In times of difficulty I do the social equivalent of turtling: zone out and wait for things to sort themselves out. In Beirut trying to pay with two currencies makes me turtle. American dollars and Lebanese lira/pound are the two currencies everyone pays in; the Lebanese lira having been pegged to the U.S. dollar since September 1999 for stability. It makes my brain hurt a little. Exacerbated by being able to read Arabic and listen to the clear words being formed with a very vague idea of what is being said based on the knowledge of classical Arabic word roots. Usually travelling in another country means not knowing much of the language at all but this is frustrating. It's like being on the brink of something and then not. I've decided to come back in the summer, not just because I want to be able to say something other than "La" (no) with a very Punjabi cluck of the tongue (much to my delight; this is a nation that thrives like the Pakistani on tongue clicking for communication), but also because I feel Beirut and I will have unfinished business after this week.
The least of which is a developing addiction to Lebanese food - tabouli, labneh (really light yogurty cream cheese), zaatar (thyme done in a certain way), makdous (stuffed egg plant) and so much more - courtesy my first epic 4 hour brunch in the city, recovering from the night in the comfort of conversation with new friends and old. Because the food is so veg based and nothing is fried or cooked in heavy, industrial grade oil, you feel full without feeling sick. The tea on the other hand has more tannins than I could imagine; without milk, the shock of its strength makes gums clench in apprehension. After brunch we walked down Maar Mikhayel in downtown Beirut in the largely Christian dominated residential area (while we stay in Kantari, the Muslim dominated area; the difference? So far uno: the sonorous Azaan five times a day pooling from the nearby mosque and dos:proliferation of workers party flags ) and I clicked away on the camera, feeding it on architecture old and new. I went a little bit over the top because of this deepening sense that some of the Ottoman style buildings would not be here in the summer when I come back.
In the aftermath of the civil war (1975 - 1990) the Lebanese government undertook reconstruction and rebuilding with a vengeance. The project goes on, the city forested with cranes, CATs and gaping maws of earth welcome you at turns as another foundation is laid for a high rise. The Plan Horizon rebuilding project is led by Solidere, a company that Hariri had shares in and that has monopoly of construction over downtown Beirut. They have an agenda to be modern and to have selective history linkages. Their slogan is "The Ancient City of the Future" and the bit of history they want to link Lebanon to is the Phoenician bit, maritime trade and wearing all that noble purple. There isn't much of an acknowledgement of a civil war or that it's less that ideal to have the city divided into neighbourhoods so cleanly along religious and ethnic lines. That segregation is what doom prophesying bureaucrats in Karachi are always warning against, the possibility that if political parties in Karachi don't watch out, we will become another Beirut. Solidere constructs in waves that takes down the old Ottoman-style mansions, with Venetian windows, arches. There are no green spaces in the city though there is a growing effort to start roof top gardens so you will see palm trees swaying drunkenly from penthouses when you look up. The Ottoman style mansions are beautiful, even in their ruins with lopsided lattice-worked arches. They are the ideal height for a cityscape (not more than four-storey usually) and soft pastel colours. Some areas like Gemmayzeh maintain the buildings, the ceilings high, tall doors and windows and bedroom and corridor floors tiled in the 20x20 decorated tile (the Beirut preference is for shades of ochre and the patterns floral or geometric). They are rapidly disappearing as construction companies take them down to replace them with towering hollow eyed structures. Who is going to occupy them honestly? There aren't enough people forget people who can afford it. Beirut has a population of 2 million approx (last census was done in 1932, they threw up their hands I think at how much displacement was going on); the entire country is not more than 4 million. Who will buy these multi-million dollar apartments? Beirut isn't exactly a commercial hub either from what I can gather. There is a very large UN employment base in the city and banks make a killing as well (home to the region's petrodollars since the oil boom in the Middle East). And of course construction businesses and architects. 'Ancient City of the Future'. Cringe.
I don't see the sense in this kind of self-defeating reconstruction/destruction. The battle over housing (tis a trial not to try and do fieldwork in every trip) is also about memory, not functional residence in isolation. Solidere seems to be using the civil war as an excuse to bulldoze Beirut's local history (a damaging, scarring civil war that lives on in the lifestyles of people regardless) and linking it to selective pieces of history as Beirut is propelled into modernity. Every construction site scaffolding has the phrase "modern luxurious living" in some form or the other. The walls of the city carry graffiti from some civil society bodies including groups of architects, protesting against this conversion to a soulless Dubai but as with Karachi when real estate booms, you can't go back. It is a seller's market.
We walked through the former Green Line that was once the city's battle line (though the fighting took place everywhere) where Solidere attempts to make a nod to the divisions in the city by developing the 'Garden of Forgiveness' project. The site is bounded by building on 3 sides and a busy main road on the fourth. It is easy to miss out the Roman ruins that have halted construction on the site. Six marred columns rise in the city lights on their plinths next to the walkway which two men lean against puffing smoke rings into the night. The buzz of the traffic is loud and the remains of the Roman city of Berytus look hilariously mutinous in modern Beirut. If the columns were children, they would be standing with arms akimbo.
We walk on to prepare for Beirut: Nightlife, round two.
The least of which is a developing addiction to Lebanese food - tabouli, labneh (really light yogurty cream cheese), zaatar (thyme done in a certain way), makdous (stuffed egg plant) and so much more - courtesy my first epic 4 hour brunch in the city, recovering from the night in the comfort of conversation with new friends and old. Because the food is so veg based and nothing is fried or cooked in heavy, industrial grade oil, you feel full without feeling sick. The tea on the other hand has more tannins than I could imagine; without milk, the shock of its strength makes gums clench in apprehension. After brunch we walked down Maar Mikhayel in downtown Beirut in the largely Christian dominated residential area (while we stay in Kantari, the Muslim dominated area; the difference? So far uno: the sonorous Azaan five times a day pooling from the nearby mosque and dos:proliferation of workers party flags ) and I clicked away on the camera, feeding it on architecture old and new. I went a little bit over the top because of this deepening sense that some of the Ottoman style buildings would not be here in the summer when I come back.
In the aftermath of the civil war (1975 - 1990) the Lebanese government undertook reconstruction and rebuilding with a vengeance. The project goes on, the city forested with cranes, CATs and gaping maws of earth welcome you at turns as another foundation is laid for a high rise. The Plan Horizon rebuilding project is led by Solidere, a company that Hariri had shares in and that has monopoly of construction over downtown Beirut. They have an agenda to be modern and to have selective history linkages. Their slogan is "The Ancient City of the Future" and the bit of history they want to link Lebanon to is the Phoenician bit, maritime trade and wearing all that noble purple. There isn't much of an acknowledgement of a civil war or that it's less that ideal to have the city divided into neighbourhoods so cleanly along religious and ethnic lines. That segregation is what doom prophesying bureaucrats in Karachi are always warning against, the possibility that if political parties in Karachi don't watch out, we will become another Beirut. Solidere constructs in waves that takes down the old Ottoman-style mansions, with Venetian windows, arches. There are no green spaces in the city though there is a growing effort to start roof top gardens so you will see palm trees swaying drunkenly from penthouses when you look up. The Ottoman style mansions are beautiful, even in their ruins with lopsided lattice-worked arches. They are the ideal height for a cityscape (not more than four-storey usually) and soft pastel colours. Some areas like Gemmayzeh maintain the buildings, the ceilings high, tall doors and windows and bedroom and corridor floors tiled in the 20x20 decorated tile (the Beirut preference is for shades of ochre and the patterns floral or geometric). They are rapidly disappearing as construction companies take them down to replace them with towering hollow eyed structures. Who is going to occupy them honestly? There aren't enough people forget people who can afford it. Beirut has a population of 2 million approx (last census was done in 1932, they threw up their hands I think at how much displacement was going on); the entire country is not more than 4 million. Who will buy these multi-million dollar apartments? Beirut isn't exactly a commercial hub either from what I can gather. There is a very large UN employment base in the city and banks make a killing as well (home to the region's petrodollars since the oil boom in the Middle East). And of course construction businesses and architects. 'Ancient City of the Future'. Cringe.
I don't see the sense in this kind of self-defeating reconstruction/destruction. The battle over housing (tis a trial not to try and do fieldwork in every trip) is also about memory, not functional residence in isolation. Solidere seems to be using the civil war as an excuse to bulldoze Beirut's local history (a damaging, scarring civil war that lives on in the lifestyles of people regardless) and linking it to selective pieces of history as Beirut is propelled into modernity. Every construction site scaffolding has the phrase "modern luxurious living" in some form or the other. The walls of the city carry graffiti from some civil society bodies including groups of architects, protesting against this conversion to a soulless Dubai but as with Karachi when real estate booms, you can't go back. It is a seller's market.
We walked through the former Green Line that was once the city's battle line (though the fighting took place everywhere) where Solidere attempts to make a nod to the divisions in the city by developing the 'Garden of Forgiveness' project. The site is bounded by building on 3 sides and a busy main road on the fourth. It is easy to miss out the Roman ruins that have halted construction on the site. Six marred columns rise in the city lights on their plinths next to the walkway which two men lean against puffing smoke rings into the night. The buzz of the traffic is loud and the remains of the Roman city of Berytus look hilariously mutinous in modern Beirut. If the columns were children, they would be standing with arms akimbo.
We walk on to prepare for Beirut: Nightlife, round two.
1 comment:
No turtling you. Really feel I'm there M. Keep on walking and writing. Can happily wait for pics.
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