'Smile! You're in Beirut, not in Abidjan!'

My weekend tripping in the Middle East had to include Beirut of course. I was there for work twice, but had some time to get the flair of the city as well as Jounieh, where I stayed during my second job assignment in Lebanon.

Lebanon is amazing. Coming from Amman, it appeared to be really liberal and very Western. Also, the fact that Beirut lies on the Mediterranean sea just makes this city a delightful place. I particularly liked the welcome greeting from a tea-selling gentleman: “Smile! You're in Beirut, not in Abidjan!” (At the time, post-civil war Ivory Coast was making the headlines.)

Sunset on the road to Jbeil

We walked from Hamra, where we were staying, to Downtown, along the beautiful streets. A few destroyed buildings, vestiges from the civil war, had caught our eye on the way from the airport, but what struck us in the city itself was the presence of so much military: they were everywhere! (just like cedar trees!) Also we couldn't access part of the pedestrian area because demonstrations were announced. Afterwards an AUB professor explained to me that they tend to close up that part even if only ten people end up demonstrating.

Beirut is beautiful. One cannot deny it. The first time I was not sure if I would abandon my Amman for it. Somehow Amman had grown on me, in the one month I had lived there, but now, with a little more perspective, I start considering Beirut as a possible future home!

For now it is an opportunity to to get away from a quite conservative society and show a little bit of skin! My first thought when I saw a young Lebanese woman wearing a tank top was “Girl, you're practically naked!” Also to see people kissing on the streets made me feel slightly uncomfortable at first. What has Jordan done to me? :)

Other places, that I can really recommend are Jbeil (or Byblos) and the Jeita Grotto. Jbeil is a very cute sea port, where you can visit the castle ruins, which look amazing, especially at sunset. There are plenty of bars and restaurants along the Souq and the atmosphere is generally relaxed. In Jeita, we visited a stalactite cave, which was really impressive, even before we entered the actual cave. Indeed, Jeita Grotto is located in the mountains, not too far from the coast though, and the hills are covered in Green! It looks like paradise, because two and a half months in the desert make you miss green nature: pastures, fields, the grass chewing cows of Normandy, a little stream and... I should stop, because even if I have a little home sickness, my appreciation for the Middle East hasn't waned !

Greeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeen treeeeeeeeeeeeeees

In Lebanon, we stayed in a Christian area, which is distinctive by certain religious pictures (including photos of the pope), frequent statues of Holy Mary, no muezzin who wakes you up in the morning and also skin: hot pants and bare shoulders! It really feels like Europe and the easiness of life felt good.

When I boarded the plane back to Amman, I could already feel the melancholy. I don't know when I will return to Lebanon, but I know I will come back and I dearly hope that it will be soon!

Petra, Aqaba and the Dead Sea

Right now I'm writing from the terrace at the well known Books@Cafe in Amman, where some jazzy tunes accompany the beautiful view onto one of Amman's hills. It is nearly mid-June and the days are now becoming quite hot, people stay up late and every morning I wake up to a sunny day. I want to use this rather relaxed Saturday to portray my recent escapades around the country.

There is one thing, a visitor of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan cannot miss out on. Petra. In fact, from the moment I knew I was coming to live here, people started telling me “You have to go to Petra!“ It's the biggest thing in the country and the developments of the historical site, financed to a large extend by USAID, have created a real hype. OF COURSE I was going to go there. After the 20^th “Are you going to visit Petra“ I nearly wanted to shoot myself. I mean, would you ask someone who is planning on living in France, whether he or she will see the Eiffel Tower? Or would you ask: “Are you going to eat Tapas in Spain?”. Anyway, when I got here, the question became: “Have you been to Petra?“. After all this pressure, I am so glad that I can say: “I have been to Petra“ and I can also expose the banalities that every visitor is able to produce, qualifying the site of beautiful, mind-blowing, huge, hot, amazing... Indeed it is an incredible place, but allow me just to say how fed up I am with hearing people talk about it. This is why I am just going to do a few remarks on the place, and for more information, well GO THERE!

  Petra

A Frenchman we met there described Petra to be beyond everything: beyond time, beyond civilisation, beyond imagination... Indeed. It's difficult to believe that this used to be a flourishing city, while you are roasting on the way up to the superb views in the mountains. It is truly amazing and in my opinion, it's worth going for three days and just enjoy hiking around the place, because during the weekend we spent there, we were only able to see the main parts of it. Also, I might be interested in history, but I have a threshold when it comes to the intake of information. Thus, the thing I enjoyed most was being outside, with magnificent weather... 30° degrees sunshine (a bit cooler would have been even better). Hiking in such a beautiful place is incredible and my favourite spot of it all is what they call “The view of the end of the world“: beyond the Monastery, there is a spot in the mountains where you see the beginning of the desert and it just appears that if you continue walking, beyond the horizon you will fall of the earth. It is just magnificent.

A week later, I had the opportunity to see a bit more of south Jordan, especially the major coast city of the country: Aqaba. Although it is a beach resort, society there remains quite conservative because of its close ties with Saudi Arabia, only a dozen miles away. At the Red Sea, there is not much to do but lie at the beach, go snorkelling, scuba diving and enjoy other leisure activities. On top of that, the city is in a 'Special Economic Zone' so that especially alcohol and cigarettes are particularly cheap, which is quite an incentive to a lot of people every year!

Sunset on the Dead Sea

Jordan is also a great place for beautiful panoramas, especially the breathtaking canyons leading to the Dead Sea, which are called Wadis. However, getting around can become a pain when you miss a road and the lack of signs does not help in that matter! It can easily mean a 60km detour but for us it was an opportunity to accidentally drive past incredible views, that you don't find in any guide. Then in the vicinity of the Dead Sea, there is Mount Nebo where Moses is said to have seen the Promised Land before dying without ever reaching it. The view is beautiful there and at night you can see the lights of Amman in the East and the lights of Jerusalem in the West. On our bible-themed day, we also visited the Baptism Site, where John the Baptist is said to have baptised Jesus. The most impressive aspect of the site, in my opinion, is that the size of the Jordan river has been quite reduced, mostly because of Israeli irrigation policies upstream. This means that at the Baptism site, you are only standing ten feet away from Palestine. You can see some of the churches of Jericho! The distance in physical terms is ludicrous compared to the distance in constructive terms. However, the essential problem with the decreasing flow of the Jordan River is that the Dead Sea is slowly... well, dying. At the shore you can clearly see from the salt residues, where the water level used to be. A project of building a canal connecting the Red and the Dead Sea exists and it would reverse the shrinking of the latter. However, it also bears the name of Peace Canal, because regional cooperation is essential in its construction, but in the current climate, the project seems far from being realisable.

On a much lighter note, the Dead Sea is a perfect escape on weekends. From Amman, it takes about an hour to go to the lowest point on earth and then you can spend a day at the pool in the various hotels or beach complexes for about 20-40 JOD (20-40€) and spending a day in a bikini is a great bubble of oxygen!  

Kate and me at the pool bar...