Middle East - Anthony Ham [353]
Highlights include some beautifully observed Phoenician marble statues of baby boys (from Echmoun, 5th century BC), lovely 3rd- and 4th-century AD mosaics, Byzantine gold jewellery (found in a jar under the floor of a villa in Beirut) and the famous, much-photographed Phoenician gilded bronze figurines from Byblos (Click here). A floor plan is distributed free with tickets, or you can opt for a more informative written guide (LL15,000) from the gift shop.
The museum screens a fascinating 12-minute documentary in its theatrette (ground fl; every hr 9am-4pm) in English hourly or French on demand, detailing how curators saved the collection during the civil war and subsequently restored it to its former glory.
To get to the museum, walk 15 minutes south from Sodeco Sq along Rue de Damas, or hail a service taxi and ask for the Musée or the Hippodrome.
Hamra & Ras Beirut
Though not as impossibly hip as Achrafiye and Gemmayzeh, the university hubs of Hamra and Ras Beirut are home to hordes of students, giving the area a cheap and cheerful charm. You’ll find good-value shopping opportunities strung along Rue Hamra, while Rue Bliss is home to lots of good bookshops and 24-hour cafés: perfect for a nargileh along with your Nietzsche.
AMERICAN UNIVERSITY OF BEIRUT (AUB)
One of the Middle East’s most prestigious universities, the AUB is spread over 28 calm and tree-filled hectares, an oasis in the heart of a fume-filled city. Its AUB museum (Map; 340 549; http://ddc.aub.edu.lb/projects/museum; AUB campus, Ras Beirut; admission free; 10am-4pm Mon-Fri, except university & public holidays), just inside the university’s main gate, is well worth a look. It was founded in 1868, making it one of the oldest museums in the Middle East. On display is a collection of Lebanese and Middle Eastern artefacts dating back to the early Stone Age, a fine collection of Phoenician glass and Arab coins from as early as the 5th century BC, and a large collection of pottery dating back to 3000 BC.
Downtown
In Beirut’s swinging ’60s heyday, a visit to Beirut’s central Downtown district, filled with gorgeous Ottoman-era architectural gems, was akin to a leisurely stroll along Paris’s Left Bank. By the 1980s, it had become the horrific, decimated centre of a protracted civil war; during the 1990s, it proved the focus of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri’s colossally ambitious rebuilding program.
Today, Downtown’s streets are surreally, spotlessly clean and traffic-free, and the whole area beautiful and impressive, though some locals suggest it lacks a little soul. Though in happier times Downtown could even have been described as touristy, much of the area is currently cordoned off to traffic (due to the ever-present threat of political assassinations and terrorism) by rolls of barbed wire and carefully stationed tanks; expect your bags to be searched as you enter.
While strolling Downtown’s nevertheless quiet, soothing streets, don’t miss the Al-Omari Mosque (Map), built in the 12th century as the Church of John the Baptist of the Knights Hospitaller and converted by the Mamluks into a mosque in 1291, and the new, Blue Mosque–like Mohammed al-Amin Mosque (Map), in which slain prime minister Rafiq Hariri is buried. Beside the Mohammed al-Amin Mosque, St George’s Cathedral (Map; 561 980; services 7.15am & 6.30pm Mon-Thu & Sat, 9am & 11am Sun) is a Maronite church dating from the Crusades.
Worth exploring, too, are the magnificently restored Roman baths (Map), the cardo maximus (Map) and the Grand Serail (Map), a majestic Ottoman-era building now housing government offices.
For a spot of shopping, head to the nearby Saifi Village (Map; 10am-7pm Mon-Sat, late night shopping Thu), a cute, restored district filled with arts, crafts and clothing boutiques. On Saturdays Souq el-Tayeb (Map; 03-340 198; www.souqaltayeb.com;