Snowy Mountain in the Morning; Sunny Beach in the Afternoon? Got to be…

Turkey!

Yep, the Lebanese-brewed cliche of skiing in the morning and sun bathing at sunset has been hijacked by the Turks in their latest “Go Turkey” tourism campaign blaring on UAE radio stations.

Here’s the clip:

Turkey Tourism Ad on UAE Radio

Guess its time we redevelop the phrase. How about this:

Lebanon: where you can see women in lingerie on snowy mountains in the morning and fully-covered women wading along sunny beaches in the afternoon.

or

Lebanon: where you can drive at break-neck speeds to snowy mountains in the morning and coast down towards sunny beaches in the afternoon while keeping the car in neutral.

Check out these great posts:

• Tourism Up, Everything Else Down
• The Middle East’s Schengen
• Lebanon Ranked #1 Most Fascinating Country the US Doesn’t Want You To Visit

International Cliche Day: A LLB Look Back

Today is International Cliche Day and so I’ve decided it would be a perfect time to remember the most memorable “Looks Like Beirut” comments of the past months:

January 2009: “…I won’t spend a lot of money tearing down those houses. If that’s going to be Beirut, let it be Beirut, but don’t let Beirut grow…”
- Wayne County Sheriff, Warren Evans

February 2009: “The area has got some problems, it does need help but the last thing it needs is being described as Beirut,”
- Lichfield City Council Member, John Bayliss

March 2009: “…cars were on fire…tyres were going off, it was a bit like Beirut.”
- Pub Landlord, Andy Ward

April 2009: “George Bush Sr.’s staff called Portland “Little Beirut” in the early 1990s.  Now some say Portland is on the way to becoming “Little Dubai”  (a wildly overdeveloped Middle Eastern nation).”
- Staffer under George Bush Sr.

May 2009: “Director McG (”Charlie’s Angels”) fuels “Terminator Salvation” with exceptional visual effects and sharp sound, but more shouting and explosions than a Super Bowl in Beirut.“
- Tyler Hanley

June 2009: “You would think, ‘Is this Beirut?’ This is a case about self-defense and self-preservation,”
- Defense Attorney Kevin Reddington

July 2009: “Its hard to find a real terrorist…there’s no Craigslist in Beirut…”
- Sacha Baron Cohen

August 2009: “People throw things at windows. It’s like living in Beirut sometimes.”
- Residents of South Elmsall

September 2009: Frightened residents being terrorised by rampaging neds in an Airdrie street have claimed – “it’s like living in Beirut!”
- Residents of Airdrie North

October 2009: “…exhibited varying styles and quality of design around key features . . . poor quality of build, external gas pipes, poor bricklaying … and buildings erected in the wrong place…locals now call it ‘Beirut,’”
- The guardian.co.uk’s Geramine Greer

Enjoy!!

Check out these great posts:

• Moving Out of “Beirut”
• Looks Like Downtown Beirut
• Its Not Beirut, There are Good People Here

Beirut or Broadgate?

That’s according to telegraph.co.uk’s Jonathan Russell’s opinion on the state of crime in London:

An article in the greatly undervalued and generously over-punctuated Badge – billed as “the voice of the London cab driver’s club” – reports that traffic wardens, sorry civil enforcement officers, are now too scared to patrol certain City streets after 7pm.

In Beirut, they do patrol the city but don’t really seem to get much done:

From *: Beirut Street Scenes: Chillin'

A LLB certificate is on the way.

Check out these great posts:

• A New “Little Beirut”
• Moving Out of “Beirut”
• Its Not Beirut, There are Good People Here

“Locals Now Call it ‘Beirut’”

So what exactly makes Orchard Park on the northern border of Cambridge in the UK look like Beirut? Well according to Geramine Greer’s report, it is this:

…exhibited “varying styles and quality of design around key features . . . poor quality of build, external gas pipes, poor bricklaying … and buildings erected in the wrong place”.

So that’s Beirut. Well, I’m not going to say much about the statement, I will let the residents of this community speak for themselves:

hattie34:

I’ve never heard it referred to as Beirut either. Perhaps that is how Ms Greers Cambridge pals refer to the area, but I’m sure none of them actually live here…or have ever spent any time here.

bob911:

Beirut? How ridiculous, having lived on Orchard park for nearly two years and having spent time with a number of my neighbours never once have I heard it called Beirut.

Miko222:

I’ve lived in Orchard Park for eighteen months now and I don’t recognise her description of my home. She says locals call it ‘Beirut’: No they don’t – they call it Orchard Park

So Ms. Greer, for your outstanding work in journalism and even greater performance in the use of metaphors, I bestow on you the Looks Like Beirut certificate.

Check out these great posts:

• “It’s Like Living in Beirut!”
• Moving Out of “Beirut”
• Its Not Beirut, There are Good People Here

“Like a Beirut Street Whore”

I really don’t know what to say, though I thought “street whores” looked a like regardless of their geographic location. Anyway, the comment was made by a celebrity blogger commenting on the feud between Demi Moore and Perez Hilton. Here’s the low down:

[Demi] Moore decided to ignite a Twitter fight with Perez for three-week-old tweets like: “Tallulah Willis, 15, dressing like a slut! Look at her boobs!”

You can find the photo in question here. All fair and good in Hollywood I guess; until a blogger on CelebJihad (which apparently is the “Only Celebrity Gossip Site Run by Islamic Extremists”) made the following comment on the story:

Apparently, Demi has taken offense to Hilton’s suggestion that she is a bad mother for dressing her daughter Tallulah like a Beirut street prostitute.

Now, when I first read that I thought to myself, what in the world is this guy on (he calls himself Jibril “Jimmy” Jihad by the way). As I went through the site, I realized that it must be some really good stuff because the writer is completely off the wall. So I’ve decided to save my time and energy – I will not be sending him a LLB Certificate, its just not worth it.

Check out these great posts:

• “It’s Like Living in Beirut!”
• Snowy Mountain in the Morning; Sunny Beach in the Afternoon? Got to be…
• Moving Out of “Beirut”