Word: lebanonã
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Dates: during 2004-2004
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...BEIRUT—Lebanon??€™s taxi system is one of my favorite things about this country. The cabs—invariably ancient green Mercedes—will pick you up on the side of the street and take you where you want to go for 1,000 liras, or about 50 cents. The driver is free to pick up other passengers along the way who are heading in the same direction and usually drops you off at the main road closest to your destination. I used to think that a system where every passing cab stopped...
Most of Beirut’s cab drivers are from poor areas in Lebanon??€™s south or Beirut’s southern suburbs. A week before I arrived in Lebanon at the beginning of June, riots broke out in those same suburbs over a new law that prohibited the less expensive diesel fuel in vehicles that carried fewer than 20 passengers. Seeing their profit margins slashed because of outrageous gas prices, drivers and their supporters protested in the streets. The protest then became about something bigger than gasoline: People protested the lack of jobs, the intermittent government services...
...still a third-world country. One university researcher here estimates that 90 percent of the population lives below the government poverty line. And that figure would be much higher if it wasn’t for the fact that remittances sent from Lebanese abroad make up 24 percent of Lebanon??€™s GDP. In a dumb tourist move, I was complaining to a group of Lebanese friends about the measly $600 a month I get paid at the paper where I work, only to find out that that was more than what many of their fathers made...
...BEIRUT, Lebanon??€”It stands like a giant upturned gray battleship sunk into the ground. No, it isn’t Mather Tower, it’s the burnt-out husk of the former Holiday Inn Beirut...