And we wonder how accidents happen in Lebanon. Dangling large steel bars over the road, whomever is in charge of constructing that building should be heavily penalized. This is in Achrafieh by the way.

Update: 2 Men Arrested after Ransacking Batroun Hospital and Snatching Body (Thanks Karim)

I heard on the news today that a young man named Elie Cherfan (aka Rambo) died in a motorcycle accident. Not sure if it was reckless driving or some random accident, but when the parents went to pick up his body from the hospital, they were asked to pay for his release. They had no money and got irritated and started breaking things, then they stormed into the morgue and retrieved the body and left without paying.

What is that rotten system that doesn’t let parents pick up their son’s body without paying ?

Today, their convoy was stopped by the police for 3 hours causing huge traffic on the Jounieh highway but they proceeded with the funeral later on.

We keep hearing of such stories every now and then. I wish young Lebanese would be more careful driving those motorcycles and wear their helmets and safety gears at all time. And most importantly, don’t take yourselves for Rambo anymore because life is not an action movie where the hero always gets away.

R.I.P Elie and may God be with your parents.

Everybody is getting ready for the world cup in Lebanon and raising their favourite teams’ flag on their balconies, cars, roofs you name it !

But there’s one thing that’s been puzzling me lately, people raising three or four different flags on the car. What’s the point of being with more than one team ?

The whole point of competitions is to be with one team against the other.

Another point is that once you hang those flags being sold on the streets on the car’s windshield, you can’t open the window anymore because the flag will fall. Not a good deal for cars without ACs.

FM entertainment is a very popular and old place in Adonis. I remember my parents used to go play bingo there during war days. It was renovated recently and it changed its whole front banner and put “Poker Club” And “Show girls” on each end of the banner.

I noticed yesterday the “girls” went off. Not sure if it’s the wind or the FM owner was forced to remove it. Either way, the show must go on!

More than 300 chefs set the new record for hummus, which the Lebanese say is their national dish despite Israeli claims, in the presence of a Guinness World Records representative who confirmed its weight at 10,452 kilograms.

[CNN] [Naharnet] [BBC]

I honestly believe this is a big waste of money and hummus !

I noticed today that the Ghazir Bridge is closed for some reason. I asked around and it appears a part of the bridge has collapsed or has weakened and there was a hole right in the middle of it. I always noticed there was a small gap between the bridge and the road, apparently that is being fixed also. This bridge was bombed by the Israelis in the 2006 July war, but they are not to blame this time for this incident. Whomever reconstructed this bridge did something wrong. Thank God no one was hurt in the process.

I just received this video in my email. It apparently is a year old but I just saw it and thought it’s interesting to share.

What do you guys think? Does it portray Lebanese women properly? Does it portray the society properly? [YouTube]

To add on Najib’s post regarding “a night out at Pierre and friends” , spending the day there on a weekend is a very relaxing and chilling outing. The music, food and overall ambiance is very nice except for the seating since they are still using the oldest benches ever. This is a must visit place in the summer and during the weekend when you feel like chilling out on the beach with a glass of wine and seafood lunch with some friends.

And we wonder why accidents happen everyday. I saw these billboards today on Jbeil highway going to the north right after Casino Du Liban, they’re displayed over a 2KM distance.

A picture of some Lebanese shepherds taken sometime between 1909 and 1940 by Albert Kahn. [Link]

If you are sick of Manakish, or Kaak with picon, or Knefeh, an alternative for a yummy breakfast is “Chez Paul” in Gemmayze. It has the yummiest croissants and breads filled with cheese, almond, zaatar, chocolate etc …

The best thing is to go there in the early morning before going to work when everything is still hot and fresh. If you have time, you can have breakfast there in their lovely indoor restaurant and outdoor garden.

It also is not expensive at all. I got two cheese baguettes, three chocolate breads, two thym breads for 18,000 LL.

Different places, same assholes driving. [YouTube]

I passed by ABC yesterday and noticed their security people are still using the proven useless bomb detectors. I wonder how long until they realize that fact.

Here’s an excerpt from the article above:

The British Foreign Office has told the BBC that they will now be urgently warning all governments who may have bought devices such as the ADE651 and GT200 that they are “wholly ineffective” at detecting bombs and explosives.

I just saw some garbage bins in downtown Beirut, next to the parking in front of Virgin, that had a big “A” on the side instead of the usual Sukleen “S”.

It’s the same “A” as in Averda, the company that owns Sukleen.

I’m sure even after changing the name people will still refer to the company as Sukleen…

This is worse than the “Sois Belle et vote” ad. First they portray Lebanese girls as “blondes” and now as materialistic and superficial.

This ad is primarily inspired by the campaign few Lebanese women led on Women’s rights day on March 8th requesting rights to grant nationality to their children, but instead turned it into a very bad and offensive joke. I am surprised barely anyone reacted to it knowing that the ad is still on the streets until today.

Paola Salwan & Joseph Daher, from Cafe Thawra blog agree with me.