Baalbeck & Anjar

The temple of Bacchus (outside)The temple of Bacchus (inside)

We spent the day in Baalbeck, one of the largest and most noble Roman temples ever built, and also the best preserved. So for a mere $10, and an hour drive from my house (65 km), you can visit the best of the Roman empire. At least, this is what they claim on the internet. I do not totally agree, because nothing beats Bosra (Syria).

We went early in the morning. Lots of roadblocks, and people hanging around on street corners. It looked like they were planning some kind of demonstration; on the way back we saw traces of tire burnings all over the place. We bought 5 kilos of grapes from a street side vendor for 3,000 LBP (about $2), and were eating grapes for the rest of the day. There were busloads of tourist when we got to Baalbeck, but I guess they were on a ‘a city a day’ tour, because by the time we got into the acropolis, they had vanished. We ambled around a bit, and Hana climbed most of the time. We had a chicken shwarma in downtown Baalbeck. Baal beck used to be a Hezbollah hotbed, maybe still is. I remember when Gerti Bierenbroodspot, a Dutch painter, spent the summers here, she had a couple of friends around town, and after a night of drinking, she would ‘fall down the mountain’ in her car, according to her ‘possibly the best way to drive around Baalbeck, otherwise you might unnerve the local population’. I once did a beautiful article on her stay in Baalbeck, was great fun We drove the Anjar in the afternoon. For years you couldn’t visit all of the the site because the Syrian mougabarat (secret service) had the site occupied, and soldiers were roaming all over the place. You can see the traces; all the wooden door ledges have been removed; probably ended up in the fire. Now that they’re gone, you can finally visit the entire city. It was a city on the crossroads of Aleppo, Beirut, Palmyra and Damascus, and was pretty popular in the 8th century. The Arabs build the first giant shopping mall; 600 shops. It only lasted 40 years.

Anjar

I just noticed I've got these tiny little ants crawling all over my keyboard. Maybe they're termites.