Lebanese Church

Last night one of my roommates and I went to compound where the Lebanese Maronite church is located. Everyone here just calls it the Lebanese Church. I've been wanting to check out the place for quite a while now.  On the weekends, many of our Lebanese students (whether Muslim or Christian) go to the church for dinner and fellowship. The compound is fairly large with a basketball court, playground, and some grassy areas for the kids to play, while the adults catch up. Occasionally, instead serving dinner in a restaurant style, they will have a barbecue or some other large gathering.

I think I've already mentioned how much I love Lebanese food, but if I haven't, I do love it. Especially their barbecues, which consist of grilled kabobs. The one think I don't know if I'll ever get used to the late night dinners that the Lebanese have. One friend told me that growing up, his family never had dinner before 10:00 pm.

Last night we arrived around 8:00 pm. to a sparsely packed Lebanese Church, but by 9:00 it was fairly packed with adults sitting at the tables and kids running all around the place. Although I couldn't understand half of the conversations being held in Lebanese Arabic, I thoroughly enjoyed people watching. The closest thing to the Lebanese culture that I've experienced would have to be the Greek culture. I think that just about every male over 18 had a cigarette in their mouth the entire evening. On top of that, the hookahs were brought out to every table, so they alternated between a smoke of cigarette and a puff on the hookah. Although I don't recall many women smoking cigarettes, quite a few were smoking the hookah.

Between the hummus, chicken kabobs, za'taar bread, and suya (goat meat), the dinner did not disappoint. Towards the end of the dinner, the DJ started playing a mix of western and Lebanese songs. I joined the dancing for some of the songs, but didn't know the footwork for the Lebanese songs, so I sat back and enjoyed the people watching.

Blessings,

Liz