“This is Lebanon. Even if you’re poor, you have to seem rich.”

AFP on extravagant spending in Ramadan:

the month of Ramadan has become an occasion for extravagant spending on everything from lavish evening meals to crystal bowls to cosmetic surgery in Lebanon, a country famed for its “see and be seen” attitude [...] Prominent Beirut families and socialites compete over who can host the most lavish iftars, and night-long feasts are not uncommon, often landing on the pages of glossy magazines.

I don’t know what it is about religious occasions that were originally intended to be ascetic affairs. Whether It’s Christmas, Easter or Ramadan, it suddenly becomes about who can get the most expensive gifts and buy the most expensive meals..