Tag: sightseeing

Erebuni Fortress

Posted on by Lark

I’ve been aggressively tackling my Armenia bucket list over the last few weeks, and this past weekend’s item was visiting Erebuni Fortress. The way I’ve been making my bucket list, especially around Yerevan, is this: I go to google maps. I click on random things on the map that look like they may be interesting. If it looks like anyone has ever been there and liked it, I add it to the list. That means that, besides the mainstream sights, I really have no idea what to expect from things because I don’t actually know other people who have been to them.

Erebuni Fortress was one of those mysteries. I found it while browsing maps and was like, “Oh yeah! This is where the city of Yerevan started!” and I added it to my list. I don’t know anyone else who has been there, besides one old volunteer friend who I found out actually volunteered there… but clearly, it meant nothing to me when she told me that the first time, and I immediately forgot. I suckered Olivia into coming with me, and the plans were set!

Me and Olivia

Erebuni Fortress, also called Arin Berd, is on top of a hill in the southern part of modern-day Yerevan. It was built in 782 BC by King Argishti I and was part of the kingdom of Urartu. It was one of a series of fortresses built along the kingdom’s northern border and became an important political, cultural, and economic center. The name “Erebuni” is thought to mean “capture” or “victory” (but maybe not because there are like 50 other guesses to what it might mean). If you visit the site, the location they selected makes perfect sense. The hill seems to come out of nowhere. Surrounded by flatness, it’s a random mountain, rising up 65 meters (about 215 feet).

Walls and walls and I don’t know what this is because it wasn’t labeled on the map.

A town was constructed at the base of the mountain, and the fortress had a view of the town, the surrounding settlements, and all roads leading to the fortress. They think that the walls used to be 12 meters high! And if that wasn’t enough defense, there were three layers of walls. And they tied in with the slopes of the mountain, making access seemingly impossible. The fortress had a triangular plan and included a main courtyard, temples to Haldi (the supreme Urartian god) and Ivarsha (some other god), the palace, grain storehouses, and guards’ and servants’ quarters.

The formerly-but-not-currently-12-meter-tall walls
Looking towards the center of Yerevan.

The existence of the fortress was forgotten until excavations in 1950 rediscovered it and revealed inscriptions crediting King Argishti with the construction. They also found the citadel walls, pipes for running water, frescoes, statues, ornaments, weapons, and over 20 cuneiform inscriptions. The water pipes were one of the craziest things because they’re made out of stone, and one of the signs in the museum said the water was piped in from GARNI. That’s like a 40-minute drive from Yerevan which doesn’t sound like much, but it is when you’re CARVING STONE PIPES to span the distance. Crazy.

These are some parts of the water pipe system. The extra hole in the middle one was for maintenance. Can you imagine having the job of carving out all of those stone pipes??? Do you know how hard it is to carve a hole through stone without splitting the whole thing apart?
This wine jug was in one of the temples. It’s also huge.

There are also some awesome mural paintings on the walls of the palace and temple. It’s amazing to think about the fact that those paints have survived for almost 3000 years! Mostly, the paintings are just patterns, but some of them also show scenes of the gods.

In celebration of Yerevan’s 2750th birthday in 1968, the fortress was partially restored, and a museum was built on the grounds to display some of the artifacts found during the excavations.

We visited the museum first, and it was kind of underwhelming. I’d still do it again though because it was only 1000 dram (about $2) for admission to the museum and the ruins, so it’s not like I felt gypped. We also didn’t get a guide which maybe would have been a good idea. Eh, it was still interesting enough, and they had some cool stuff in there like the stone water pipes. I think part of the problem was that it was kind of dark and the font on the signs was small, so I just felt like I should be falling asleep.

Museum views. Kind of dark, right?

They had a reconstructed model of the site, and when we looked at it and noticed the painted walls, we thought that the modeler had just taken some artistic liberties. When we walked up to the fortress and saw painted walls in the very first building, we were VERY excited and also made mental apologies to the modeler for doubting him/her. To get to the ruins from the museum, you have to walk up a LOT of stairs. Olivia and I pretended to stop periodically to “check out the view”, but we were both just pretending that we weren’t getting winded. I used the excuse that since we were walking up a mountain, the air was thinning out so it had nothing to do with our physical shape and everything to do with the lack of oxygen in the air.

Model of the fortress. the part at the bottom of the triangle is the religious part of the fortress with the main temple, the top left part is the palace complex including the smaller temple, and the top right is mostly servants’ quarters.

To be fair, the view was pretty great. If we had gone on a clearer day, it would have been spectacular. It’s without a doubt the best view of Ararat in the city, and you can see Yerevan stretching out in every direction around you. I always forget what a sprawling city it is because I live near the center, and if I don’t have a specific reason to go into the outskirts (such as a random sightseeing excursion), I never do.

Hey hey, Yerevan! And Ararat is lurking under a whole load of clouds.

I don’t know what I expected from the ruins, but I think I imagined them smaller and in worse condition. They are not small, and it looks like they did a decent amount of work rebuilding things. The walls are only maybe three meters high, and I can’t even imagine how imposing it must have looked when they were 12 meters. We entered through the original entrance to the fortress on the southeastern side, walking past the famous cuneiform stone about King Argishti coming to this place where there used to be nothing but desert and accomplishing great works upon it… or something to that effect. Very modest guy, that King Argishti.

This was the outer post where visitors came before getting admitted to the fortress. This is when Olivia and I realized the wall paintings were real
They must have looked amazing when they weren’t 2800 years old!
Entrance stairs into the fortress.

We wandered around the ruins for a bit and marveled at how extensive they were. We also both ranted about how no one respects history and “kids these days” because a bunch of the murals had names and other jibberish carved into them. Like come on… do you really have to do that? No one cares about your declaration of love or the fact that you “wuz here” (I don’t know if that was actually written anywhere, but probably). Why can’t people just go somewhere, admire it, and then NOT deface it? I know, crazy talk. Sorry for even suggesting it.

The main courtyard, looking towards the servant quarters.
Looking towards the temple area from the main courtyard.
Temple hall with vandalized walls.

If we had explored the entire fortress, we could have spent hours and hours there. Instead, we explored a decent amount of it and then decided we were hungry and went to get dinner. I think we were still there for a considerable amount of time though because I ate before we went and was famished by the time we left (we’re apparently going to reference my stomach clock instead of actual times… mostly because I don’t remember those).

Anyway, all I can say about the general experience is thank you, google map browsing, for preventing me from missing out on a Yerevan not-so-hidden-but-definitely-underrated gem. Why on earth don’t more people go there???

Courtyard in the palace area.
Palace… kind of… used to be.
The temple area is to the left, and the palace area is to the right.

Back to the Old Neighborhood

Posted on by Lark

Included on my list of “must do” things before leaving Armenia was going back to visit Gyumri for a weekend. One of my friends, Lexi, had an apartment there until the middle of February, so I went a couple weekends ago and stayed with her. There wasn’t anything too crazy on the schedule… mostly I just wanted to hang out and enjoy being back in my old hood.

There are three ways that you can get to Gyumri from Yerevan without having your own car (excluding walking):

  1. Taxi – takes 2 hours (unless you have a psycho driver who makes it in 1:30… but that’s really not safe), costs 10,000 dram (about $20) so 2500 each when you have four people
  2. Marshrutka – takes about 2.5 hours, 1500 dram (about $3)
  3. Train – takes 3 hours, 1000 dram (about $2)

This may seem strange to you. In what universe is the train the slowest and the least expensive mode of transportation?? Answer: the strange, strange universe called Armenia. I guess it makes sense that when one of those is true, the other also is… but like, when is the train the slowest mode of transportation??

Inside the train

Despite this, the train is without a doubt my favorite way to travel. As long as you’re not in a rush, it’s fantastic! There’s space to stretch, you can walk around if you want, there’s a bathroom, you can get work done because you’re not cramped, and the scenery is beautiful. It’s slightly less beautiful in the winter when everything is brown, but at least the mountains are still there, and they look great coated in snow.

Enjoying all of my space on the train

I woke up bright and early on Saturday to take the first train of the day at 8AM. I had an incredibly productive ride… I worked on my blog, I worked on my journal, I studied some Armenian, I looked out the window… and then just like that, we were in Gyumri!

I didn’t have much of a plan for how to get from the train station to Lexi’s apartment, but turns out that I didn’t need one! I walked out of the station, saw a #12 marshrutka, and vaguely remembered that maybe it went to the right neighborhood. They do have a list of stops written on the side, but there’s no chance it was going to sit there while I tried to figure things out. And I guess I could have asked the driver, but sometimes I like to look like I know what I’m doing so I blend in better. I figured that worst case, I would get off in whatever random part of town I ended up in and call a taxi. Thankfully that wasn’t necessary because we ended up exactly where I thought we would. Score one for my memory!

Puppies!

I dropped my stuff at Lexi’s apartment, and we went to have breakfast at her friends’ house. They’re trying to start an animal shelter in Gyumri which is definitely needed. They still have to raise money and work out more of the details, but in the meantime, they’re rescuing dogs on their own and working to find homes for them, both in the US and in Armenia. It’s actually kind of amazing (you can check out their facebook page here). In general, people here don’t see animals as creatures with any value (though there are certainly exceptions to that). There are stray dogs and cats everywhere, and people mistreat them all the time. I’ve seen people kick dogs, people get paid to shoot them, dogfighting isn’t uncommon, and even people who own pets don’t necessarily know how to take care of them.

We went over to their house to see three puppies that they had found roaming around on the side of the highway the day before. After checking out the situation, they realized they had been dumped there and left to die, probably because they were all female puppies, and people want males for dogfighting. They took the puppies in, got them checked out by the vet, and were starting to look for permanent homes for them. Lexi loves puppies, so off we went. I’m not a huge animal person (as in, I’m not interested in picking up poop or getting my face licked, so I’m fine with not owning any myself), but who doesn’t like puppies?

Isn’t it a little weird?

After a little puppy time, we went to cross off the only three things I had on my list for the weekend. I hadn’t been to the Russian church in town, St. Nikolai the Wonderworker Church, so that was my first must-do. It was built in 1880 and is located in what is now a Russian military cemetery. It’s an interesting looking building because the bottom part uses black tuff stone which is classic Armenian, but the roof gives it away as a Russian church. Its nickname is “the shimmering chapel” because of the shiny roof.

 

The cemetery with the church in the background
Painting in progress!
Pretty cool!

I stopped by a few times back when I lived in Gyumri, but it was never open. This time, we were in luck! We walked around the grounds first and then went inside. I guess they’re in the middle of some restoration work because now they’re in the process of painting the walls and ceiling. They look awesome!!! I love painted churches. They still have a bit of work to do, but I can just imagine how incredible it will be when it’s finished.

Number two on my list was kind of stupid, but there’s this road in town that was under construction all summer and is finished now. I mostly was just impressed that a construction project was completed in a reasonable amount of time, so I wanted to check it out. We took a drive down the new street, and it didn’t disappoint. It’s probably the nicest road in town now.

Number three was really the most important. I wanted to have ponchiks at Ponchik Monchik. I am convinced that they make the best ponchiks in Armenia (they’re basically like the most wonderful cream/chocolate-filled donuts). They always make them fresh for you, they’re nice and crispy, and I love them. In their terminology, a ponchik is a vanilla one, and a monchik is a chocolate one. And they’re both delicious, so I got one of each. And I obviously didn’t take a picture of them because that would have kept me from eating them immediately, so you’ll just have to use your imagination. As if those weren’t already enough sugar, I got a hot chocolate too. If that’s not the perfect meal, I don’t know what is. WAIT. I do. Add ice cream to that, and you’ve got yourself a winner.

Unfinished ceiling of the Russian church

The rest of the day/night was spent hanging out, talking, and playing Rummikub (best game ever). It was relaxed and fun, and I think it was exactly what I needed. Sometimes it can get exhausting living in Yerevan. I know that’s crazy to say considering I used to live in Philadelphia which is at least equally as chaotic, but it’s the truth. Yerevan feels like a big city, and Gyumri feels like home.

On Sunday, we took a trip to the vet to get the puppies and Lexi’s cat checked for worms. Ew. I was slightly less than thrilled with the situation because the vet’s office is tiny, and it was packed. There was an old woman with her little dog, a couple of guys with their cat, and a few other dog owners came and went. The woman was losing it a bit because they had to drug her dog. She was so hysterical that I wanted to give her a big hug, and I’m not a hugger. It was nice to see that there are some people who care about animals. She clearly loved that dog. When she and the other people in the office heard the puppies’ story, they declared that whoever left them was a monster. Maybe there’s hope after all!

Post-vet, Lexi and I spent some time wandering around the fields near the neighborhood. We walked around the same fields back in July when we first met (throwback here), so it was a fun full circle for our friendship. There was still some clean, untouched snow to play around in out there, and the mountains in the distance were beautiful and snow-covered. Field walks are also always good for conversations, and it was nice to have some time to catch up.

It wasn’t a very clear day so you can’t see the mountains very well, but just trust me when I say they looked great
Me and Lexi
You can kind of see the mountains better here… kind of

We had just enough time to eat before I had to get to the train station to catch the last train back to Yerevan. It was kind of crowded this time, so I ended up in the window seat on top of the heater… which tried very hard the entire ride to burn my butt. Slightly less than pleasant, but at least I couldn’t complain that I was too cold! I still managed to be productive though, so it clearly wasn’t that bad (after I folded up my scarf and sat on it!). I finished my Armenian homework, made some flashcards, and by the time we were back in Yerevan, I had them memorized.

I thought the weekend might feel rushed since I was only there for one night, but I’m so glad I went. It was just the relaxing escape I didn’t know I needed!

Matenadaran

Posted on by Lark

I’m starting to have the feeling that I’m running out of time, and I’m not going to be able to do all the things I want to do before I leave Armenia. That feeling has given me renewed motivation to use my weekends wisely and start crossing things off my list again.

One of the big things that I’ve repeatedly put off is a visit to the Matenadaran, the manuscript museum and repository in Yerevan. Sarah and I tried to go when I first came to Armenia, but we went on a Sunday and it was closed. My family thought about going, but the week was already too museum-packed. I didn’t want to go alone, and that’s why it was put off for so long. Finally, I decided that I was going to go no matter what. I still asked a couple friends if they wanted to come along, and one said yes! I guess all it took was for me to make up my mind, make a firm plan, and THEN ask someone to join. That works much better than saying, “Do you want to do this together at some point?” because ‘some point’ never ends up getting scheduled.

Matenadaran on the approach
Me and Zoe

I met Zoe, my friend from church, outside the Matenadaran. It’s a pretty epic building, set at the top of a hill on the edge of the Yerevan city center. Aptly, it’s on Mesrop Mashtots Street, and out front, there’s a statue of Mashtots sitting next to a stone tablet displaying his prized alphabet. Makes sense that the creator of the Armenian alphabet would be the hero of the manuscript museum!

Can you find me in this picture?

The Matenadaran was completed in 1957. Before then, most of the manuscripts were kept at Etchmiadzin and the State Library. Today, the building houses around 20,000 manuscripts. Only about 1% of the collection is on display, and the rest is kept in environmentally-controlled storage for preservation purposes. They still receive new (old) manuscripts to add to the collection, mostly from the diaspora.

So epic!
Those doors weigh A LOT
Entry area of the museum
Inside the Matenadaran
Grand staircase (it’s a panorama picture which is why it looks warped)

One percent of the total collection might not sound like a lot, but trust me, it’s plenty. I knew that it would be a waste to go to the museum without a tour guide, so we sprung the extra $5 (split between the two of us) for a tour. As always, it was MORE than worth it. Zoe was a great museum buddy too. We both asked the guide a bunch of questions which she patiently and thoroughly answered. If we had just gone on our own, I wouldn’t have even gotten half as much out of our visit. Most of the stuff I’m going to say is based on what we learned from the tour, so if something is wrong, I’m passing off the blame!

The Armenian alphabet was created by Mashtots in 405AD in order to translate and record the Bible in Armenian. The first Bible was translated, and many other books followed. There were a lot of books translated from the famous Library of Alexandria in Egypt, and our guide said that when that library burned down, a number of books were translated from Armenian back into the original languages to replace those that were destroyed.

The materials used to make the different ink colors.

The first books were written on lambskin and later parchment. They used all-natural inks, so the colors have been preserved in their original quality throughout the years. Blue is from lapis lazuli, a rock known for its rich blue color. Green is from copper oxide. Red is from the Armenian cochineal bug, found in the Armenian highlands. The bugs live underground and only emerge for a few hours each morning from mid-September to mid-October to mate. Gold is real gold, and it’s attached to the pages with garlic juice. How on earth did people figure this stuff out?? (Excuse the upcoming series of horrible pictures because it’s not easy to take good pictures of things covered in glass.)

It’s amazing that the ink is unrestored! This copy of the gospels is from the 13th century.
That’s one serious Bible cover

The Bibles especially have very beautiful covers because the quality of the cover should reflect the importance of the contents. Mostly, Bibles had silver, leather, or velvet covers. One Bible that they have on display was copied at Etchmiadzin and has a 6th-century ivory cover.

After the alphabet was invented, Bibles and other books started being copied all over Armenia, mostly in monasteries. It could take around two or three years to complete one copy. That sounds like long, but when you look at the amazing penmanship and drawings inside, it almost doesn’t seem like it should be enough time!

The original 36 letters of the alphabet as designed by Mashtots. For the old numbering system, the first column is ones, second tens, third hundreds, and fourth thousands.

Until the 10th century, everything was written in all capital letters. They think that Mashtots only made the capitals, and lowercase letters were developed later on. They also used to use the alphabet for numbers. When the alphabet is written in four columns from left to right, the first column is ones, the second is tens, the third is hundreds, and the fourth is thousands. From top to bottom, the letters are 1-9. There’s no way to write zero, so don’t ask me how they dealt with that. For numbers greater than 9999, a horizontal line drawn over a letter meant that the value of that letter should be multiplied by 10,000. The western Arabic numbering system started being used in the 16th century… thank goodness because that old system is confuuuuuusing.

Ivory covered Etchmiadzin gospel
These are some books that were in very bad shape and had to be grafted onto new pages to keep them from falling apart. You can see the original pages in the little pictures to the left, and the book shows those pages attached to new ones.

Armenians also used to have their own system for music. There are 49 classical Armenian musical notes and the great tragedy is that no one knows how to read it anymore. They can’t find a key that explains it, so all of the music that they have is unusable. I feel like someone should write a historical mystery novel where the characters are searching for the lost key (if anyone out there wants to write it, you don’t even need to give me credit… just send me a free copy of your book when it’s finished).

I just love how museums look. So neat and organized!

There are more than just Bibles at the Matenadaran, though at this point it might sound like that’s the extent of the collection. There are definitely MOSTLY Bibles, but they have a bunch of other cool things too. There’s a 6th-century book written by David the Invincible, the first Armenian philosopher. There are 5th-century Armenian history books, including one written by Movses Khorenatsi that was the first attempt to create a complete history of Armenia from its origins. Armenia’s first legal text is displayed, written in the 12th century by Mkhitar Gosh (he also founded Goshavank Monastery). Since, as you know, everything was done first by the Armenians, Anania Shirakatsi’s work is also displayed, showing that he claimed in the 7th century that the earth is round and that the moon has no light of its own and instead reflects the sun’s light, though he had no way to prove either claim (Galileo didn’t come along until the 16th century). There are also 3,500 manuscripts written in languages other than Armenian.

History books! Why did I never have any history books with such awesome pictures?
This is an example of a book that was copied from one at the Library of Alexandria, and now the original no longer exists
This inscription was found at a destroyed church. It is the only thing that survived. It was written by the builder and says that he gives it to his brother and his sons. Then, the brother adds on saying that anyone who destroys the inscription will not have God’s mercy. It was the only part of the church that was left untouched.
This is written on palm leaves in the Tamil language (spoken in parts of India, Sri Lanka, Singapore, etc)

The printing press was invented in Germany in 1440, and the first Armenian book was printed in 1512 in Venice. The first Armenian Bible was printed in 1666 in Amsterdam. Etchmiadzin eventually got its own press, and it printed its first book in 1772. All of those books are displayed in the museum.

There is also an entire medical section. Mkhitar Heratsi, the father of Armenian medicine, lived in the 12th century. Some of his books are there, plus many others. There are books talking about different herbs, Armenian and imported, and their medicinal qualities. At the Matenadaran, they have used some of the recipes for elixirs and lotions and other beauty products in the old books and recreated them! Isn’t that cool?? One of them, the “royal elixir” is made from 54 herbs that are gathered on specific lunar days in order to make the elixir stronger. It was used in the Middle Ages to give the kings “youthfulness and zest” and it “heals the heart and makes the spirit happy”.

These are the 54 spices used to make the royal elixir.
Medical book talking about herbs and their uses.
Looking out at the city.

Side tidbit: when we were talking about the royal elixir, our guide brought up the fact that at Etchmiadzin, they make myrrh every seven years. Armenian priests come from around the world to take some back with them and use it sparingly until the next batch is made. Each new batch is mixed with the old, so there’s continuity from the very beginning of the Armenian church. It contains over 40 herbs and is mixed in a big, silver cauldron.

Reading the biggest book. Captions courtesy of Zoe.

Finally, the funniest display they have is a contrast between the biggest and the smallest books in the museum. The largest one is 604 pages, and each page is an ENTIRE lambskin. That means that 604 lambs went into the creation of that book. Like what. It weighs 28kg and is the Homilies of Mush. It’s now split into two parts because two women decided to save it during the Armenian Genocide. They found it in the ruins of the church in Mush, split it in half, and both headed towards Etchmiadzin. One woman made it. The other did not, but before she died, she buried her half at a monastery. It was found years later by a Russian soldier. Those two women saved that book from sharing the fate of the estimated 20,000 manuscripts destroyed during the Armenian Genocide.

The smallest book doesn’t have a story to go along with it, but it weighs 19g and, in contrast, did not require one lamb for the creation of each page. It’s a church calendar, and apparently you can’t really read it with the naked eye which seems a little inconvenient to me… Oh well.

The biggest book and the smallest book!

It would have been a shame to leave Armenia after 9 months without visiting the Matenadaran. It was absolutely worth the visit, and absolutely x10000000 worth the tour. I am a lover of books, art, and architecture, so it was kind of like heaven to me, but I think that even if you weren’t, it would be an interesting and worthwhile trip.

Dubai Marina and “Old” Dubai

Posted on by Lark
Funky balconies

I left off my previous post about my “world’s longest day” in Dubai at the Dubai Mall metro station…

I think they got their metros from Japan or something. They’re the same ones that they have in Hong Kong, if I’m not mistaken. They’re all automatically driven and perfectly line up with the glass doors on the platform every time. They are almost impeccably on schedule and can get VERY crowded (that has nothing to do with where the metros were made, it just seems to be a theme everywhere). Like I said in my Dubai intro post, the public transit has optional designated seating for women that I wasn’t going to use until I realized that I was the only woman on the platform NOT in front of the women’s car. When it came and we all packed in, I was happy with my decision.

I took the metro to one of the stops near Dubai Marina. Then, a bunch of people were running to catch a tram that was coming, and I remembered from the transit map that one of the stops was Marina Mall which is exactly where I needed to go. What I didn’t realize was that the tram does a loop from the stop I was at, and the mall is the last stop on that loop, not the first. Oops.

Dubai Marina
Awkward marina selfie as I sweated it out in my winter-appropriate attire.

I planned to take a ferry from the marina to the “old” part of Dubai. Due to my unexpected detour, I got to the ferry terminal at about 11:02, and the ferry left at 11. It was pulling out just as I walked up. I’m blessed with very good luck disguised as bad luck, though, because every time I think something has gone wrong, I end up being better off than if it had gone “right”. Okay, so I missed the first ferry, but the next one was in just two hours.

There’s a promenade that runs right next to the water, so I strolled along that for a bit and took in the sights. I spent a little more time sitting on a bench, soaking in the sun and warm air, watching people walk, run, and bike by, and wondering what brought each of them to Dubai.

Yachts. Everywhere.
I’ve definitely seen pictures of that little twin building in the front before… But there are so many highrises and funky architectural statements that things get lost.

My extra hours at the marina flew by. Before I knew it, it was time to go and buy my ferry ticket! Based on the information I found online, the ferry was supposed to take 60-90 minutes. Ha. The route was a little different than anticipated, and it ended up taking TWO hours! I was excited because we went around one of the palm islands which is something I wasn’t expecting to get to see. Maybe other people would have chosen to spend their day differently, but I thought it was great! It only cost 50 dirhams (about $14), and I got to be on a boat in Dubai which kind of just felt right since boats are such a big part of the identity of the city.

I wish we were a little closer to shore, but you can see the Burj Al Arab (the taller one), Jumeirah Beach Hotel (the short one to the left of the tall one), and in the foreground, there’s a sailboat which is kind of funny because the Burj Al Arab is supposed to look like a sail.
Check out how ridiculous the Burj Khalifa looks, popping up above all of the other buildings

When we finally landed, I was right in the middle of the things I wanted to see next. I was worried that I wasn’t going to have enough time to see everything based on my time estimates, but you know what? It worked out perfectly. I made it to everything on my list, and I didn’t feel the least bit rushed. I actually don’t know what I would have done if I’d had all the time I planned. It would have been way too much!

First, I strolled around Heritage Village. I didn’t realize at the time that it’s currently closed for renovations, so nothing much was going on. It’s a rebuilt neighborhood that is supposed to show “the traditional lifestyle” with demonstrations of the customs, traditions, professions, and craftsmanship of old Dubai. It has a mix of different building types to show building traditions across the different parts of the emirate. That probably would have been cool to see, but instead, I just wandered a bit and looked at the buildings.

Look at those pristine streets

My next destination was Al Fahidi neighborhood. This and Heritage Village are right along Dubai Creek, where the oldest settlements in the area were located. Apparently, they wanted to tear the neighborhood down and develop it, but people fought to preserve the history there. The result was that they didn’t build big buildings… but it’s still been developed. It feels like something straight out of Disney. A brand new historic village. It was still interesting, but I was a little disappointed, to be honest.

After I’d had enough of that, I went to the Dubai Museum. I was ready to be slightly disappointed again since the last two things I planned to see were such bummers. If the museum was a similar failure, I was going to be left with all sorts of extra time.

Thankfully, it was much better. It’s in an old fort, Al Fahidi Fort, and that building actually looks like it was preserved instead of rebuilt. The walls aren’t perfectly finished and fresh looking. I mean, I’m sure they did plenty of work on it, but it was at least less obvious and fake looking.

The “historical” neighborhood of Al Fahidi
Cool trees in the hood
Dubai Museum/Al Fahidi Fort
They’re kind of hard to see, but these little wire guys trying to climb the wall made me smile.

The museum itself was fairly well-done. In a few parts, there was so much information that it was actually exhausting (and I have a high tolerance for museums), but otherwise, it was good. There were also parts where the text was so small that I literally couldn’t read it from the distance I was required to stand at. By about the halfway point, no one besides me was even attempting to read anything anymore. Everyone else was just trying to get through it as fast as they could manage.

I thought it was really interesting because it talked about the history of Dubai and of the UAE in general. I haven’t been to many countries in that part of the world, so the history wasn’t the same old story that I’m used to, and the culture is completely different from many of the things I’ve seen before.

Not awkward
HOW COOL ARE THOSE SPIRAL LIGHTS? But also… what would you do with them?

From there, I headed to the river. I walked through the textile souks and admired all of the pretty fabrics and scarves. The unfortunate thing about the souks, at least when I was there, is that you can’t just walk around anonymously. People are constantly trying to get your attention, talk to you, and get you to look inside their shops. I wish I could wear a sign telling them not to waste their time with me because I cannot be persuaded to buy something when I have literally no interest in buying anything. I had no interest in buying anything. No, I don’t want a pashmina scarf. I don’t want any spices. I don’t want a fake designer purse. What am I supposed to do with these things? Where am I supposed to put them? I’m currently living out of a backpack, and the rest of my life is in boxes/my childhood room at my parents’ house. If there’s one thing I definitely don’t need, it’s more stuff (I’m sure my parents would agree).

When I got to the river, I watched the abras, old boat “buses”, pull in and out of the dock. It was mesmerizing! It looked like they were doing a dance, and I was amazed that they weren’t constantly bumping into each other. The passengers sit on this raised middle part of the boat, and it’s only 1 dirham (30ish cents US) to get across. After I watched long enough to understand what was going on, I hopped onto a boat to cross the river. I think this was my favorite part of the whole day because it was the only thing that felt authentic. The boats were old and a bit sketchy, they were constantly packed, and the ride was cheap It was fun to be out on the water like that.

Abra docks
Organized chaos
Just living that solo travel selfie struggle
Coming into the dock
Clearly amped about getting to ride on the abra… things got better after this.

On the other side, I walked in the direction of the gold and spice souks. I spent a lot of time pretending that I was oblivious, pretending that I didn’t speak English (which is kind of hilarious because I pretended that I could only speak Armenian), and telling people that I didn’t want anything. People also kept trying to guess my ethnicity (this is a common occurrence in my life) with guesses ranging from Iranian to Arab to some mix of those with other things.

When it was about time to leave, I decided to take a boat back across the river just because I wanted to. If I had the time, I could have been happy riding back and forth all night. From the dock, I walked to the metro and spent the rest of my money on plane snacks. I had 12 dirhams left, and I strategically planned what snacks I could get, trying to get as close as possible to 12 without going over. Guess what I ended up with? 11.90. It doesn’t get much better than that! I left with a very healthy haul of three cookie varieties.

I’m kind of obsessed with these lamps
Classic spice market picture
Souks
Blurry night abra picture

Getting back into the airport was a breeze because I didn’t have to check my bag. I was at the gate in less than 20 minutes. Turns out my speed was completely unnecessary because about an hour before take-off, we were informed that our flight was cancelled because of weather conditions in Yerevan. In classic Armenian fashion, everyone started calling their relatives in Yerevan, confirming that the weather was fine and that planes were landing, and arguing with the airline staff. None of this resulted in our flight getting un-cancelled, but they did agree to give out food vouchers which was enough to satisfy me.

I ended up sleeping on the floor because the chairs in the terminal all have armrests on them (how rude). It wasn’t the most restful night of my life, but of course I managed to sleep. I always do. I went to sleep around midnight, woke up about every two hours to change position, and got up for good at 8AM before our flight finally left at 2PM. Not exactly the ideal end to Dubai Day, but I survived and got free KFC out of it, so it could have been worse.

There were some awesome views on the way back to Armenia! I usually fly at night, so I never get to see anything
Mount Ararat on the way into Yerevan airport

A Day in Dubai: The Burj Khalifa

Posted on by Lark

Dubai Day started bright and early… and after an INCREDIBLY restful four hours of plane sleep on my flight from Beirut. My flight landed at 4:45AM, I zoomed through immigration, and I tried to somewhat pull myself together in an airport bathroom before venturing out into the world.

My first stop was the Burj Khalifa, aka the tallest building in the world. You can schedule a time to go up to one of the viewing decks (I opted for the lower one because I’m not rich), and I signed up for a sunrise time slot. I made the mistake of going to Dubai on a Friday. That was stupid because Friday is the Muslim Sabbath day, and in the UAE, it’s a “non-work day”. It didn’t mess me up TOO much, but most things opened later in the day which wasn’t ideal since I got in so early in the morning. The metro wasn’t open yet, so I took a cab from the airport and got dropped off next to the building.

Welcome to Dubai! That body of water is the Persian Gulf.

The thing about being “next to the building” is that when the building is 828 meters tall (2,716 feet), the base of the building is not small. I had NO idea where to find the correct entrance to go to the viewing decks, so I just walked in a direction that I thought made sense until a guard told me I was going the wrong way and redirected me. No doubt that’s a normal occurrence in his job.

The walk to the right entrance was about 15 minutes, and I didn’t mind one bit because the world was quiet, and the city was still asleep. That’s one of my favorite times in a city (though I hate being awake so early).

Nighttime city view

One of the best parts of going to viewing platforms in tall buildings is getting to learn about the building. They always have information about the design and how it was built. Learning about the process makes the experience so much more interesting!

Excavations for the Burj Khalifa started in January of 2004, and it was officially opened in January of 2010. Even though it boasts a height of 828 meters (2,716 ft), the top floor is located at 584 meters (1,915 ft). The rest is just a ridiculous spire to make it taller.

The piles that make up the foundation system are 50 meters deep (165 ft). They also had the challenge of making sure that the in-ground structure could withstand the harsh minerals found in the soil. After a year of construction to prepare the foundation, work started on the floors. They created a process that allowed them to pour the concrete for one floor every three days! They also pumped concrete from the ground up to 601 meters (1,972 ft) which is about 3/4 the height of the building. That set another world record (there really is a world record for everything).

The quantity of building materials that went into the structure is insane. The foundation alone used 45,000 m3 of concrete (58,900 yd3), which is like if you filled 18 Olympic swimming pools, and the superstructure used another 330,000 m3 (431,600 yd3) or 150 more swimming pools. If you lined up the steel rebar end-to-end, it would go a quarter of the way around the world.

See the area of brown out in the water in the upper right? That’s where they’re building the world islands. There’s an island for each country… It’s like Epcot on steroids.

During the summers, temperatures easily reach over 44 degrees C (about 110 degrees F). In order to keep work going through the summer months, concrete was poured at night when the sun was gone and temperatures were lower. Also, as the tower’s height increased, workers were subjected to stronger winds, making their work more challenging and dangerous. Another crazy statistic for you: 22 MILLION man-hours went into the construction.

The building’s shape was determined by its structural requirements. A Y-shaped floor plan was selected to add stability, and the weird shape and setbacks were designed to reduce the impact of wind on the building. The occupied levels were built with poured concrete floors, but the structure of the spire is entirely steel. It has 54,000 windows. Can you imagine being in charge of window cleaning??? I wonder if they ever do clean the windows because it seems like that would be terribly unsafe. Haha I just looked it up… it takes 36 workers 3-4 months to clean all of the windows. The top 27 levels are cleaned by unmanned machines. (Also, the window-cleaning system cost US$6.3 million which I personally think is insane.)

Looking up… and this is just the part of the building that’s above the viewing deck.

It holds the titles of: tallest building in the world, tallest free-standing structure, tallest man-made structure, building with the most stories, highest occupied floor, highest outdoor observation deck, and a few more. It houses a hotel, apartments, a restaurant, and offices. At its base is the Dubai Mall, filled with expensive stores and ridiculous attractions such as an ice rink and an aquarium.

After my brain was filled with knowledge, I took an elevator to the 124th floor. I think it only took a minute, and the elevator was so smooth that you could barely even tell it was moving. For reference, I live on the 7th floor of my building in Armenia, and I’m fairly certain that the elevator there takes longer to go 6 floors than this one takes to go 124. Not sure if that’s a compliment to the Burj Khalifa elevator, an insult to the one in my building, or a little of both. Apparently, the building is so tall and the elevators are so fast that you can watch the sunset twice from the building, once from the base and once from the observation deck.

At the top, I wandered around a bit before the sun started to rise. It was still completely dark outside, so I got to see the city lights all the way around the building. About half an hour before sunrise, I claimed a spot next to the windows with a good eastern view and waited.

It was awesome getting to see the world light up and the city wake up. The streetlights gradually turned off, along with the building lights. The world got brighter and brighter and the sky more and more orange. Then, finally, the sun broke over the horizon, and everyone cheered.

Based on the group’s reaction, you’d think no one had ever seen a sunrise before, but it felt extra special that day. You know how things like the sunrise or stargazing can make you feel like your problems or day-to-day worries are so small? Like there’s a whole big universe out there, and you’re just a tiny part of it? In that moment, as we watched the sunrise together, It didn’t matter where we were from, what language we spoke, or what our beliefs were. Everyone, young and old, had the same look of excitement and awe on their face. The sun rises every day, it rises in every country, and that morning, it shined its light on our shared humanity. At our core, we’re all the same. And we all love sunrises.

Yes, I’m wearing a scarf in the desert. It was a chilly morning! (But it came off VERY soon after this.)
The sun is cominggggg. I love that the roads are little lines of light. That’s some serious street lighting!
The sky is brightening…
The city lights turn off. The sun peeks out! The crowd goes wild!
Good morning, sun!

After the sun rose, I walked around again and took another look at the city. It’s cool how light transforms things. The city has a completely different personality during the day. It was like I got double the value for my ticket because I got to see two different Dubais, or maybe even three. Night Dubai, waking up Dubai, and daytime Dubai.

It’s such an interesting skyline… most cities have some tall buildings in the middle, and then they gradually get shorter as you move out. In Dubai, it’s like skyscrapers were dropped from the sky without any rhyme or reason.
There’s just so much empty space between the buildings, and immediately next to a 100-story building is a 1-story house. It feels so unnatural.

I stayed there longer than anticipated. By the time I got downstairs, it was about 8AM. Part of the sunrise deal was a drink and breakfast sandwich, so I still had to eat before moving on to my next activity. The only drinks included were different types of coffee (the ongoing struggle of eating and drinking like a child), so I just asked for a cup of hot water. The guy working there thought it was weird (who drinks a cup of hot water in the desert?), but I conveniently had a hot chocolate packet in my backpack. Score!

I was originally planning to take a bus to my next stop at 8:30, but at that point, I figured I might as well take my time and wait for the metro to start running at 10. After breakfast, I headed into the mall to poke around a bit. The stores were mostly still closed, but I wasn’t interested in those. I got to see the aquarium from the outside (you can pay to go in, but even without entering, there’s a huge tank visible from the mall), the ice rink, the “human waterfall”, and the general ambiance of the mall.

Divers in Dubai Mall
The aquarium!
And a dinosaur because why not?

Between the mall and the metro, there’s a crazy long “metro link”, aka a series of above-ground tunnels connecting the two. I didn’t mind the walk because the tunnels are lined with floor-to-ceiling windows, and it was cool to see the city from a VERY different perspective than the top of Burj Khalifa.

To spare you from spending one day reading this post about one day, to be continued…

Check out the continuation here.

Related Posts

Dubai First Impressions – get a feel for the city with a list of my first impressions

Dubai Mini-History Lesson – follow Dubai’s development from a small fishing village into the international, skyscraper-filled city it is today

Dubai Marina and “Old” Dubai – join me as I zig-zag my way across the city after leaving the Burj Khalifa, exploring Dubai Marina and attempting to go back to Dubai’s roots in not-so-old “old” Dubai

Galata Tower (Istanbul, Turkey) – enjoy a panoramic view of Istanbul from the top of Galata Tower… it’s significantly shorter than the Burj Khalifa, but the view is no less impressive

Sky Garden (London, England) – look out over London from the Sky Garden, plus take a stroll through Hyde Park and past Buckingham Palace and St. Paul’s Cathedral

Welcome to Dubai!

Posted on by Lark

Welcome to Dubai! Leaving Lebanon was sad, but that was buffered a bit by the fact that I still had an adventure ahead. I intentionally scheduled a long layover in Dubai so that I could leave the airport and check out the city. I was trying to get a normal length layover until I realized that the long one was cheaper, AND it gave me a chance to see something new. Score!

Before I get into what I did while I was there, let me tell you about some of my first impressions…

  1. Vertical city – Dubai claims to be a “vertical city”, and I guess to a certain extent, that’s true. There are a lot of VERY tall buildings. At the same time though, it’s also very horizontal. There will be a little patch of super tall buildings over here, then there’s an area of completely flat land, and then there’s another patch of tall buildings. It’s like if you took the center city areas of a bunch of cities and then put them near each other. Instead of seeming like one city, it’s more like a few weird, disconnected but nearby cities.

    Cluster of tall buildings. Flatness. Cluster of tall buildings.
  2. Not a city made for people – That sounds stupid, I know, but I mean that it’s really not pedestrian friendly. I always consider one of the great things about cities to be the fact that you don’t need a car. If you’re in the downtown area, you should be able to walk to all of the major things. In Dubai, there are places where it’s so hard to find a place to cross the street that you feel like you can’t even navigate the city on foot. It is also completely NOT bike friendly which is enough to make me immediately turn up my nose (I’m a bike snob, I know).

    This night shot is cool because you can so clearly see the roads. All of the orange light lines are street lights… doesn’t it seem wrong that so many of them are floating in a sea of darkness with no buildings near them?
  3. Public transit – As bad as the pedestrian situation is, the public transit really is good. I rode the metro, bus, and trolley while I was there, and all of them were impressive. They were clean and prompt and everything had a separate section for women only. The first time I went on the metro, I was going to just ride in the normal part… until I looked around the platform and realized that NO other women were standing near me. I moved to the women’s car, and I’m happy that I did because it was PACKED, and at least that way I didn’t have to be smushed up next to a bunch of smelly guys.
    The price of the public transit also wasn’t bad… a little over a dollar for a ride. I think that if you have a more permanent card, it’s even cheaper too.
    There are A LOT of rules on the metro. The number of things that you can get fined for is actually kind of impressive. There are penalties for eating, drinking, chewing gum, falsely pressing the emergency button, being a man in the women’s cabin… probably more that I’m forgetting. I don’t know how seriously they enforce the rules, but they exist.

    They make it very clear where the women’s car on the metro is.
  4. Shiny and new – Everything just seems… shiny. And surreal. And inauthentic. It’s like the whole city is trying too hard. For example, there’s this one part of the city that’s supposedly “historically preserved”. In Dubai that apparently means “rebuilt but in the old style”. The buildings are too tall. Everything is too new. It’s just too fill in the blank.

    This is supposed to be “old” Dubai… It is very clearly “new old” Dubai. How could I tell? Well, besides the fact that everything looked pristine, there were fire alarms and lights installed with no wiring exposed. Unless the pearl divers of old Dubai were way ahead of the rest of us in harnessing electricity, I don’t think those are original.
  5. Foreigners – There are foreigners everywhere. Tons of tourists, tons of foreigners who live there. If you were trying to guess where in the world you were just based on the people, I don’t know that the United Arab Emirates would even be top 15 on your list of guesses.
  6. English – On that note, you can speak English everywhere. When I was getting ready for my day in Dubai, I stumbled on some forums where people were asking if you needed to speak Arabic to be able to navigate Dubai easily. The answer was a resounding no. After being there, my answer is an even more resounding no. You can easily speak zero Arabic and have zero issues.
  7. When everything is impressive, nothing is – If you’re a genius and you work at a company filled with geniuses, is anyone a genius? Or are you all just average? Next question: If you’re an impressive skyscraper surrounded by a bunch of other impressive skyscrapers, are any of you impressive? Or are you all just normal? Dubai is filled with statement buildings. They are weird and funky, and in any other city, they would help to define the skyline. Instead, they’re surrounded by other weird and funky buildings that make them look normal. It’s almost a shame that anyone even bothers putting effort into their designs because it’s only a matter of time until there are more tall buildings on all sides, and you can’t even see the first building anymore. If you want to build a statement building and have anyone care, don’t build it in Dubai.

    Hidden away in this picture are two skyscrapers that I knew about before I went to Dubai, Princess Tower and Infinity Tower (since renamed, but I’m going to pretend not). If I hadn’t KNOWN that they were there, I wouldn’t have even looked twice. Infinity Tower is the twisty one to the left of the big block building on the right side of the picture, and Princess Tower is behind it with the round spaceship-like top. It’s the second tallest building in Dubai after the Burj Khalifa, but you’d never know because it looks dwarfed from this angle by all of the surrounding buildings.
  8. Construction – Remember when I said that there’s a lot of construction in Beirut? HAHAHA. That’s like child’s play compared to the construction happening in Dubai. Everywhere, there’s some sort of construction happening. It seems like it’s endless, and I seriously just don’t understand it. Which leads me to my next point…
  9. Confusing – This is a long one. Dubai confuses me in many ways.
    There are a few developers who are doing most of the construction in the city. They seem to just keep building more and more and more, and I don’t understand how it’s sustainable. Are they seriously making enough money that it’s worth it to keep building? Maybe this has changed, but I always think of Dubai as a ghost city where there’s a ton of empty property. The numbers have probably improved since back when Dubai was just starting to emerge, but I can’t imagine that everything could be full.
    This is going to sound like a direct contradiction of #7, but that’s part of the reason why this is going under the category of “confusing”. Dubai is filled with icon buildings and icon things in general (for example, the palm islands or the world map islands)… and then those iconic things might be right next to the most boring, uniform pop-up of skyscrapers ever. There were some skyscraper clusters where it looked like the architect got bored or fired after designing the first building, and every building after that was just slightly modified from the first. Maybe this one has 10 fewer floors. Maybe that one has one column of windows shifted slightly. Why build an army of buildings that all look the same and that are all seemingly empty?

    Have you ever seen a more boring group of skyscrapers? Just wait until you see them from the back…

    Okay, NOW have you ever seen a more boring group of skyscrapers? Seriously, how lazy can you be? B.O.R.I.N.G.
  10. Over-the-top – Everything. Nothing can be done halfway. If something is done, it will be the _______est. The Burj Khalifa is the tallest building in the world. The world map islands are the most ridiculous collection of man-made islands (that’s a title that I just made up now, but I am extremely confident that it would hold up in front of a judge). The I-can’t-remember-the-name flower garden is the most absurd flower garden in the world. It’s like everything is super-sized whether that be in actual size or just in concept.

There are a few of my first impressions of the city, but if I’m being totally honest, none of those were surprises to me. I think it was about what I expected. That doesn’t make it any less weird, though, when you’re surrounded by tall buildings and there’s not a person in sight. There were moments when I felt like I was in a post-apocalyptic movie or something, and I was the last human on earth. The city is built for SO many more people than live there. I wonder if it will ever grow into itself. Better question, if it DOES grow into itself, will there be enough capacity in the public transportation and roadways to accommodate those people?

Next, I’ll tell you a little bit about the history of Dubai and how it turned into the craziness that it is today. Maybe the history lesson will clear up some of your confusion regarding the mysterious existence of this wacky city… or maybe not.

Last Days in Beirut

Posted on by Lark
The church at Antelias

Does it feel like we’ve been in Lebanon forever? It’s amazing how much you can pack into 9 days! All good things must come to an end though, and here we come (side note: I’ve just now decided that is a very dumb saying, and I’m not going to use it anymore. All it does it make you dread the “inevitable end” of the good). I spent my last couple of days wandering around Beirut, making sure everything was checked off my sightseeing list, and revisiting some of the things I saw with Badveli in the rain or the dark.

Maria and I went on an adventure to the “Etchmiadzin of Lebanon”. As a refresher, Etchmiadzin is like the Vatican of the Armenian Apostolic Church. It’s where the Catholicos (the Armenian version of the Pope) sits… but of course, nothing is simple, so here’s another quick, complicated history lesson for you. When Armenia was under the control of the Seljuk Turks in the 1100s, the Catholicos ended up in Cilicia and set up camp there. A couple hundred year later, when the situation in Cilicia started to fall apart, a new Catholicos was elected in Etchmiadzin. The Cilicia Catholicos settled in Antelias, Lebanon, and now there are two Catholici, with the one in Etchmiadzin serving as the supreme Catholicos. The Catholicos of Cilicia is responsible for the Armenian Apostolic churches in Lebanon, Syria, Cyprus, Greece, Iran, and the Gulf countries.

The compound includes a cathedral, museum, library, the Catholicos’s residence, and a school for clergy. There’s also an Armenian Genocide memorial that includes sand and bones from Deir ez-Zor, the major “concentration camp” located in the Syrian desert. I put that in quotes because those words imply that there was something there, but it was just open, empty desert where people were sent to wait for death. There used to be a memorial and museum there, but those have since been destroyed in the Syrian war.

Chandelier party in the church at Antelias… hehe
Their mannequin nativity made me giggle

The building where all of the old Catholici are buried
Outside of the Armenian Genocide memorial
Inside the Armenian Genocide memorial
Plant. Covered. Walkways. <3 <3

The rest of my remaining adventures took place around Beirut. I started out my last day with a leisurely walk to downtown on Armenia Street (the name changes halfway, but we’ll just claim it all for Armenia). There are some cool alleyways that I had noticed earlier in the week and wanted to go back to check out more closely. Based on my walk, I’ve decided that every staircase should be painted, and every walkway should be covered with a canopy of plants. Those two things make everything look at least 100 million times cooler.

St. Elias… probably my favorite church from the outside. I tried to look inside, but it was under construction 🙁
Stairs!
Seriously though, how much more fabulous do they look because of the paint?
These are the coolest ones
There’s some pretty fab graffiti too
Martyrs’ Monument

Once I made it into town, I paid a visit to Martyrs’ Square… and by “square” I mean “parking lot with a monument in the middle”. The square was the location of executions of Lebanese nationalists by the Ottomans and was thereafter known as “Martyrs’ Square”. The first statue was erected there in the 1930s, and it showed a Muslim woman and a Christian woman holding hands over a coffin. The current statue replaced that one in 1960. Martyrs’ Square was a place to gather, a place to demonstrate. During the civil war, it was right on the dividing line of the city, and the statue suffered a lot of damage. After the war, they decided to restore the statue and leave it with some of the war damage as a reminder. It has reclaimed its former position and now sits in the middle of two muddy parking lots. There are plans to rebuild the square, but they definitely haven’t come to fruition yet.

Street views
Pretty but deserted streets leading into the central square
Anddd empty…
Crusader Castle in Beirut… not quite in the same condition as the one in Byblos!

Yay for twinkle lights!

Another spot in the city that I visited with Badveli was the Beirut Souks. The name is misleading because “souks” implies that it’s a market, but it’s actually just a mall. Back in the day, it used to be a market. You know, one of those bustling, crowded, personality-filled markets. I love those places. The people-watching is always fabulous because they’re full of people with purpose. I think it’s cool when you’re in a place that seems like nothing but chaos to you, but when you look around at the people who clearly live and work there, they all know exactly what they’re doing and where they’re going. From the outside, it looks like chaos. To the people on the inside, it’s organized chaos.

When all of the post-war redevelopment of the city started, the old shop owners were offered money in exchange for their shops. The payouts weren’t fair, but with the compulsory purchase power held by the developers, people really didn’t have a choice. I think the new building is nice and all, but it’s just like any other shopping mall. There’s nothing “souk”y about it. They did keep the old streets as the layout for the new corridors, but like… come on. I wanted to hate the building because of what it represents, but I can’t pretend that I didn’t enjoy it a little bit. Especially since when I went with Badveli, it was all decorated for the holidays, and you know what a sucker I am for lights! It’s nothing unique though, that’s for sure. Essentially, it’s like any other mall you’ve ever been in.

Beirut Souks
This would be way more ordinary without the decorations
A building in Saifi Village, an upscale neighborhood in Beirut that was completely rebuilt after the war
More Saifi Village views

Hard at work

The final activity of my last day was a trip to a gallery, Beyt Amir. There’s a little café in the backyard, and we went there for lunch before checking out the show. Maria unfortunately had a lot of things to do at work, so that mostly left Badveli and me alone except for a quick few minutes during lunchtime.

The big thing at this gallery is a bunch of panorama-type pictures of Beirut at different points throughout history. There’s one from 1870, one before the war, one right after the war, and one modern day. Then, an artist did a drawing of what the 2052 Beirut might look like. At the café, the artist’s black and white panorama drawing has been split into pieces and it’s used for placemats! Each table also has coloring utensils at each table, sooooo they’re obviously telling you to color. Badveli and I were talking… and then we were coloring and talking… and then we were so into it that getting our food was almost an inconvenience because we had to stop coloring to eat.

I don’t know how long we sat at that table… but I do know that it was long enough for both of us to finish our masterpieces. It took stealing some markers and pencils from another table to make our dreams a reality, but we did it! It was only after we finished, took photos of our artwork, left them on the table, and went to the gallery that we realized we had colored a couple pieces of a bigger picture… and that our pictures fit next to each other! We rushed back to the table, and sure enough, they matched up perfectly! We found this to be extremely exciting and then obviously took a few more photos before going back to the gallery.

Our masterpieces. Whose is whose? (though I guess the last picture kind of gives it away)
Gate into the cafe

The exhibition was an interesting mix of things. There were the panoramas, plus some watercolors of old, damaged buildings from around the city. Those were cool because the surroundings were all just pen-drawn, and the building that was the focus was painted in watercolor. There were other things that were like little metal dioramas. They were showing war-damaged rooms and buildings but were kind of beautiful because of all the details and the lights that made them look like decorations. The building itself was also pretty. All in all, a great choice of lunch venue and afternoon perusal location.

Inside Beyt Amir
Isn’t this cool?? All of the details are crazy!
Me with my airplane kuftes

And just like that, my time in Lebanon ran out. Badveli, Maria, and I had our last supper, and before we knew it, Hovig was downstairs to take me to the airport. Maria, in a classic Armenian mother move, insisted that I pack kuftes for the road… because that’s such a normal airplane snack… I pretend to grumble in those situations, but it’s nice to feel the love that comes along with the food pressure because you know that you’re only being forced to take/eat food because you’re cared for and no one wants you to waste away (like that’s even possible in an Armenian household).

I was sad to leave, but I went with a full heart. Seriously, it was just the break I needed to refresh me and prepare me for the rest of my time in Armenia. It was nice to be around familiar people, eat familiar food (because the food in Armenia is NOT the Armenian food I’m used to, but the Middle Eastern and Armenian food in Lebanon are exactly what we ate growing up), spend time in familiar community, and just have a little time where I felt like I was truly at home.

I also took a stroll around the American University of Beirut’s campus. They have some really nice buildings! And lots of green space.
AUB greenery
If you keep your eyes open, you can find all sorts of hidden architectural gems in the city.
This is a pretty classic apartment building view. The curtains on the balconies help to keep out the rain and heat.

Byblos

Posted on by Lark

I’ve already decided that I need to go back to Lebanon because there’s SO much more to see there (and because I had a great time hanging out with Badveli and Maria). I spent most of my time in Beirut, so I definitely have to go back to see the major sights that I didn’t get to outside of the city. Next time will be a cross-country tour… which sounds intense until you remember that it takes about 2 hours to drive across the country from west to east and maybe 6 from north to south.

HI, PRETTY WATER!

Anyway, we did get out of the city a couple of times, and one of those adventures was to Byblos (Jbail in Arabic)! Byblos is a coastal city north of Beirut. “They” say it’s one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. “They” seem to say that about a lot of cities though, so I’m a little hesitant to listen to anyone who tries to claim that title. People in Armenia say that about Yerevan too, but there are a TON of waaay older cities than Yerevan. I guess that when you say it’s “one of the oldest”, there isn’t a clear place to draw the line. Convenient. Well then, I’m one of the oldest people in the world. I’m one of the tallest humans. I’m one of the coolest people in the universe. These all could very well be true as long as you stretch your imagination a little bit.

View of the city to the north of the castle

Wow okay, I got a little carried away with that. Like I was saying, pre-rant, Byblos is old. That certainly can’t be argued… Back in the day, Byblos was a fishing village until it turned into an important Phoenician port, shipping out the famous Lebanon cedars and more. It was known for both that and for fantastic shipbuilding. The city grew very wealthy due to its trade with Egypt, and it was heavily influenced by Egyptian culture. It’s also one of the Phoenician cities that gets a few shout-outs in the Bible (though that’s not exactly a good thing because it’s usually when one of God’s prophets is foretelling judgment on the city that will lead to its destruction or something to that effect).

That water though…

As Tyre became more and more important, Byblos became less and less and started to decline. It had a resurgence under Babylonian and Roman rule until almost fading out completely during Muslim rule. During the brief upswing, they exported a lot of papyrus. For this reason, the Greek word for book, biblio, came from the city’s Greek name. And the word for Bible came from the Greek word for book… so the Bible is kind of named after Byblos. After the Muslim conquest of Byblos, they cared so little about the city that they didn’t even bother fixing the things that were destroyed during their invasion. Byblos was nearly forgotten until the 1860s when it was brought back into the picture by a French historian (Ernest Renan).

Today, Byblos is becoming a more and more popular tourist destination because of its beaches, history, and beautiful setting.

Obsessed.
One of the restored “souk” streets in the city which basically just sells souvenirs and such now

The “modern” Christmas tree in Byblos. Hovig despised it. I thought it was kind of interesting.

Badveli asked one of his car-owning friends, Hovig, if he could drive us there, and thankfully he said yes. It didn’t take long for me to realize that Hovig has the same *brilliant* sense of humor as Badveli and I do, so all it took was a few corny jokes before it felt like we were old friends.

We went to the Crusader castle in the city, and I absolutely loved it. The castle was built in the 12th century by… you guessed it, the Crusaders. Besides the castle, there are also extensive ruins on the grounds. You can see the foundations of temples and dwellings and fortifications, and the actual castle has been restored to give you a better idea of what it was like in its former glory. It’s pretty cool because there are ruins from practically every part of Lebanon’s history… prehistoric dwellings, the Phoenician necropolis, Egyptian temples, Persian fortress, a Roman amphitheater, and more. The site is right on the coast, so there’s a beautiful view of the sea which is made even better by the fact that you can go all the way to the top of the castle to see it. I kept marveling at how pretty and blue the water is… and Badveli and Hovig responded by saying how gross and dirty it is because trash and stuff get dumped into it. Well excuuuuse me. I didn’t say it looked clean (though from afar it looked fine), I just said it looked pretty.

Entrance to the castle

Can you see me?
Me, Badveli, and Hovig on top of the castle

Badveli took over as the official “Lara in holes” photographer during the trip. Can you find me?We were at the castle until closing when a guy started aggressively blowing a whistle to get people to leave. I, of course at that very moment, was poking around a building on the site that I felt like maybe I shouldn’t be poking around. (My recent approach to sightseeing has been “do what you want until someone yells at you” because so often, things that you wouldn’t be allowed to do in the US are totally okay in other countries. If you limit yourself to the things you think would/should be allowed, you’ll probably miss out on something.) Since you get super jumpy when you think you’re doing something wrong (or at least I do), the instant the whistle started blowing, I was sure that it was someone whistling at me for being somewhere I shouldn’t be. I’ve been to places (I can’t remember exactly where… Machu Picchu maybe?) where that’s the how the guards get your attention. I kind of spazzed and ran to what I deemed a more acceptable location before realizing that he wasn’t whistling at me. And of course, Badveli and Hovig laughed at me the entire time (to be fair, I deserved to be laughed at). Apparently not having learned my lesson about trying to look semi-normal, I then ran around like a lunatic, trying to see the couple of things we hadn’t gotten to yet before the whistle man kicked us out.

Poke poke poking around… this is just moments pre-whistle and spaz attack.
The castle from my illegal (but not actually) stop on the steps of that building
Egyptian obelisk temple that was relocated to this site to conserve it
Weird flower field
Looking south

We used the last hour or so of daylight to walk down to the harbor where Hovig was a helpful tour guide by showing me where you can see trash floating in the water. I chose to ignore it, not because I think it’s fine that the water is gross, but because I wanted to enjoy the illusion that the water was blue and pure and that humans weren’t doing what they do best and ruining nature.

Despite the garbage, it really was beautiful. There were some very nice rocks, and the sun was starting to set. Boats bobbed around in the harbor, surrounded by picturesque buildings. The air was that perfect, comfortable temperature, and a breeze was coming off the sea. We stayed there for a bit, me soaking in the beauty of the moment, Hovig looking in disgust at the dirty water, and Badveli most likely making a fantastic(ly bad) joke (Badveli – by bad I obviously mean good… but if not good, definitely funny… or at least cringe-worthy).

The harbor
Sunset!
Admiring the *clean* water

Okay, quiz time. What’s the best way to make a great day into a phenomenal day? The answer is ice cream. Always ice cream. On the ride back to Beirut, we stopped and got Arabic ice cream which is different because it uses flour made from orchids that helps keep it from melting and mastic tree resin to help stabilize it (whatever that all means). I’ll be honest, if you didn’t tell me that it wasn’t normal ice cream, I never would have known. It was delicious. We were supposed to just stop to pick up a container to bring back with us, but we obviously ate some there also (unless Maria is reading this… then that didn’t happen and we just did what we were told because we’re very good at following directions). Then, I ended up eating ice cream TWICE, and that’s how you make a phenomenal day into a historic day that will be remembered forever.

If you remember anything from my blog, let it be this: Ice cream makes everything better.

LOL
Chocolate and vanilla because I’m boring

Pigeon Rocks, Luna Park, and the Coast

Posted on by Lark

When I finally awakened from my post-Christmas caroling coma… I wanted to go right back to sleep. But no! I had a set amount of time in Lebanon, and I had to make the most of it. By the time I managed to pull myself together, Maria was home from church with plans for us to check a few more things off our sightseeing list.

We hopped on the bus and went all the way to the western waterfront of the city where Badveli was waiting to meet us. Our first stop was the famous “Pigeon Rocks.” There isn’t too much to say about these… They’re a couple of big rock formations out in the water. They are definitely cool looking! And it was nice to be by the water. They probably look even cooler during the sunset, but we were there earlier in the day and saw the awesome sunset from elsewhere along the coast.

Apparently, people sometimes try to go through the hole in the big rock in boats. Like… come on. After watching the waves crash against the rocks and the water rush through the hole for about five seconds, I was convinced that that’s a terrible idea. I’m all about adventure and taking risks or whatever, but not when they’re stupid. Sorry, that was strongly worded and full of judgement. Let’s try again… As fun as it sounds to attempt to launch myself through a rocky hole in a little boat while waves try to smash me into tiny pieces, I think I’ll pass. (I don’t think that was any less judge-y… oh well, I tried.)

Pigeon rocks. Aren’t you tempted to brave the tunnel?

From there, we walked north and went for a nice stroll along the water. The weather, finally after three days of constant rain, was perfect. There’s nothing like the feeling of the sun warming your face, and the smell of the air reminded me of the beach back home. It was a snapshot of summer in the middle of winter, and what’s better than that? I’m sure it gets miserably hot during the summer months, but I was happy to enjoy the warmth while it was juuust right.

I’m sure it’s completely safe…

Our next stop was Luna Park, an amusement park right on the coast. Luna Park isn’t any sort of special name for that particular spot. More like it’s the generic name for “amusement park”. Fun fact: there are a ton of “Luna Parks” in existence. The name originally comes from Luna Park on Coney Island in New York, and it was borrowed by a few other developers who built amusement parks across the world. Now, in more countries than just Lebanon, saying “Luna Park” is the same as saying “amusement park”.

I wanted to go on the ferris wheel, something Badveli and Maria had never done before, probably because it’s another one of those “this ferris wheel has been here since before the beginning of time” situations.  But you know, remember how I was talking about risks and how some are worth taking? Terrifyingly old ferris wheels are almost ALWAYS worth it.

Since this isn’t exactly high season for the ferris wheel, there was no one else riding when we got on. That meant that we got an extended ride and went around like 5 times. I’m fairly certain the operator just started the ride, went and drank a cup of coffee, and then came back to stop it. We got a great view of the city and the water, and the ferris wheel had those cars that you can spin around and around until you feel like you’re going to throw up, so that was fun too. I was just happy that my brothers weren’t there with us because they’re known for spinning those things so fast that you can feel your stomach trying to leap out of your body… and so fast that everyone watching is almost positive that your car is going to disconnect from the ride and spin off into oblivion. Thankfully, our experience was slightly less dramatic than that, though still pretty great.

Ferris wheel party!
Photo credit to Badveli for this cool pic!
View from the ferris wheel

After the park, we kept walking along the water. It was such a pleasant night, and hearing the water crash up against the shore is always so calming. There was a spectacular sunset, and all of that put together was almost enough to make me forget that the first few days were filled with rain and rain and rain.

Can you spot the lighthouse?
Picture perfect!
Check out the water!! So blue! <3
Sunset walk along the water.
Sunset!
It’s almost like the clouds were intentionally and perfectly arranged to make this look as cool as possible.

Rain, Ruins, Everything

Posted on by Lark

Ready for more walking? How about more rain, some ruins, and a little bit of everything else? I left off my last post at St. George Maronite Cathedral in downtown Beirut. Directly next to the church and Al-Amin Mosque, there’s a large area filled with ruins! At the moment, it doesn’t look like much besides a grass-covered pile of rocks. There are a few columns standing, but besides that, it’s hard to tell what exactly is there. Supposedly though, the ruins date back to the Hellenistic period (around 320BC – 30BC) and have layers from the Roman, Byzantine, Umayyad, Mamluk, and Ottoman times as well.

Future Garden of Forgiveness

The site was discovered during the post-civil war excavations. There’s a procedure to follow when ancient ruins are found during construction: construction halts, the authorities are notified, and archaeological excavations are undertaken until they are considered complete. Then, a decision is made about what will happen, based on the findings and secretly probably the level of influence of the developer. The ruins are either left in place, moved, or demolished to make way for the construction.

These particular ruins have been set aside in the Beirut master plan as an area to be left unbuilt. The intersection of the Roman city’s two major streets was found there, and archaeologists also think that the famous Roman law school was located nearby. They haven’t found the school, but they know it was next to a church whose ruins have been located. There was a competition to decide what to do with the land, and a plan for creating a “Garden of Forgiveness” was selected. The project hopes to be “a step towards social harmony in Beirut by raising awareness about the need to resolve historical grievances”. The plan integrates the ruins and also includes lots of trees and water features and other things that I guess are supposed to suggest peacefulness and harmony. The construction is currently on hold though, so for the time being, the overgrown pile of rocks is here to stay.

The ruins with St. George in the background
Outside of St. George

There’s ANOTHER St. George church on the other side of the ruins, St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral. It was originally built in the 1760s, but there had already been churches on the same site for hundreds of years by then. The first known church there was built in the 5th century AD, and that’s the one I mentioned that they know was located next to the Roman law school. That church was destroyed along with the law school in the 6th-century earthquake, and a new church was built in the 12th century. Another earthquake in the 18th century destroyed that one as well, and another new church was built. During the civil war, the church was shelled and left in ruins. Geez. Talk about bad luck.

When they decided to rebuild the church in the 1990s, they used the opportunity that the ruined church presented to conduct some archaeological excavations before reconstruction. Over about a year and a half, archaeologists worked to uncover and decode the layers of history underneath the church. They found the ancient cathedral, plus evidence of other churches built on the site. There are also graves, remains of a paved street, and columns that used to line the colonnaded streets of the Roman city.

St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral. I just think this is the coolest picture ever with the lights and the frescoes visible through the windows.
Excuse this picture of a picture, but I thought it was really cool because it shows the church with the floor all opened up during the excavations.

After the excavations were finished, they turned them into a museum and restored the church above. Badveli and went to visit the church first, and it was AWESOME!!!! I love frescoed churches, and literally every surface in this church was covered in frescoes. There were magnificently done, and they actually had them lit so that you could see everything! I wish I’d had all day to scrutinize each fresco, but it would have taken hours to do anything more than quickly glance at them while walking a loop through the church. The frescoes obviously all had to be restored after the war, but a few bullet holes were left as a reminder. I like when they do that… It’s like saying, “We’re rebuilding and moving on because that’s what we have to do, but we also can’t forget about the past or pretend that it never happened.”

Inside St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral
I have no words… except for HOW FREAKING COOL IS THIS???
EVERYTHING was painted.
It’s a little creepy looking up at the church from the museum!
Material timeline!

From there, we went to the crypt museum to check out the ruins. Badveli had never been before, and I was glad that we were doing something new for him so that the whole day wasn’t just him playing tour guide for a bunch of things he’d already seen a million times (most of the day was that, but thanks to this museum, it wasn’t the WHOLE day).

The museum is small, but it’s one of the coolest archaeology museums I’ve ever been to. Since the museum IS the excavation, things are mostly left where they found them. You can see the layers of churches and their different mosaic floors. You can see exactly where graves were found, and a bunch of them still have the skeletons inside. When you first enter, there’s a wall that shows what is basically a vertical timeline of the site. The different material layers in the soil are identified and dated so you can see the various civilizations all stacked on top of one another. The Ottoman layer has a skeleton sticking out, so that’s fun too (eek!). They also have cases with various things in them, but it’s so much cooler knowing that those things were found right next to where they’re now displayed.

A grave… creepy. The last year has made me VERY certain that I want to be cremated because as cool as skeletons are, do I really want people from hundreds or thousands of years in the future digging up my bones? Nooo thank you!
The floor of the medieval church!

It also gives you an idea of how archaeologists piece things together. Since you’re looking at exactly what they were looking at, you can see what columns they used to determine the orientation of the medieval church or the fragment of fresco that was the basis for their assumption that the entire church was painted. The museum has a path for you to follow with numbered stations. At each, you press a button on the information panel, and lights turn on to direct your attention to the places it’s talking about. It was very well done! I felt like I was an archaeologist too, uncovering the secrets of the site as we went from station to station. Maybe I just have an overactive imagination, but it was awesome.

You can see the walkways and information panels

Doesn’t it just look like a cool museum? (I ran around and hit like 5 buttons to turn the lights on for this picture.)

You can see two layers of mosaic floors!
Fresco remnant from the medieval church.
Archaeologists in training!

From there, we walked out into the central square of Beirut. There’s a clock tower in the middle (that escaped damage during the civil war because was disassembled and hidden until it was over) and the Parliament building. It’s a bit eerie because the car traffic is incredibly limited there, so it’s practically a ghost town. Fun because you can walk in the middle of the street, but still just a little weird.

Clocktower! This was taken on a sunny day later in the week, and even with the nice weather, you can still see that there are barely any people out.
The baths on a sunny day when I went back later

Another area of ruins in the city is the Roman baths. They were discovered originally in the late 1960s, were further excavated in the 90s, and are designated as land to remain “unbuilt” in the city. They aren’t the best-preserved baths I’ve ever seen, but they’re definitely still impressive, especially when you think about the fact that they were buried under the city for hundreds of years! The floors are almost completely gone, but they’ve re-set many pieces of the little pillars that held up the floor in the hot room so that the warm air could go underneath. I need to brush up on my Roman bath knowledge again because I didn’t remember too much beyond that, but it was still cool to look at while not knowing anything.

The Roman baths! And you can see the tower of Saint Louis Capuchin Cathedral in the background.
The baths from above

Right near there is the Grand Serail which is the headquarters of the Prime Minister. Badveli said that they can get pretty defensive if you try to take pictures…  even if you only want a picture of the Armenian church Surp Nishan that happens to be right next to it. I’m not interested in getting on the wrong side of someone with an assault rifle, so I didn’t try to take one from any closer than from the Roman baths.

Grand Serail to the left
Surp Nishan from an angle where no one will yell at you for taking a picture.
Inside St. Louis Cathedral

From there, we walked over to ANOTHER church, St. Louis Capuchin Cathedral. It was originally built by Capuchin missionaries and is named after the French King Louis IX. By the time we got there, it was getting dark outside which made it extra dark inside. We couldn’t see much of the interior, but luckily, the stained glass windows were still bright! I went back later on during the day, and I got to enjoy the stained glass again and see the pretty paintings on the ceiling above the altar. No matter how many churches I see, I’m still amazed by how each of them has something that makes it different from the rest. I haven’t gotten sick of them yet! That’s saying something, too, because I’ve been to Rome and I’ve been to Armenia, and they both have more than enough churches to keep you busy.

We saw a couple more things after that, but I’m going to save those for later. When we were both about ready to collapse, we decided to walk the 40ish minutes back to the apartment because it was rush hour. That means walking is probably close to as fast as driving, and I wanted to see the nighttime street life anyway. The walk was nice, though it would have been even nicer with functional sidewalks. I know, I know. I expect too much sometimes.

Check out those paintings!
St Louis Cathedral
Louis from the front