Lebanon’s January 2013 Storm In Pictures

Lebanon’s weather was all over the place this past week. The “Bride” storm (Or Georgette or Olga as some have called it – we sure can’t agree on a storm name as well) is ending and it was one of the biggest snowstorms to hit Lebanon in years. Torrential rain and snow, including some accumulations on the Lebanese coast, have all been documented. The joke for the first days of the storm went: Skiing and swimming at the same time are now much easier because the storm has brought the sea to your home. For the next few days, the storm brought the snow to your sea.

Many casualties have fallen to the storm, notably young infants of Syrian refugees who died of the freezing cold. Many Lebanese have had their houses completely ruined in the Beiruti neighborhood of Hay el Sellom due to the nearby river flooding.

I have reverted to the following Facebook page (here) unless otherwise specified in order to collect as many pictures as I can and include them here.

Don’t you just love how Lebanon looks after a decent blizzard? I sure do.

Achkout

View of Beirut

This is Batroun’s beach

My hometown Ebrine

Sawfar

Jounieh Bay

Aito, in the North

Hrajel

Hasroun – Picture from the Daily Star

Jounieh Highway

Ehden

Jounieh highway

Klei3at

Ein El Mraysseh – Picture from the Daily Star

This is a picture in the Jbeil caza

Raachine –

Manara, Bekaa

Bteghrine, Metn

Dhour el Choueir

Ajaltoun

Hay el Sellom – Picture by the Daily Star

Baalbak

Lille, France

I spent the month of August discovering the gorgeous city of Lille in Northern France. I went there for a clerkship at one of the city’s hospitals and I absolutely fell in love with its culture, its people and everything it had to offer. Lille is one of France’s biggest cities and yet it still has this rustic feel to it – especially in its older streets, aptly called Vieux Lille.

I made a lot of memories in that city. I won’t go down memory lane and enumerate them for you because I’m fairly certain you couldn’t care less. But I am thankful for getting the chance to go there and meet the people that I met and make those memories that I cherish now.

Xavier & Camille, our amazing French hosts and friends that made us feel at home – literally – for the entire month that we spent there, this is for you. Thank you for everything.

Here are some of the many pictures that I took of the beautiful city of Lille. I’m not a professional so these are not meant to be impeccable – but I do hope my love for the city comes across in them.

Palais des Beaux Arts

Another old street in the city

A parc bench in the city

Rue de Bethune

The city’s opera house

Vieux Lille

The view from our apartment

A statue next to Palais des Beaux Arts

A war monument

One of the city’s cathedrals

Welch – one of the city’s specialities

Inside one of Lille’s cathedrals

A mural found in one of Lille’s subway and train stations: Lille Europe

One of the specialties of the North

Beer, another specialty

Another street in the old parts of the city

One of the streets of Vieux Lile

The opera house

Gargoyles

The city’s heart – place du General De Gaulle also known as Grand Place

Lille doesn’t like Sarkozy

Another street in old Lille

These pictures were taken using a Nikon D5100 and edited using my iPhone 5’s Camera+ app.

2012’s Most Powerful Pictures

Buzz Feed has recently published a set of 45 pictures that they’ve called 2012’s Most Powerful Pictures. And the least that can be said about these pictures is that they’re chilling. Some of them are haunting, others will bring tears to your eyes. And they are all supremely striking.

A Greek woman’s suicide attempt as she’s told she would be laid off work

Bangladesh Riot Beating woman with baton

A woman from Bangladesh defies the police

Palestinian girl punching Israeli soldier

A little Palestinian girl tries to punch an Israeli soldier

Syrian Father saving daughter hospital Aleppo

A Syrian father trying to save his daughter’s life after his city, Aleppo, was shelled by regime forces.

Father begging Bangladesh soldier Myanmar

A father from Myanmar begs a border control officer from Bangladesh not to deport his family back to Myanmar

An American woman mourns her son on Memorial Day

Check out the rest of the brilliant pictures here.

[NSFW] Sex: The New Food of Instagram

It is common knowledge that the most shared types of pictures of Instagram are those of meals. Be it their lunch, dinner or breakfast, people just love to snap pictures of their food, apply some filter on it and share it for the whole world to see. I don’t have a problem with that but it has become a running joke with many.

But there’s a new type of “food” that’s making its way around Instagram. And you’ll know what I mean once you see this picture:

I guess we can say someone has been all tied up in the matters of breakfast.

This makes my Instagram pictures (example 1 and example 2) look very mundane. I don’t post much but I cannot begin to fathom sharing any sexual exploits there. I guess I’m too conservative for that. But whatever floats one’s boat.

Pope Benedict XVI’s Visit To Lebanon in Pictures

With the Pope leaving Lebanon on Sunday and those who had seizures caused by his three visit stay recovering, I figured it would be nice to have a chronicle of sorts for the visit.

These are pictures amassed from different sources, be it from Facebook friends who attended the festivities, BBC, Washington Post.

Day 1: Arrival to the airport and signing of the Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation at St. Paul’s Catholic Church.