Across Beirut's coastline, hot summer nights are illuminated by packed nightclubs, where sweaty ravers dance to bass-heavy music until the sun comes up.
Nearby, people from Lebanon and across the world fill up the Gemmayzeh area's pubs and bars on an unusually noisy Monday night. The sound of pop music can be heard on every corner of the narrow streets, as travellers move from place to place trying to find a vacant table.
It's a scene that had more or less disappeared over the past couple of years in the Beirut neighbourhood, which still shows signs of damage by the 2020 port blast that flattened much of the area.
Even with the country still struggling through an economic
crisis and political paralysis, its restaurant and pub owners
now appear to be savouring a few cautious sighs of
relief.
"There are more people than before, but we are not able to predict
how active they will be," said Andy Noaim, a manager at 16MM, a bar
in Gemmayzeh.
Caretaker Tourism Minister Walid Nassar expects more than two
million people to visit Lebanon this summer, the highest figure in
years. Numbers last December had already recovered past the 2019
pre-Covid figure for that low-season part of the year.
Now the country's cash-strapped government and businesses hope the tourists and expatriates will give the ailing economy a much-needed cash boost.
