Correction!

Hi everybody! I want to give you all some information about the pictures below. I previously titled the pictures of the buildings "Sabtieh, the place where my family is from". I took the pictures looking right down the hill from my aunt's balcony so I thought it was the same neighborhood but it is NOT. The name of the neighborhood is Zeitrieh (I hope I am spelling it correctly). The distinction is important because Sabtieh(where my family lives) is a Christian neighborhood and Zeitrieh is a Muslim Shia neighborhood. When my mom was growing up her neighborhood was shelled by fighters in Zeitrieh and many of her neighbors were killed and homes were ruined. Looking out over Zeitrieh can bring back many bad memories for people who had to endure that time. My uncle recalled a woman, who lived in the building behind his, hiding in the hallway with her two children when the shells came and her throat was cut by shrapnel. She died in front of her children. Lebanon has a very sad and complicated past which dictates the present and the future in huge ways. I am learning more about this everyday as I talk to people. There are people who will disagree with me, but I believe that all religious and political sects have both contributed to the problems and suffered as well. Through all the history here and all the wars, all the groups have caused some pain and felt immense pain. As it is with all wars, it is the innocent everyday people who just want to be able to go to work and buy groceries, who suffer the most. As I said before, my aunt and my mom warned me not to talk to people about politics and these issues but I have found that people my age, studying at the university, are very interested to talk about these subjects and have incredible insight. I talked to the president of Haigazian this morning and he told me that in the past there was never a demand for political science classes and now, all of sudden, many young people want to study politics. Some students here have expressed hope in Lebanon's future and want to help make it better. I have also talked to students who believe that voting here is useless. They refuse to vote because they don't think any of the candidates care about what is best for the Lebanese people as a whole, but rather, have their own monetary interests and political ambitions in mind. This is going to be a very interesting place to study political science. Check in soon for new pictures of the REAL Sabtieh!