Lebanon Excursion: Byblos

Visiting Byblos is like peeling an onion - you get layers upon layers. According to guides, Byblos is one of the oldest continuous inhabited cities in the world. Archaeologists have uncovered relics of Stone Age inhabitants living 7,000 years ago. In the 3rd millennuim BC, the city was a powerful Phoenician port (inventors of the alphabet?). The city was assimilated into the Roman empire. During the crusades, Byblos became one of the Christian coastal strongholds* to stand against the Islamic troops. After the successful expulsion of the crusaders, the Arab conquerers also contributed their share to the history of Byblos. During World War 1, a Turkish detachment was said to be occupying the crusader stronghold (which is still standing today). Today it is one picturesque town to visit and reminisce the past.














A Crusader guard tower still overlooks the dock although the archers are long dead and gone.













The main attraction of Byblos - The castle of the Knights of the Cross. Build in 1103 fundamentally for the pratical purpose of defence, the stronghold doesn't score points in aesthetic value. That it is still standing today after withstanding centuries of warfare and natural calamities proves indeed that it served its purpose.

Roman columns are inserted within the wall base to stregthen the foundation of the castle. Some of the building stone bricks of the walls were recycled from the Roman ruins. Perhaps it was Roman architecture that helped to preserve the castle. Hmmm...

Ruins of Roman street theatre featuring female gladiator! "Gladiator! We salute you!"
The Church of St. John the Baptist build by the Crusaders. It was rebuild several times after the crusades due to damage.

*Crusaders were said to have occupied and fortified the Lebanese coastal regions from Tripoli, Byblos, Beirut, Sidon (North to South) perhaps to form a line of defence from Europe to Jerusalem. They were more successful at holding the coast where they are more easily resupplied by ships from Italy.

Lebanon Excursion: Harissa, Lady of Lebanon

On the heights (more than 600 m) an immense immaculate statue overlooks the bay of Jounieh. Erected at the end of the 19th Century, the statue of the Virgin dominates a sanctuary (a chapel in the pedestal). A panoramic view is guaranteed at the top of the statue.
(source: http://www.harissa.info)

Lady of Lebanon - Statue of Virgin Mary
At the base of the statue is a curled staircase that leads to a spectacular view of the city of Jounieh.Within the base of the statue houses a chapel

Lebanon Excursion: Jeita Grotto

The Jeita Grotto is an impressive limestone cavern complex located 18 km North of Beirut. It consists of an upper grotto and a lower grotto. Discovered in 1958, the upper grotto, which functioned as a store for arnament during the civil war, can be explored on foot at length. The lower grotto was discovered in the 19th century by accident. It is crossed by an underground river and a boat ride is necessary to explore the 500 m that is open to the public out of the 6,200 m discovered.

Within these grottoes are the most magnificient shapes of stalacites and stalagmites - splendid limestone formations sculpted by the magical hands of nature and time. Upon entering the grottoes, we were immersed in a Tolkien-ish mystical surreal realm so breath-taking and awesome that we can hardly believe it to be natural. Taking of photos within the grottoes are prohibited for the fear of ruining the natural beauty of the formations. However, thanks to the wonders of internet, there is an abundance of pictures available. Yet the craft of man pales in comparison with the work of nature, only seeing it in person can one really appreciates the true beauty of the grottoes!

Back In Action

I've lapsed in my blogging recently because of high work volume. Today is the first day after coming back from a long business trip in Algeria, I think it's time to get back into some blogging action.

I'll start tomorrow with the accounting of our Lebanon sigh-seeing trips we made when Xinyi came for a visit last December.

Never Gone

Apologies for the cheesy BackStreet Boy-ish title for this entry because I'm having mental block again. Anyway, its good to be blogging again.

I realized that although I've been in living and working here for almost three months, I've not actually talked about Lebanon much. The reason is that I haven't been around much. When I'm not on business trips, I hang out in my apartment.

This month, my girlfriend Xinyi is here for a visit so there's plenty of chance to visit what Lebanon has to offer. Will blog about our sight seeing soon....

Later....

Mental Block

Recently, I ran out of ideas about what to blog. Sometimes I started writing but cannot continue and then I moved on to another topic but stopped halfway as well. It's like the same feeling I get when I was sitting in MPH2 with a paper full of essay questions, an A4 booklet and 3 hours to kill. And then starting to think...

"Which questions to answer? Which questions to answer?"

Then one question starts to look appealing. Halfway through mental block sets in - I'm stuck! I take another look at the question paper again, another question starts to look more appealing. And time is running out....Before I know it, the Chief Examiner proclaim ominously through the microphone...

"You have 15 mins left!"

Arghh...

Haha...many of us sure remember those painful NUS exams. One of my professors, Chan Kwok Bun used to say, "three hours is what it takes to decide your life"! Life really sucks if one fails because one have to repeat the failed module. But what he was talking about is perhaps that the paper also determines one's life chances. During my time, failure of one paper usually eliminates one's chance of qualifying for the honours program. And not doing honours excludes one from a payscale beyond the ordinary bachelor degree. So one starts his/her career at a lower rank in the bureaucracy, gets promoted later than his/her peers, develops a lower self-esteem and ends up being a loser in life. Nah, the example is very ridiculous but you get the idea that how failing a 3 hours paper can do to disrupt one's life. =P

Lucky me, I had the luck of scraping through every paper thrown my way and sneaked my way into the honors program and somehow graduated. Although in the first place, I really have no idea why I enrolled in the honors program.

By the way, here's what the internet has to offer on overcoming mental block:

1. Fake violent convulsions, induce green slime vomiting, shudder erratically claiming the "Martians are coming to get me" and hope that the exam is cancelled or at least postponed because of the emotional upset caused by your sudden illness.

2. The Science of Neuro Linguistic Programming (or NLP for short) has shown that by looking up we access information from our memories. So if you are faced with a mental block, instead of staring at your desk, look up as you search for that crucial information.

3. Stop saying "I don't know this …. I don't know this". Now say to yourself "If I did know the answer, what would I write?" and see what happens.

4. Breathe deeply and relax

(Plagarized from www.positivelymad.co.uk)

Back to Africa!

My next business trip takes me back to North Africa. And yes, I'm flying Air France again! For those of you who have been following my blog, I had two previous bad experiences with flights related to France. As if on cue to avoid disappointment to anyone reading, some incident did happen and I'll share them here.

My flight to Algeria was a MEA/AF coach sharing flight connecting at Paris CDG airport. 40 minutes before arrival to airspace around CDG, the pilot announced that the airport will be closed because of the bad weather so our flight will be directed to Paris Orly airport, the nearest airport. Which was a good thing for me because, I forgot to mention, me connecting flight starts from Orly. I don't have to take the airport bus to transfer between airports. Unexpected good new, Yey!

Anyway, my MEA flight landed about an hour after being re-directed to Orly. As the plane lowered to the ground, all the passengers could see clearly that thick, wet fog that enveloped the Orly airport. It must have been impossible to land the plane without instruments! The visibility was about 400 m. Fortunately, the plane made a safe but bumpy landing and everyone clapped.

And that concludes another eventful trip...;P

Monster Meets Art

(source: http://www.worth1000.com/)
Michelangelo saw and likes the Aliens Trilogy very much.

First Meal

The first meal I cooked by myself. What else but the easiest - spaghetti bolognaise. The pasta were over done, no al dente and a tad soggy. Not familiar with my utensils yet. But as the saying goes, (in hokkien) cannot swim don't blame the swimming trunks for being oversized. Haha....また頑張ります！　ｐ（＾O＾）ｑ

Holiday in KL/ Lucus

Left Singapore on 4th November with Xinyi and family to Kuala Lumpur for a short holiday before I catch my flight back to Beirut on the 6th. Its makan all the way! Took a lot of shots, especially of Lucus, my nephew. Check it out! =P

我回来了！

Took a MAS shutter flight back to Singapore while on transit in Kuala Lumpur from Osaka enroute to Beirut on 29 Oct . Spent about 5 days in Singapore.

Big changes to my room but its great to sleep on my old bed and pillow again. Don't know why my pillow in Beirut isn't as comfortable. I should consider shipping my pillows...

There were so many things I planned to do but only managed to accomplished some.

Nevertheless it was good to be back! =)
Great to see Xinyi, my family, her family!
Glad that ex-colleagues are doing fine!
Those that I failed to meet up because of the time span, we'll catch up in 2006!

Movie Review - 電車男

Saw this on a flight back from Osaka to KL.

The movie was based on a popular Japanese novel of the same title (obviously or it wouldn't have been made right?). The protagonist is an anime/game/collectible otaku who simply cannot talk to the opposite sex. He turns red, stammers and shivers when he has to talk to any female and so he has always been unattached. He should have killed himself when he was 16 but anyway...

Once in a train, he (trainman) courageously stood up for a female passenger who was being harassed by a drunkard. In return, trainman received a pair of Hermes cups from the lady victim as a token of thanks. Our protagonist geek tells a group of anonymous geeks that he chats online all the time about Ms. Hermes' present and they start jumping to conclusions about "Ms. Hermes" having fallen for him and he should go after her. Soon everybody he chats with throw in their two cents worth of advice/suggestions/tips on how to date Ms. Hermes. Through the advice/suggestions/tips, trainman is bit by bit transformed into a dating machine and swept Ms. Hermes off her feet into his arms...or did he?

Basically a simple love story, what's unique about the movie is the bunch of net-denizens supporting the reluctant trainman on his quest. None of them ever met in real life but unite together to help the trainman. In fact, they are so connected to the internet, they seem to have difficulties in human relationships in real life. And helping trainman became part self-discovery and somehow transformed the way they relate better to the people around them. Morale of the story: Losers help loser, everybody wins!

Somehow, I still think that the trainman should have killed himself when he was 16. He is such a sissy when he talks to women. Perhaps his character was over-acted. Ms. Hermes, on the contrary, is self-assured and calm. Not incredibly pretty but she has character and sort of balanced the cast. The movie would have been over-emotional because of the weepy trainman if not for the little parts of humor dosage. I like best the part where trainman was advised by his "friends" to try all the food in a restaurant that was to be the setting for his date with Ms. Hermes, so that he will know what to order during the date. Haha...=P

Test Drive in Osaka

I love test drives!

To be exact, I love driving at breakneck speed if I know that I am not going to cause an accident. For those not familar with the basic test courses, there's usually four lanes to to a course with four different speed limits. The first lane: 0-50km/h; second lane: 50-100km/h; third lane: 100-160km/h. Finally, the fourth lane slopes upwards at a 45 degrees angle and the car needs a considerable speed to stay on that lane because of the angle. I love the 4th lane!

Actually, the first rule of test drives is not about breaking the sound barrier but to see if the car handles, drives and breaks well under normal driving circumstances. Of course, you are welcomed to test how the car handles at max speed but seldom you need to climb that 4th lane.

But at the test course, everyone will say that the rule is a whole load of bull. Of course you start a slow acceleration to see if it changes gears nicely; then you jam the breaks hard to test the breaking performance. You can test also the steering control and almost every features the car has. Five minutes tops, and then you start to fly on that 4th lane...! (^_^) v

Tokyo Motor Show

At the motorshow today, I plan to do what most people do at motorshows, which was to take plenty of snapshots of pretty cars and the pretty gals beside them... =P The problem with digital cameras is that the battery always seem to run out faster when photo opportunities present themselves aplenty. It's like there's a correlation or something! Anyway, in preparation of such an event, I always have a spare battery on hand.

Things started well and I was happily snapping away with my aging Canon Ixus, when the dreaded battery icon started to flash on my camera screen. As I reached into my bag to get the spare battery, I realized that I left my spare battery with Sakai for some forgotten reasons! Earlier on, our delegation had splitted into two groups and Sakai was leading the other group. The situation likens to being in a chocolate factory and having no appertite! There's so many photo opportunities here but my dead camera can't take pictures.

Solution? Appoint a photographer. The Moroccan GM for sales was so happily snapping at everything and anything, that he willingly obliged to share with me all his pictures. Please enjoy some of them here....

にこにこ．．．
Lexus LFA Concept - Damn bloody nice car!

The new RAV-4 (front)

The new RAV-4 (back) - Think about it, Wanli

香車美女...Hahaha！

Daihatsu Copen: Cute like the MR-S [I'm test driving it tomorrow =) ]

Daihatsu Pretty

VW Polo GTI! The VW booth was the best booth IMO ^_^

King of Cars! 23 Skyline GTR! _/￣\○"

Nice touch by Mini =P

久しぶりに日本！

やっとう，日本出張は現実になりました！2 か月間中近東で働く後，今度の出張は初めてアジアに戻られる旅です．または，今年2番目の日本出張！（＾O＾）ｖ

My Japanese is really going down the drain. Two sentences are the max I can go to express myself in writing! Well, what the heck! =P
　

France 2: 0 Sencha

It's incredible that I encountered two problems with Air France in one single month! My impression of France now is already bad even before I visited the country!

If you remember, Air France lost my luggage for a week because of labor strike in Paris in the beginning of October. This time as I was coming back from Algiers, they screwed up again! The French are simply marvellous at screwing up!

There I was on my return trip, with Sakai, sitting comfortably on ME212 (coach share with AF), waiting for take off, when they ordered all passenger to disembark. Fortunately or unfortunately, when alighting, we met Hisham, a colleague working for our Moroccan distributor, on his way to Beirut. Sham told us that when the ground crew was retracting the boarding stairs from the plane, the machinery sliced through the door of the plane and badly damaged the door.

So we were stuck in Charles de Gaulle airport while the ground crew tried to repair the plane. Turned out, the spare part they need can only be found in Hamburg and it is not likely for the part to arrive in such a short time. Incredible! Airbus has no spare parts in France? Seems like all the passengers will be stuck in Paris for a while because there wasn't a way for the repair to be done so quickly.

After two hours, AF staff finally hatched a plan. They would book accomodations in a transit hotel and put us up for the night and arrange us to fly on the first available flight to Beirut the next morning. So after being stucked in the terminal for 5 hours past our schedule flight, we could finally leave the airport and go to the transit hotel. But we couldn't leave Sham behind. Being a Morrocan, Sham needs a visa to enter Paris and so we stayed back in the terminal with him.

It was the beginning of the long wait with Sham and some of the other passengers who had their passports detained to apply for their temporary visa. We watched as the AF staff, who were dispatched to handle us, disappear one by one. The promised 1 hour wait stretched to 3 hours. By then, we decided to check on the visa application status with the AF booth outside the terminal. Guess what? They have no clue about Sham and the other passengers without visa. Sakai mentioned that this could be real-life event of The Terminal in the making but fortunately, Sham didn't watch the movie. The new AF staff only followed-up on the visa application status when one of the Lebanese "aunties" and Sham started to complain loudly. I guess there was no proper handover of the issue because after the complaint, the AF staff were able to come up with their passports and a collective visa. Finally, it was okay for us to leave for the transit hotel at about 10 pm after such a long ordeal at the airport.

There were approximately 90 people from our delayed flight scheduled for the next day 9pm morning flight to Beirut. There were approximately 90 people who didn't brush their teeth and change their clothes that morning...

After such a bad experience with Air France (twice for me!), we didn't have much to expect from them other than just get us where we want to go safely. As usual, almost on cue, our new flight was delayed for an hour because the cabin crew couldn't ascertain the correct number of people on the flight and they kept counting and counting from back to front and front to back. Amazing!

When we were stuck in the airport, the three of us started to play a little game called, Renaming Air France. The objective of the game is to come up with the best definition for the acronym AF. Sakai won the game with a new acronym for Air France..... AF - Always Frustrating!

Ramadan

It finally rained in Algiers after several months of drought, on the day of my arrival. Mabrouk to all the farmers here who have been bearing the brunt of crop shortage. The view of the mountains nearby the airport was of exceptional clarity because the rain has washed away all the dust and smog.

This period is also the period of Ramadan, which means that people will stop eating, drinking, and smoking after sunrise and resume food-intake after sunset. I'm quite familiar with Ramadan because of the large population of Muslims back in Singapore. Unlike in Singapore and Lebanon, Algerians are more strict with their observance of Ramadan, so there is no food and drinks sales anywhere throughout the day.

Our group of visitors to Algeria decided among ourselves that we should probably observe the local customs as well. Which means for the Japanese, no alcohol at all, which is a big sacrifice for them! For the past few days, we have either skipped meals or reduce our food intake drastically to just a bottle of water or a piece of fruits for lunch. Today was my second day of full fledge fasting and I think it is doing me good because it is reducing my stock of fats which, I have been diligently accumulating. Since yesterday, I opted to begin eating only one meal in the evening for the entire day. Its nice to be able to observe the local customs to show one's respect I think. A good way of gaining local respect through genchi genbutsu.

Still three hours and a half to go until the official breakfast time at 6:30pm. Everyone looks hungry (locals included) and we were just a while ago discussing dinner plans at a local pasta restaurant at the hotel and the visit to the El Khaima (traditional Ramadan performance) after dinner. Pasta sounds very good indeed!

Luggage Lost and Found...

I lost my luggage in Paris when I was flying back from Morocco on the 4th last Tuesday...

My flight from Charles de Gaulle Aeroport was delayed for two hours because there was a strike involving French transport workers, including those working at the airport. My luggage must have gotten lost. I realized that my luggage was missing at the baggage collection point along with 20 over people from the same flight. To register for luggage claim, I have to queue for another 2 hours.

It was a terrible experience because almost everything I own in Lebanon, I carried in my luggage. One of my colleague helped me by lending me some clothes to wear. Other stuffs, I had to buy. I even had to go to a colleague's "posh" wedding dinner without any formal wear! So...Tak Glam.... =(

Today morning, the company recep told me that they found it. Finally! A colleague drove me to the airport and I had to get through the bureaucracy to retrieve my luggage. It was almost one week due....

In post mortem analysis, the main culprit for this inconvenience is........AIR FRANCE !!!

A few colleagues and superiors had taken the same flight before and also had their luggage lost.
Yes, not everything European are first class. In fact, Air France is quite sub-standard. The service wasn't something to yell about...There was no procedure for lost luggage handling. You lose your luggage? Too bad! Don't complain and wait until it comes....No bloody mention of compensation for the delay at all!

Take Air France at your own risk....Have a nice FRIGHT!

Grrr....Have to get even....I want to watch The Last of The Mohicans movie DVD again to see the French get their ass kicked!

When will I go diving again?

Darn! I haven't dived since July with Xinyi. Almost three months has passed.

My basic gears are still sitting in a DHL box ready to be shipped over from Singapore, once I have the official address for my apartment in Beirut.

To rub salt to the wound, the office in Morocco has a full view of the Atlantic ocean which made me longed to be out at sea rather than stuck in the office for meeting the entire weekend. Sigh...

A colleague in Beirut told me that the underwater landscape of Lebanon is dotted with sunken ships and planes. Really hope to be able to explore them.

I have to get out and blow some bubbles soon. Bloop bloop

Plus, I've yet to complete my PADI Underwater Banana Eating Specialty!

No Guys Allowed....

On a flight to Morocco, I read in Newsweek that some prominent hotels are wooing female customers with guest rooms exclusive with ladies. Quoting a top exec of a UK hotel, the article said that many hotels are realizing that 50% of business travellers are female and they hope to cater to this trend. Exclusive female guestrooms will have features that appeal to the lady traveller, such as feminine interior decorations, pink couches and other amenities. Also to come in the future, entire wings of hotels and resorts will be made exclusive to the female traveller. One hotel manager maintains that this is not discrimination.

Yeah right! That means that the next time I travel to a hotel, I will have half the chance of getting a room because the other half is reserved for the ladies, whether they turn up or not. I certainly will object to staying in a room with complimentary sanitary napkins in the drawers and pink fluffy pillows on the bed. Worse, I will be totally barred from an exclusive female wing of a hotel.

Seriously, I have never even considered that guestrooms are unfriendly to womankind. Aren't they neutral? Moreover, good hotels tend to be flexible to their customers' needs and give them almost what they want. Other than class and status, since when is gender an issue?

Without a doubt, this is certainly a marketing gimmick to pander to the rising spending power of women at the expense of men. Indeed, rise in women consumerism is bit by bit eroding the notion of men as the stronger sex. I'm not arguing that men should be the dominant gender but stating that this notion is sometimes far from the reality...We can be the weaker sex at some point as well, ladies...