the query of beyrouth

The day before we went to Beirut I was quite batty at a hostel in Damascus. Quite batty, throbbing with whether or not the idea of going to Beirut was foolish, naive, precarious, or whether all of the above were imbedded with unsubstantiated fear and propaganda.


I'd been following Lebanese newspapers online for days, and deduced, with my very lightly educated understanding of the country's present turmoil, that as long as the UN's indictment regarding prime minister Rafik Hariri's death wasn't released during the duration of my visit (and it likely wasn't to be), than Hezbollah would continue to sit pretty (as opposed to likely going apeshit if they were held responsible for his assassination), and my trip to Beirut and greater Lebanon was likely not to be in ludicrous opposition to my personal safety.

Yet later that night, desperate for another human opinion, I found myself nearly gasping in the common room: "have any of you guys ever been to Lebanon?"

Between the UN freelance writer from NY who frequented the country, the German backpacker enroute, and the Spanish kid in his first semester at the AUB (American University of Beirut), I felt better.

Next thing I know the Spanish guy is co-ordinating with the freelance writer about how many kilos of Lebanese sweets he should get for her in Tripoli before we all planned to meet at some vinyl bar where they were to have a poetry slam a few nights nights later.

In the words of the freelancer "Beirut could blow up at any time, so if you want to go, just go."

So we did.