Fourth of July

(Random Beirut photos posted)

Thankfully no fireworks in Beirut today. Life in the middle of the city is calm and busy on Monday, people doing everything they've done and will continue to do. Woke up this morning saying, "What a day, cloudless and blue, before the city wakes up." and then it does. And we wake to doing little, wandering streets, changing money, doing chores. Lots to accomplish before we leave in a week. Lots. Smell this, look at that, taste this sweet, that fruit or meat, and buy, and hope, and pray. Another helicopter flies around this morning, but nothing more than morning traffic, though I can't tell why, because no one needs direction to go whatever way they want to go. You need a sixth sense to walk these streets much less drive them, or ride in cab through them.

Elise and Phoebe are getting restless, wanting to do something all the time. So we try, and then give up, play cards through the night the Crown Plaza Hotel shines different colored lights on its 20 story facade celebrating its win of the coveted 'Hotel of the Month' award. We are impressed.

Last night we went to the movies, took a cab across town, and every time we do we wonder if it can be any more of a wild ride than the last one. Last night the old Mercedes had no lights and the cabdriver had to push it into neutral at the stops to keep it from stalling. 5,000 pounds from Hamra to Sedeco, a deal in anyone's book. And we caught the movie just in time, left in another wild Mercedes, this one with the driver smoking more than I wanted to and slipping through alleys we didn't know existed. But how could we? We're just walking the surface of this city more lightly that the lint that falls from the rugs strewn over balconies. We are passing through at best.
And when we get back home Jaminna in the lobby says, "Good night, these men are from Iraq and would like to talk to you." And I say I have to get my family upstairs and need toilet paper before we go," and she gets it and we go upstairs. And I said I'd go downstairs and I go downstairs, meet the three men, draped over the worn arm chairs, and sweat. Not because I'm overly nervous (which I am) but because it's just hot. And we struggle through my bad Arabic and Jaminna's better English, all in translation, these fellas just want to know what I think, as an American, of the situation we've all found ourselves in. And we're in it. So I sit and talk and say this and that, and they grill me as best they can. After awhile I excuse myself, happy to be going home to those I know love me. But it was something, sitting and 'talking,' each of us trying to get a feel for what the other felt, without really having the tools to do so. No language tools. No political tools. No real sense of who it was any of us were talking to. Except each other.

That's where we are, tonight, talking to each other through whatever calamity may present itself. Like crossing the street. Like getting through town. Like looking at the most perfect sky and having the time and wherewithal to know it is perfect. It is, look... See that?

Comments

[Todd Gilbert]

Clifford,

Thank you for taking me with you. I love you Brother.

Namsate

Todd Tone

[Lana Ellis]

Dakota and I ran into Blue on the bluff and got your website info. HI!
Lana Ellis and Dakota

[jeramy]

not quite awake yet, reading your log for the first time, I'm kind of crying and laughing at the same time, so happy for you and amazed by the world thru your eyes, and not quite awake just yet... we send you our love and godspeed ... be safe, jeramy g