Beirut Souks (Picture taken yesterday around 9pm)
The few Arab tourists we had left for the summer fled or were evacuated by their embassies in the past few days due to the recent unfortunate events, mainly the kidnapping of Syrians and Turks by the Mokdad family’s “military branch”.
I went down to Beirut Souks yesterday and it barely took me 30 minutes from Jounieh to get there. I expected traffic at Dbayyeh with Le Mall now open and at Nahr el Mot (City Mall) but didn’t find any. Once I got to Beirut Souks, I easily found a parking spot and the Souks weren’t as busy as I imagined they’d be be. Even the “Man In The Mirror Michael Jackson show” event that was taking place at the Souks wasn’t completely sold out as there were a lot of empty seats.
Meanwhile, the random kidnappings of foreigners and Lebanese is still ongoing. All in all, I think this is the worst summer we’ve had in Lebanon for the past 10 years, even worse than the 2006 summer. That’s really sad specially with all the potential we have in this country.