Lebanon Diary, Part VII

Marcelle Bedran and 22 other Liberians and Lebanese-Liberians have been seeking a way out of Beirut for more than two weeks. They are among about 50 Liberians trapped in the besieged city. Liberia has no embassy in Lebanon to evacuate them. Bedran, 19, and her family were evicted from the one-bedroom apartment they were staying in because the landlord said there were too many people staying there. They have found another one-bedroom flat but the landlord there is also urging them to move on. IRIN has been documenting the plight of Bedran and her fiancé, 25-year-old Saide Chaar, and their family through daily phone conversations that are published in narrative form. IRIN spoke with Bedran on Monday and compiled Part 7 of an ongoing diary of life in Beirut. 31 July 2006 - Everybody slept angry. Yesterday they were quarrelling over the cell phones - where were we going to get money to have credit for the cell phones … who was going to recharge phones. Everybody is borrowing each other’s phones and nobody has credits. You can receive calls but you can’t make calls. Early this morning around 3 am to 4 am the news came on and we heard Israel’s decision to do a ceasefire for 48 hours. Up to now we haven’t eaten anything. We called on some friends of ours, some neighbours, to get us some food but nobody has come yet. We just got to know them during these few weeks and they said, “Ok, we don’t know if we have enough for ourselves we’ll just see what we can get.” I’m so hungry and just waiting for some food to eat. If you are really hungry I believe you don’t think straight. And everything you see, in your eyes, you only see food. You’re temples ache and your tummy is like something is pinching you. The baby … he’s feeling a little bit all right. We don’t know where the humanitarian stands are. I think they’re supposed to be calling people to come take food and medication. Somebody told us that they’re only giving them out to people displaced in school buildings. They never announce anything. All they do on national news they just show people giving out cartons, giving out medicine, giving out first aid care to people, but they never say where. Giving out blankets, clothes. Some people said it’s coming from Syria, some people said it’s coming from America, some said some food is coming from Jordan but I have no idea. (The landlord) he’s still cutting the water. We have no water in the flat. We went to a nearby apartment with buckets and begged as usual. Everybody shared water for a bath. The shower is not working so we have to take a bath in the bucket and everybody can only have a half a bucket of water. Today when they said there is a ceasefire for 48 hours everybody was in line for gas. We tried to get a refill but there were cars everywhere – maybe 100 or more – not just one gas station, all the gas stands everywhere. There were cars and cars and cars in line. They said no fuel is coming to Lebanon because of the crisis. We asked how much it was to get a taxi to go to Syria. Some people have big families, they want to charter a van. They were quarrelling over the prices. Everybody had their own price. Someone told us 100 dollars. Someone told us it is about 20 dollars per person. We didn’t get any straight answer. When we are sure at least we can call some relatives abroad and let them send some money for the carfare (through Western Union). Syria opened a refugee camp. We don’t know nobody there. We will just declare ourselves as refugees. It’s better than just sitting in a war. It’s better to be a refugee than to die.