The grass IS greener!

I must say every time I travel to Beirut I confirm my belief that it is a very open and progressive city, for the Middle East, that has a lot going on. Every place has it's problems but this place can be physically and culturally entertaining while it is governmentally problematic. One of my gripes about Aleppo is "there is nothing to do!" I terminally feel like I am twelve wanting to live in New York City, yet I am stuck in Loveland with no way to go anywhere else. That is the difference between Aleppo and Beirut. I will concede what most of the westerners that I have met in Beirut have said. Yes Aleppo has nice history, architecture, and food. It's people are friendly and it has a slower pace that makes it feel more homey. In my world reality kicks in after you have been here longer than a week. It's history is history, you will probably know more of it than many people here. It's architecture is nice in the old city but nothing compared to Beirut, and the food is good but all the same. You can eat Armenian food here, but I can find Armenian restaurants there as well. There are Armenian clubs here but you can only get in if you are Armenian. Armenians are just as welcoming as Arabs if they think you are Christian...and lose interest if you aren't. The people treat most foreigners warmly, but hold class and status pretty firm when it comes to one another. And finally, the pace is slow becuase nothing works, not because people enjoy life any more. If anything people here are lazy because there is no incentive to work.

It's funny when people romanticize about places you wouldn't think twice about, but what are they really idealizing. I guess they are looking at what they don't have, and nicely assigning it a positive value. What someone see's as a livable pace I see as lazy cause I have been caught in that "livable pace" trying to get something done to no avail. I can't really say Beirut is "better" than Haleb because one man's trash is another man's treasure as they say. I have met people that hate Beirut. I have met people that would choose to live in a wig-wam over a nice apartment. I guess we all have different values of good and right. I find myself continually forcing myself to not judge or place value on things. I end up with caveats in conversations like "for me" and "in my opinion." I guess the more you banter on about how much something sucks you will eventually run into someone who feels devalued and a little bent 'cause you just ultimately labled them.

I have learned more about how much tolerance I DON'T have being here than anything else. I study history and discuss politics, religion and current events with a very static approach. Of course I have my opinions and someone else has theirs, but I have been placing my values on other peoples realities. I owe the world an apology for being an ass.

Today I will re-assert my heart felt attempt at understanding the world as it is and not as I want it to be. I definitely have ideas about what would make the world great, but none of them include whining and belittling places and cultures. I do try but I have a long way to go.