Vacation time!

This past week/weekend was another amazing adventure. We have off of school from Monday-Thursday next week for Eid al Adha. Originally it was just going to be Tuesday through Thursday, but on Thursday the Ministry of Education decided to add Monday as well. Jackpot. A lot of people are traveling during this time and we decided to stick around and get to know Beirut more. This weekend we had a potluck dinner at the home of our headmaster, which is on the roof of the school. It is an incredible place. Saturday I went shopping for the first time here, which really made me feel like I was at home. Shopping is shopping no matter where you are at in the world. Saturday night we had made the plan to go to Vinifest with Gretchen, Mike, Jesse, Tue, Joe and Jessica. It was a blast. It was at a place called the Hippodrome, which is where they do the horse racing. Explaining in English to a taxi driver who speaks Arabic was hilarious. Ryan mimed out riding a horse, more like the Jump on it dance. We did make it. It was 35 thousand Lebanese for two people to get in and have all the wine you wanted. That is like 20 dollars. There were probably close to 20 wineries there, all from Lebanon or Syria. They had a lot of food and different kinds of wines to sample. We got a lot of business cards from the owners who said they would give us tours of the wineries.

Today we continued the brunch tradition, this time at Jesse's. There were a good number of us there. Ryan made some amazing stuffed peppers as well. Ryan and I decided to go to the Hotel Riviera to enjoy the pool, which is on the Med. It was incredible. There were hardly any people there so it was very relaxing. We are going back tomorrow with some others as well.

But probably the highlight of the weekend for Ryan was tonight's dinner. We finally went to Joe Pena's in Gemmayzeh. Now, there is not a lot of Mexican food here, and for those of you who know Ryan, you know how hard that is for him not to have a burrito every two days. We have been able to make some, but it really isn't the same. Well tonight, the dream came true. First of all, during happy hour the drinks are half off, which is nice, but more importantly there is a self serve nacho bar for free. We also ordered the guacamole before we knew about the nacho bar, and the waiter made it right at our table. It was great. I ordered fajitas and Ryan had a quesadilla/burrito type thing. All in all, it was a delicious night.  We walked the around 2 miles home through the city at night, taking streets we hadn't really walked on before, so it was really interesting. The Souks (shops) were so busy with everyone visiting for the holiday. It is crazy how much money is here, every store is Versace, Armani, Rolex and others like that.

I'll probably blog later this week, we have some fun things planned. Tuesday night we are going for a Lebanese cooking class, and Thursday we are going on a hike. Saturday we will be going camping and hiking as well.