This morning I am considerably tired I think. I think it might be that candle, or the midnight lamp, or over-enthusiastic daytime weekend sleeping, or the sluggish pace at which this loads- perhaps it’s the cumbersome name trying to squeeze through the telecommunications system. Sorry about that. I’ve been attempting to accumulate basic bits of Arabic, but it’s quite hard, and I rarely remember things the first time. This Dutch Ex Pat, propping up the bar also at the Torino Express, she had me two words for the day, which were the words for today and tomorrow, but overnight it seems they’ve slipped away. Obsolete. Trying to learn the alphabet and numbers from numberplates of cars. That’s not going to get me vary far, but it passes the time.
How fast the weeks seemed to pass at home, and how long this one just gone seems to have lasted. Last nightwe went to this seaside cafe, Elena and I, in Manara, West Beirut, kind of on the corner, by a rickety, and decidedly picturesque funfair, and a communist looking swimming pool. There was one man, he looked quite large, in the big buccaneer boat swing. Anyone been to the funfair in Porthcawl? This one’s worse and therefore better, at the same time. There has been some interesting driving. We were pulled up to reverse into a space on the Corniche nearby, indicating, as you do, and this 4×4 crosses into the space behind us, and stops and 2 guys get out of the driver and passenger doors. the car isn’t parked as such, just stopped, the angle to the curb rakish I’m sure it could be said. Your man the passenger, discreetly shielding his modesty behind the door of the fuck off chelsea tractor, really needs to pee it seems, and does so with absolute composure. I suppose waiting to park there if they pulled off was out of the question. We drive around, marveling at the anarchistic approach to junctions and general traffic rules, and Elena lets me beep the horn, senselessly, emphatically, like a small child. There was a queue of traffic Downtown, on the edge of the Hizbollah occupied new centre that Hariri was rebuilding before he was murdered, and it was meet, it seemed, to beep. This was a beepable situation. So a lot of people started to beep. And we crawl onwards down the hill. There’s a priest and a couple of nuns getting out of a smart motor, ah, just outside a church… Wait, is it a wedding…? it might just be so, the girls dressed up for more than Church surely, and a lot of nice suits around… the cars that had been holding it up move away and traffic flows once again freely. We move off in a hail of beeping, relief, approval, congratulation, all so conveniently and simply expressed.
Labneh is cheese-yoghurt. It’s nice. You can make it at home kids, with some yoghurt and a pillow. You put the yoghurt in the pillow, hang it up over night to let some of the liquid drain out, et voila. with pitta and oil and a bit of salt. yum.
The 1967 Club, I think that’s what it’s called, is a communist bar in Gemayze, which is where we seem to go out most, a bit of a social focal point, over in East Beirut especially, i haven’t been to West much yet, especially since the centre’s been occupied. It was founded in the eponymous year by a group of left-leaning intellectuals, to make a democratic space free of traditional confessional and sectarian political divisions. The people there are cool, and it has a kind of lived in feel, pot of toothbrushes in the bathroom, occasional snacks on the house, ‘Come on Eileen’ by Dexys Midnight Runners… which has haunted me all the way from Reflex, where you’ve got to expect it really, all the way to Bar social the previous night , to the Communist, as we like to call it.
On Friday there was a great party on the roof terrace of this house in Gemayze too. There was ‘a shadow’. Lots of people ‘had shadows’. This is elena-ese. I’m not sure what it means, but I’m almost certain that it’s true. A view of the enormous illuminated mosque in the occupied centre, looking out over to the west. An Enormous bottle of Johnny Walker Red. A lot of Italians and French and Spanish people some of whom seemed to be partying here their last, and were doing so with feeling. I had a long conversation about form and content with the Middle East correspondent for Italian Vanity Fair. And a girl with crazy -read blue- eyes, when when she knew I was English, sang the praises of…. guess who? Richard Lion Heart- Richard Coeur de Leon, and how much she admired his democratising time in Jerusalem especially. (!-?) And shared Big Lebowski enthusiasm with Isabelle the French pianist. When there was only gin and red wine left, and I’d had enough of both, I wove my way home, via a polite, but ever so serious army checkpoint.
On Wednesday we drove down to Nabatiye for the celebration to end one of Elena’s projects, in Shia area badly affected by the 2006 war. The hall had been sound insulated to make performance possible over the echo. Kids song and dance inpraise of their mothers. Equipment for a nearby orphanage. Elena moved to tears by the head of the school’s praise of her work and Project Manager, and the gifts from the institution and the children. Both big light airy buildings tremendously solid, left me with a sense of their ultimate fragility.
The beach- north past the ancient Phonecian city of Byblos. like driving along the costa del sol, leaving Beirut. All looks the same, but clears out eventually and you can se the hills. Hazy and windy, and I’m the only one in the water. Which suits me fine, as it is opaline blue and clear and warm and choppy over the big white rocks. Like swimming in Light. so i stay in a long while.
That’s my brother!
Beirut sounds very intriguing, Dan. I think mum was a bit overzealous about trying to stop you going. Love t’see your next snippet of Lebanon. The dog’s sitting next to me on the sofa and looks positively worn out by your literary antics!
See you soon I hope, brother.
George.