sure he wouldn’t get run over. Well, the owner of the car did not like that one bit. He turned the palms of both of his hands up (a gesture meaning ‘what do you want?’) and mouthed “Shou Bik!?” (What’s wrong with you?).

“What’s wrong with me?” replied the young man, pointing to his own chest. “What’s wrong with me?”

That sounded like a regular Al Pacino . And indeed. The verbal abuse lasted only a few seconds, and then the rage took over. The young man walked over to the driver’s door, opened it and entered the vehicle.

Walls of snow

And there we watched from the sidelines the little yellow car bobbing up and down as the young man obviously exerted some type of strenuous activity on the driver. By now the light had turned green for the traffic, and while some cars tried to circumvent this shaking car, others just honked their horn in anger, not aware that someone inside the car was about to be killed. Finally some taxi drivers noticed, and they blocked the remaining traffic flow as they stopped their cabs and tried to separate the two men inside the car. Priceless!

By now of course, the jam was complete, a cacophony of horns were all over the street, and two severely bruised gentlemen, were sent their separate ways. I regret not taking any pictures.

Running into friends at the slopes is probably the best thing about skiing, according to my daughter

So Friday to Feraya still had the usual traffic jams. Which somehow got my daughter to the topic of “How did that Zen workshop work out for you, Mom?”

Yes. That Zen Workshop. Some time ago, a buddhist monk in the making (with the brain of an advertising guy in the body of a nightclub doorman, according to his Twitter account) went on a ‘ yearlong spiritual quest’  to find inspiring people. His adventure, called The Quest for the 21st Centrury Warrior, brought him to Beirut where he offered a 5 hour (!) workshop.

The blurb read ‘The goal is to give you a better understanding of yourself and the other. My workshops are 'experiential' which means that you will actually feel better, more open, wiser and more understanding afterwards. Also, you will experience meditative states and inner peace.’

Well, god knows I could use some inner peace. Besides, I have a sister-in-law who is a buddhist, and I tell you, she never loses her cool, yet lives with my brother, so I am in awe of the power of buddha. Out came to yoga pants (I thought I was going to sit there and meditate) and off I went to this ‘guy in the body of a nightclub doorman’. Make no mistake, he sure was a Zen guy in the body of a bouncer.

I had assumed however that I’d be sitting there with 20 other ‘strangers’ who’d give this Zen business a try.

And playing in the snow is even better than skiing

Turns out he had called all my friends. And apparently they were all looking for some ‘inner peace’. It probably has to do with living in Beirut.

It is ‘life in the fast lane’ here on a constant basis, and being ‘a woman of a certain age’, you want to be heading the platoon out of fear of being left behind. We are, of course, mounting the rear guard, as my son will point out on a daily basis.

So how did the Zen workshop go? I learned that my voice of skepticism is probably a whole heck of a lot more present than I assumed it was. I think I am too pragmatic. And participating in a Zen workshop with your friends present, while having to open up all your ‘inner voices’, well . . . I am not yet in that mindset. My ‘yoga outfit’ was not needed either.

I need more practice. Until then, I find great ‘soulagement’ honking my horn, use a body part that has a name but which my daughter refers to as ‘the F-word finger’ and resorting to all kinds of language while I hear my child in the back of the car say “there’s another one for my swear jar!”

Well, I am all Zen here

So no Zen for me just yet. But a day on the slopes, in the sun, does it for me too. I’m all chilled.

Because its Worth Sharing . .

I didn't watch this episode, but several bloggers have already posted it (Blogging Beirut, Blogbaladi, Lebanon Aggregator, How I See Things and +961), and I think everyone should watch this one.
We're all up in arms these days about some war lord in Africa, but I believe we've got to start closer to home, and take this guy to justice, and the poor girl out of his house.

This is not necessarily how all housekeepers are treated, but things like this do happen in this country, and it is shameful!

The particular gentleman seems to have been identified, and a name is circulating. I cannot vouch for its accuracy, so will refrain from posting it, but other sites will have it.

Dog Weather

It is dog weather in Beirut.

A friend calls.

“Where are you?”

“I am on the Corniche taking a picture,” I reply

“Oh. (sigh) Not another sunset, I hope.”

Uh. No, Yes. Well, not really, I was a little too early for that. But with this dog weather, there isn’t much to do. If I had a fireplace, I’d go and sit in front of it, but mine is in the mountains, not in Beirut. And I dare say it is too cold to go to the mountains. Even with central heating, I’d need about 24 hours to heat up that place (and by then it is time to go down to Beirut again). They say on the news that snow has fallen as slow as 300 meters.

That’s pretty low for a regular Lebanese winter, which means there is snow around the mountain house. I should have gone there, but was busy all Saturday shuttling my kids around to their various destinations and activities, and that was the end of that.

It is dog weather anyway. Not much to do in town. So when I drove along the Corniche this afternoon, and saw the waves, I thought I’d take a picture. This boat (you'd have to click on the picture nd zoom it, it is quite small), by the way, is the Abou Karim II. It is a 6172 ton cargo ship from 1979. How do I know? Go here  (click on Sector 99 and zoom in). You can pretty much track any ship that passes by. You can do it with planes too, but I didn’t see one passing over as I was standing there on the Corniche.

Tomorrow I’ve got something interesting planned. Let’s see how that works out. So, yes (sigh), another sunset of sorts.

Happiness is

Sunny skies

No traffic

Crispy snow

Empty slopes

No queues

Family to ski with

Kids that will (still) ski with you (now and then. Sometimes. If they cannot organize a ride up themselves. Albeit incognito, as a very last resort.)

Friends you can sleep over at,

Beirut sunsets when going back home

And money to pay for it all.

The Wife and the Parrot

It is cold in Beirut. Cold for Beirut standards, that is. Nothing compared to the Siberian temperatures that pummeled Europe the past weeks. No Arctic winters here, but 11 degrees Celsius for Beirut, now that is cold. I, as a Northerner, should have no problem with that type of weather. And indeed, outside the house I am in my element. Makes me all nostalgic, feels like Holland (in summer).

It’s inside the house that I suffer. Beirut houses are not built for this kind of weather. Thin cinder block walls, no double glazing, marble floors and aluminum window frames sort of suck the cold in instead of keeping it out. Well, turn on the heat then, you say?

That is a bit of an issue. Since it doesn’t often get cold like this, we’re not really into advanced heating systems. My building did – at one point –have a central heating system. I know that from a radiator I once discovered in the back of a closet. The war, lack of water pressure, the price of oil, the state of electricity or the general Arab attitude towards the maintenance of equipment; you take your pick, but that radiator was all that was left of a once functioning system.

I don’t know many people that have central heating in their houses in Beirut these days. The stack of cast-iron radiators at the ‘antique’ dealers of Basta is an indication that many houses are now without. Only the new high-end apartments these days come with central heating; the rest of us mortal souls have to do with a variety of solutions.

There is the inverted AC, (If you can turn it on cold in summer, you can put it on ‘hot’ in winter), there’s your ‘subia’; an old-fashioned furnace that runs on oil (or wood, if you’re lucky), you have your little push-around heaters fed by bottled gas, and you have the mobile radiators, which run on electricity, and will suck your bank account dry and blow up your main switch board once the neighborhood generator takes over from the government electricity.

If you are not from Lebanon, you have probably no idea what I am talking about.

If you are from Lebanon, but living abroad, you are probably laughing your ass off because you do not have to deal with this misery anymore.

If – however – you live in country , you have by now identified your source of heat in these cold days, and sympathize with me in my misery.

I am an inverted AC gal. (although I do have the mobile radiator for the bathroom in the mornings). Inverted AC sucks. Your hair gets static, there’s the constant drone of the unit, it is only really warm if you’re right in the flow of it, and if it turns off, it’s back to cold within a matter of minutes. But if that’s all there is, you take it.

Now in comes the parrot. (Hence the title). Hubbie got a parrot last summer. It flew in, just like that, and it stayed. It’s an African grey. Not really an indigenous species, but quite popular, and so now and then there’s an escape artist landing on our balcony. Hubbie is quite smitten by this one.

And so, when this morning, I decided to turn on the heating unit because I was freezing to death, he said: “No, you cannot do that. It is not good for the parrot. He’ll die with these temperature changes and the draft. Turn it off.” (Did I hear a please somewhere?)

Now I sit here on the couch, in four layers, a scarf around my head and a blanket around me, typing with 4 fingers (the others don’t function well when it gets this cold), and reflecting upon my faith and that of the parrot.

On a totally different note, I did go and see Cat Stevens in concert (Yusuf, these days). I was more impressed with being recognized by Tracy (thank you Tracy!) then with Cat Stevens.

A Thousand Words?

A picture is worth a thousand words. Isn’t that the saying? So here’s a picture, and let’s see if you can figure out what the thousand words might be. I can easily churn out a 1,000 words about this one. One of my main problem – as a journalist – has always been that I use too many words. When my paper went to tabloid format, my articles were downsized from the usual 900 to a mere 600 words. I’d write a story in an hour, en then spent another 6 hours downsizing it until it reached the required amount. I was a frequent 598 or 599 words per article writer. You do get the hang of it after a while, and become much more apt at ‘killing your darlings’. Look, I am already at 134 words and haven’t said a thing yet.

So what exactly are you seeing here? These are the confiscated tools from the shoe shiners, standing outside a police station in West-Beirut. The shoe shiners in general are young Syrian boys, who apparently were not in the possession of the proper shoe shining permit, or whatever it is you need in order to shine people’s shoes, and so they get arrested, and their meager boxes are confiscated, and discarded in the back yard of the police station. No idea what happened to the shoe shiners themselves. They probably pay a fine, are let off, and then have to scramble a new set together.
The shoeshining business isn't what it used to be, I reckon. People where either Uggs, Converse, sneakers, or plastic rain boots, as seems to be the fashion in Beirut these days. But as every Dutch person can tell you; you get awfully wet and cold feet in rubber boots.
There you go, and some 700 more words to go.

On Traffic Jams and AA's

The pictures in the post are serene and not in accordance with the contents of this post. You might choose to look at the pictures only.

I went skiing yesterday. I got stuck in a traffic jam. A jam is opposed to a traffic flow: Traffic phenomena are complex and nonlinear, depending on the interactions of a large number of vehicles. Due to the individual reactions of human drivers, vehicles do not interact simply following the laws of mechanics, but rather show phenomena of cluster formation and shock wave propagation, both forward and backward, depending on vehicle density in a given area.(source)

Did you know that there’s a field of science that involves itself with traffic jams? The problem, according to this diagram, is saturation (of cars, that is). This saturation is caused by 3 reasons (as displayed in this diagram): 1) butterfly effect, 2) invisible waves, and 3) tragedy of commons.

I think we should add a fourth reason, one particular applicable to the Lebanese situation; it’s called the AA (that stands for Asshole Alert).

Lovely skiing! The slopes were positively empty. Hana did her first red run (proud mom)

And it goes like this.

You are on a two-way road. A narrow road, at that. At one point in time, your lane slows down due to the fact that the beginning of the line has reached its end-point at a village (let’s use Feraya, for example) where everyone wants to embark. This, of course, will cause the entire line to slow down. Logic has it that eventually this line will dissipate, as everyone will find a parking spot.

Now in comes the AA factor. These are people that can see no further than their nose is long (which according to this source means that they are ‘narrow-minded; and lack understanding and perception’.

And since they cannot see further than the end of their nose, they most defenitely cannot see further than the bend in the road, and since there seems to be no clear reason for the line the stop on this particular stretch of road, than there must be no reason at all for them to stop.

It is as if we are just standing there in a line, admiring the landscape.

All that it takes then, in their futile little brains, is to drive past this line, and voila, problem solved.

A and his sister. (Ever since he's been buying his own clothes, his style has significantly changed. I kind of like it, even though it's not really mystyle)

This is not the case however, as any sane thinking person can predict.  

And so these AA's get out of the line, and proceed to drive past the line. Unfortunately, that lane is used by upcoming traffic. Oh surprise oh surprise, didn't see that one coming.



What happens, as a matter of fact, is that they block the way for upcoming traffic; people that are in fact emptying the village, which will allow our line to occupy the space of the departing cars. But since the departing cars can no longer depart, due to the actions of the AA, the line will subsequently not move anymore at all.  

They have Hollywood-like ambitions in this place

This, the AA’s, find very curious. Now why would there be upcoming traffic?

But no problem, they can just get back into their former line. Usually without any qualms, or so much as an ‘’excuse me”.

Now in Holland, we can be pretty narrow minded too, believe me. But what we would do, in a case like this, is to make that ‘former line’ absolutely inpenetratable for the offender, forcing him to have to drive backwards all the way to the very beginning of the line.

Empty slopes, sunny skies and crispy snow 

This would 1) greatly alleviate the stress is causes the people that actually do understand the reason for the traffic jam and display civilized behavior, and 2) it might help understand the AA that this particular behavior is non-social, and will not get him (or her), anywhere but to the end of the line (i.e. the beginning of the traffic jam.

I, in particular, can be a regular 'B' at that. I will not let anyone get back in front of me. I am willing to bend my fender for that (on my account, no problem) if I have to.

Alas, not in Lebanon. We’re too smooth, and let the asshole take our place. Now if it were only one AA, the line would eventually slowly budge, and you might reach your destination within humanly acceptable time. Unfortunately, the AA’s are abound! Especially fathers with children in their cars. Cars with legislative license plates. The mini-bus gypsy drivers.

At the end of the day, there was a boarders and skiers competition. Testosterone abound. It was fun to watch.

As a result, the AA’s are gratified in their actions, and are confirmed in their beliefs that we – the people in line – are just dumb suckers, and they are well above us. I have complained about this before; the majority of the Lebanese are meek like sheep. I don’t get this. An otherwise passionate people, can be so meek about getting pushed around be a couple of bozzos in SUV’s.



The lift from Cabane



The skiing was – by the way – fantastic. And when it gets to lining up in the ski lift, I just shove those AA’s aside with much verbal and physical ado. It embarrasses my son to no extent, one of the reasons why he is no longer skiing with me. I couldn’t give a rat’s ass. Because nobody shoves me around.

Another Intermezzo

Slopes of Feraya

My computer was (re)formatted this week. While everyone has Internet faster than the speed of light these days, mine only seemed to slow down more and more, till it got to a point where I could go and make myself a cup of coffee between the loadings of pages. My brother blames it on Bill Gates. I blame it on my downloading of 1000 and 1 free programs. Now that I have formatted the computer, and am back to zero, I have to download the bare essentials (for me); Picasa.

Some of you sometimes comment on the lovely photos I make, but although I’d love to take all the credit, most have been pulled though Picasa. Such as these, made yesterday on the slopes of Feraya; 6 Degrees, sunshine, good snow, few people (on the Wardeh slopes) and only one traffic jam. Holland is currently in a Siberian time zone, with -20 Celcius in some places. - 13 C in my hometown. I miss the Dutch winters (now and then), but luckily the snow is just 55 km away.

 

We’re not getting any younger, Marijke and I. We’ve known each other since 1990 if I am correct, but she’s got a better memory than I have. And that’s why I thought this 60’s filter (which comes straight out of Picasa) was appropriate. Two old bags in the ski-lift.

Travels with Hubbie Part III

In the mist

Yes, still in that northern region of the Beqaa Valley. So we are driving around, and suddenly in the mist, we see all these shapes popping up all over the plain. The area around el Qaa is teeming with ancient mud dwellings.

In the old days, mud was the only building material, since there is very little rock in the valley, and wood, well, that was hauled off eons ago. The rich built in stone. The rest used mud, because mud brick was the only building material around that didn’t cost (much), and everyone was living in little mud brick dwellings.

All these mud brick dwellings have since been abandoned and fallen to ruins, but here in el Qaa, you can see that at one point in time, this region must have been teeming with these little houses, each one on its own little plot of land. The mud bricks were prepared in wooden forms from a mixture of loamy earth, chaff and water. (source) . This type of housing has been in use since Neolithic times, and our mud is pretty famous, I found out while surfing the web.

The Israelis – while occupying the southern part of it - apparently referred to Lebanon as ‘the mud’; Once you get struck into it, there’s just no way to get out. (source).
Mud houses are environmental friendly, isolate well against the winter’s cold (and boy, does it get cold over there) and the summer’s heat, and are made from local products. It is a pity when you see all these ruins, that the knowledge of how to build these houses is gone.

They have totally disappeared from the valley landscape since the introduction of cement, and if you do want to see an original house from those days, you will have to go to the Terbol Museum, where Bedouin women have constructed an original mud brick farm house.

You can also sleep in one in Taanayel, where the NGO Arc-en-Ciel has one fixed as an eco-lodge. It seems you can participate in the making of the mud bricks and children can learn how to build mini mud houses.

We also ran into this bizarre project. Although it looks good and very romantic, I think it might be better for the local economy if we’d give mud bricks a try.

Travels with Hubbie Part II

Catching trout

While in the northern part of the Beqaa, we ran into a fish farm. They’re breeding trout in the Assi river, rainbow trout. I have lived here for a long time now, but have driven trough Hermel maybe once. And only last fall did I end up there by chance while taking the kids out on a rafting trip, and we were served trout for lunch. I didn’t even know they had trout in Lebanon. Well, they do. And good ones too.

Look at that weight; It think it was once part of a car engine

We used to have brown trout in Lebanon, but that one is practically extinct due to overfishing. The rainbow trout was introduced somewhere in the fifties and is 'characterized by a fast growth rate. Trout is raised in areas where a constant supply of high quality water is available all year round. Lebanese waters are predominantly calcareous and suitable for trout production. Water temperature is usually the most critical water quality factor. Trout Farms in Lebanon are mostly family owned businesses. An average yield of 30 kg/m2 is common.' If you are interested in fish, you can find the entire document here.

Catch of the day

 The fish gets pulled out of the river right in front of you, gutted and weighed, and all that at $4 the kilo.

The average annual production of trout is around 1 100 tonnes (MOA figures). This is produced by 150 farms, 80 percent of which are in Hermel-North Bekaa, at a total value of USD 3.7 million and an estimated average yield of 10-12 tonnes (at approximately 1.5 Kg/liter/minute). (Taken from here)

The fish gets gutted and cleaned in front of you, and goes home for $4 a kilo.

 Now all that hubbie needs is a wife that knows how to cook.

My Bank Sucks

It is Sunday, and I am doing my banking online. 'Online' banking needs some explanation here. It isn't really that 'online'. For most transactions you still need to pass by the bank in person to get permission to do what you want to do online.
I want to transfer some Lebanese pounds to my Euro account. I get an error message. I try again. Same message. I call the help center of the bank.



“Oh, but you cannot transfer Lebanese pounds to Euros. Only Lebanese pounds to dollars,” says the man on the other side of the line.
Oh really? Well, how about the other 10 times when I was able to do it?
Silence.
“Maybe because it is Sunday. There are no rates.”


Maybe. Maybe not. That was helpful. Not.


Then I notice that my Euro account has 5 Euros less from last September. Now how did that happen? I check the account summary. Guess what I read?

I paid 5 Euros en 25 cents for service fees. Come again? I thought it was supposed to be the other way. Isn’t the bank supposed to give me money, as in interest?

It is that same sucky bank that offers me a credit card for MY account with MY salary, but who want my husband to come and sign.

Me thinks I need a new bank. Any suggestions out there?

Intermezzo

They said it was going to storm this weekend. And so no one went skiing this today. I am kind of surprised that anyone still believes these weather forecasts because they are consistently two days off. It was a little foggy, and not all slopes were open, but it was lovely. Lovely and quiet, and so you go up and down and up and down.

For those unfamiliar with Feraya; do not think we've got a whole lot of trees on the slopes. These are the only ones

The best part of the day remains the evening though, when the slopes close down, and everyone goes home. It got horrendously icy suddenly, and we saw several cars running into the ditch or each other. My son went down with friends, and their car got banged up on both sides; one side by a lady coming from the opposite directions, the other side by a gasoline truck losing grip. I think somebody’s driver is getting fired tonight.

Going home