From Megadeath to Mega-Dinner! And then more music.

After the concert, we loitered, waiting to gather the 9 of us back again. Ibrahim found us with a poster in his hand and told us we could go back inside and get free posters, then suggested we find the band and get autographs, which we obviously couldn't refuse--though it was a little awkward, since we are no longer in the prime groupie years of 14-16. Then came the inevitable question of, what next? I felt right back at school, my AmeriEuro friends pulled out their cellphones, looking for the next party or whatever, but we settled on finding a nearby restaurant to sit and get something to eat. Ibrahim's friend suggested one with a live singer, so after shedding a few from our group, we walked around the block into the old city.

The restaurant was called "Narcissus Palace" and was in a renovated old Damascene house, with a large courtyard (the ceiling was covered for the winter) filled with long tables of families. We sat in the back, with the groups of men, where apparently they put all the 'rowdy' folks who might not be family-appropriate (I was the only female back there, not that it was weird but still.) The waiter informed us that it's necessary to order the full mezze menu, and then if we wanted to add anything else, we could. Our table was soon filled with small dishes of hummus, labne, muhammara, tabbouleh, fattoush, arugula salad, kibbe, chicken, etc etc and so on and so forth. I tried a drink made from fresh lemon juice and mint (it came out green and delicccccious) I think it was called something like popo.

Dinner conversation morphed from one topic to the next, though I won't record them here. Suffice it to say it was very interesting and thought-provoking. By the end of the meal, a few of our friends were anxious to move on and continue celebrating the end of class at a friend's house, but Paolo and I decided to stay for the music with Ibrahim and his friend.

The music was the same kind of music that the band performed at that cafe in Lebanon-- the traditional Arabic songs that everyone in the restaurant knew all the words to. It wasn't quite the same dancing spectacle as in Beirut, though by the end small children were dancing on tables and people were up in the aisles dancing with friends. Behind us was a long table of men and a few of them got up, twisting their hips and shaking their chests, and were met with a lot of cheers and laughter. Though it may not be common for men to dance like women, it certainly wasn't their first time.

But the best part of it all was seeing Ibrahim and his friend waving napkins in the air, dancing in their seats, singing along and wearing their Megadeath t-shirts, the same two who had been jumping around and banging their heads to rock songs just a few hours earlier.