Let’s hope this won’t become a trend among Lebanese politicians! Anyone knows who’s the man who was hit?
Bernard Khoury’s penthouse in Beirut
Bernard Khoury, the Lebanese famous architect who’s known for many projects like B018, Centrale, and many other places, had his penthouse featured in The Wall Street Journal last month.
This spacious penthouse in Beirut is owned by 45-year-old Lebanese architect Bernard Khoury. He chose a home with its hodgepodge city view over the more sought-after romantic sea view. It happened by circumstance, when his friend, Marc Doumit, a developer, bought the land on Damascus Road at a low price in the late 1990s after it had been sitting deserted for nearly a decade following the end of the 15-year civil war. Mr. Khoury’s family moved in last year.
The penthouse is 400 square meters with 5 bedrooms, 7 bathrooms, a swimming pool and an awesome view over Beirut and the mountains! You can check more photos of it here.
via @LaCeline
New Year celebrations around the world
While most of the world cities celebrated New Year with some spectacular fireworks display, Dubai chose take it a bit further this year and succeeded in breaking the world record for the largest fireworks display. They crushed the record previously set by Kuwait by firing more than 400,000 shots in around six minutes!
Anyway, make sure to check this article on BuzzFeed for a glimpse of how the rest of the world celebrated last night.
Paris
Copacabana
New York
Malek El Raouche ملك الروشة – Blurred Lines Lebanese Cover
This one is hilarious! The video was made by the cool people at Leo Burnett Beirut as part of an inter-agency competition. They were requested to create a video clip representing the 2010’s era and they actually won. Make sure to watch it since it really represents the scene at Raouche and some other places!
Virginia man arrested for trying to ship weapons to Lebanon
Juging by his name, Sam Rafic Ghanem, he seems to be of Lebanese origin, but how stupid can he be? I mean doesn’t he know about the arms trade with Syria through the uncontrolled borders? Even kids here are playing with Klashinkoves, so we definitely need nothing from Virginia!
Sam Rafic Ghanem, owner of an international shipping company with offices in the Washington suburbs, was arrested Saturday after an FBI sting, ABC News said.
The intended recipient of the weapons is not clear, but at one point Ghanem claimed he was recently asked to obtain two guns for an unnamed member of the Lebanese government, according to court documents filed in the case.
Over the past few months, Ghanem and a former employee of his company, Washington Movers International, devised “a scheme to send weapons to Lebanon by hiding them inside automobile parts shipped by the company,” court documents allege.
The former employee, though, was working as “an undercover source for the FBI,” ABC News noted.
Last Saturday, the source picked up Ghanem from his Springfield, Virginia home and drove to Washington Movers International’s offices in Maryland, where Ghanem helped stuff 10 handguns, 10 semi-automatic rifles and 18 “optic devices” into doors and other parts of salvaged vehicles, an FBI agent alleged in charging documents.
The car parts were then loaded into a shipping container, but the weapons hidden inside were “fake,” according to the charging documents. Ghanem was subsequently arrested.
via Naharnet
Merry Christmas!
#Lebanese women wearing #santa outfit and weaving their national #flag #waterski during a show in the #bay of #Jounieh in the #mediterranean #sea off #lebanon’s coast. Merry #Christmas to all. #photojournalism
Photo by @patrickbaz
Man stabbed in Jdeideh over a car parking space
According to LBCI, this woman and her husband stabbed a man inside a beauty salon in Jdeideh after fighting with him over a parking space.
She’s called Hind Khatib. For your own safety, never try to get into an argument with her over anything!
Could these Lebanese 3D glasses really beat Google Glass?
Wamda has an interesting article today about Lebanese entrepreneur Soulaiman Itani who debuted a pair of wearable glasses that displays augmented reality in three dimensions as opposed to Google’s two.
The glasses, Atheer One, were built in partnership with a computer vision researcher called Allen Yang and can allow the wearer to exercise with virtual targets, conduct conference calls while browsing online, and even play three dimensional games.
They also have two major advantages over Google Glass since they offer a bigger field of vision and can allow all existing Android apps to work withing their platform. However, they always need to be physically attached to an Android device to work.
Itani and his partner are currently raising funds on Indiegogo and offering Atheer One for an early bird special price of $350 for the first 100 backers.
Make sure to check the whole article here on Wamda.
Alexa as viewed from space
The Washington Post posted some photos that were taken yesterday by NASA of the snowstorm Alexa that hit the region last week.
The white areas on the land are all snow, another wider photo shows that even a northern area of Saudi Arabia got a little bit of snow.
On a side note, the author of the article might have to consider educating himself a bit more about the middle east as he thinks “it is quite something” to see snow around here and our neighbors!
NASA’s Earth Observatory has posted a photo of the storm taken from space. It was taken Dec. 15, after the storm had passed and the skies had cleared; the white areas on the land are snow, not clouds. It’s quite something to see the snow across Lebanon, Syria and Israel.
VIP Prisoner in Roumieh
This guy made it to the news today for living like a king behind the bars in Roumieh prison! It seems like he has his own room inside the prison and manages to get really good food delivered to him almost everyday!