A Year in Tyr

By Eric Jonas Swensson

Lebanon may not receive the most news coverage, but this book will make you think it should. It was written by an American during the year 2009-2010, when his wife took a job working for an NGO near the border with Israel. Since his wife had the job, and his son went to school, the American would take lengthy walks daily through the nearby city of Tyr, observing and experiencing the locals, the expatriot international community, Hizbullah, historic sites, and the Mediterranean Sea in ways he had never encountered before.

His memoir, A Year in Tyr, is the result. It is a fascinating yet troubling record of one American’s sojourn from the good life, to anxiety over anti-American bias, to dread of war with Israel, which seems to loom as a very real possibility at all times among those who live in southern Lebanon. Told with warmth and humor at times and very tough talk at others, A Year in Tyr is sure to get people talking about something Margaret Atwood raised when she said, “There is just one race -- the human race -- and we are all members of it.” This book is a wake-up call on that very subject.

This is the second release by the author, Eric Jonas Swensson. His first book was Kinderbeten, an historical work. He had planned to use the year in Tyr to do more historical research in his field, but he found the subject of Lebanon and its present-day politics right in his face and very compelling.. So will you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eric Jonas Swensson
• Release date: Jul 26, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465853271

Eric Jonas Swensson

Eric Jonas Swensson is an author, blogger, historian, ordained minister and social media director for nonprofits. He lives north of New York City with his wife and teenage son. A Year in Tyr is a memoir of time spent in Lebanon. His previous work is Kinderbeten: The Origin, Unfolding, and Interpretations of the Silesian Children's Prayer Revival.

Book preview

A YEAR IN TYR

Published by Eric Jonas Swensson at Smashwords

Copyright 2011 Eric Jonas Swensson

Smashwords Edition

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*

Preface

In 2009-2010, I spent a year with my family in Tyr, Lebanon, near the border with Israel. Since my wife had taken a job working for an NGO and my son was attending school, I was assigned the role of house husband for the family. This gave me ample time for lengthy walks through the city, and I was able to meet shopkeepers, gypsies, suspected Hizbullah agents, and expatriates from the international community as I went along. The details of Lebanese life in Tyr were recorded in my daily journal entries, which became the basis for A Year in Tyr.

What you are about to read is what I saw. Looming largest for me was this: Tyr is not so much about what one sees; it is much more about what lurks below the surface. It is a place of masks where few conversations are really what they seem, and where intrigue is practically a religion, and if you know anything of the booby-trap we in the West call denial, the culture itself seems to manufacture munitions and strew them by every roadside.

It would take a long time to begin to explain such a complicated place, and this is not meant to be the last word on Lebanon. This is not merely a memoir. It is a tale of masks, as it were, where nothing is quite what it seems, where uniforms are costumes, and costumes are uniform. The cast is a collection of characters waiting for the other shoe to drop, and they hope it is not a bomb.

The town in which we lived is called by different names, depending on with which empire one identifies. The English call it Tyre, while the French call it Tyr (pronounced so it sounds like tear as in a teardrop). Tyre, the ancient city of the fabled Phoenicians does look good on a page in a history book, but residents seldom use the English form. When the Arabic form is put into Western letters it appears as Sur or Sour (pronounced to rhyme with cure). It means the south, which makes sense for this farther most city in Lebanon. We shall go with the French Tyr, as it is used as much or more than the Arabic in the city itself, and is the name used exclusively by the international community. Yes, we shall have many Tyrs falling on these pages.

This most famous and ancient city is at once beautiful and ugly, holding so much promise almost certain to be unfulfilled. It is a city of infinite beauty marred everywhere by the wastes of civilization. Once a prized jewel that Alexander the Great simply had to possess, Tyr is virtually governed by the Resistance, otherwise known as Hizbullah.

However, looming largest in Tyr, it is not what one sees, but what one does not. The Resistance is everywhere and nowhere and one never sees The Enemy, but that name is spoken of constantly. Of what one does see, one suspects that truly nothing is quite what it seems, even when it is acted out large as life for the world stage.

One can only guess what reality really is here in the Middle East. This is the story of the intersection of two worlds, a year in Tyr.

*

From the First Class lounge at JFK to the first sight of Beirut, husband and son had enjoyed the Business Class treatment courtesy of his wife’s employer, a certain international organization that shall remain nameless. As with all the flights he subsequently took there, the plane approached Rafik Hariri International Airport shortly after passing over Cyprus. It was late afternoon in what had been a good Lufthansa red-eye flight from New York via Frankfurt. From the air, Beirut looked to him like a beautiful city set on the side of a hill, complete with beaches, hotels, and pools: a seaside playground glittering in the sun.

His wife had been working in southern Lebanon for two months already. It was an important post amongst important people, and they received VIP treatment of a sort on arrival. A soldier met them as they exited the plane and walked them through passport control, baggage, and out to the vehicles.

Outside the airport, it looked like the grounds of a posh hotel. Our man could not help but notice there were palm trees everywhere. It reminded him of Miami or Scottsdale, but these looked more like the real thing. Furthermore, there were varieties of pine trees he had never seen before, like he had seen in South America. The mountains were in your face somewhat like Vancouver, British Columbia. For the next year, he would see mountains and palm trees every time he turned his head unless he was looking straight out to sea. Much was familiar, but much was different, too.

Well, what do you know, it is like they say after all, he said to his wife. These really are mountains. I thought they would look like hills, but they are vertical. This is beautiful. I’m impressed.

Oh, wait until you see it.

We are going to take the coastal highway?

Of course, it is the only road south.

What?

You’ll see. Lebanon is a small country. It is the size of maybe Connecticut. Either way, the mountains run along the coast, so there is one main road going north-south. Well, there is a valley on the other side running between it and a second mountain range, but we don’t get over there much.

Syria is on the other side of that, right?

Right. If you want to go to Syria, we have to get a visa, and that takes a while. Let me know if you want to go to Damascus.

OK.

Our man was having a hard enough time letting it sink in that he was actually in Beirut, much less imagining what Damascus might be like and contemplating going there. But sure, why not?

Two SUVs awaited them. What is this? he asked his wife. Why are there two vehicles? It isn’t like we have that much luggage.

We do, but no, it’s best practices. If something happens to one vehicle, the other is there. Also, having two vehicles that are obviously traveling together is a deterrent.

Deterrent? Deterrent to what? Our man looked around to make sure his son was not listening. Listen, I knew that there was an element of risk, but it sounds like you guys consider going to the airport dangerous.

Oh, no. Don’t be silly. It is just taking precautions. You know, there are people whose whole job it is to think about stuff like this, and this is what they say to do. Besides that, it is Saturday afternoon and people from the South like to go to Beirut on the weekend. They have all been shopping and stuff before coming here.

People were approaching with big smiles on their faces. While his wife greeted the people who came to meet them, the husband took in the sights and sounds. The arrival area of any airport is quite a cacophony, but Beirut seemed especially divergent: soldiers, taxi drivers, and elegant businessmen. Women were dressed either as stylishly as in Vogue magazine, or in headscarves and long coats like figures dressed for the pilgrimage to Mecca. It seemed to him as if he was walking onto a stage set, joining a cast. All the actors were taking their places in a drama set in a garden with palm trees in a city with the side of a mountain as its backdrop.

They divided the luggage between the two SUV’s. He was busy processing what he had just experienced inside the airport and was glad to pull away and get on the road. He had been around the world, but there was definitely something different about Beirut.

He thought to himself, This place is like stepping into the sixties. Very different from Michael Bloomberg’s New York City. Well, I’ve never been in an Arab city before, of course, he thought. They still smoke in the airport. Amazing. Smoking cigarettes in an airport. What a time warp.

Very different from the U.S. indeed, but smoking inside the airport terminal was not the main break from the reality he had recently departed. The oddest thing was seeing so many men in uniform, as though there was a war going on. Maybe there was a war going on, and he just didn’t know it. Part of him wished he had taken a better look at the script before accepting the part.

The highway leaving the airport is boxed in and tunnel-like as it runs along the airport perimeter before finally breaking out onto the coastal plain. The next half hour consisted of apartment houses and retail shopping strip centers. Urban sprawl contrasted smoky grey mountains on one side of the highway with stores and houses giving way to farms and villas with a view of the sea on the other. Our man joyfully scanned the beautiful lapis lazuli blue sea. However, the thing that grabs the eyes most, and is the constant distraction in Lebanon, is the traffic.

Hey, did you see that? Our man was in the back seat, and he directed his question to anyone in the front.

See what?

That guy just about hit that car.

No, I didn’t see, his wife said, We were talking.

The driver spoke, These people are the worst drivers in the world. You have to be super-careful. You have to drive offensively.

You mean defensively.

No, I mean offensively. If they think you are weak, they will drive you off the road. You do not want that. You do not want to be in an accident. You cannot afford to stop. If you have a collision with a Lebanese driver, it doesn’t matter whose fault it is, you are going to be the one to go to jail unless you hand over a lot of cash.

Our man had no response to that, and began to get an uneasy feeling in his stomach like the first time he sat down to sign a mortgage contract. Do I really understand what I am getting myself into? He wondered what he had signed onto, agreeing to come and live in Tyr for a year or two.

Just then, he was shook by the roar of a motorcycle. Shooting past them like a rocket, it was fading fast into the horizon. The cyclist must have been going a hundred miles an hour. He was followed by a dozen others.

What in the world?

His wife said, Oh, yeah. They have these crazy motorcyclists. They are not like biker gangs in the U.S. Here they come out to show off. We are their audience. Watch. They get up and ride on the back wheel. They go that way for a mile.

The driver answered, Or longer. I suppose they think we are really impressed.

What? Where are the police?

This is Lebanon, the driver said. Police do other things here. They don’t do traffic.

What?

I’ve never seen a police car pull over anyone.

That’s true, his wife said.

What?

The driver spoke, They don’t pull anyone over. They might get shot.

What?

This is a heavily armed population. Haven’t you heard? People still have some of the arms from the Civil War, plus what they re-armed with afterwards. You know what happened in 2008, right?

No, what happened in 2008?

The Sunnis and Christians in the government tried to fire a couple of people aligned with Hizbullah, some cabinet members, something to do with the ministry of communication, but Hizbullah showed who was boss by turning out their army based in South Beirut. They had a mini Civil War for a week or so. The army and the Christian and Sunni militias were completely unprepared for what happened and stood down within a few days. It was a Hizbullah show of force, completely.

While our man was processing this information, he looked ahead and saw that the motorcycle daredevil show had indeed begun. One fellow was standing on his cycle and a dozen bikers were weaving in and out of traffic lanes. Suddenly several others stood up. It was like a circus act, but this was no act. They were showing off on a real highway. He felt like he was following chaos down the road. Chaos was preceding him, leading the way to where he was himself heading, hurtling along to a place he has never been, but where he has signed a lease for a year.

He had such a bad feeling watching the half dozen cycles up on their rear wheels roaring down a highway full of cars and trucks. More than a circus, it reminded him of Mad Max, the Mel Gibson movie.

This is crazy. If one of those idiots crashes, it would cause a chain reaction.

Yeah. But it’s just one of those things.

What do you mean?

You’ll see. There are all these things that go on in Lebanon that you can’t do anything about, you really can’t, but it’s all right because you are supposed to mind your own business anyway.

Uh. Oh. OK.

Don’t worry, his wife said. We will be at our apartment in another half hour, we will have something to eat and get some rest. You’re tired.

I’m not tired. Those guys are nuts.

His wife turned around and gave him a look. He knew the look. She was right. He didn’t know the driver. He could easily keep his opinions to himself. Later, he would take grim satisfaction that he knew from the beginning that something was off kilter. Life in Lebanon was life from another era or another world. The people who populate this paradise, or what should be a paradise, were a highly dysfunctional family at best, at least from a Western perspective.

Well, hey, you know, everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, right? At least that is the way it is in America.

Something tells me, Toto, we are not in Kansas anymore.

*

They brought the suitcases up, and he looked around what was to be his new home. One living room wall was made of glass and faced the Mediterranean. His first impression was of incredibly good fortune. He ventured on to see the bedrooms with his wife following. She had, after all, already been living there two months and was surveying the apartment and him with a practiced eye.

See, one bedroom is on the street, one on the courtyard. That one should be quieter because there is less street noise, so I tried sleeping there one night, but there is a mosque on that hill, and the call to prayer comes straight at you, so it’s no bargain either. Since you can get woken up either way, I stayed here because I like the view of the water early in the morning.

Sure, sure. Look at this! You can sit up in bed and look at the ocean.

It is not an ocean, it is the Mediterranean.

It’s salt water and has waves, so it’s an ocean to me. Anyway, the noise cannot be that bad, right? Surely you get used to it?

Two months and I haven’t yet.

He shrugged and went back to the living room. He walked to the sliding glass door, opened it and walked onto the balcony. He turned around to his wife and with a big grin and said, Why didn’t you tell me the apartment was right on the water?

I did.

I thought you said it was a block away.

No, I said we were separated by the road and what they call The Corniche.

Well, that was the impression I had. You never made a big deal of it. This is beautiful!

Well, remember, I leave early and come home late.

OK…

And you see all those cars?

Sure...

The scooters?

Yes...

You see those vans? There is a line of them. Sometimes there are twenty vans lined up along the road. They sell food. They set up tables and people sit there all night drinking coffee and smoking their nargillahs.

Smoking their nargillahs?

That’s what they call it. They all do it, it seems. Men and women both. It’s on a stand, they hold this hose, you’ve seen it. Look, there.

Oh. I thought it was called a hookah. Sure. They really use that?

You’ll see. There are places on every block where men sit and smoke flavored tobacco in their nargillahs, drink their little cups of coffee and play cards.

Really?

Well, they have all these little storefront places where men drink coffee, smoke nargillah and play cards. They are male only. They have places like Starbucks, and women go there. Restaurants are for the whole family, and I’ve seen men, women, teenagers smoking nargillahs. You’ll see. Life is different here. Remember, I’ve warned you. You have to be aware of things all the time. I’ll show you the security video tomorrow. I have it on CD. Remember, you promised to go along with it.

Sure, sure. I’m not stupid.

No, but I know you. You think you are smarter than most people, and you can work around things. You can’t do that here. They will cut you to pieces.

And I suppose you mean that literally.

I am not joking. Anyway, you will see. Just pay attention to the security briefings, and if you have any questions ask me.

I’m here because I couldn’t bear the idea of sitting in New York and not being able to help if you needed me. I came to help, not to make problems. Don’t worry.

Yes, and I am so very glad you are here. It’s nice, but it is stressful. I told you that men would follow me when I tried to walk around to see the place. I gave up and had to drive instead.

You told me. I don’t much like that.

I do hope you like it here. It has its good points and bad. Listen. You hear how much noise comes from the street? You don’t get used to it, and it is hard to get to sleep. That, and the call to prayer, robs me of sleep every night, so I have to wear ear plugs and that does not feel very nice.

OK. Still, look, my goodness, what a view.

I have thought about moving, but from asking around, it is noisy everywhere. The young men ride their scooters around making all this racket, and they do it until the first call to prayer. The only time it is quiet is from about 4:30 to 5:30.

Don’t you think you are overdoing it a little? It doesn’t seem that bad.

Trust me. You will see.

OK. Hey, look, what is that? he said standing and pointing to the left of the horizon. The port? That flashing light is the entrance for boats? Oh, wow. And over there, he said, pointing to the lights now twinkling on a hillside. It is just beautiful.

Well, I am glad you like it.

They were tired from the trip. The flight had been good, but it was a red eye out of New York, and they had a three-hour layover in Frankfurt, so they had been on the road for 24 hours.

The housekeeper had come in earlier that day and left some warm food on the stove. She had also brought back fruit from the market, washed it, laid it on a large tray and left it to chill in the fridge. He brought the fruit out to the table, calling to his son to come and see. Cherries, peaches, apricots, watermelon and more. The melon looked like honeydew because it was green, but a taste spoke cantaloupe. He had an apricot. It had a deep, complex flavor as if it had been injected with honey and laced with cinnamon. He handed one to his son.

This is so good! his son exclaimed after his third apricot.

Father and son looked at each other, smiled, nodded their heads, and gave the thumbs up sign.

After a little unpacking and freshening up, they went to bed. Our man lay down on the king-size bed.

Thank you, honey.

Thank you for what?

Well, for making this possible.

What? she said, coyly.

My Mediterranean adventure.

She said slowly, Oh, your Mediterranean adventure? Sure. Just remember what you promised.

No politics and religion?

That’s right.

Well, OK, just remember, I only promised to be careful.

You can’t go around getting into conversations with people you just met and talking to them about anything and everything. I know you, and this is what you do, but not here.

Hey, don’t worry, I understand. Besides, I am going to be studying. This is my sabbatical, I have to finish my book, and I am going to work on a collection of essays. Don’t worry. Let’s get some sleep, OK?

OK. Come here. Give me a kiss.

He leaned over, kissed his wife, and fell asleep quickly.

*

Is that it?

That’s it.

What time is it?

3:30.

You weren’t kidding.

Put in the earplugs.

Go ahead. I’m so tired, I do not think I’ll have any trouble going back to sleep.

The man lay on his back and listened to what was to him a very mournful sounding chant. It sounded vaguely familiar, but he had never before in person had the opportunity to hear the Muslim call to prayer. It was loud, obviously being blared through a bad public address system on multiple speakers. It amazed him that this was a way of life for some people.

He drifted off and was awakened again by a second call to prayer. This one seemed different. It wasn’t nearly as nice to listen to (not that he had enjoyed the first one). This process of being wakened by another chant coming from another direction was repeated several times. He thought to himself that he sure hoped his system would get used to their PA systems quickly.

*

He still had stars in his eyes the next morning while he was seeing his wife off as he thought about how great it was going to be walking over to the beach. His wife told him to go up the hill, turn right at the first bank he saw, turn left after another few blocks, and the beach was a few more blocks beyond that.

Be careful, we were told not to use that beach, but instead go to the Rest House beach.

What’s wrong with going to the beach you just gave me directions to?

I don’t know. You will stand out too much. One thing, it is close enough to the road that people can see you as they drive by. For another thing, the beach looks dirty.

Dirty?

Lots of bottles, black bags, take-out containers, that sort of thing. I have never gone there mainly because the international women have been warned away. You’ll see. The women who do go, go fully clothed.

You told me about that. It’s called hijab?

That’s one of the words. Hijab means ‘taking the headscarf’. The burkha is the black outer garment that covers everything. You don’t see burkhas as much as the women wearing a headscarf and a long coat. The women dressing like that when go outside is very common."

Hard to imagine. They sit on the beach dressed like that?

Yes. They walk around town all wrapped up like that all the time, so I suppose it does not seem odd to them. Not all women dress like that, but many do.

What percentage?

"Oh, down here in Tyr? Most. And like I said, wearing a headscarf is very common. For the young women, it looks like it is a fashion accessory. They wear very nice scarves, and wear them in certain ways. For example, it appears that many wear their hair pulled back in a ponytail underneath it, so the total effect is like they have something on their head underneath the scarf. I heard our neighbor say it reminds him of the movie Alien but I don’t know what he means. Do you?"

I don’t know. Maybe. It doesn’t sound very nice to say it though. I guess it seems weird to us Westerners. You know, back home we hear about Muslim women wearing headscarves and see pictures of women in burkhas, but we never see pictures of it being fashionable, but I noticed it at the airport right away. You see the young women in scarves but they are wearing high-heels, tight jeans, tight fitting sweaters and very fashionable sunglasses.

Muhujababes.

What?

Oh, another woman from New York loaned me a couple of books. That’s the title of one of them, written by a young British woman. It’s a major trend. She calls it ‘religious chic’. The title is a play on mujahideen, I suppose.

OK. Sounds weird. Anyway, back to the beach. How hot is it in the daytime? Ninety?

Yes, and it is humid. Something about how the moist sea air runs into the mountains and hangs around along the coast. So, yes, uncomfortably humid and hot and women sit on the beach fully dressed.

Basically under their own personal tent.

Their son had come from his bedroom and was looking at his mother with a funny look on his face. Husband and wife chuckled.

Why? the son asked.

Why what?

Why do they cover themselves head to foot when it is so hot outside?

It’s their religion.

*

The sun blazed above them, but a nice breeze was coming off the sea, and it was time to choose which of the several available beaches to go to for their swim. In the beginning, he went to the closest beach, the one on Nabih Berri Boulevard. He would swim opposite the KFC, using the nine-story building as a landmark. However, he did not like the attention he and his son attracted. He liked to go for long swims, but his son liked to hang out on the beach where the waves hit the sand, and several times his swim came to an abrupt end because he saw a solitary man approach his son.

They were learning how to deal with many things that were new to them. Some things were nice, even delightful, but many were odd, and a few were downright disturbing. One in particular was a daily problem: men on the street, complete strangers, seemed to be unable to keep their hands off his son. They would pinch his cheek, rub his head, stroke his arm. True, they probably wanted nothing, it was just something about their culture, but it seemed to our man that they looked at his son like a fat man looks at a piece of chicken.

In the meantime he had found the place where people swim off the rocks in what is called the Christian Quarter. It was an area in the oldest part of Tyr adjacent to the port. There the cultural norms were different. Women wore two-piece swimsuits, men might bring a beer with them, and to him it was much more like normal life.

He liked to head to the old city anyway. It was like a medieval affair with narrow curvy streets laid out without any foreseeable logic. The port was there, and it was very interesting. There is so much atmosphere one could not help but feel like he was walking though a scenic, touristic postcard. There were only a few pleasure craft docked there because ninety-five per cent of the fleet was made up of wooden boats owned by real fishermen, each with its piles of nets that were let out and pulled in by hand.

So, another day, another trip to the beach. Our man stepped out of his apartment, closed the door, turned the key twice and walked down the hall. Down the stairs and into a lobby which looks out on the never ending vistas of blue.

The view of the sea stretched out before him greets him every time he comes around the last turn in the stairway. His eyes shoot out to a horizon where two shades of blue meet. The deeper blues and greens of the waters meet the light blue of the sky somewhere beyond sight. In this dusty land the blues are forever rising above and beyond the earth colored hues of this dust, stone and sand country.

His thirteen-year-old son was following by his side. Both were dressed in sandals, surfer shorts and T-shirts. Our man was carrying a backpack with two towels and a water bottle. This was the usual mid-morning arrangement, Monday through Friday. Saturday and Sunday had their own respective schedules. The former for running errands with the wife, and the latter was for church and taking it easy.

Father and son had gone to the beach the first day and had a good time. They did not stay too long because our man did not want to overdo it. They had left without any unpleasantness besides being stared at by what seemed like everyone in town. Several days later, our man was still sort of getting the lay of the land. He still lost his bearings at times though. The older part of the city is on a neck of land sticking out into the sea, so as one turns a corner sometimes there is water in the distance where one does not expect it to be, if you can imagine that.

They walked out of the building, crossed the parking lot, and as usual had to stop at the road where they always had to wait for the stream of vehicles to pass. After all, they live on a boulevard on the main highway into Tyr. The building, the boulevard, and the beach were just like Tyr itself, a big couldawoulda. So much potential, and at the same time, such a waste. The Civil War had taken a great toll. So many people seem caught up in scurrying around trying to sell something. He had heard again and again that there were no opportunities for a man to get a good job, which is why everyone goes overseas.

He thought back to what it all looked like when he first arrived just a few days ago. He had arrived at night, and it had looked like a nice apartment building on a beautiful boulevard across from an amazing setting on the Mediterranean. He looked back at the building over his shoulder while he waited to cross the street. It already looked like a wreck to him. The concrete exterior was splotchy and had cracks. Each apartment’s balcony was different and some of the railings were rusty. Everywhere he looked, there was litter. He had begun to notice that weeds were growing in the cracks of the sidewalks and street. Worst of all was the parking lot directly in front of the hardware store that was on one side of the lobby of the apartment building. Delivery trucks and workmen crowded their vehicles any which way all day long.

He was becoming more aware of the widespread litter. Leaving the building, he looked with distaste at the always chaotic parking lot. There was parking for three cars, and only two car-lengths deep, but there were often seven or eight vehicles jammed in.

As most buildings here, the ground floor was occupied by businesses. Here there were two, an agency to help orphans and a hardware store. People came and went to the agency throughout the day, but it was quiet. The hardware store though was problematic.

Trucks pulled in and out of the parking lot throughout the day and were often loading and unloading in the back. It was just a little hardware store, but it appeared that every handyman in this area pulled into the parking lot throughout the day, or so it seemed because new concrete buildings were going up in every vacant lot in town. The hardware store appeared to be a small storefront, but had a big yard in the back. This was the immediate view the apartment’s tenants had from their kitchens. The courtyard and back of the building had been taken over all the way to the alley.

Besides having to get used to the way they drove here, he was trying to deal with the way they parked. Our man had never seen anything like it. Cars, trucks and scooters punched their way in at every possible angle, coming to rest in countless configurations. The Lebanese can be counted on to be creative when it comes to every aspect of driving, even parking.

The father had to walk sideways through the cars in the parking lot to get to the street. He and his son walked across the side road over a sidewalk where they waited for a break in traffic. The stream of cars, trucks, motorcycles, scooters and private buses flowed by.

His apartment building was one of hundreds of apartment buildings in Tyr standing between five to seven stories tall. There were a few that were taller, the highest being thirteen stories, but they all looked more or less the same, big concrete boxes. Sure, some looked better than others, but it was easy to imagine they would look just as dingy in another decade.

The city had been experiencing an upsurge due to the 2006 war with Israel. Rents had shot up, and the new apartments being built were a little nicer. Some had a stone front and other nice embellishments on the first floor. Overall though, they were gray boxes. Some looked like they were from a war zone even though Tyr had escaped that kind of shooting war. He had been told that the pockmarked holes in their sides were made to increase ventilation, but they reminded him of Beirut’s scars from the civil war, holes made by rocket shells.

Still standing by the boulevard, he was waiting for a break in traffic. The cars coming his way from the left were coming out of a roundabout. It was truly a foreign site to our man. There were big placards placed in and around it, large photos of clerics, politicians and soldiers.