Tag Archives | Lebanon

Footage of a car theft in Hadath

By Rami on March 29, 2009 in What the fuck!

This is a video of a REAL car theft that has occurred on saturday morning, the thieves as you will see were acting so cool and appear to be professionals! It only took them 2 attempts to unlock and turn on the car. The whole thing was captured on some security camera installed by one of the street residents.

I found it weird when the video said the stolen car is a 1988 BMW 323. Correct me if I am wrong, but thieves usually target new cars, don’t you think this car might end up being used in a car bombing?

Earth Hour – Lebanon

By Rami on March 28, 2009 in Events

vote-earth

On Saturday March 28th at 8:30PM the world will be voting earth by turning off the lights for one hours, the Earth Hour.

Some students from the Notre Dame University noticed that among the arab countries only Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates are contributing in the event. So they decided that Lebanon SHOULD take part in being earth responsible, therefore they created this facebook group, with the slogan “Chou Na2esna?” (”what’s requiring us to participate?”).

The answer to their slogan is simple, what’s missing is electricity in Lebanon! Thank’s to Électricité Du Liban, we are “voting earth” at least 3 hours a day (at least I do). Not to forget of course that some roads are always dark, and thus “voting earth” on a daily basis. Meen addna?

Anyway, I think the move is very symbolic and is not effective against global warming, people will forget about it very soon. If I were in the NDU students place, I would have redirected my efforts into convincing my university (or other organizations) to buy windmills, solar firms or whatever, in order to produce pollution-free energy and become a serisouly socially responsible organization.

On lowering the voting age to 18

By Rami on March 26, 2009 in Election ’09

18 years old “wazawiz” can now vote… plain stupid!

At the age of 18, students are merely wise enough to make a good choice about their major in the university, how do you expect them to make a “good” political choice?

Moreover, a lot of fights are erupting at some universities nowadays, especially in USJ Huvelin, but they’re never mentioned in the news. Imagine what would happen in the next election (2013) when students feel they have more “authority”.

Hiba Tawaji – Metl El Reeh

By Rami on March 16, 2009 in Music

Hiba Tawaji was a lead actress in “The Return of the Phoenix”, a historical epic musical play by Oussama Rahbani
created and written by Mansour Rahbani.

You probably know her from the LBCI ads for the play, she has a very beautiful voice and they used to play a piece of “Mitl El Reeh” each time they run the ad. Today I got the full version of the song from my friend so I thought of sharing it with you, worth posting!

Click here to download the song.

P.S: I removed the flash player because I have noticed it is causing an error in Internet Explorer 7.0 and below.

Lebanese movie HELP banned

By Rami on March 12, 2009 in Lebanon

Yet another movie ban, this time it is Marc Abi Rashed’s turn to have his movie “HELP” banned in Lebanon.

In brief, “Help” is the story of a teenager named Ali who lives in a van in Lebanon. His life suddenly turns upside down when he meets Thuraya, a prostitute living with a gay man. The movie has nudity and an excessive use of inappropriate words.

The reason of the ban is still not clear, at least to me. The movie was initially given the license to be shown in the Lebanese theaters on contdition that it will be restricted to viewers above 18 years old, later on he head of the censoring body was replaced and his successor withdrew the authorization! Some claim it is because the movie is too much for the Lebanese audience to accept, while others say that it is because the lead actress “Thuraya” who has appeared naked in the movie, and happens to be Joanna Andraos the daughter of the Lebanese MP Antoine Andraos, which might negatively affect his campaign in the upcoming election in June 2009.

In case authorities gace the license back to “HELP”, I believe it will make double the profits it was supposed to make before, becuase people will be eager to watch it after the fuss that the ban issue has created!

I leave you now with the movie trailer I found on YouTube.

From Hamra to New York

By Rami on March 9, 2009 in Lebanon

hamra-street

Is it only me? Or do others also feel that Hamra resembles to New York? (Tsu2, I’m not out of my mind yet).

I used to rarely go to Hamra until recently when I got bored of all the other places like Downtown Beirut and Achrafiyeh, which are currently being heavily invaded by “wozziyyeh” teenage boys and girls especially on weekends!

Few weeks ago I went there in a hopeless attempt to find some new nice spot, and I was surprised by how beautiful Hamra is! Although I live in west Beirut, but since ever Hamra meant “traffic jam” to me, so I have always avoided passing by there. It isn’t like I have NEVER passed by Hamra before! But I’ve never passed and noticed the nice places I’m observing today.

The numerous neighboring shops, the cozy restaurants and cafés and the cozy streets, they all remind me of New York. I know that for some people there is no way to compare, but I have almost re-experience the same feeling I once had in New York everytime I go to Hamra for a walk.

I can call the Hamra area as “Little New York”… and no, once again I tell you that I’m not out of my mind yet!

Live webcams from Lebanon

By Rami on March 4, 2009 in Blog news

Did you notice what I recently added on the right under “Eyes of Lebanon”?

It’s a drop down list containing various locations in Beirut and the surroundings, when you choose location and click “Check Area” a new window will open containing a snapshot taken by a webcam positioned at that location, and the snapshots will auto refresh every 30 seconds, even if you kept the window open.

It’s not a new idea, the service is actually available via the LBC Group website through a service called “Eyes of Lebanon“. There you will find the very same webcam locations, except that the location links are spread on a dedicated webpage. So I thought of using my scripting skills and gather all these links into one drop down list that would fit in my sidebar, and let the readers check them out!

The webcams can be very beneficial sometimes when you need to check if there’s traffic congestion at one of the available areas. (Actually that’s their main purpose!)

P.S: If you would like to publish them on your website as well, I will be glad to provide you with the script I wrote. Just contact me on rami[at]plus961[dot]com

Cedar Island

By Rami on January 29, 2009 in Lebanon

It all started in Dubai with the Palm islands, followed by the Pearl island in Qatar, and soon we might have the Cedar Island here in Lebanon at the cost of Damour!

Covering an area of 3.311.731.60 squared meters in the touristic coastal area of Lebanon, the Cedar Island lends itself as a luxurious residential, commercial, and touristic project. Its geographical location along the Lebanese coast allows it to play a vital role in attracting tourists and VIP residents looking for an exotic lifestyle or escaping from the city.

I’ve read about this project in different new sources and to my knowledge there are still some doubts about realizing it. However, if you check the project’s website, you notice like the project is on its way to be started.

An interesting project indeed, but the question is: What is the enviromental cost for this artificial Cedar Island??

Updates:

There are a couple of groups on Facebook, one supporting the project, and the other is opposing it.
Via Nihil Declaro.
I tend to agree with this guy, who wrote a post titled “The island of Dr. Moron“.
Check this interesting article about the environmental cost of the artificial islands in Dubai, the article is followed by a response by an environmental scientist from the Nakheel project of Dubai.

Download Waltz With Bashir

By Rami on January 25, 2009 in Lebanon

Just in case you still have not heard of this Israeli movie which has been banned in Lebanon.

In 1982, Ari Folman was a 19-year-old infantry soldier in the Israel Defense Forces. In 2006, he meets with a friend from the army service period, who tells him of the nightmares connected to his experiences from the 1982 Lebanon War. Folman is surprised to find out that he does not remember a thing from the same period. Later that night he has a vision from the night of the Sabra and Shatila massacre the reality of which he is unable to tell. In his memory he and his soldier friends are bathing at night by the seaside in Beirut to the light of flares descending over the city. Folman rushes off to meet another friend from his army service, who advises him to discuss it with other people who were in Beirut at the same time to understand what happened there and to relive his own memory. The film follows Folman in his conversations with friends, a psychologist and the reporter Ron Ben-Yishai who was in Beirut at the same time.

The film takes its title from a scene in which one of the interviewees, the commander of Folman’s infantry unit at the time of the film’s events, grabs a light machine gun and “dances an insane waltz” amid heavy enemy fire, on a street festooned with huge posters of Bashir Gemayel.

When the movie was banned, Dr. Tarek Mitri (Minister of Information) said the ban is silly because people can get anything from the internet. And he was right, the movie is widely available on the internet now.

So how to download it?

It is available through torrent sites. You first have to install a torrent client, I recommend BitTorrent wich you can download from here.
Get the torrent file that will let you download the movie. I already uploaded the torrent file to +961, and you can click here to get it.
Assuming you have installed the BitTorrent client by now, double click on the torrent file and wait for the movie to completely download.

Update:

Download the english subtitles for Waltz With Bashir by clicking here.

Note that you should place the subtitles file in the same directory as the movie file, the subtitles will then appear automatically when you play the movie in your media player.

Orascom & Zain: Welcome to Lebanon!

By Rami on January 14, 2009 in Lebanon

I assume you all know it by now, the 2 new mobile operators to replace Alfa and MTC Touch will be Orascom and Zain (formerly MTC).

We have been promised since Gibran Bassil became the minister of telecommunication that a third operator might be introduced to the market and hopefully impose competition, which will result in lowering prices (happy us!). I was surprised though that this didn’t happen…

Anyway, while checking the Tayyar.org website today I came across this flash new:

“The contracts between the new operators and the government are different now, the two companies will be profiting from the working phone lines, which will help in lowering prices and providing a better service” (It seems like Alfa and MTC Touch were previously getting management fees only).

Well, let me tell you something Mr. Bassil, what we have in the mobile telephony sector right now is a duopoly, it’s actually a monopoly since the two operators are controlled by the government, but let’s assume it’s a duopoly. Do you know what kind of pricing strategies are followed in such cases? ANYTHING but price wars!

Seriously, come to think of it! They both have almost the same prices, and they’re sharing the market almost equally. Why would they want to go into price wars and risk lowering their profits? In case there will be a price decrease, they will BOTH agree on it. No marketer will ever work against the good of their firm. I doubt there will be a significant decrease in price by the way, we will never reach what’s set in Egypt and other Arab countries for example.

So, Mr. Bassil, you seem to be just like all the previous ministers (until time proves me wrong), you promised us the stars and delivered nothing until now. We’re being robbed and we will always be robbed!

Ya3neh we’re getting raped and might as well like it! Otherwise we get no phone line!

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