The Khamsin

Image: The Cyprus Informer


This past Sunday the city of Beirut was under a haze of dust. I was warned about this spring storm...it was warm, dry air and it comes from as far away as Northern Africa. While the image of this wasn't as amazing as these, it could be felt with itchy eyes and some allergy irritation.

This phenomenon occurs all over the Middle East and some portions of the Mediterranean and can be as large as 400 miles across. Here they locals refer to it as "the 50's" or "kham-seen"...  In the Middle East (Turkey, Syria, Jordan, etc they are referred to as Haboob, Simum, Black Blizzards. Or on the Mediterranean as Sirocco, Yugo and Ghibli. From what i can tell, in Cyprus they refer to them as Coptic Storms.

These storms and their regions of impact have been identified and mapped: "Sudan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf, are the regions that reported the greatest occurrence of dust storms. Dust storms in Iran, north-eastern Iraq and Syria, the Persian Gulf and southern Arabian Peninsula are more frequent in summer. In western Iraq and Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, northern Israel, northern Arabian Peninsula and southern Egypt they occur mainly in the spring, while in southern Israel and in the Mediterranean parts of northern Egypt, in winter and spring."


The Coptic Chart
Blogger Video
NASA

The Eco-Village

Tuck up into the Chouf mountains is the Eco-Village. A community of only a handful, working in natural construction materials, growing and harvesting, cooking and eating for visitors to experience.

The village is located within a valley, on a river that feeds the farms and waters the orchards and livestock. Ducks, goats and a collection of dogs roams the land.

A very nice break from the city.

The BCD

The Beirut Central District, or better known as Solidere, always gets a reaction from a visitor to Beirut. The architecture (old and new), the car-less, heavily guarded pedestrian walkways, the international couture boutiques or the remains of centuries of the cities war torn past are an apparition within the heart of this city on the sea.

It could be something about the lack of people. The strange feeling of not being in Beirut anymore. While the site of these recent constructions are placed upon the remains of a downtown and souks nearly leveled by civil war between 1975 to 1990, they don't yet seem integrated into the city as a whole...but what neighborhood in Beirut seems integrated to the city?