The task was easy. Out of the 15 countries we visited on this trip, five stood out the most.

Read the article to see which ones.

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I saw more types of sweets than savoury dishes. It’s an intimidating constellation. Here are a few of my favourites and where to find the best of each.

Sahlab

A deceptively simple blend of milk, sugar, corn starch and rose water, it’s thick, warm, and more comforting than your mama’s hot cocoa on a winter night. When cooled, it congeals like gelatin and can be spooned as a dessert. Get creative with toppings: cinnamon, crushed nuts, shredded coconut, etc.

Best one: El-Mina, Lebanon
This seaside suburb of Tripoli has a little shop that specializes in warm liquid treats. Go to the Christian souk and ask around for it.

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Kneffeh

The edible equivalent of an oily four-hand massage given by two Arab beauties with roses in their hair. Fresh cheese is baked under semolina cake and the whole thing is drowned in sugar syrup. Served on a plate or to go in a sesame flatbread, it should be classified as a dangerous substance. Thankfully, it isn’t.

Best one: Jenin, West Bank
There’s an unassuming sweet shop called Shalhoub in the central shopping area of Jenin. Unlike regular knaffeh, they bake it in vermicelli pastry. The cheese is fresh  and gooey and the outside crispy.

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Halawet al-Jibn

It’s not a cannelloni, it’s akawi cheese and semolina flour pressed into sheets and rolled with ashta cream. Although bland on its own, it resembles a lighter cheesecake once you douse it with sugar syrup.

Best one: Tripoli, Lebanon
The Hallab family of Tripoli is famous for sweets. Lore says that after a nasty fight, the three Hallab brothers split up the family business, each running their own sweet empire. They are all fantastic, especially their cream-based sweets like halawet al-jibn.

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Halva/halawa

Whether in the Hebrew or Arabic domains, this dense, crumbly sesame paste is delicious on its own, topped with nuts or as a sweet dip with pita bread. For my money, the Israelis do it best.

Best one: West Jerusalem, Israel
I don’t like endorsing rude pricks, but one seller in Jerusalem’s Machane Yehuda market makes perfect halva with a scary flavour variety:  coffee, passion fruit, pomegranate, and nuts are just a few. Must spend a minimum of 40 shekels. Look for his stall near the wine shops. And brace for hostile service.

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Arabic ice cream

On the first spoonful you notice that the ice cream of the Arab world is different. It’s gooier and gummier, almost like a taffy. A key ingredient is Arabic gum, a resin form the mastic tree (not to be confused with gum arabic, with is derived from the acacia tree). Try the Arabic flavour, which tastes of nuts, rosewater, and sesame.

Best one: Ramallah, West Bank
There are many reasons to visit the Palestinian capital. The ice cream is just another. Try Baladna on Main St.

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Kataif

It looks like a turnover, but it’s sweet and creamy. A crumpet-like pancake is filled with ashta cream, fried, and doused in syrup. Crispy on the outside, cool and buttery inside.

Best one: Damascus, Syria
Jasmatiyeh Street, which I dubbed the Las Vegas of sweets, has a line of shops offering fresh kataif. Try any of them.

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Namoura

You can spot this simple semolina cake in any sweet shop by the almond placed atop each cut square. That’s the traditional way. Some shops, however, add their own poetry by tinkering with the density and toppings.

Best one: Aleppo, Syria
The Aleppan version of namoura is the closest you’ll come to dark matter. You could power a hyperspace engine on it. It’s impossibly chunky, gooey, and layered with pistachios and cashews.

“In Lebanon, you can ski in the morning and go to the beach in the afternoon.” So goes the old cliché that every travel guide and Lebanese host love repeating.

What a waste that would be. Forget this piece of cram-travel advice, which, as a matter of fact, is strictly theoretical: if you can ski, it means it’s winter. And winter is too cold for the beach. Instead, slowly savour Bcharré, a mountain village that seems to have been plucked right out of the Swiss Alps.

Or, more appropriately, from a fairy tale.

At an altitude of 1650 meters, Bcharré is close to the Qadisha Valley, roughly fours hours from Beirut. The road leading to it is among the most scenic in the country, adorned with snowy peaks, canyons, olive groves, vineyards and valleys.

You can begin your visit exploring the town’s steep streets, peeking inside stone-built Maronite churches, shopping for home-made chocolate, or even being invited for tea and cake at the home of a friendly local, like we were. Other attraction include a Phoenician tomb dating back to 750 BC, and the 500-meter long Qadisha Grotto.

At night, the city is motionless. But since the town’s population is mostly Christian, alcohol is amply available in every little corner shop. Buy a few bottles of Ksara and Kefraya wines, some nuts and hommos, and invite the small hotel crowd for a few drinks around the oil furnace of the cozy hostel Tiger House.

The next day you can combine two activities. The first is a visit to the Kahlil Gibran museum, which honours the Bcharré native who gave the world The Prophet. Thous he chose the US as his home, he came back to his hometown for his eternal rest. In addition to the impressive collection of Gibran’s paintings, the museum enjoys a privileged view of the region.

From there, take a taxi to the cedar reserve, which in fact harbours only a few of Lebanon’s iconic trees. Beside it is a ski hill, which was totally empty during our visit in mid-December. It’s a chance to see snow while enjoying pleasant temperatures.

On the way back, wave away the taxis. The walk down the winding mountain road has stunning views of the area. Few places have such a scenery concentrated in a two-hour walk. Back at the hotel, another well-deserved round of Lebanese wines.

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A perfect day trip from Byblos (or even Beirut) is Batroun, a town offering a millennial Phoenician sea seawall, Lebanon’s best lemonade, and a roaring nightlife.

It’s perfect for a day trip because it’s compact: three hours are plenty to digest it. The highlight is the seaside old town with an impressive 18th-century stone church above the fishing marina and a nicely restored residential quarter.

Here you can wander among stone homes with loaded citrus trees. Plaques painted in cursive point the way to the tourist attractions, like minor churches, the restaurant-lined corniche, and the remains of a 2000-year old stone wall that held back the sea.

Today this wall is just a few metres long and holds nothing. In front of it is a rock bed pitted by centuries of tides.

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Batroun is famous for two things: its lemonade and its nightlife. You’ll find lemonade stands in just about every corner, but the most popular one – according to its maker – is at Le Garage, a snack bar and pool hall just beside the St. George Orthodox Church. It truly is a rarity of flavour, perfectly blending sour and sweet.

The couple who makes it, in the photo below, keep the recipe secret but say the lemons come from the south of Lebanon.

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Batroun’s main commercial street is lined with nightclubs, known to Lebanese in distant cities. We didn’t sample them, so it’s up to the visitor to confirm or debunk their fame.

To get to Batorun:
Take any microbus on the Lebanese coastal highway. Ask for Batroun. You’ll be dropped off at the entrance to the town. Walk 10 minutes towards the sea and you’ll find everything easily.

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But that small area is packed with cities, mountains, and vineyards, all of them that compel the traveller to stay longer than anticipated.

Here are our best shots from Lebanon, a country that surprises as much as it endears.
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Note: The south of Lebanon is the most politically unstable region in the country, and the main theatre of conflict with Israel. Tourists need a permit to enter, but no one offered or asked one from us. Maybe it’s because we could pass for Lebanese. Maybe we were just lucky. Anyone thinking of going should check with the authorities: policemen, soldiers, or tourism workers.

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The gentleman at the sweet shop in Tyre helped us negotiate a good price for a taxi to Bint Jbeil. This is pure Lebanon: buy some sweets, befriend the owner over tea and you have a local fixer for life.

The road was smooth, but with more military checkpoints than usual. We were told to expect soldiers to inquire as to the purpose of our visit. We were to ask them for a visit permit. We were just waved through every time.

It’s common in Lebanon to see flags and posters with political party logos on each street, marking their territory like gang tags. But the further south you go, the more martial the posters get: young men with keffiyeh around their necks and rifles in their hands. The unmistakable bearded glower of Hassan Nasrallah.

After a certain point, the red-and-white markings of the Lebanese army were nowhere to be seen. Only green and yellow. We were in Hezbollah territory.

All around us were grassy hills flecked with white rocks. Some had traditional stone houses. It all looked very biblical. Our taxi had some engine trouble and the driver got out to check under the hood. I stepped out to take some pictures and the driver discreetly told me to stop.

This was the last picture I was able to take for two hours:

Bint Jbeil

The only sign that this town was flattened by Israel in 2006 is the frantic pace of construction. The main commercial street – just a dozen shops on each side, really – has brand new arabesque arches, giving it a neo-souk look. Everywhere you see large, impressive homes going up.

Instead of statues and monuments, parks and roundabouts had decommissioned pieces of heavy artillery, like anti-aircraft guns and clusters of Katyusha rockets.

We walked past the shops and toward a stone mosque. An old Ford with two young men stopped in front of us. The driver, who spoke respectable French, asked what we were doing there.

“Just going for a walk,” I said, introducing myself. “Is that ok?”

“Do you have a permit to be here?”

“No, no one asked us and no one offered one. But we have all our documents.” I showed him my passport.

“It shouldn’t be a problem,” he answered. “But other people higher up are responsible for this. Do you have a camera?”

“Yes, but I’m not taking any pictures.”

He paused to think. “Don’t go any further,” he said. “Please turn around.”

We did as he said and stopped for a coffee on the main street. This is where interesting things happened.

“Welcome to Lebanon,” a gentleman in his fifties beamed when he saw us come in. He runs a shoe and bag shop two doors down when he is in town. The rest of the time he lives and works near Detroit, where he owns a gas station, and where his wife and three children live.

“I love American people,” he offered without any prompting. “They are so wonderful. I don’t care what anybody says.”

We sat outside the shop with him, the coffee shop owner, and his sister-in-law. Family members and friends would stop by, exchange a kind word, and leave.

“Do you like Lebanese women,” he asked me. “I love them. They are so clean. This is most important for us. First, they must be clean. Then beautiful.”

Like the gentleman in Tyre, he helped us negotiate a fair price for a taxi to Maroun el-Ras, Aytarun, and back. We agreed to 20,000 LBP, roughly $13.

Maroun el-Ras

This town that overlooks the Israeli border from a hilltop is just five km away from Bint Jbeil, but up on a steep climb. The street leading toward it is lined with Iranian flags.

A destroyed Israeli tank watched over Bint Jbeil. A tattered Hezbollah flag lazily waves from it. Not far from it a blocky stone statue has one foot over a green helmet with a star of David.

We arrive at the town’s brand new family park. The gate was decorated with Iranian symbols, and large posters of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad are clearly visible from the outside.

It looked like the entrance to a theme park: manicured shrubs lined cobblestone walkways. There were several thatched-rood shelters with picnic tables and barbecue pits. Wind turbines and solar panels were everywhere. A small mosque, finished on the outside, was still rough on the inside.

It was a chilly, windy winter day, so the park was empty save for two young Lebanese men who live and work in West Africa, there on holiday. They warmly greeted us.

“So Iran helped build this place,” I asked one.

“No,” he smiled. “Iran built all of it.”

He said that families from all over south Lebanon come here on summer weekends. The park is still wrapping up contraction on a hotel, a swimming pool, and a paintball arena.

He led us to the edge of the park, where the hill drops sharply. “There’s our neighbour,” he said and pointed to the horizon. We could clearly see the fenced border and the Israeli town of Avivim. There were a lot more trees on the other side.

“Aren’t the people here afraid of being this close to Israel,” I asked him. He smiled. “We in the south aren’t afraid of anything.”

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Aytarun and Aynata

Our taxi driver drove us around Aytarun, another border town with nothing remarkable about it. “Aytarun, nothing,” he said in his barely functional English.

Without us asking, he drove to nearby Aynata, where a memorial to fallen Hezbollah fighters stands:

Inside were several stones with Arabic engraving and the Hezbollah logo. Several of them had wreaths, photos of the soldiers, and leather-bound copies of the Koran. I ran outside to take a wide-angle shot of the monument and was intercepted by a Ford SUV driven by a beefy man with a leather jacket, sunglasses, and a Bluetooth earpiece. “Salaam aleykum,” he said flatly.

“Aleykum salaam,” I responded. “Ana min Brazil. Turisti. Afwan, ma behki arabi.” I’m from Brazil. A tourist. Sorry, I don’t speak Arabic.

He grinned. “Do you know what this is,” he asked in serviceable English. “It’s a monument for our martyrs.” He stepped out of the car, even though it was stopped in the middle of the street. “Come, I show you.” His passenger, a well-dressed woman with a hijab, followed him smiling politely. He led us back inside.

“These are for populi,” he said, pointing to the stones on the left side. “Mothers, bothers, and wives.” I assumed he meant civilians. “And these for the martyrs. Every stone is for 14 men.” Fifteen fighters from this town died is 2006, he told us.

“You are welcome here,” he said. “You can take photos here. But outside, no photos.” I nodded.

The graveyard

The taxi driver made one last stop before taking us back to Bint Jbeil. It was a graveyard. It was clear from the flags and photos it was made for Hezbollah fighters. He led us now a row of tombstones with little glass-enclosed shrines. He stopped at the second-to-last stone and pointed to a large photograph of a mature man clutching an AK-47. “My father,” he said.

The cost of visiting the Lebanese south as a day trip from Beirut:
(for two people. $1 = 1,500 Lebanese pounds)

Shared taxi from Beirut to Tyre: 15,000 LBP
Taxi from Tyre to Bint Jbeil: 12,000 LBP
Taxi to Maroun el Ras, Aytarun, and back : 20,000 LBP
Taxi from Bint Jbeil to Tyre: 25,000 LBP
Microbus from Tyre to Beirut: 10,000 LBP

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There’s no time to waste in the hammam. Once you agree to the full package – steam, scrub and massage – you’re asked to strip, right there, at the reception area, where people come in from the street, enjoy a post-bath tea, and pay the cashier.

I pulled off my shirt and shoes and left it at that, waiting for the young man in the tight tank top, tribal tattoos and gelled hair to lead me to a more intimate ante-chamber.

Women can’t enjoy the services of this public bath in Tripoli, but nothing stops them from popping in and checking out the reception. It’s a round room with vaulted stone ceilings and a fountain in middle with plastic flower pots. Against the walls are benches upholstered in traditional cloths with ornate tea tables.

The young man pointed at my pants. I started to undo my buckle and hoped for a misunderstanding, for him to say, “No, not here, you lunatic! I want to know where you got those jeans.”

But speaking no English, he produced a checkered white-and-red cloth, the kind that drapes tables at old Italian restaurants, and held it in front of me below belt-level. It was my cue to go all the way.

A pale Syrian man with a whisper of a teenage moustache appeared wearing a T-shirt and wet boxer-briefs. “You. Come,” he beckoned.

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A restored luxury hammam at the Beiteddine palace in Lebanon.

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The inside of the bath is white, warm and moist. There’s always the sound of running water. A central round chamber leads to several private bathing areas, the massage room, and a steam room.

“First here,” the Syrian man said, pointing to the latter. Inside lounged a middle-aged man with the same checkered cloth loosely tied around his waist. “Marhaba,” I squeaked with the uncertainty that comes with greeting another naked man in an alien culture, and spent the time looking at everything except him.

He didn’t say much, although he occasionally glanced at me, probably wondering what I found so interesting in the ceiling tiles.

After five minutes, the Syrian man fetched me and led me to a private bathing room. It was 3m x 3m with a stone sink near the marble floor. “Lie,” he said with a lit cigarette on a corner of his mouth. I lied. The floor was warm and wet. He slipped on a glove with an abrasive rubber pad and started to scrub. Little black slivers of grime appeared on my arms, chest, and legs.

Seeing this job would need unconventional effort, he tossed his cigarette on the wet floor beside him. He soaped me up, front and back. To reach my upper thighs, he yanked my loincloth between my legs hard enough to suspend my fertility, and got closer to me than any man ever did.

Then he slipped on another glove that I’ve seen used to scour burnt lasagna from baking trays. It felt like I was being teased with a power sander. I feared it would shear my nipples right off, leaving me looking like a shirtless Ken doll.

“Now, massage,” the Syrian man announced, and took me to a steamy room with a cushioned bed. For the 15 miserably short minutes it lasted, it was the most wonderful massage. Deep and vigorous, right at the sore spots. I swore never again to pay $60 to be tickled for one hour by a dainty blonde at a spa. Even if it means having her hands this close to my balls.

The Syrian man stood me up, rinsed the soap off, wrapped one towel on my head and another around my shoulders, and left me at the central chamber. My skin never felt smoother. Another man came to greet me, wearing a tight blue T-shirt that articulated his gym habit.

“Good,” he asked, looking severely into my eyes.

“Yes, good,” I said.

“Gay?”

I looked at my right, hoping that my brain would analyze the question and detect a dropped syllable, an indiscernible lilt, an accent further distorted by the bath’s acoustics, anything that would contradict what I thought I had just heard.

I had nothing.

“No, no. Not gay,” I replied.

The man clicked his tongue and rolled his eyes like a teacher about to lose his patience with an exceptionally slow student.

“No, no,” he grumbled. “You like hammam?”

“Yes.”

“Then tips. OK? Tips for me, for other man.”

This struck me as the most opportunistic face-saving manoeuvre ever. I was impressed.

Back at the reception, I awkwardly slinked back into my clothes underneath the wet checkered cloth. The Syrian masseur brought me sweet tea and a cigarette. The room was pleasantly cool. Every worker who passed smiled at me and it made me think of the man’s question inside.

Nonsense, I thought, swatting away the suspicion. They’re just friendly and happy that a tourist came to their business. I must have misheard him. After all, this is a business at the heart of a major Muslim city.

Epilogue

I told Pierre, a Lebanese friend I made in Tripoli, that I took a full session at the Hammam al-Abed. His eyes snapped open and his jaw plunged.

“Are you serious,” he asked incredulously. “That place is for gay people!”

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Detail from an old, abandoned hammam in Tripoli.

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We arrived in Tripoli and for the first time in two Lebanese weeks, we felt like we were in the Middle East.

The look-at-me designer shops that water down Beirut were nowhere in sight. There were no Pepsi billboards or golden arches, or other homogenizers of Western culture in the old city.

The main city square dominated by an old clock tower was abuzz with messengers, merchants transporting goods and ideas, soldiers on coffee break, all the activity you’d expect to see 200 years ago in a touristic corner that hasn’t fallen to tourism.

The most prominent street-level commercial space on this square was populated not by a Starbucks or KFC, but by old men sitting around plastic tables smoking narguileh and playing cards.

There was an undefinable haze in the air that gave all the crumbling stone arches a dreamy look. I felt like I was in someone’s recollection of a vague Arabian memory.

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One of the few touristy touches in Tripoli, a remake of a traditional tea den in the Khan el-Saboun soap market. It’s still cool, though.

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There are many reasons to spend a few days in Tripoli:

The narrow covered corridors of the old city that branch into tiny passageways and may lead to an underground mosque, a section of the souk, or someone’s front yard.

The 700-year old abandoned Turkish baths that can only be accessed by asking an old man in a loose turban to reveal the entrance behind a soda machine.

The smells of cardamon, coffee, cheese and sesame that puff from pushcarts.

The sellers of said coffee pushcarts who, when approached by a pair of foreigners, offer a complimentary cup instead of charging double.

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The Great Mosque in Tripoli’s old city.

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The countless sweet shops, from simple, unassuming holes-in-the-wall to velvet-upholstered palaces, all of them delicious, and that do brisk business even though every Lebanese you meet say they never eat Lebanese sweets.

The labyrinthine souk that still sells fish, fruits, jewelry, and other ephemera of everyday use, and where sellers still believe that a friendly smile is all they need to lure a foreign-looking shopper.

The Akra chain of restaurants, which always inhabit perfectly-lit, arched stone buildings, and offer high-end versions of peasant dishes like fatteh, hommos, and foul beans.

The Crusades-era castle that looms over a decaying cluster of slum homes perched helter-skelter on a hillside.

Said slum where you could be greeted by a curious old lady one moment, mobbed by friendly boys playing football the next, and ten steps later interrogated by scowling Shia women suspicious of any Westerners.

And finally, the faint suspicion when leaving that I could gladly spend many more days doing the same thing over and over again.

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A 700-year old Turkish bath, abandoned and crumbling.

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It’s a shame that so many tourists come to Byblos on a day trip. This is a town that begs for slow, aimless wandering, both during daytime and at night.

It’s an easy mistake to make, though. The historical part of Byblos, and the only one of interest, really, is barely the size of five city blocks. You’re greeted by a souk selling bland clothing, the usual souvenirs, overpriced cafés, and one interesting bookstore specializing in Lebanese literature.

But it’s not the shopping that stirs you, it’s the perfectly resorted stonework of the houses that glow ochre in the Mediterranean light. You can almost picture Romans, Persians, Ottomans, or any of the many civilizations that traipsed though Lebanon haggling for dates. I say almost because the plastic Christmas trees and snowmen the city scattered on the souk destroy any possibility of creative visualization.

The souk ends in a small plaza with an expensive-looking restaurant, an ancient Orthodox church to the right and the main archaeological site to the left. This is where the magic of Byblos converges. From here you can take one of four ways down stony walkways and get happily lost for hours.

We went straight and walked down a grove-covered stairways that leads to the marina. There’s stuff to look at everywhere: a stone chapel no larger than a minivan with a Portuguese name, Nossa Senhora da Penna. Two shops selling fish fossils, stairways leading to rooftops, and locked gates for gardens with vines, lemon trees, and old pottery hanging from the walls.

The marina is quickly being claimed by high-end restaurants and hotels, but retains some crumbling charm, like a Phoenician watchtower that you can climb and enjoy the view for a few minutes before a lazy-eyed fisherman with Popeye forearms hisses at you to come down.

We walked along the water across several elevated seafood restaurants. It was a chilly December afternoon but couples happily downed wine and calamari on the outdoor patios. At the north end is a hotel that succumbed to the fad of combining old stone structures with sleek modern elements like glass balconies and wooden parapets.

It looked grand at any rate, and workers were still tapping the last finishing tiles on the front entrance. The interior was plush enough for movie stars. The concierge, quickly noting our dazzled state and our scrappy backpacker attire, scrambled to intercept us.

“Can I help you,” he said in that vaguely sardonic tone of someone who thinks we’re clearly in the wrong place.

“We were drawn by the decor,” I said in my politest tone. “Is this a hotel or a restaurant or what?”

“Well, both,” the barrel-chested concierge said. “It’s a five-star hotel,” he added, quickly dashing any idea we might harbour of sticking around. “We’re preparing for a special dinner tonight.”

I asked if we could take a quick look around, and he invited us to admire the floor of the dining area. From far it looked like a glass floor with blue lights underneath. But the glass revealed the foundations of a bronze-age settlement, neat lines of unearthed stones in square arrangements. Even the tables were glass so guests could admire their choice of accommodation during dinner.

Further down the dining room was three exquisite sofas and a coffee table with picture books of Lebanon. We couldn’t resist and started leafing through one. Waiters dashed around us setting cutlery and moving chairs.

“You must have misunderstood me,” a voice said above us. It was the concierge. “I said you could look at the floor. But you can’t sit here unless you buy something.”

We looked around and there were no guests that could be potentially repulsed by my Mountain Equipment Coop daypack and four-day stubble. Judging by the state of the room, it was still several hours until the dinner started.

“Sorry, it’s policy,” the concierge said, as though that would soften our expusion.

On the way out, we walked by a manager-looking man, his eyes fixed at his shoes, his lips stretched into a forced smile, the clear mark of a supervisor who just used a minion to do the unpleasant work won’t.

Night fell and the town was perfectly lit. Walkways were deserted and led us to happy places like an old Maronite church, narrow stairways, and tree-covered corridors between restored homes of what must be very rich people. A group of teens babbled in Arabic near a tiny stone mosque where two men stood silently inside.

Else, it was eerily quiet. We were glad that few visitors stay the night, especially during the winter low season. It was like walking through a sleeping Medieval town minus the plague and religious persecution.

We eventually ambled back to the plaza. A few people clustered inside cafes, smoking narguileh and drinking coffee. The Crusades fortress and the Roman columns at the archaeological site was gorgeously lit. The site itself, with is many Phoenician ruins, deep, accessible tombs with huge monolithic sarcophagi, and a heart-stopping view of the Mediterranean sunset from the fortress is worth a travel book on its own.

This was an experience we would repeat the next day, during the early day’s light and at sunset.

And it felt like a whole different town at each time.

Blame it on the Saudis. That’s what the Lebanese do.

The most striking first impression of Beirut is the number of cranes deployed for new luxury condos. Dubai usually gets the fame for unfettered construction, but we were in Dubai, and it’s nothing like this.

It doesn’t make sense. Lebanon is at peace, but for how long is anyone’s guess. The border with Israel is still hot. Tensions could flare at any moment when a UN tribunal issues the first accusations on the assassination of Rafik Hariri, the prime minister slain in a car bomb in 2006. Everyone expects Hezbollah to be fingered, and the militant group swore trouble as such.

A place with this much political uncertainty should not, logically, have this much economic confidence. Too many buildings pockmarked by the civil war haven’t been mended. The electricity doesn’t work half the time, for crying out loud.

Every Lebanese we spoke with say it’s all spurred by Gulf Arabs who build, sell, and get out. But probe a little further and you find that many Lebanese – those with two passports who can easily duck out if things get hairy – do have a hand in Beirut’s bewildering construction boom.

But that’s Lebanon for you. In a place where peacetime is as rare as hot sunny days in Canada, the people learned to make use of every bomb-free moment.

This naturally goes to its absurd extreme. Beirut’s main districts are lined with designer shops, sleek bars and restaurants where an appetizer costs as much as a day’s budget in Vietnam. The souk in the old city hardly merits the name; it’s a mall for Hermès and Burberry to claim some Arabian cachet.

Young people are fabulously dressed to sip coffee and smoke narguileh. And when another daily blackout darkens the humbler neighbourhoods, the lights keep burning bright in the pubs of Gemmayze and Monot Street, where the nation’s elite go to be seen.

You start to think that things are so expensive in Lebanon because every serious business has to pay two electricity bills: one for the utility and the other for the diesel generators that hum continuously in the basement.

Either this country is suffering the world’s greatest case of mass denial, or the Lebanese are implacable, refusing to let something as banal as unreliable power interfere with their lifestyle.

This staged glitz on top of a shaky foundation reminds me of that scene in Downfall when Eva Braun urges her party guests to dance while Allied mortars shake the streets just outside.

The only difference is that Braun couldn’t accept that it was all over. The Lebanese know that at any moment, this could all go away.

Good on them for enjoying while they can.