A lovely day

Ah, after rain comes fresher air and a brighter sky. Lovely! Today I got up eeearly to take my dear “wife” (Trude) to the airport. The clock rang at 05:30. A bit early maybe, but what won`t you do for your loved ones? :) After spending every day together for three months it will be strange not to have Trude around for three weeks. But probably it`s healthy for our relationship to have the time to miss eath other a bit. Now I have four days “alone” in Beirut, and then I`ll be home in Norway together with my family. How I`m looking forward to it! Saturday is by the way a working day here in Lebanon, so after the airport mission this early morning I went to the office to execute the tasks of the day. Since I`m traveling on monday I thought it would be nice to spread some Christmas joy to the employees and the volunteers, so I brought some candle lights, some norwegian crackers and our traditional brown cheese. A culinary (?) experience that was well appreaciated. On my way home from work I dropped by a second hand store which is run by this increadibly nice elderly gentleman. We talked about this and that, and nice to see you again, and acctually I dropped by to ask if he had an old guitar to sell. He didn`t, but as it was he gave me his own guitar to borrow with me home. He thought it would be appropriate since I was alone in the appartment now and then had the time to play. He showed me an old and yellowish program for a guitar consert he had done at the American University in the city in 1957, and he told me about how he started playing the guitar in his younger days. What an increadibly nice man! Almost confused from happiness and gratitude I continued my walk home with a well played guitar in one hand, and a beautiful red flower for 3 norwegian kr from the shop at the corner in the other. Tonight I`ll visit some friends, and we`ll eat chicken and enjoy ourselves even more. What a lovely day!

Stormy weather ahead

Help! Tonight it was again so much lightning and thunder that I thought the whole building would collapse. The rumours say that we should prepare for three days of storm. This I can believe. Yesterday one of the windowglasses in the kitchen blew off it`s track and was left on the floor in a thousand pieces. Something which was possible because these windows are not normal closeable windows, but rather some sort of Venetian blind in glass. Quite charming actually, but I admit that I am a bit sceptical regarding how this is going to keep out the cold this winter. I guess I`ll bring another wollen sweather back from Norway after x-mas, and then it will be just fine. Three days with storm is likely to mean three days without internett (which we`ve finally gotten installed at home – hurray!), and possibly also without electrisity, but I`m not too concerned about this since I`m spending all Saturday and Sunday in a workshop a thousand and something meters above sealevel. (And here it will probably snow!! :)) The Humanitarian Law program of the Lebanese Red Cross Youth is going to test out some new activities for their internal trainings this weekend, and I`m going to facilitate the semi roleplaying game Raw War. The volunteers will do the “combating” part of the game outdoors, wearing costumes and armypaint. And I`ll make angels in the snow:) Weehee! For sure this is going to be a whole lot of fun!!

December

It`s starting to get colder now, and the winter is obviously around the corner. On a mission a few hours drive from Beirut I recently discovered one of the most typical signs of spring in Norway. A Tussilago farfara! It is in other words not a typical norwegian winter that`s waiting for me, but rather a combination of spring and autumn, I guess. At least in the capital city, where snowfall is not common. However, the houses here are not very well isolated, and when the temperature goes down to 12-13 degrees celcius and the rain is pouring down, I feel increadibly thankful that I decided to let the wollen underwear and grandma`s wollen rugs take up some space in my suitcase when leaving Norway. Up in the mountains the first snow has already paid a visit, and there the cold is being kept out of the homes with paraffin stoves and fireplaces in the rooms.

A few days ago Beirut started decorating the streets for Christmas. The arrangements of lights are modestly placed in shrubs, windows and across the streets, and in the shelfes in the shops a number of red and golden Santa Clauses, stars and other typical X-mas stuff have appeared. Suddently it hits me that December is here! As opposed to the norwegian context you don`t find Christmas marzipan on display in October i Beirut, and this might be part of the reason why this obvious fact has missed my attention completely. It`s almost X-mas! I have decided to spend the holydays in Norway, which I`m looking very much forward to. Without doubt it would have been special to experience the lebanese celebration, but so be it. Holydays are best spent together with those you love the most, and this is what I intend to do. I really miss my familiy.