One of the miracles that Lebanese perform is the following: They change the universal time table. And they do it easily. For them/us, 5 minutes=50 minutes, 10 minutes=1 hour and 32 minutes, Monday=Wednesday afternoon, next week= varies between next month and the next millennium. There are no mathematical rules to follow and you don't have to hold a calculator in your hand to expect what you should be expecting. For normal people like me, who think of themselves as a know-how-the-Lebanese-do-their-business shop owner, I get always the wrong answer. I am failing the "special time table 101 course" and I am always repeating it. Yep, I was promised a coffee supply by the afternoon (today is Monday, right?), instead I got a new promise for Wednesday followed by my favorite business word "Inshallah".
I woke up at 5:30 AM, like a normal those-who-are-living-in-Lebanon-in-shitty-times-like-these-creatures, at the sound of bombs. All TV stations showing their non creative report: "Now, another Israeli air raid on Dahieh". They/we should be more creative than that, like, I don't know: "Olmert's grumpy morning" or "Today, I am in a generous mood, says Peretz" or even "How about a wake up call at 5:30?" Yes, it is just a game for them, a losing game anyhow.

• Toufic, the son of Abou Toufic, came to order two kilograms of coffee for his father. I know Toufic since he was 12. Now he is a 20 years old soldier in the Lebanese army. He parked half his jeep on the sidewalk (no! The other half is on the street) and walked in proudly. When I asked where he is stationed, he answered with this inseparable smile of his: "3 days in Awkar, near the American consulate, and 3 days in Saida. This means I shit in my pants 3 days a week."
• A client rushed in to order some coffee. After the usual "Kifak" (how are you), he replied that his uncle died two days ago from an Israeli air raid on Bint Jbeil. In fact, he used the sacred word of "martyr". He is going to Saida to recover his uncle's body for a proper funeral in Beirut.
• A group of university students passed by. Attached on their t-shirts a sign with the words "Mouwatinoun" (citizens), a local NGO formed two days after the beginning of the war. A young girl, with the help of two of her friends started the group doing sandwiches of Arabic bread and Picon cheese and distributing them to displaced families. Now "Mouwatinoun" is a group of more than a hundred members responsible of three schools and more than two hundred displaced families.
• A joke to ease the tension told shyly by one member of the "Mouwatinoun" group: Two guys on a motorcycle were speeding heading outside Dahieh showing the V (victory) sign. A man asked them: "Hey, did we win the war?" They answered: "No, there are still only two standing buildings left".
• A small competition among a dozen of my regulars was held in Cafe Younes to choose the most horrible war picture. And the winner was: The famous picture taken of Israeli children writing on the army missiles: From the children of Israel to the children of Lebanon.

Attached: Two clients with their water gallons supply.