Birthday

It was her birthday, so we had a birthday dinner at grandma's house.

A baby poster bed on wheels; now who could ask for more?

Three candles; three years old

Snow in Holland

When people ask me what I miss about my country, I usually cannot think of anything other than 'driedubbelzoute drop' (type of liqorice). But when I see pictures like this, I do remember the first snow, and the orange glow (The orange streetlights reflect upon the snow) at night when you wake up in your room, and you now the ground is covered with snow. It is not often that I miss my country, but when I see pictures like this, I do.

Thumb stuck in car door

And as we are walking though town in T-shirts; it’s rather hot today, I think I’ll eat outside on the terrace, I saw this picture in my Dutch newspaper. The First Snow in Holland; It’s not fair, is it?
I had to pick up something in town, a little table, and Hana went with me. When getting back into the car, Hana wanted to close her own car door. She’s getting independent; opens and closes doors herself, rolls windows up and down etc. Okay, so you can close your own door. So she closes her own door, rather firmly. I look at her through the window as I see her suddenly look in anguish, and notice that her chest heaves as she is taking air in. She’s puffing up like a toad. Her facial muscles are getting rather distorted at this point. I am wondering why all this is happening, until I notice that, when I trace her right arm, her hand is holding on to the car door. And suddenly I realize that her fingers are stuck between the car door (all this is taking less than a split second). So I want to open her door, but no, she locked her door. I want to open my door so I can open her door, but no, my door is locked as well. So I’ve got to look for my keys, to open my door, to unlock her door, and then I can finally open her door. Boy, what a sound.
She took it well though. It's the thumb on the left.

There Grows A Tree in Beirut

I shot this tree (or trunk, rather) near Karantina (East Beirut). Or actually between downtown and the Beirut River (euphemism for open sewer), which is technically Karantina, but it's more to the downtown side.

And as I downloaded this picture, it reminded me of another tree I took some years ago in the Basta region (West Beirut), near the old antique market. Another euphemism. They are very similar. There are quite a few places where they have these trees with massive trunks. There's one huge one in front of the medical gate of AUB, and on the AUB campus there are another three that I know of that dwarf these puny little trunks. I'll make a picture of those and post them as well.

That's all for today; trees that grow in Beirut.

Israeli Pamphlet

A total non-event for me. Until just now. A couple of days ago I read in several blogs about Lebanon that the Israelis had flown over Beirut and drop a load of leaflets, warning us for the evil ‘baddies’; Hezbollah. I hadn’t heard the planes, nor did I see any leaflet floating around the air, nor did I find any on the street, so I didn’t really understand what they were talking about. Then I saw it on the news (they pictured early morning joggers picking up yellow papers and reading them), but didn’t think anything of it.
And now, as I got onto the back balcony, I see a paper lying on the floor. The writing is in Arabic, so I cannot read it, but obviously this is the famous Israeli pamphlet. Must have been quiet a ticker parade over Beirut. Now what an odd thing to do! Fly a plane over Beirut, and drop papers warning the population for Hezbollah (they hardly need to, the infamous Party of God seems to lose some popularity now that the Syrians have gone.). But can you just picture that military staff meeting in Israel? Big guys in uniforms deciding to make up some silly paper? “What shall we write on it, boss”? What amateurism! It’s just incredible. These days there are several blogs that cannot get over the fact how Syria is run by a bunch of total idiots and amateurs, but I must say our Southern neighbors are capable of making some pretty dense decisions as well. Did they actually think it was going to change anyone’s mind? How much does an operation like this cost? If I were living in Israel, I’d wonder whether my tax shekels were wisely spent.
I kept the paper; nice memento. We still have the ones the Israelis sent out in 1982, urging the population of West-Beirut to get out of town before they’d bomb the place to smithereens.

Bourj Barajneh

Just had to drop something off at a Palestinian camp in town. There are four Palestinian camps in Beirut: Mar Elias (puny little camp, no access by car, only little alleys), Sabra and Chatila (well known) and Bourj Barajneh. All are in the same neighborhood, West-Beirut leaning on the southern suburbs. These people live under some pretty appalling circumstances. I drove in at dusk; there are no streetlights, there is no parking, and the streets are no streets but sort of little winding alleys, where two-way traffic tries to wriggle themselves through. It’s muddy and wet, doorways open onto the street and there’s garbage heaping up all over the place. It’s just not a very pretty picture. The place is cramped with humans. I dropped something off; the lady asked if I wanted to go all the way over the her place, but this is three steps down, five steps left, six up, then to your right and on and on and on. And on the way back, I couldn’t find my way out. It’s like this huge labyrinth, and you wind up deeper and deeper into the camp, and the roads get narrower and narrower as you go, and then you get stuck. No street signs, no street lights, no streets, basically, and then you’ve got to turn around and wiggle your way out again. There’s only one entry into the camp.
I did make it out of the camp after two guys on a little scooter offered to show me the way. Boy, what a humbling experience as I drove to my own neighborhood, where the streets were getting wider and wider.
I made this picture once of a Palestinian youngster, member of Fatah, in his camp near Tyrus. They had a little more space, but were also living within their own grave yard.

Marathon times

I have been keeping track of the 10 K we walk every year. It must be said that I amble well. And that I don't run.

Marathon time when my son had to walk with me. (2003)
Me: 2:25:50
Son: 2:25:50
Marathon time when he was allowed to partially walk on his own. (2004)
Me: 2:30:45
Son: 2:13:25
Marathon time when he walked on his own (2005)
Me: 2:26:59
Son: 1:48:06

Do we see a pattern here?

Beirut International Marathon

Kamau takes Beirut Marathon title

Kenya's Francis Kamau won the third annual Beirut International Marathon on Sunday in a time of two hours 19 minutes, 20 seconds. The 26-year-old, who won $10,000, was followed home by last year's winner, Eshetu Bekele of Ethiopia, in 2.19:38.
More than 17,000 competitors from 77 nations took part in this year's race, up from 11,000 runner from 66 countries in 2004. (www.bbb.co.uk)

Pa

Last year president Lahoud was standing at the start line, waving happily. This year they did not invite him back. The man is shunned; no one wants to be seen in public with him any more. I think they feared for his safety if they’d have invited him, all 11,000 would have gone after him; feelings are running pretty high in Beirut. Anyway, we didn’t do the 42 K in 2 hours and 19 minutes; we did the 10K in somewhere around that same time. Adrian was a bit faster. Weather was fantastic, nothing unusual happened.

We should add another 2 kilometers to our 10 K, because the car was parker way up on the hill, at least 1K from the start line. Start was at 9:05, but it was so crowded we didn't pass the satrt line until 9:17 A.M.

On the way back, we took the (201 steps) stairs of Gemayze (Ashrafiya)

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.

On First snow and Phil Collins II

I had this beautiful post written for when the first rains would come, but the first rains came and never went, and it was more like a downpour, so I never got around posting it. To show how much it rained, and how much the temperature has dropped; we’ve got the first snow. You’ve got to look really well, but it is there, right on the top of Feraya. The Cedars has snow as well, but you can’t see that from my house. The snow capped mountains of Feraya are somewhere in the circle. (Use a looking glass)
The Phil Collins concert was actually quite good. It seems he’s got a problem with his hearing (I read somewhere), so this is supposed to be his final farewell tour, although the poster advertises it as ‘the first final’ farewell tour. Adrian enjoyed it, we sat in a section bought by a local bank, which seemed to have invited all it’s senior high ranking staff; people who probably never heard of Phil Collins or are way to old to get up and boogie. So we had an excellent view, as the six rows in front of us didn’t budge. This particular picture was nicked from someone else's site, and was not taken last night anyway.
But since I wrote this rain post, I’ll post it anyway. It is a little lame, in retrospect.
Today is also my last day in university. This particular professor is getting tremendously on my nerves, it’s a good thing it’s the last day.
I love the coming of the first rains in Beirut. The first signs are usually around dusk. It gets really really hot, and very windy. Not breezy, coming from one direction, but sudden gusts of wind, running trough the street, pushing in between buildings. Bits of paper and plastic supermarket bags fly around high in the air, and dust – inches thick, accumulated over the long summer months – is picked up and flown around. When you sit in your car, and you don’t feel the wind, it looks at first it is as if there is a fire nearby, and the ashes are twirling down. When you’re outside, you have the squeeze your eyes to small slits because the dusts flies thick in the evening air.
People are rushing home, because of the impendent rain, and you hear wooden shutters bang in the distance. The rains won’t come for another five or six hours, when the wind has died again. But those first signs of the upcoming rains are one of my favorite moments in Beirut.

On Beirut in a Balloon and Phil Collins

West-Beirut; We live right there where the circle is

The balloon has been up here since June, but I had never gone up in it yet. One, because I am afraid of heights, and two, because it’s built, maintained and run by a Lebanese company, and this does not instill much faith. According to Anwar, who was the contractor, it’s all very safe and sound, but I was not convinced. But as my parents are here, and I have the day off, we’re not in the mood to go very far because my dad is sort of sick and I still have to study for tomorrow, we decided to go in this thing. It seems they did their test run on the morning of February the 14th, when Hariri was blown up, which is just around the corner; you can still feel the –now water filled – crater. The St. George, where Hariri got blown up.

The crater. It doesn't look that big, but it's pretty huge.

It goes up about 300 meters, I was on my knees most of the ride, and have decided not to go ever on a balloon ride. I remember once I went on a ULM flight in French; a type of motorcycle with some flimsy wings attached. The guy in front of me, the ‘pilot’, almost had its waist severed from his torso by my knee-clasp-grip. My brother, who said he’d go if I’d go, decided to cancel after I landed.
Anyway, it was not a bad ride after all. I took some shots of the city, show were I live. It is in the red circle. Right at the tip of the tip of Beirut. The balloon next to the Holiday Inn; bombed out in 1975 and never rebuilt

(Snoop Dogg: (Whachu doin?) Nothing chillin at the Holiday Inn (Who you wit?) Me and my peeps won't you bring four of your friends(What we gon' do?) Feel on each other and sip on some Hen One thing leading to another let the party begin) Hana and I in the balloon

On another (lower) note; it seems I’m going to Phil Collins Saturday night. I’m going with Eddie, as part of his education as a ‘whole child’. We went to the Rolling Stone two years ago, that was pretty good, sitting in the Press Box. I’m not quite sure where we will end up this time, but since he’s barely 1.50 (m), it better be somewhere up front or else he’s not going to see much. I’m not a fan, but hey, down here you got to take what comes along. I read this on a local blog, thought it was pretty funny: “Now, I know we like to think that our country has some irresistable artistic attraction to superstars but personally (and Rolling Stone can quote me), I think that coming here to perform is a sure sign that you're a has-been.”

Spelling

As I am doing this course on Language Acquisition, and plowing through all these theories and methodologies and en method and strategies and techniques and I don’t know what, we were pondering on the importance of teaching spelling. Barbara, one of my fellow students, came up with this little text.
The implicatotions of this might be not to bother teaching spelling.

Sick

My father has the uncanny ability of getting mysterious diseases whenever he is away from home. So today he is sick, although not quite sick, but not feeling well, so he’s in bed. As he’s painting my kitchen, I do hope he’ll be able to finish it, otherwise I’ll be living with a half-painted kitchen for the next year, as I do not see myself paint anything at the moment. I am currently stuck at yet another university course. ‘Brain research and the implication for second language acquisition’. Anyway, he’s got to walk a marathon in two weeks time, so he better shape up by then. He’ll probably be the oldest participant; 90 years old to join the Beirut International Marathon. Hana must have been the youngest, two years ago, when she was 10 months old when she did her first marathon.
And here's Hana on her first marathon (Eddie on the left)