We are Lebanon!
A wonderful sentiment shared by many of us who are sick and tired of the polarization of Lebanon is spreading around the blogsphere, we duly post it here
University Elections
Al Tayar wins elections in USJ
Perhaps it’s because I didn’t attend university in Lebanon but I just don’t quite grasp the relevance of these political elections on university campuses. Where I attended college, different parties ran based on platforms that promised to have the library open later, fight rising tuition costs and such …. I won’t deny that parties in American college campuses have some political overtones however the essential matters under which they campaign are issues of concerns to students which the elected representatives have a say in and not political or ideological persuasions.
How true…
Poor Lebanon. This nation has the misfortune to be caught in the middle of all the feuds and contradictions of the Middle East. Arab vs. Israeli, Shiite vs. Sunni, Iran vs. America — it all collides here. Let President Bush talk glibly about World War III, or Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad assemble his version of a war cabinet, and the mess lands on little Lebanon’s head.
“The trouble is that Lebanon has become an extension of the crisis in the region,” says Charles Rizk, the Lebanese justice minister and a Maronite Christian who is a candidate for president.
Quote from a Washington Post Article “A Nation Of Mideast Hostages”
Shame …. لبنان، بلد العبيد
«من كان يتصوّر أن ذلك يحدث في بلد متحضّر مثل لبنان؟». هذا السؤال الجارح تسأله دومينيك توريز في تحقيق يبثّه التلفزيون الفرنسي هذا المساء عن النخاسة الحديثة، ضمن برنامج «موفد خاص» على القناة الثانية
أولئك أُرغمن على البقاء أسيرات المنازل التي هجرها أهلها في الجنوب والأحياء الأكثر عرضة للقصف في بيروت. تمّ إقفال الأبواب عليهن، وتُركن برفقة كلاب الحراسة، حتى لا تتعرض البيوت التي فرّ أصحابها نحو وُجهات أكثر أماناً، للنهب والسرقة!
كم كان عدد قتلى الحرب بين هؤلاء الخادمات؟ لا أحد يدري بالضبط، أو بالأحرى لا أحد يهتم. فهنّ في الواقع لسنَ مجرّد عاملات في البيوت، بل يمثّلن نوعاً من رقيق العصر الحديث. ويقول الأب ماك ـــــ ديرموت الذي تلجأ إليه العديدات منهن في كنيسة القديس يوسف في بيروت: «أغلب الناس يرون الخادمات ملكاً لهم، ويعاملونهن كأمتعة أو أثاث، لا
كبشر.
The Lebanese Parliament Meets
This sums it all up I guess…no comment.
A look at Bogota, Colombia
Environmentalism is probably the last thing anyone would think of when mentioning Columbia as the country has been mired in conflict for the past 30 years; violence, drugs and slums are your stereotypical images of the country.
However, the mayor (now former mayor) of its capital city Bogotá, Enrique Peñalosa, has managed to transform his city by introducing an annual car free day, raising the tax on gasoline and creating a rapid bus system, among other plans.
“During his three-year term, Penalosa brought in initiatives that would seem impossible in most cities, even in the wealthy north. He built more than a hundred nurseries for children. He built 50 new public schools and increased enrollment by 34 percent. He built a network of libraries. He created a highly-efficient, “bus highway” transit system. He built or reconstructed hundreds of kilometers of sidewalks, more than 300 kilometers of bicycle paths, pedestrian streets, and more than 1,200 parks.
He did it all, in part, by declaring a war on private cars.”
Although the mayor left office in 2001, the way Penalosa reinvented the city is remarkable because it shows that developing nations are not helpless, dependent nations that need to be showered with aid all the time, it also highlights how much a creative and trustworthy civil servant can accomplish if his/her goal is to truly help the people, and lastly it illustrates the obvious environmental implications of how we can alter our cities through radical yet feasible ways.
Click here for a short video about the mayor.
The mayor before him, Antanus Mockus, was also quite eccentric, he’s famous for having hired mimes to model civil behavior in the streets.
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