but the ISF site is already down.

Update: It is now back up and we can start checking our speeding tickets on Wednesday .

It is really amazing how time flies by so quickly. I have been wanting to go visit the Ferrari showroom since July 2010 but today is my first day off since then so the first thing on my to-do list will be passing by the showroom.

Back in July, i posted on how i got stuck in traffic while the Ferrari people were unloading their cars but how it was totally worth it, and got an invitation from Marie-Claire Chammas, one of the Ferrari Lebanon people, to go take a closer look.

I can always hope for a test drive of the Ferrari 458 Italia. Anyway i will keep you posted on how the visit goes.

I’ve been to Ferdinand a couple of times already. It’s a very cozy bar with a really laid back atmosphere. It has old comfy couches and really old stuff hanging on the walls, like books and phones.

They have this AMAZING blueberry burger. IT’S SOOOO GOOD! Meat patty, a piece of bacon, can’t remember if it had lettuce and some blueberry jam! At first I was skeptical, but after trying it… OMG. I’ve been there twice already, the second time just for the burger.

Highly recommended.

Ferdinand 01-355955
Ghandi Street, Hamra

The police have announced that the radars will be installed – in secret locations – and activated starting Monday. No checkpoints will be erected to mark the radars and violating vehicles will be photographed and referred to regional authorities for notification. [DailyStar]

I really don’t understand why the locations are kept as secret? What is really the purpose behind those radars? to steal money from us or lower accidents and enhance road safety awareness?

In places where there’s no speed limit, the limit will be 50KM/h inside cities which is absurd in many places and 100KM/h on highways which is reasonable. I also heard there will be a website where we can check if we received violations or not.

I am sensing those measures are going to cause big problems if not carried on properly, and so far no minister of interior has been able to do so.

Apparently, there was a 3K race today at the Beirut Marathon 2010 dedicated to politicians only, with over 30 participants including MP Saad Hariri, Minister of Interior Ziad Baroud, MP Alain Aoun, MP Strida Geagea and many others.

MP Strida Geagea won the race in 16 minutes according to lebanonfiles which is pretty fast for 3 kilometers.

I came across an interesting post by finkployd on BloggingBeirut‘s blog and found the content of the post quite unreasonable and fake.

I’ve followed this blog since ever and always and still enjoy the posts, but allow me to very skeptical of it being the most popular, most visited, oldest continuously active blog not just in Lebanon but in the Levant!

Oldest continuously active Blog in Lebanon / Levant
February 2005 to Present Day = 5.5 years, that’s like 50 in Internet years

1- BloggingBeirut is indeed one of the oldest blogs, along with BeirutSpring, Ouwet.com, Plus961, The InnerCircle and some others but it has not been continuously active as i recall weeks, sometimes months passing by without one single post, similarly to other blogs just to be fair.

Highest number of blog posts / comments in Lebanon / Levant
1440 blog posts – over 5000 comments

2- Claiming to have the highest Number of blog posts and comments is absurd. BlogBaladi has had 2000+ comments in just 6 months and if it keeps doing well, it would have surpassed the 5000 comments by the mid of next year. BeirutSpring passed this number a long time ago, so did QifaNabki, that averages over 100 comments per post, or Ouwet.com, that has over 3000 posts, and maybe as well plus961.com who has been here for quite a long time and Maya’s Amalgam that receives a decent number of comments.

Most visited / popular Blog in Lebanon / Levant
over 80 million hits
over 20 million pageviews
over 4 million unique IPs
over 5 terabytes of data served

3- Last but not least, alexa.com seems to disagree with the charts and graphs posted. plus961 has a more page views, reach and is much better ranked than BloggingBeirut globally and in Lebanon.

Here’s a list of few selected blogs and their rankings:

Alexa Traffic Rank
1- Plus961 450,649
2- BeirutSpring 456,197
3- BloggingBeirut 845,852
4- BlogBaladi 1,115,896

Rank in Lebanon
1- Plus961 409
2- BeirutSpring 872
3- BloggingBeirut 1,439
4- BlogBaladi 1,606

Those are few stats for few selected blogs in Lebanon and not for all the Levant. I am not trying to prove anything here, but i really was surprised to see such non-credible and unrealistic stats without any reference to any source whatsoever. Maybe this is a fun post but i don’t see the joke in it.

Beirut Marathon 2010 finished few minutes ago with another great success and the participation of thousands of Lebanese, and a lot of political figures and celebrities.

One remark i have on the ad they used for this year saying “Why walk when you can run?”
Well running is more exhausting, harder on the knees and joints, and less fat-burning than a quick walk.

I had a birthday party yesterday at Al Mandaloun and it was one of the best parties I’ve had in years, and most expensive too …

The place is very spacious from the inside as shown above, with a stage where several artists perform throughout the night. We were seated upstairs looking over the whole place.

We arrived there around 11 pm, there were lots of parking around the place which is pretty cool. First thing we did was order dinner, I had a chicken pollard while my girlfriend had the smoked salmon platter both of which were really good. Then the show started with a lady singing Fayrouz songs followed by old Lebanese songs, then a Jazz singer, a few disco songs, an artist performing Mika songs (that was not so great), some rock opera music and more.

There’s barely a few minutes between every artist and the music is great even between the breaks. I recorded some songs and I will upload them later on this weekend.

Price-wise, the minimum charge is between 75$ and 100$, including dinner and drinks.

I didn’t get the remark though. Is he trying to push away customers or something?

Last time i was cutting my hair, i was watching whatever is on TV and this video below came up. I watched all of it and i noticed many parts that are very similar to the movie 300. I noted the song and its singer and checked it out few days later. Turns out not only there are very similar scenes to 300 but there are some stolen scenes from the movie.

Minute 2:43 ( All around the fire scene very close to 300)
Minute 3:17 ( Start of battle very similar to 300, javelin thrown at the enemy)
Minute 3:25 till 3:32 (This is the most hilarious one, the exact same scene stolen from 300)
Minute 3:36 (enemy yelling shown upclose, same as 300)
Minute 3:46 (All around the fire scene very similar to 300)
Minute 4:18 till 4:22 (Same exact fight scene as 300)

Minute 4:24 is funny because the guy jumps before the explosion behind him.

Yesterday I posted about two iTunes apps created by a Lebanese company and being sold for $6.99. Those applications provided all sort of information on every Lebanese citizen simply by querying his/her mobile number or car plate number.

According to bloggingbeirut who is following up the issue closely, the source of those apps is from a site called mulhak.com run by Nader Tfaili. There is also another Itunes app called “Lebanon Directory+” from MT2 / Libancall.

I hope legal action will be taken asap against those people.

GeekFestBeirut 3.14

I didn’t pay much attention to this event when reading it on bloggingbeirut yesterday, but i re-checked it today and it looks interesting so i think i am gonna pass by and see what’s happening. It will be a chance to meet other fellow bloggers and listen to what they’ve got to say.

For those who take the maritime road at Dbayyeh every morning, i think i’ve figured out a way that might cut some 20 minutes of traffic in the morning. I thought at first that i should not share it so that not everyone starts taking it, but that would be selfish of me.

As you can see in the picture above, you can skip all the zigzags and get straight to the seaside road and avoid all the mess chahe posted about.

The only problem is it requires some offroad driving, but i don’t know how bad the road is. I am gonna try it tomorrow and let you know.

I must agree i’ve been hearing more and more in the last few years about husbands cheating on their wifes or vice versa, but this trend is not just growing among married couples, but even among young non-committed couples. Ethics and virtues are on the low these days.

While there are no available statistics on adultery, most people, whether experts or Lebanese people in general agree the phenomenon has evolved. Now, both men and women cheat. According to Seropian, “The trend is certainly more common in the middle to upper class, especially in environments where the female has money. It comes with their liberalization. Women are less tolerant of mistreatment, increasingly aware of their desire to be fulfilled and likely to search for satisfaction if they don’t feel it.” [Full Article]

Taken from lebanonfiles.