From Middle East to East End

So I'm finally back... and the routine is about to settle in once more: CV, application, portfolio... Send.
"To find a job" as my everlasting mantra, I am battling yet again the purpose of my fierce zeal to work in London. Beirut is beautiful, but EVERYONE nags. Out of all the encounters in Torino of my graduate peers, there was only my cousin, back from 4 years of exile in Boston, who was genuinely loving her job and her life in Beirut. Everyone else is either underpaid, overworked, bored AND is made to feel that they should be grateful to be employed as slaves. I am being applauded for choosing to struggle in Europe, even though, on the downside, I have been actively doing close to zero for the past 5 months. Of course, the grass is always greener on the other side, but I still can't decide which side that might be...
So, yes, there is a general umph and ukh about the fresh crop of graduates, but I've mostly hung out with my graphic design friends from college, and there is still a long way to go for the country to accept design as a valid craft deserving of recognition, and not simply as a luxury. My Business or Finance friends seem to be doing alright, though, but that's understandable... The economy is crap for those who don't work in the economy.



Oh, and there was a bomb during my stay there, and I just wanted to point out how strange the reaction when that happened. Fate. Simply fate, and... acceptance? When there is no verified enemy, it is easy to be made to imagine that they just drop from the sky by no one and nothing. They're just there from time to time, and they make a rubble on some empty street. People wave from behind the news reporters, and wonder if Starbucks will be re-opened the next morning in time for their morning coffee. I was told that people were avoiding going out on weekend nights, since most bombs 'decided to explode' either friday or saturday nights, so Torino was busier on Tuesday than on Saturday. But when the last bomb happened on Monday night, the pattern was disrupted and people went back to the normal weekend drinks. When there is no logic, no culprit, or no way of prevention, there is almost no more discussion, simply... fate.

Oh, and I ate a lot of Moujaddarah and Loubieh Bil Zeit, which was was just perfect.



Batroun bay


Site of Hariri assassination


Torino my love...