Beirut Day 18- July 11, 2009

Today was the first program-wide Saturday fieldtrip. We went to Jeita Grotto, Harissa, and Jbeil/Byblos. Pictures will be uploaded to Flickr.

We left AUB sometime between 8:30 and 9:00am and got on the buses, which one once again arranged by level of Arabic knowledge in order to facilitate us speaking in Arabic entirely for the trip or at least on the bus…which broke down quite quickly. We stopped at an amazing place called Wooden Bakery that had tons of freshly baked breads, pastries and doughnuts. I got a mini doughnut and three mini cinnamon rolls. The mini doughnut was absolutely adorable (and tasty) and can be seen on Flickr. After a delicious breakfast we all got back on the buses and headed to Jeita Grottos.

[Largely taken from Lonely Planet and Wikipedia]
Jeita Grotto is a series of limestone caves and is also the source of the Nahr al-Kalb river. It stretches about 6km back in to the mountains. It was apparently inhabited in prehistoric times but was rediscovered in modern times in the mid 19th century by westerners. During the civil war it was used as ammunition storage but the caves were reopened to the public in 1995.

We took a short sky gondola ride up to the Upper Grotto. Unfortunately we had to surrender our cameras whenever we were in the caves so as not to damages the structures and as such I have no pictures. I highly encourage anyone to look on the internet for pictures or on the Wikipedia page that has a few pictures. The inside of the Upper Grotto was breathtaking. It was huge and contained a wide variety of limestone formations. What was really fascinating to me was to see where water was still dripping and the rocks were wet, demonstrating that the process is, albeit infinitesimally slowly, still continuing.

After the Upper Grotto we descended on the outside towards the Lower Grotto. There was a large group of Indian male tourists that for some reason kept wanting to take pictures with our group and on the way down a group of them asked Teresa and me to take pictures with them. I’m not sure why (as they were equal opportunity men and women), but it was amusing. In the Lower Grotto we took a boat ride along the river that had helped to make the cavern. Our fearless program leader Bilal was in my boat and he enjoyed repeatedly trying to splash the other boats filled with CAMES students. It was just as spectacular although I may have enjoyed the Upper Grotto more because there was such a sense of awesome space.

After Jeita we headed towards Jounieh. We took a very lengthy and then steep sky gondola (called the Téléférique) up towards the top of the mountains. There we got some ice cream and then took a furnicular ride up to the actual top of the mountain. On top of the mountain is Harissa, a Christian pilgrimage site. I have been hearing that the Christians of Lebanon like to associate themselves more with the French than with the Arabs and often speak more French than Arabic. I definitely found this to be true in Harissa where many of the signs and souvenirs were in French and my stuttered Arabic did not get me as far as Rob’s French in buying souvenirs.

Also at the top is the Our Lady of Lebanon/Notre Dame du Liban (the name can also be applied to the statue), a Maronite cathedral which belongs to the modernist school of architecture. Next to it is the large white-painted bronze statue of the Virgin Mary. You can climb to the level of its feet by means of a circular stone stairwell. In the base of the statue is a small chapel, which I did not enter. I did however enter the gift shop and buy a Jesus-related gift for my Catholic grandmother.

After descending from Harissa we headed to Byblos for a late lunch at around 3pm. This is a late lunch by American standards but quite normal by Lebanese standards. Dinner is also not usually had until at least 8, if not 10. We went to a restaurant called the House of Blue where we were absolutely stuffed with food. We began with fattoush, tabbouleh, jebne, mini spinach pies, French fries, pita, tum (a garlic paste) and many other things, most of which were filled with meat. After all this the plates were cleared….only for the main meat dishes to be brought out. Most of the meat eaters were full and had to force themselves to eat more. For desert there was watermelon, cherries and peaches.

I had been very excited before the trip began for the portion in Byblos. Unfortunately we figured out later that the only place we would be going in Byblos would be the restaurant and a boat ride on the Mediterranean. Since there are many things I want to see in Byblos my friends and I have tentatively planned a return trip for next Sunday along with a trip to Tripoli.

After being stuffed at lunch we went for a boat ride on the Mediterranean. The captain, upon the request of one of the teachers, turned on some music and there was much rejoicing. The boat was going at a good clip over some waves and I was seated near the front so I got bounced around a lot which was really fun. We also saw hundreds of jellyfish in the water. And not just small ones, huge ones that were probably two feet across. The boat ride was just a loop and then we headed back to the buses and back to Beirut.