Executive Summary:
- marched in a pro-government rally
- drove past war-damaged roadways to go to the south of Lebanon (the center of the most recent war with Israel)
- listened (in three languages) to a story of how a Ukrainian woman and a Lebanese man met and fell in love over the Internet
- and stuffed myself at three meals.
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Where to start? Well, first I apologize to lying to all of you. I've done pretty much everything I said that I would not be doing. Let's start with going to the large pro-government rally commemorating the death of Rafiq Hariri. The radio was calling for 600,000 people to gather in the city center. Ask any one of people there and they would have told you that over a million would be in attendance. We did not intend to go, but as with any transgression we took a sip and ended up finishing the entire glass. On the way out of town we passed near the roads leading to Martyr's Square, the location of the rally. Though still a good distance away, we felt very safe taping the mass of people walking to the city center. Bearing a free Lebanese flag, we joined the masses, taping along the way. As we approached the center of the rally, the security got tighter, as did the breathing room. To get a better vista we used Dave's camera as a ticket to get on the roof of a nearby building, providing us with a spectacular view of the mosque, demonstration, and Hariri's burial site. The scene was very peaceful, yet full of passion as people chanted in support of the government. Giddy as school children having , we made our way back to the car and headed to lunch. There we would be transferred to another driver that would take us to the southern portion of Lebanon, thus turning me into a lier twice over. Along the way we stopped off at Tyre (cf. Acts 21:3 to take pictures of the ruins. As we ventured further south, the damage from last year's war with Israel became more evident. Bridges remain impassable after being bombed. Bombed roads have been fixed with gravel, rendering them passable, but drastically increasing the travel time between Beirut and the south. Hezbollah flags and pictures of Nasrallah (the leader of Hezbollah) became more prevalent. Our driver asked if I feared Hezbollah. "Not when they're far away from me," I responded. "They're really not so bad," he replied. An awkward silence ensued. He continued to yet again broaden my perspective. While not all Lebanese people think Hezbollah are "good guys," they are considered to be the group that pushed Israel out of Lebanese lands many years ago, thus providing freedom and returning dignity to the Lebanese people, both Christian and Muslim. Have they done bad things? Yes. But they have also done good things in the eyes of the people. Soon after we reached our destination town in south Lebanon we filmed the prayer meeting and Bible study of the church plant. A few minutes into the service the power went out. Within a minute someone had initiated the back up system: four fluorescent bulbs attached to a car battery. Dave filmed remaining majority of the service in what appeared to be dance club lighting. Upon returning to the house of the pastor, we were greeted with a fine Lebanese meal and warm conversation in a mixture English, Arabic, and Ukrainian. After a tasty meal of potatos, lamb, labneh, lebanese bread, and much more, our hosts treated us to the story of how they met and were engaged to be married. The 31 year old wife-to-be was a single mother living in the Ukraine, about to lose her apartment. She prayed for a husband who could provide for her and be a father for her son. At the recommendation of a friend at church, she filled out an online dating form. Now at this time a Lebanese man in the Ukraine told her pastor's about a man he knew in Lebanon who was looking for a wife. Her pastor passed along the information and suggested that they correspond. After many emails, requests for pictures (and polite requests for more pictures after not caring for the expressions), and a lot of prayer, the wife-to-be waited until the end of the July War and travelled to Lebanon to meet her suitor. She did not simply want a man to be a husband, she wanted a man of character to be a companion and a father for her ten-year-old. After a week with the man's family and in his country, he proposed and she accepted. A few months after that she and her son left their life in the Ukraine and moved to Lebanon for a new life. The couple really is quite cute and happy, and the man has accepted the child as if it were his own. I could do little but sit back and laugh to myself at the beauty and hilarity of such a story. Before heading to bed as a liar twice over, I ate roasted chestnuts and looked at pictures while laughing at what I thought was the correct moment in the grandfather's jokes. He, by the way, reminded us greatly of Uncle Joe from "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," a fact that has put "And I've Got a Golden Ticket" on the soundtrack to this trip.