I know YouTube is infested with Lebanese drone shot videos but some just stand out and are too good not to share. The one below is produced by Dark Matters and is available in UHD resoultion, so if you have a suitable display and a hopefully fast connection just let it load in 4K and enjoy the cool shots and music.
Someone going by the handle “LemojiArt” on Instagram contacted me today to inform me about a visual project they’re working on which involves building LEGO Emojis (hence the word lemoji) and sticking them around Beirut. I can’t really explain the point of the project other than bringing a smile to passers by and I personally liked it.
Among the lemojis made so far my favorite is the one at Salim Salam tunnel since I get stuck there everyday! (I wouldn’t have noticed it by myself though if it wasn’t for the photo due to its small size)
Mar Mkhayel
Salim Salam
Ain El Mrayyseh
I have no idea about the real identity of the artist as he/she prefered to remain anonymous, but all I know is that the project will not be limited to Beirut alone and will soon “invade” other cities, so stay tuned to LemojiArt.
It’s been a while since I last used a ride hailing app around Beirut, and when I recently booked a Careem last Saturday it caught my attention that they currently charge 6,000L.L for rides within Beirut which is less than the standard fare you pay for other regular Taxis (10,000L.L / ride). I later checked UBER and noticed that they are charging a similar low fare as well.
I know the price difference doesn’t matter much with people who rarely use taxi cabs to commute, but those who do it frequently will definitely save some good money using mobile apps. My wife for example take cabs 3 to 4 times a week and I already convinced her to use Careem since it is my favorite booking app locally.
Talking about Careem, they recently announced integration with Google Maps, so you can see the estimated time of arrival as well as a fare estimate when you search for some location on Google Maps which can be quite useful. To try it out you can simply choosing the ride-hailing icon when searching for directions, then clicking “Open App” to launch Careem and book your ride.
I know the use of apps is to some associated with paying premium prices, but in the case of taxi booking apps it is not, so give it a try.
Photo via Flickr
Barcelona won a second Clasico within a week on Friday but this time when their legends team beat the Real Madrid legends 3-2 at Camille Chamoun Sports City Stadium in Beirut.
Barcelona legends were led by Ronaldinho, and even though he didn’t score, he showed he still got the magic with three assists in the game. Giuly scored twice for Barcelona and Simao also scored a goal, while Fernando Sanz and Javi Guerrero scored for Real Madrid.
The game was broadcasted live on MTV, and for those who missed you can still check the highlights as posted on FC Barcelona’s YouTube channel.
This video is ~7 minutes of pure horror to anybody into traffic management. A Lebanese YouTuber (Nash Suleiman) recorded his journey in and out of Beirut (from and to Choueifat as it shows) and documented the violations people and himself do everyday.
This video also incidentally proves that relying on the new traffic law alone to reduce road accidents is utter bullshit. As Nash mentioned at the end, safer roads is a responsibility that each and everyone of us has to bear.
Activists supported by ABAAD succeeded back in December to make the parliament agree on a draft law to abolish the controversial penal code article 522 that allow rapists to escape jail time by marrying their victims, and in an attempt to push the parliament to fully approve this law the cooperated with artist Mireille Honein to exhibit 31 paper dresses swaying between the palm trees in Ain El Mraysseh yesterday as a symbol of how unjust is the article 522 to rape victims.
The exhibition was designed in Paris by Honein who brought it to Beirut to support the NGO with the pressure it is exercising to have the legislation abolished.
Photo via AFP/Patrick Baz
In a public post on Facebook, Jawad Sbeity the owner of Beirut by Bike shared some photos from Waygand street showing the setup of the first bike lane in Beirut.
It wasn’t clear where exactly does the lane start and where does it end, nor the streets that will cover or when will it be finalized, nevertheless it’s definitely some good to those who take their bikes around the downtown.
However, the only and most important concern remains whether driver will acknowledge this bike lane or not. Waygand street gets quite busy during the day with some shops there have valet parking service and most of the time you find cars parked on the right lane which narrows the road… so whether you like it or not drivers will have no option but to drive over that bike lane especially during rush hour. Still, neither Sbeity nor the municipality can be blamed for that, but rather the lack of urban planning that should have provisioned wider streets around Beirut.
Anyway, let’s see how long will this lane live on!
Fadi is a quite popular fruit and vegetable store in Jnah that has been recently making rounds around social networks for the zucchini-flavored ice cream. The thing eventually went viral simply because “bouza 3a kousa” has been always regarded among the least appetizing things to try.
And it seems like he’s intending to continue with these weird flavors! Over the last few days he posted about spicy chocolate ice cream, and just today he added a new beetroot flavor!
Aside from ice cream, Fadi is well known by the way for the high quality vegetables (at a relatively high price) and the seasonal products that you can’t easily find in other stores.
Today marked the third day in Ogero’s “Unleash the speed” tests for subscribers in Beirut, and among the exchange offices that were included today is the Achrafieh exchange office, so I passed by one of my friends there in the area to test the “unleashed” bandwidth myself!
I eventually used speedtest.net and picked a server in Lyon that I usually use to test my home connection. I performed numerous tests and was impressed by the download speed which was consistent at ~6.5Mbps (3 times the subscription original speed), however the ping latency varied from 90 milliseconds as shown above up to 300 milliseconds, it’s worth noting though that ping to local servers at Cyberia and Connect was consistently less than 50 milliseconds.
Assuming the subscription fees will remain unchanged or hopefully decrease, the speed upgrades are much welcome but the latency thing should definitely be reduced to provide a better experience for online gamers. Aside from that, the ultimate challenge for Ogero will of course be to cope with the increasing demand on bandwidth once they remove the speed caps for all subscribers. People are currently barely getting the speeds they are subscribed to, so increasing line speeds without having the necessary bandwidth to cater for the users is going to be pretty disappointing.
Anyway, I don’t want to be pessimistic about the upgrade plan, but let’s just keep our fingers crossed until it is all done.
I just stumbled upon this Instagram account by a Lebanese hairdresser named Abedallah Itani who uses Nutella, conensed milk, and cotton candy among other products to color women’s hair!
The idea sounds crazy indeed but judging from the videos he posts it seems that it somehow works! I’m not sure though how long does the resultant color last or how bad does the hair smells afterwards… I mean I enjoy the smell of Nutella but I doubt anybody would want to have it on them all day long!
Coloring using Nutella
…using cotton candy
… and even caramel!