Beirutista

Dining out at a Lebanese restaurant outside the motherland has become somewhat of a stigmatic experience. In fact, if I’m looking for a surefire way of being disappointed, my best bet is to consult Yelp for local Mediterranean cuisine and follow through with a reservation at any of the rated eateries. Try to think back to the last time you enjoyed Lebanese food to a superlative standard outside of Lebanon or the Arab countries. Can you conjure up even one such scenario? I lived in Boston for two years and discovered nothing even mildly close to the rich, earthy taste of hummus or the fresh, crisp blend of parsley and bulgur in tabbouleh that we Lebanese have come to know and adore in our fertile Mediterranean paradise. From fast food joints like Aceituna near Kendall Square to more family-style diners like Café Barada in Davis Square, my appetite was never piqued. An expedition out to Norwood, the so-called Lebanese hotbed of greater Boston, for a proper taste of mezza left m...

Blame the engineer in me, but while the rest of Lebanon tuned in zealously to Miss Lebanon last Sunday on LBCI – or equally, on Twitter – I waited a few days to catch it on YouTube . Armed with control over the play, pause, and replay buttons, and wielding a pen and notepad, I thus watched one of the country’s most highly anticipated entertainment stunts of the year. Ordinarily, we don’t apply a scientific lens to beauty pageants. Sure, there are some numbers involved, notably the height and weight of each participant. But I was interested in a completely different set of numerical figures, and that was the judges’ scores. What I discovered would intrigue the most discerning of audiences. Miss Lebanon 2017 contestants in elegant wear (photo source: APF) Let’s start with the basics: name, height and weight (in both metric and English units), and order of appearance in the pageant lineup, which as a variable is more instrumental than first meets the eye. ...