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When myself and my friends booked our Middle Eastern backpacking expedition in October last, Lebanon was at peace. When we had reached the first stage of our travels in Greece in November, political protests had broken out all over the country. Not much was being said in the media except that there had been minor violence of army against protesters. The norm as Western media had put it. We meandered forward with trepidation on our MEA airline, with one of the friendliest and funniest pre flight safety videos myself and my friends had ever seen. Still, even this did not abate our nerves. This was a country we did not know to expect. It is definitely not a normal destination for the conventional backpacker. What we had found was madness. It was wild yes, with barely built roads, road rage, cars zooming at unspeakable speeds. However, we did feel safe with exception of a random car reversing up the motorway! Our pale Irish pasty white skin going pink thanks to the 30 degree weather in November, but we were happy in the heat. We drove our rental into Beirut, a crackling cauldron into the ether of lunacy with trigger happy hands at the horns of their cars and bullet holes still on show from the past horrors of the civil war. We found a car space outside of a jewelers near our hostel. We were told it was private parking but we kindly asked could we leave it there for five minutes until we found a place to park it by foot, our designated driver needing the break. Me being the biggest, stayed with the car and bags, I ended up in deep conversation with the jeweler himself. By the time my two friends had come back they had found me inside the jewelers with a coffee, chatting to all members of the family run jewelers. I also met the best gambler in all of Beirut and the reader will be glad to find out the man was covered from head to toe in gold. Our anxiety of seeing guns everywhere was somewhat eased by this incident of kindness and backpacking revelry. Although the sounds of sirens were still whizzing past and the noise of protesters was still heard from the neighbourhood we we stayed gave us anxiety for the night ahead. The following day, after a night of frolicking, we zigzagged our way into the mountains to visit two waterfalls. We were driving a small automatic hatchback on undriveable steep roads. A great combination. On reaching the first waterfall, we parked in a car park where again we found ourselves in the ideal incident of comedy and horror. Being accosted by a gentleman who told us it would be 2 dollars to park there. While waiting on the change we received directions from a man cleaning his gun, ending his tradition by belting out the cocking sound of the pump action. It had felt like the crack of a whip against one's back. While my friends were listening to this, I had received an invitation to smoke a hookah which may or may not have contained hash. These experiences had given us a feeling of Shaggy and Scooby Doo running from a monster, screaming; "Let's get out of here!". We fast paced down to the water and were met with the coldest experience of skinny dipping yet in the freezing, fresh mountain water. We arrived back to find our car still in one piece with no bullet holes in it, and thanked the spirit watching over us for our luck. We rallied our terrible rental car out of the make shift car park as fast as we could. Despite this, our day had ended in the ancient Phoenician capital of Byblos. The sun was setting and we made a dash for the sea. Changing into our togs, we dove into the Mediterranean sea. The water was warm, fishing boats were ambling past, locals were catching the dying rays of the November sun and we were finally in a setting of tranquility. As the sun set over the horizon, we had finally found peace in the wild, wild middle east.