Adjustment and Survival

The terms adjustment and survival can be applied to the Lebanese situation and how they live their lives. They constantly adjust to different situations and this allows them to survive the long years of the civil war and the fighting. The Lebanese are a people used to compromise because there are seventeen different groups that comprise the population of Lebanon and they all have to compromise and make adjustments in order to survive in one country.

The people develop various ways of coping with all of the years of fighting. Some do it with mind games that they play. Others say they come to know their neighbors very well because of all of the hours they have to spend together during the fighting. Others survive by not looking or by looking the other way. Friedman himself says he does this when confronted with kidnappings and acts...