Before we left the village, we were invited by some of the elders to talk over mint tea and Shisha pipes.

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Finally, sit back and try a flavoured shisha or Arabic coffee.

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Traditional shisha water pipes are also found in many coffee shops.

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Looking a little like a Marrakesh riad transplanted to Austria, Arte Vida has a lantern-lit communal salon and a Moorish garden replete with tent and shisha pipes.

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In addition to the scores of restaurants that line the main thoroughfare, ranging from Iraqi food to flavoured tobacco shisha to Haagen Daaz ice cream, the area is a functioning market.

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In search of alternative African heroes who could restore African pride, I settled down for a shisha and whisky the other night to watch the Champions League Football Final.

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Men sit in plastic chairs puffing on shisha pipes.

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Stick around after your meal to watch either football or Lebanese music videos (it is only ever one of these programs) on the giant projector screen on the wall, accompanied by mint tea and a shisha.

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It may have been built to look old, but the souq is still a top spot for an evening out, wandering in and out of warmly-lit stalls and galleries selling everything from jewellery to spices, past groups of men smoking shisha and sipping mint tea.

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Once you have shopped within a whisker of your luggage allowance, grab a Lebanese mezze lunch outdoors at Cafe Layali Zaman on the Corniche (look for the "Baguette" sign), where the hummus is perfectly garlicky, the baba ganoush a smoky, aubergine dream and you might choose to accompany your Arabic coffee with a sweet-scented shisha water-pipe.

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