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A Lebanese Blog

Category: Lebanon

  • We’ll soon start paying 3,000L.L for a service taxi?

    As per this article in The Daily Star today, minivan drivers decided to raise their fares from 1,000 to 1,500L.L yesterday.

    “The drivers are no longer capable of keeping the fares at a low level. At LL1,000, they can barely make ends meet,” he said. “They [drivers] do not benefit from the [recent] wage increase decision but will suffer from the consequences of the measure in terms of increases in prices and rent.”

    And although it is stated at the end of the article that service taxi and bus fares will remain unchanged at 2,000 and 1,000 L.L, I highly doubt they will. Even since 2006, we got used to one of the three (Taxis, buses, or minivans) increasing their fares with the other two following shortly after. Which means that we might soon start paying 2,500 or 3,000 L.L for a taxi ride.

    Photo via Note Connection

    Update:

    Buses already increased their fares to 1,250L.L, and some taxi drivers started charging 3,000L.L as per some people on Twitter.

  • Meshtah Dagher – Haret Sakhr

    This small kiosk called “Meshtah Dagher” on Haret Sakhr main road has some really great Saj Manakish. For some reason the guy there (Charbel) refers to them as “Meshtah”, which to my knowledge is a kind of bread, while in fact the Manakish he makes are actually called “Mashrouha”. Anyway whatever they’re called, they just taste great!

    Charbel is pretty generous with the ingredients, be it zaatar, cheese, or keshk, while the dough is thin and light, the kind that doesn’t make you feel stuffed when you’re done. Definitely worth a try when you’re passing by on a morning.

  • Waterfront City Dbayeh

    Here’s how Dbayeh’s Waterfront City should look like in a few years from now.

    According to this article in The Daily Star, the project will be complete in 4 phases over a period of 15 years (too much??), with the first phase set to be complete with 7 buildings in 2 years from now.

    I just wish this project and the alike outside Beirut would consider creating more office spaces to take some load off the suffocating areas in Beirut such as Hamra, Achrafiyeh, and downtown.

  • Lebanon in the 60’s

    I just came across this old segment by Harold Baim about Lebanon in the 1960’s. Pretty nice to watch.

  • What does “karfoukha” mean?

    Where the hell did Joseph Abou Fadel come up with this “iben karfoukha” swear?

  • Beware of explosive pizza

    Sheikh Omar Bakri who currently lives somewhere in Tripoli, claimed a few days ago that Al-Qaeda are so clever that they can even make an explosive pizza!

    “Al Qaeda are so clever, they can make so many weapons from nothing. They can go to any kitchen, make a very nice pizza bomb and deliver it fresh,” added Bakri. Source

    Now we’ve got to be careful with pizza delivery boys!

  • Faraya ski slopes

    I went skiing in Faraya yesterday for the first time this year, and it was really great with so much snow on and off the slopes.

    Starting Faraya main square, the road was packed with the Sunday crowd but surprisingly there was not much people on pistes. And no I’m not complaining about it!

  • The ice skating rink at Beirut Souks

    I was at Beirut Souks last night and thought of passing by the new ice skating rink to check it out but was disappointed by how small it is. It’s like 20 x 20 meters and looked a bit crowded to me with like 20 people on it. Not to mention the overpriced tickets at 20,000 L.L.

    The rink is lasting till the end of February, and opens from 12PM till midnight.

  • Roadster Diner’s new menu

    Roadster just launched its new menu containig some new items like the Texas Steak sandwich, Rd. Cheese-At-Heart burger, and Rd Double Diner burger. Make sure to check it out here.

    Unfortunately I will not be able to attend a tasting session I’ve been invited to at their branch in Le Mall tonight, but trying out some of the new items is definitely on my to do list in the coming few days because of all the good feedback I’m reading on their Facebook page!

  • Power generators making a comeback in Beirut

    Beirut is currently experiencing 3 hours of power rationing a day, and even though setting up big private power generators and offering subscriptions to the people is illegal in the city (unlike other areas), I started seeing these flyers in Tarik El-Jadida since last week.

    And I expect to see more of these now that Gibran Bassil is calling to increase the rationing in Beirut and stating earlier that whoever bares 3 hours of power cut a day can actually handle 3 additional hours, totally disregarding that he’s actually talking about the business center of the country!