eid al fitr pt 1: three countries in one day

I have been meaning to write about my trip over first Eid in September for about two months now. Here is the beginning of it: more for myself to remember than to share anything profound (which, I suppose, applies to everything else here as well but especially so in this. I typically get bored when reading other people's minute-by-minute accounts of their travels, but I feel like I owe it to this trip to get it all down for myself so please forgive me for the following act of hypocrisy). Here's a recap that I will write stream-of-consciously with probably too many details and not a lot of organization, but I will attempt to make up for the lack of readability by posting pictures of Beirut, Damascus, and Baalbak (oh, Baalbak!) when I get back from Egypt next week.

day 1: saturday, september 19

Flew from Doha to Kuwait where we had a six hour layover. We decided to collect a bonus stamp in the passport and leave the airport to see Kuwait City. The conversion rate for Kuwaiti dinar was dismal - changing a $20 bill got me just barely 5 KD (the visa was 3 KD) and we scraped together our dinar to get a cab to the city. Conclusion: An unattractive version of Doha. Ramadan was still in full swing, and the cab driver took us to "the souq" which ended up just being a mall. Walked on a pier for about five minutes before succombing to the heat and heading back to the airport. Two GCC nations down, four to go (three realistically, since I have no husband or male relative to accompany me to Saudi . . . ugh).

Arrived in Beirut a little after six and it was raining!!! Zack scooped up a friend on the flight in (Lebanese South African guy working for Red Bull in Doha) who offered us a ride to town with his parents, who were picking him up. They were total dears and we had to practice intense negotiating in refusing their offer of a flowery umbrella when we got out of the car in Gemayzah. We had dinner at Margherita, a lovely pizza place where Peter had eaten three times during his last visit to Beirut. I have a jumbly and rosy warm memory of the ambiance - rain and slow-moving headlights outside the window filled with jars of peppers and tomatoes, good smells and good lighting, beautiful people and families eating dinner around us, beautiful chefs in white smocks throwing dough, a bottle of Lebanese wine (wine!! after living in Doha for a month during Ramadan, it was shocking and joyous to have wine with dinner) with a most delicious pizza with pepper infused dipping oil . . . c'etait completement parfait.

Spent the next few hours acquiring money (American dollars at the ATM - excellent work, Lebanon, saving me from the horror of international currency conversion fees) and lodging, which turned out to be a little tricky. Both hostels mentioned in Lonely Planet were full for the night, and we found a third around the corner where the owner, Firass, said he would have loved to have us stay except for the "catastrophe!" which had occured - namely, the rain forced would-be customers of the rooftop beds indoors. Firass spoke more French than English and consequently pronounced it "cat-a-strof!" with great drama. He had Peter play him some tunes on the guitar and decided that he would do his very best to provide beds for us. After a lot of talking and whispered negotiations so that the other guests wouldn't hear what a good deal we were getting and walking up to the roof to examine the wetness of matresses (it had stopped raining at this point) we cut a deal - the three of us would risk the rain and sleep on the roof for eight Lebanese pounds each. We dropped off our bags and headed to the bars and clubs - fun times ensued. The only nightclub we made it to was the legendary B 018 where bros abounded and the bouncers grew impatient with our inability to convert currency for the cover fee. We had taken a cab from Gemayzah to the club and, as in almost 100% of our dealings with Lebanese cab drivers, had been shamelessly ripped off (but, to our credit, only half as shamelessly ripped off as we would have been without putting up a fight). I promised Peter and Zack that I would use my schoolgirl French to negotiate the cab fare home and get us back to the hostel for "definitely less than eight pounds". The cabs lurking outside the club when we emerged had other ideas, however, and so we decided by exhausted consensus to walk back. Which did, indeed, put us back fewer than eight pounds but also ruined my shoes and Peter's spirit. On the kilometer or so walk back we had to stop and rest, sitting on the curb of a sidewalk and sleepily discussing the bombed-out looking buildings around us. After finally arriving back at the hostel, we found the door locked and folks asleep in the stairwell. I rang the doorbell and a half-awake Firass answered, gesturing the three of us to a slightly smaller than full size mattress next to the hostel desk. "There has been another catastrophe!" he whispered. Apparently the rain had started again, and, we discovered in the morning, other lost souls had claimed the soggy beds up on the roof before we wandered back. And so the three of us squeezed onto the mattress (Firass and the other workers at the hostel were on the floor around us) and fell asleep just as the pre-dawn call to prayer began.


Pier in the hot Ramadan heat in Kuwait. I packed too much. Photo credit: Jack

This is how I feel about Kuwait (outside the "souq"). It was hotter than can be described, or maybe even remembered. I have gotten very good at wearing way too much clothes in way too much heat after spending August in Qatar. Photo credit: Jack

Hunting for a hostel on a rainy evening in Beirut.

oh my: dubai!

The plan was a quick weekend in Dubai - leave Qatar Friday morning, fly back Saturday night. I packed just my camera bag (in which I kept my wallet and passports - I have two, soon to be three passports these days) and a backgammon board (in which I cunningly stowed a bikini and a pair of boxers to sleep in). All went acceptably well for a group of eight - it took some time to figure out lodging and desired activities, but we sampled a good smattering in the short time we were there.

My Traveling Companions, AKA the Seven Dwarves
(It is impossible to get a good picture of seven people)

Lost in the Dubai Metro System (shiny but regrettably unfinished)

Highlights include Barasti at Le Meridian (surprising and laid back beach bar with sheesha and young folks from all over the world and beanbags on the beach), Jumeirah (basically Reston Town Center with more food, more Europeans, and beaches), and the wholesale district near the port.

Mosque and cargo.

Lovely dhows from Iran full of refrigerators, couches, and men who hung their laundry all over the colorful boats.

A Dubai must-see is the indoor ski slope at the Mall of the Emirates. We only ended up going here because the other metro stops were not open yet, but this snowflake planter of palm fronds outside the window to the ski slope was worth it.


Then we went to watch the sunset on the beach, but it turns out that Nagheel Harbor is not really a harbor and that the metro never gets close enough to the beach to walk - you have to take a cab anyways. But I did get to see the sunset over transmission lines which was very industrial and awesome in its own right.

The only reason I would start this post with "The plan was", of course, is that things did not go according to plan. I ended up with an extra day in Fabulous Dubai after glimpsing a hot air balloon launch pad at Ibn Battula Mall three hours prior to our departing flight (and right after taking the sunset photo above). Naturally, I could not think of a more perfect way to bid adieu to this sprawling full busy diverse Gulf metropolis than by seeing it from the sky. The more perfect way, I realized later, would have been to see it from the sky one hour earlier. I started to get nervous around 6:09 after we bought tickets for the balloon and went looking for food to eat during the ride (oh, how charming, a picnic in a hot air balloon!). At 6:30, armed with a baguette, figs, and brie, we finally stepped on board. Nevermind that our flight was departing at 8:20 PM from an airport at least one hour away. We would be taking the world's fastest metro! Everything would be fine!

Taken from the balloon - southern end of Dubai, the real skyline is way north of this point but it was pretty.

After disembarking, the attendant had us take a shortcut of stepping stones (which saved us maybe 20 seconds) towards the metro stop, but I think they secretly knew we weren't going to make it. We'd overestimated the speed of the metro in our calculations (forty five minutes to Terminal 3, not twenty). An hour and a half of rush rush rushing to the airport and trying unsucessfully to trick our way to the gate ensued. No dice. Inquiries about buses or boats to Doha were met with chuckles and we had to suck it up and buy a one-way ticket on flydubai for the next day. I spent my bonus day in Dubai playing a lot of backgammon, eating fresh dates, and getting to the airport early . . . enough.

Hopefully Egypt will not have any fiascoes (along with the Lost Passport in Syria, I'm 0 for 2 in botch-free journies so far), but I am certainly learning - about how to make the most of arguably unsavory situations, how to do it better the next time around, and also a good bit about myself in having to deal fully with the consequences of my mistakes. And the fiascoes have been both fun and funny. The adventure is in the uncertainty you embrace - either with intention or by clueless default.