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Phoenicia existed thousands of years B.C. as a virtual empire. Phoenicians are known as the first civilization to master the seas and the oceans, and as the inventors of the first written alphabet.
The Lebanese are the modern descendents of the Phoenicians. The fishermen, as a group, pretend to be to the most direct descendents: some have kept some of the basic fishing techniques that have been used for centuries.
We were spending our summer vacations in Lebanon in 2003. We rented a place by the sea, in Jounieh, north of Beirut. A morning, as I was walking on the beach looking for an interesting opportunity, fog started to clear slowly, and I noticed that this small boat contrasted nicely with the industrial background.
Good old fishing techniques in the foreground, and a polluting electrical utility fading in the background: this is a perfect summary of the contrasts of Lebanon. A beautiful green country where 17 religions cohabitated in peace, until a 17-year war disrupted the fragile equilibrium, and sets the entire country on fire. After the war ended, a massive reconstruction effort brought modernization to many regions of the country, without proper planning, putting the fragile ecological equilibrium at risk.
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