Day trip to Tripoli

After a quiet day on Sunday, I was ready to go out on Monday and see something new. But first I had to go through the same whirlwind of changing plans that I experienced on Friday. I called the Chouf Cedar Reserve to ask about visiting the park-- what time it was open, if I could go hiking, which entrance to go to, if there was transportation. I planned to visit the reserve after visiting the nearby Beiteddine, but since it is the off-season there was no transportation to take me from Beiteddine to the Reserve, or from the Reserve back home. It seemed there was no option but to rent a taxi for the whole day, which I knew would be expensive. But before I could figure that out, the park called me back to let me know that Beiteddine is closed on Mondays. Good to know.

So I called Chantal at work for another idea-- she suggested going north to the Cedars (another park), but I told her I had read that in the winter there is only downhill skiing there, no hiking, because of the snow, and I would rather snowshoe or xc-ski than downhill. Plus again the transportation did not work out and so on. Then she suggested Tripoli, 85 km north of Beirut on the coast, which I had not yet been to see. My aunt was on her way out for the day, so she said she and Ramez could drop me at the taxi station in Dora and find me a service taxi (shared betwee 4 people) so I wouldn't have to rent the taxi for myself alone. By this time it was late in the morning and when we arrived at the station it was already noon. Nagibe found me a good driver and told me that it would be 7,000 LL (less than $5) to the city and an extra 5,000 ($3.33) to take me directly to the old city. This sounded like a great deal to me, so I happily waited in the car with my book (now I am reading Islam: A Short History by Karen Armstrong-- Elisabeth I think it is yours? I definitely recommend it) for the car to fill. It reminded me of Ghana, where we would wait a few hours for the bus to fill, though since it was already late in the day and Tripoli is relatively far I hoped it wouldn't take so long to find a few other passengers.

In the meantime, the driver, Antoine, took me across the street to refill my cell phone ($47 in one week?!) and I bought a new card for $23 to last the next 10 days (I am writing this on Friday and I only have $2.62 left and I didn't even call the US). Then back to the car.

An hour later, no one had joined me and I began to get worried. No other cars had been filled since I arrived and the drivers were walking back and forth with their hands behind their back, praying with their prayer beads. Not a good sign. My aunt reappeared, having finished her errand and saw me still sitting in the car, alone. She talked to the driver then asked if I wanted to buy the whole car since there were no other passengers. There seemed to be no other options and it was getting late so I agreed.

Tripoli is twice as far from Beirut as Byblos is, so it is about a 90 minute car ride, or 2-3 hours by bus. Antoine was very friendly, though he spoke little English, so I practiced some Arabic with him and he practiced his English with me and he told me about his family, gave me his phone number in case I have any problems, told me he lives 10km from Tripoli and I can stay with his family if I need to.

We were more than halfway there when he pulled off the highway and onto a side road. I recognized the fort in front of us from my drive north with the trekking group as the guide had pointed it out to us when we drove by. Apparently my driver wanted me to see it up close, so we walked up and read the info signs, then approached the stairs to climb up to the top. A man appeared from a small building hidden in the trees and at first I thought he was going to tell us we couldn't go up. Instead he pulled out a key and led us up the stairs and opened the entrance door for us. Though he didn't speak any English, he gave us a tour around, the only word I recognized was "W.C." (water closet = bathroom) and we saw a 500 year-old bathroom intact.

After a series of photo shoots with my driver acting as photographer, we returned to the car and Antoine whispered I should give him 5,000 LL for the tour ("harram, this is his business"). I gladly did and we continued on the road.

Antoine dropped me at the appropriate location and then wrote out for me in Arabic the directions to get home again (1. from the castle where he dropped me to the taxi station 2. from the taxi station back to Dora, Beirut 3. from Dora taxi station home again). I ended up paying him more than I thought I needed to, as usual, but I didn't know exactly what price he agreed on with my aunt and it ended up being almost $30.

Tripoli (Trablous in Arabic-- transliterated from the Greek word Tripolis) is the second largest city in Lebanon and has been around since maybe before 1400 BC. It was settled by communities of traders coming from Saida, Tyre and modern-day Tartus in Syria, each settling their own city within distinct walls (hence the name "three cities"). It has been under the rule of Seleucids, Romans, Umayyads, Byzantines, Fatimids, then became independent in 1069 under the Ammar family. Then came the Crusaders, led by Raymond de Saint-Gilles of Toulouse, who built a fortress, which is where I began my tour. The castle has been burnt down and rebuilt several times. In general, it was a fairly unexciting castle, though huge and good for wandering, and it seemed like no dark and narrow passage into the depths and dungeons were off-limits. It was nearly empty and there were no informational signs so I did what I usually do and made it up as I went. From the top you can see the modern city below.

I left the castle and asked for directions to the old city, which the man at the door gave me, but they consisted of hand gestures and the words "blue box." I walked down the street and wondered which blue box he meant-- the blue stand selling fruit? The blue street sign? So I decided to give it up and just walked, walking from one souq to another, coming out in some strange area, asking someone else, not understanding them, walking in a different direction. There should have been many mosques, madrassas, hammams, khans, etc. to be seen, but I didn't really care if I found them or not so I just walked. In one souq where I was following a chain of gold jewelry shops I saw a sign for the Khan al-Saboun's soap workshop. So I entered and was greeted by a young man who works there and asked if I wanted to see the gallery. Two young women gave me a full tour of all the soaps, massage oils, hand creams, etc that they make, smelled every single scent they have and worried they would ask me to buy something. Instead, they asked me to sign their guestbook and gave me a pamphlet of information and a bag of soap shavings to put in my clothing drawers. I would have bought something if I had not already heard about the soaps and such awaiting me in Syria.

From there I decided I should probably wander my way in the direction of the taxi station, which according to my book was not far from whereever I happened to be, so I asked a few more people and walked in the general direction of their gestures. Along the way I looked into the windows of their famous sweet shops (one gave me a taste of their baklava) and bought a pomegranate juice from a street vendor (in retrospect probably a bad idea-- not feeling so well a few days later). Eventually I found the "garage of the clock," aka taxi station under the clock tower. I asked for the Dora station and found a taxi to sit in and wait once more for passengers to go home.

30 minutes later, yet again, no one had showed up. The driver asked me if I wanted him to take me home for $20. Sigh. With no other choice, I agreed and we left. I asked him if he would take me directly to the house and he said yes, then he talked to my aunt on the phone to be sure of the directions. When he hung up he laughed and said "your aunt is very good." Apparently she had invited him up for coffee, I'm not really sure why, except to check on him (usually when I am sent off with a driver she takes down his name and license plate number). He came up for coffee and before he left he asked for an additional 5,000 LL, or rather, he asked for 10,000 and my aunt bargained him down to 5. Later, Chantal pointed out I may as well have gone with a tour group for all the money that I spent on taxis, which unfortunately was true.

That night Chantal's sister, Josyan, came over to visit. I had not seen her since we stayed at their house eleven years ago-- my only memories of their house include the short supply of hot water for showers (which I couldn't understand) and slicing my finger while cutting a bagel and fainting from watching the blood flow. We rearranged the artwork and furniture in the living room and sat drinking coffee and eating nuts. Eventually she invited us all out to dinner with her and her husband, Eli, but Nagibe and Chantal were both too tired. I gladly accepted the invitation and we went to meet Eli at a nearby Lebanese restaurant.

Josyan is a doctor at AUB and Eli has a fertilizer business (I erred before saying they are both doctors) and they have three children: Elisa is 28 and studying theater in Barcelona, Josef is 25 and studying classical music/playing the lute in Stockholm, and Sarjoun who is 31, received his phD in Robotics from Carnegie Mellon and is now trying to start his own robot toy company, spending 6 months in Pittsburgh and 6 months in China. Unfortunately I missed all of them by about a week. Instead, Josyan suggested that I meet her co-worker's American niece who is completing her masters at AUB, who I will probably meet sometime this weekend.

For dinner we had a ridiculous amount of food: olives, bread, tabbouleh, stuffed grape leaves, labneh, kibbe, meat pies, cheese sticks, kibbe nayyeh (raw kibbe), sausage, muhammarah (spicy red pepper and walnut dip), hummus, eggplant dip, mashed potatoes with garlic, pickled vegetables, fresh vegetables, and thyme salad with onions. For dessert: a towering platter of fresh fruit, sliced pineapple, strawberries, grapes, and a platter of sweetened apricots, figs, pumpkin, dates and eggplant. Most of it was for my sake to try new foods and taste a little bit of everything and in the end too much of it returned to the kitchen. I tried to convince myself that they must recycle it in some way, though I couldn't figure out how, but I later asked Chantal and she said they throw it all out. This I cannot understand nor appreciate. Usually I am very careful to not waste any food and therefore eat everything that is served to me, for better or for worse, but with so much excess here I can't eat that way. When one is cooking at home, its good to make in excess because you can refrigerate it and eat delicious leftovers for the next few days. But eating this way in a restaurant makes no sense to me. Especially without doggy bags!