Eric Lian

Just kill me now...

From: Nick Hays <nickhaysX@XXXXXX.uk>   
To: Eric Lian <ericlianXX@gmaiX.com>
Date: Jul 16, 2006 11:27 AM

Hey Eric,

All getting a bit mental in Israel right now. My brother and I are in Tel Aviv waiting for our flights out -apache helicopters go past our hostel every 30 minutes - would have been a good photo opp for you!

How's Italy?

=====

The nice thing about email is that friends can find you no matter where you are. The bad thing about email is that friends can find you no matter where you are...

Still weak from my exchange with Rami, I received an email from Nick, my travel buddy (and ancient film camera photographer) from the UK. We shared a room together for a few days in Beirut and spent a day together in the Bekaa Valley - the heart of Hezbollah  country.

To the uninitiated, Nick's email seems friendly and quite innocent. And, yes, the world is flat. Knowing that the Israelis recently "installed" several sizable craters in the runways at Beirut airport, the email is a serial killer dressed as Mother Theresa sent through the internet to my Italian apartment to do away with me.

In case what I'm talking about is completely lost on you, I'll interpret each methodically crafted sentence. It's really quite vicious, even in terms of dry, understated British humor:

Hey Eric,
[You poor, sorry SOB. I know you're watching CNN and kicking yourself]

All getting a bit mental in Israel right now.
[I'm sure Italy is all safe and pretty right now and that you (and your completely useless camera gear) are probably sitting in an Italian cafe sipping an overpriced espresso - with your pinky finger extended in that high-fashion sort of way - content to watch the tourists walk by]
My brother and I are in Tel Aviv waiting for our flights out
[A pathetic trick to distract me from what is about to come, and he's being evasive in not telling when and where he's flying out to because he doesn't want to kill me just yet. He probably found a fearless taxi driver to take him back to Beirut right now]
-apache helicopters go past our hostel every 30 minutes-
[A low blow and I didn't even see it coming. The room goes black and I crumple to the cold cement floor]
would have been a good photo opp for you!
[It's not enough that I'm already down. He kicks me hard for good measure. I'm just waiting for the death blow now. I hope it's quick...]   

How's Italy?

[And there it is...A wooden stake through the heart. Simply masterful...]

This is now getting out of control!

From: Rami Mukhtar <rami@XXXXXX.com>   
To: Eric Lian <ericlianXX@gmaiX.com>
Date: Jul 14, 2006 2:28 PM
Subject: RE: Beirut...

Eric,

This is now getting out of control!  I am getting a bit upset about all of this. How on earth are these Israelis getting away with it?  To think, all those people living in Beirut, the cafes, the restaurants, the expensive and very over rated shops.  In 12 months from now that could all be gone.

But you know what?

I am more pissed off that we are not in Talal’s right now – because it would have made one hell of an interesting holiday to tell the grand kids about!

Rami 

=====

A small departure from the illusion of travel...

Rami is from Australia, but is of Lebanese descent. We met at the Talal hostel in central Beirut and shared a room together for several days. We hit it off immediately. He was visiting relatives and getting in touch with his roots. I was in the country because I heard trouble was a-brewin'. Turns out the tit-for-tat skirmishes we witnessed while we were there were likely the opening salvos of the current conflict.

At this moment, Rami and I are furiously firing emails back and forth lamenting our bad timing as reports filter in from CNN about continued strikes in Beirut and the airport by Israeli jets.

If Rami and I had the slightest inclination those skirmishes would have escalated to the direct bombing of Beirut, Rami wouldn't be in Australia and I certainly wouldn't be in Italy right now. We'd be in downtown Beruit dodging missile strikes and we'd be happy - though likely scared senseless - to be there. I know some of you are shaking your heads and thinking we couldn't possibly be more stupid and that we probably need our heads examined. It's certainly not something everyone would choose to do. 

That said, we are both extremely concerned for the friends we made there and for his extended family who live in Lebanon. In the past twenty years, neither one of us cared a damn about Lebanon prior to our experience there and unfortunately, as in any conflict or war, it's always the innocent who will ultimately suffer. this is going to get far worse before it gets better.

Travel goes a long to humanize and personalize what are otherwise nothing more than attention getting, space filling quips in newspapers and web pages. If there is still any question in your mind why I do what I do - it's as simple as that.

UN-BELIEVABLE

New Feature Alert: There is a folder of additional photos you can view. The folder is located at the top of the left sidebar. Click on the photo icon to view.

UN-BELIEVABLE

Even more so considering I wasn't really suppose to arrive in Italy for another ten days. I could have been trudging my way through Slovenia right about now. What a thought.

The per-game festivities are like the world's biggest block party where everyone knows each other. There's no such thing as staking out "your" territory or being polite about bumping into each other. The fact that you're going to sit where you can and get a little squished in the process is all part of the fun. Beverages of every type were passed and shared from group to group regardless of whether or not you knew the person who's knee was resting on your shoulder. There was little room to walk, but somehow people were still able to negotiate their way through some areas where one more person couldn't possibly fit and still get other people to nudge over and make a little more room. All this and the dancing, singing, and flag waving continued to invite more people in. The more the merrier isn't just a saying in Italy, it's something that is ingrained in Italian society.

There were a lot of photo opportunities even before the game started. I shared the stage area with three other local news photographers and though none could speak English, and I speak even less Italian, we were able to easily comminucate through hand signals and smiles. One of the roles we played was as official photographers to the fans. People would hand us their cameras and we would take photos of them as they mugged with their group. I couldn't help but notice - maybe it was just my imagination - that some of the female fans would sometimes do "things" to draw the attention of the cameras. Is that conceivable? Do you really think they would do that on purpose? Well, I fell for it... Shameless, I know, but I'm only serving those of you who have been hounding me with, "What, no women?".

On with the game     

The penalty kick that was awarded to the French at the seven minute mark - and successfully executed - was like letting air out of collective tire. What a blow it was to Italian fans to have something so dastardly happen so early in the game and there was no shortage of jeers and taunts in the direction of the big screen. Goals at this level of play are extremely difficult to come by, but I didn't see anybody anxious to leave. Soon, Italy scored a well deserved goal of their own and the fans were quickly reinvigorated. Score: France 1, Italy 1.

Two halves of regular play and two extra time periods and the score was still tied. As I mentioned in the previous entry, penalty kicks were not an Italian strong point, but again, I didn't see anyone get up to leave or cover their faces because they could not bear to watch. You may already know what happened in the end, but I've included a video clip so you can take a brief walk to the front of the stage.

I finally arrived back at my apartment at 3:00am having been pulled from cafe to cafe by some of the people I met in the crowd during the day. Italians - gotta love 'em. This was truly an unforgettable day.

Download italy_final_2_0001.WMV

 

Special World Cup Report

Enough about being sick. Yes, I still am *cough*. However, I have to interrupt my real life for a timely report. My sincere, heart-felt apologies to my German travel friends who may want to stop reading here...

I am in Florence, Italy. I've been here for a little over a week and my good friend Sylvia, from Los Angeles, has already emailed me and accused me of going soft. Tough crowd  :)  I can think of no better place to be to experience the passion Europeans have for football (soccer) than in the country that has a possible contender for the finals. I figure it's even better than being in Germany - where the World Cup is being held - because the fans here are 100% Italian - not diluted nationalities choosing one side or the other because they have tickets to the events, just pure screaming, cursing, out-of-control Italians pulling for the Italian team - All or nothing!

 

My Italian friend Tania tipped me off to the huge, outdoor, big screen TV that was
erected on the other side of the Arno River to showcase the semi-final match between Italy and Germany. Germany was favored to win, but as many of the matches have progressed in this World Cup, it was anyone's game to win or lose. The game was scheduled to begin at 9:00pm - the site was a half hour walk from my apartment - 8:30 and it was still light outside.

 

When I arrived, there were at least ten thousand people sitting on the park lawn anxiously waiting in front of the Sony PS2 big screen. They were already waving flags and banners and singing those songs that only Europeans sing. The reason that the US sucks at soccer is because we don't have a song. The only thing we have that even comes close is the  Atlanta Braves Tomahawk Chop chant, but that's baseball. Americans think it's sissy to sing, therefore, we'll never win a World Cup.

I made my way towards the front of the stage so I could shoot back at the crowd. The TV fired up - Live From Germany - and the crowd went bonkers. Everyone joined in during the Italian national anthem and when it ended you would have thought Italy had just scored the first goal. When the German national anthem began to play, a single German fan with a face painted in red, yellow, and black - likely the only one for a hundred miles - stood up on a high pillar in front of the crowd, more to antagonize the Italian fans than to show spirit, and was summarily jeered and ridiculed by 10,000 blood thirsty maniacs. I have never seen so many beautiful women scowl and flip someone the bird. Fortunately, he had the sense to stay well out of reach.

For those of you not savvy with World Cup rules at this late stage of the tournament, regular play is two forty five minute periods. If the game is tied after regular play, there are two shorter overtime periods. If the game is still tied, then the game moves to penalty kicks. The overall consensus was that if the game were to go to penalty kicks, Italy would certainly lose because German efficiency did not allow for failure from 12 yards out.

I spent most of the match looking at the crowd trying to pick out animated faces while listening to the broadcast to anticipate the best times to shoot. As the game progressed, emotions ran the gamut of joy, frustration, and cries of sudden horror quickly followed by nervous laughter and relief whenever Germany got too close to the Italian goal for comfort. After the two periods of regular play, the Italian crowd was still engaged, but their faces were filled with angst. It was almost too much to bear.

The first overtime period had finished, the second was two minutes from ending and still there was no score. Penalty kicks were all but inevitable. Download the movie clip to see what I saw and it will be like we saw it together. You and me in Florence in front of 10,000 screaming Italian football fans...

Download italian_lesson_1.WMV

Summing Up Dubai in two words...

Hot and shopping. If you don't like to be hot or shop, or be hot while you shop, or shop while its hot - this is not the place for you. Dubai is essentially a non-location in the middle of the desert with the most amazing urban planning vision I have ever seen. Whoever is in charge of development in this country certainly knows where they want Dubai to be in ten years, and that vision is plastered on hundreds of bill boards showing you exactly what each development will look like when completed.

Two of the most fascinating developments are currently under construction. The first (one of three of its kind) is a community that looks like a gigantic palm tree floating on the ocean when viewed from the air. Access to the community is via the palm's trunk with housing and business offices built into the palm's fronds. The second development is also being built just off the coast and consists of 300 man-made islands shaped to look like a map of the world. Who thinks these things up?

Two days into my Dubai experience, I came down with the flu. Yes, I know this was the flu rather than a re-introduction of Malaria because the skull splitting headache and severe lower back pain that accompanied my original case of Malaria did not materialize. I was also congested this time which was something that was noticeably absent with the Malaria. My number one mission was to beat this as quickly as possible because traveling anywhere is no place to be while you're sick. My number two mission was to figure out where to go from Dubai. Croatia was the original flag I had planted, but I was running into a time constraint with my sister-in-law Carol flying out to visit me in Italy on July 19th. I might not have time to hit eastern Europe at a leisurely pace, and rushing through to meet the July 19 deadline wasn't appealing. 

The average daytime temperature in Dubai was 42.7C (109F). Thankfully, it cooled to a chilly 36.1C (97F) at night, otherwise I may not have been able to sleep. Daytime hours were spent finding shady sidewalks and alleys to walk through because the heat was just unbelievable, and having a fever made it worse. I soon discovered a fruit stand near my hostel that sold what I can only describe as a fruit slushy made from fresh fruit that's peeled, chopped, and blended as you wait. I quickly became addicted to the Mango-Orange-Strawberry version. Not only was it cooling, but it soothed my sore throat and I hoped the overwhelming influx of vitamins would chase away the flu. I had better drink twenty of these a day!

Other than interesting architecture and nickel and dime stores there really wasn't that much interesting to see or do. A cab driver did suggest that I visit the "Mall of the Emirates" before I left. I guess it was Dubai's answer to Mall of America. Okay, I'll do that, and while I'm at it there's this famous hotel that Tiger Woods likes to hit golf balls from. I don't know what it's called, but I'll know it when I see it. Apparently the mall and hotel are in the same area. All the better.

The hotel was a 20 minute cab ride down the coast. Just as the pyramids in Egypt, the hotel rose in the distance and suddenly I was there - Dubai's most recognizable landmark. After a brief swim in the Persian Gulf, I watched an impromptu game of beach soccer in the shadow of the hotel, and eyed the circular platform where Tiger once stood to drive golf balls, and settled in for a few night time shots before heading for the mall.

The mall was four floors high. Nice mall, big mall, expensive mall, a mall with fruit juice shops. That's what I needed *cough*. With my second slushy in hand, I steered my way to the most impressive attraction I have ever seen indoors - a ski area complete with snow, a chair lift, a luge run, and a bunny hill where inexperienced skiers could practice. If I wasn't sick, I would have been skiing...*cough*