Explosions and such

At the protest
Originally uploaded by Jane Rubio.

So you might have noticed I haven't blogged at all since Hariri's assassination. I was kind of too overwhelmed by the whole thing. Some of you were e-mailing me, asking how I was. And I know a lot of you are news junkies and read all the analysis anyways. So in a way, I felt like I had nothing to contribute. I was reading all the analysis too, and just getting overwhelmed.

I have cried--twice--over Hariri. About three years ago, downtown was nothing. Still destroyed from the war. But now it's beautiful. Great stone, European-style buildings with outdoor restaurants where people smoke argila and drink coffee. Little kids run around the Place d'Etoile (chased by their Sri Lankan and Phillipino workers--the trafficing in women from Asia can be another blog.)

I know people who got scholarship money from him. If you want to go to a top end school in Lebanon, you have to have money. The government doesn't give financial aid. Hariri gave a LOT of scholarship money. And these friends are Druze. He wasn't keeping it to his sect--the Sunni Muslims.

A couple days ago was the fifth explosion, and apparently the biggest. How does this affect me? Aley is dead. There are supposed to be tons of people here in the summer. All my friends who work in the souk are very depressed.

But I don't let it stop me from anything. It has all been in Christian areas. Driving home the other night through Ashrafiyeh, a Christian area, there were military checkpoints. But this is normal now, everywhere.

One night, the phone cut off when I was talking to Christine. I then heard a loud noise. I said Christine, "Check on line. I think there was another big explosion." I was in my apartment in Aley, 17 km. up the mountain from Beirut. I heard Hariri's, too. It was during the lunch break at school. I was talking to some of my students and we heard it. "What was that?" I asked. They said, "Oh, that's just Israel flying their planes really low making that explosion noise." Of course, Israel always does that, just to be obnoxious.

How else did this affect me? We missed a lot of school days for protests and national strikes called by the opposition. Then we had to make up 4 Saturdays, which was one of the most horrible things I've ever had to experience.

Oh, and who's doing it? Here in Aley, if there's wrong weather, it's Syria's fault. During the war, the Syrian soldiers would just occupy people's houses and they took or destroyed all the stuff when they left.

But why would Syria do it? To bring the world's condemnation on them. I say it's the Americans or the Israelis. The U.S. needs more of a justification to be where it shouldn't. Iraq stuff spills over into Syria. Israel would like to have a weaker Syria, since it's a regional power that tries to keep Israel in check.

I guess some are concerned about bombs. But y'all shouldn't be. All you brave souls should come visit me anyways.