The Beginning of a Long Summer--SH

My family and I were strolling down the Champs-Elysées looking at all the crowds that poured into Paris to watch the final game in the world cup. The weather in Paris was perfect for a short walk in the city, not too windy or too sunny. Everybody expected France to win and Paris was preparing for the big celebration. It was just like the fourth of July. The colors red, white and blue were everywhere. Unfortunately, France lost the finals and Paris had a grim face on this sunny summer day. The Champs Elysees were not that fun in an ambiance of disappointment and we decided to head back to the hotel, and leave to London.

We packed our bags and loaded them into the car and went to the train station heading back for London which we left few days ago to attend the world cup finals among French supporters. On our way to the train station my father received a phone call from one of his business partners. They talked for a while before my father hung up the phone and announced the news, "Feto Hezbollah 3ala Israel 2o 2atalo sab3a commandos, 2o khatafou tneen (Hezbollah entered Israel and killed seven Israeli commandos and kidnapped two)". As usual, we didn't think much of the situation, and took it very lightly because operations like these were frequent in Lebanon.

We arrived at the station and unloaded our luggage onto three carts. We checked into the lounge and waited for our train to take us under the English Channel to London. It has not been 30 minutes before we had forgotten about the news. I was too caught up playing on my PSP (Play Station Portable) to think about anything. Our train finally arrived. We loaded our bags onto the train and we were off to London. We were all beat when we arrived, and on top of that we couldn't get adjoining rooms, so me and my sister had to sleep the room in front of our parents' room. We finally got into our hotel rooms and we slept immediately. Our plane was to leave at 9:00 in morning on Thursday June the 15th which was the next day. I closed my eyes and couldn't remember anything till the next morning.

The phone rang; I expected it the call to be a wake up call from my mother telling me to get ready for our flight. I answered the phone still trying to open my eyes completely.

"2allo (hello)".

"2allo Souhail (hello Souhail)?"

"2e (yeah)".

"Come to my room for breakfast".

"Eh, Ok".

I looked at my watch. It was 12:30. Confused, I asked my mother, "Mom?"

"Eh habibi (yes honey)".

"Aren't we late for our flight?"

She paused a little, and during that short pause I got a bad feeling, I knew something was wrong, I knew my mom too well. She finally answered, "Just come to my room".

"Ok mom".

I put down the phone and woke up my sister, who was still sleeping. I looked out the window. The sky was very gloomy, and it was really cold. I got dressed and walked over to my parents' room. The door was open so I walked in.

I saw my parents staring at the T.V., I continued further into the room so I could get a clear look at the T.V., and when I did I was mortified. I froze, and a rush of fear and confusion hit me. We all just sat there watching the T.V. as our country was being bombed. I was so confused. I kept hoping it was a different country, but when I read the subtitles it said Beirut, Hariri International Airport. The images on the screen of T.V. looked like it was the war in Iraq all over again. I started to feel sick, and my stomach began to ache.

After staring for ten minutes, I finally got the drive to ask what was going on. My mother explained how Israel was responding to Hezbollah's operation. The airport was shut down because the runways were bombed, so we were stuck in London. From that moment, I knew this was only the beginning of a long summer. Before that day I used to think cars were really "cool", and I always imagined Lebanon at war, and I would be hero and save Lebanon. But from that horrible summer I learned an important lesson, "be careful for what you wish for".