Partially disguised by a collection of photocopies and a slim grey Apple laptop, the friendly smile appeared again. Karen was a journalist from London, heading to Beirut for Business. I spent the four hour plane journey discussing Middle Eastern politics with someone that had experienced it firsthand.
“So why exactly has Israel captured and even killed some of the aid workers on the aid ship?” I asked. The flotilla raid was just hot news and I was eager to find out more on the crisis. The mainstream media outlets had far from provided me with a firm understanding of what exactly was happening.
“Well, the Israeli’s claimed that their actions had been in self defence” she began, “that they had performed their actions in Israeli waters”. She carefully chose her words, pausing now and then, attempting to maintain a level of objectivity and balance that respected all sides of the argument.
“But the humanitarian situation in Gaza is a desperate one, and the Israeli blockade and actions are simply unjustified”. She went on explaining the situation, every once in a while interrupted by my questions. About her own job she kept fairly distant, maintaining a certain degree of secrecy, as if sworn by her journalistic instincts not to reveal any details of the mission she was on.
As the automatic doors slid open, I was surprisingly not confronted with a wave of humid thick air I had expected from the Middle East. Beirut stood in front of me, invitingly fresh and hillier than I had anticipated.
I caught sight of a relatively large man, somewhat bald and holding a cardboard sign with my surname on it. I introduced myself and stuck out my hand.
“Only you?” The man looked surprised. This would be the first of many stunned locals at the sight of an eighteen year old tourist wandering the streets of Lebanon by himself. It seemed my friends weren’t the only ones taken back by my holiday choice.
“Where is my car?” He asked. “I’ve lost my car. She’s hiding”. The driver had a funny sense of humour. We spent the next ten minutes searching the car park where his car must have been ‘hiding’... Playing hide and seek with an inanimate object, I could already see this holiday was going to be interesting.
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