History in the Making | by Art Hake

Once upon a time, on a beautiful shore of the Mediterranean, a group of men and women installed their little brick houses and called it home. They soon got bored thus thought of a way to better communicate. They invented the alphabet and developed the first sea port. Since they didn’t always agree on what to say and ended up fighting a bit, some went off to faraway places, creating little colonies around the Mother sea: Nice, Ibiza, Larnaca, Malta, Carthage, Palermo, etc. fetching gold, turquoise and slaves in exchange of cedar wood and Tyrian purple while identifying good vacation spots for future generations. Those who stayed opened fish restaurants and got screwed by most tourists and visiting neighbors.

The women were so gorgeous; they drew attention from kings and princes around, dragging the cities into endless wars.

Their relatives across the globe kept on sending aid and visiting from time to time, but like you’d get overwhelmed by a creepy old aunt in your family that wouldn’t die, visit intervals got longer and longer, until centuries passed by. Guilt feeling left few open channels but nonetheless, Phoenicians of Lebanon had to count on nobody but themselves.

Nowadays, you’d find Phoenicians somewhat happier with their lives, despite the fact that not much has changed. Their commerce is growing, they have no more wood to sell but their mastering of the languages makes them amazing negotiators of whatever-it-is-you-need, women manage to grow even bigger boobs, they still import slaves and continuously get screwed by their neighbors (although to be honest, I think they’re starting to enjoy this).

The fish restaurants are quite good, which tempts tourists and descendants of their diaspora to come back.

But some things did change. Our natural resources are now limited to sun, sea, liquor, parties, sex & drugs. With the extinction of the murex, origin of the purple color, the disappearance of the green forests, the pollution of the blue sea, the melting of the white snows, the place is threatened of grimness. We need to bring back the glee. Happy people from around the world unite, come in and spread the rainbow, which is also a perspective of the peace flag, the only flag we believe in. Berytus is your next destination!