(New photos @ More Beirut...)
Last night we walked the Corniché to Rouché, the piece of Beirut that pushes out into the sea. It has the old restaurants and hotels, the ones that somehow survived the years of battle, and it has Pigeon Rocks,

and the old amusement park Elise wanted to visit her last night in the Middle East. She wanted to ride the ferris wheel and eat at a restaurant on the water. The ferris wheel was cheap, and the electricity only went out twice, but we were happy, at sunset, watching the sea on one side and the city on the other, Thursday night full of people, the Islam Friday night, as Friday is the holy day. So we went around and tried to sum up Elise's stay here in Beirut. Swinging at the top, poised between these states, without power we had some tears, some laughter, said prayers for us all, and then made out way along the Corniché, past Bain Militaré that still houses a garrison, and as we passed the guard changed and the fresh young soldiers trotted out of their barracks cocking their automatic weapons loudly enough we stopped in our tracks, until a young mother in a passing family said, "Don't worry, they are only changing the guard." Funny how far you can go in your mind so quickly.
We stopped at a waterside restaurant, huge and nearly empty at 8:30, full of Muslim families eating and smoking nargalies. We ate Lebanese food at the water's edge, watched an old man and his son mount the old pillars to fish, then took coffee and readied to leave, when our waiter told us to sit, inside where we wouldn't be bothered to buy anything, but could watch the now filled up space clap and sing along to the trio singing Arabic songs. By the time we left the Corniché was full, more families cooling off late, and it was, and we had to get Elise on a plane early.
And Elise left early, after suffering though the past few days with us stressing and fretting over an Indian bureaucrat busting our collective chops about our visas to India. All, "I'm sorry, no way, impossible. It will take 10 days," to today, when we're told we will board our plane Monday, with or without a visa in hand and will be allowed to enter India. Go Figure. Poor Elise, thrilled to have been here, thrilled to be leaving, and poor Phoebe, knowing she's with us for the long run. But I get up early, wake Elise and get the 5-am taxi to the AirPort, kisskisskiss goodbye then I take the same cab back home. We'd arranged on a price to the AirPort, but not the return, so when I get home, half asleep and sadly missing my daughter I ask how much is the fare. I pull out money enough and more, and the driver takes it without flinching. An hour later the phone rings and it's the driver asking me how much I paid. "70,000," I tell him, "OK," he says. A half an hour later the owner of the cab company calls me and asks how could I make such a big mistake, sends a car for me because he wants to talk in person. OK, I get in the car thinking whatever I'm thinking this early and get there and Mohamed tells me he fired the driver because this wasn't the first time. "It is up to us to make sure business is honest in Lebanon." He gives me 40,000 and the strongest, sweetest you can imagine and apologizes for the driver's dishonesty. He was going to fire him anyway. All this on top of my missing Elise already and half-worrying about our Indian visa.
But today is just business, happy to be here, readying to leave. Leslie and Phoebe are at the beach, taking in the white hot afternoon. We are all listing in the tide of yesterday's dastardly bombing in London, and no one here is happy, no one. Especially the new best friend we've made in the nurseryman Daruuze, who poured us coffee this morning while we waited on the the Indian embassy to say yes (and the fellow finally said, "Yes, we will help you, even if we need a counsel to get you in to India.") And Daruuze, so happy for our company, and we so happy in his, later, just now, brought us a lovely arrangement of flowers and fruit, because he loves us, and America, and wants nothing more than the rest of the world to know the generosity, hospitality, and love these people feel for each other and all of us.
The sadness on the faces of the Arab people we've met is so true and sincere. There are renegade factions that everyone dreads. It's the same in Oakland, San Francisco, London, Damascus, Hamma. Here, in Lebanon, what everyone wants is the return to the eons of good business, happy trade, tourists, and travel. And I'll go now, to trade a little and travel the fairly quiet afternoon Beirut streets, looking for nothing but a box big enough to send home what I don't want to carry. To India. Inshalla.