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Another sunny, breezy, humid morning in Hamra, Beirut. I’m drinking coffee, listening to Ethan swear at his internet connection, and trying to get ahold of an organization for which I am hopefully going to do some volunteer work. A little later, we intend to go swimming for the first time since we have been here. Apparently, the beaches in Beirut are all totally polluted, but we are going to do it anyhow.

Yesterday I went and wandered around Bourj Hammoud, which is the Armenian neighborhood. I want to go back and look further, what I saw was just a shopping district with narrow streets and a lot of low-quality clothing stores. I didn’t get to see any churches or talk to anyone. I’m starting to get to know the city better and better, and yesterday had a couple of “aha!” moments when I figured out how a few different neighborhoods are connected. Afterward, I met Carrie, the journalist, for a drink during happy hour. Happy hour is not very popular with the Lebanese, but it seems to be the only way to have a nice cocktail for $5 or less. Carrie has a lot of interesting stories, as she just spent the past year in Abidjan, working for Voice of America.

Quite a few people have asked me about Hezbollah winning the elections in the South. It seemed to have been really big news in the west, and people seemed surprised. But Hezbollah has been a political party for years, and has had representatives in parliament since the early 90s. The election was not too surprising for people here, but it does demonstrate how divided this country is. Beirut overwhelmingly supported Hariri’s coalition, The South overwhelmingly supported Hezbollah’s coalition (not all of Hariri’s coalition is anti-Syria, not all of Hezbollah’s is pro-Syria, or even Hezbollah). While the US does claim that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization, not everyone else does-most of Europe has refused to give this label to the political wing of Hezbollah. There is a fine line between resistance movements and terrorist groups, and unfortunately, the US government seems to base that definition entirely on which side the US government is on. Hezbollah has remained popular here, largely because they were able to drive Israel out of the South (Israel occupied South Lebanon until 2000), but also because of its humanitarian work- building schools, hospitals, etc.

Anyhow- the upcoming elections will be more interesting because the seats are more hotly contested.