In Over My Head

2 Weeks into this and it seems like we've been here a longer time. Spent the day with 6 beautiful women wandering the streets of Beirut, from the conglomerated uptown, that used to be the new town, and now looks tired and held together with baling wire, glue and political posters; and the new Hariri downtown that looks like a pastiche of Moorish architecture, costumed hookah charcoal keepers and expensive restaurants and shops. And each time passing through the blurry line that separates them, the ever-present St George and the sight of the Hariri's assassination. This city is a study in opposites, the rich the poor, the new and the blown up, fast cars, stumbling motorbikes,
donkeys and politics, abject hunger and abundance and waste. And always the cats.

Last-night was the ACS gala for the reunion, and it was as over the top as anything I've ever seen. A thousand people; alumni, students, parents, teachers and administration meeting at sunset in a brand new hotel in Rouché Beirut, overlooking the Mediterranean of course, but just off the Corniché, through the station of military and adjacent to the bombed-out buildings. So we were there to celebrate 100 years of the school being agile, adroit, and flexible enough to survive world wars, civil wars and occupations from nations too numerous to name. And we survived, all of us in our own way. Eating too much, drinking too much, crying and laughing and dancing to wild Arabian hip-hop beats.

This place seems to climb inside everyone who has lived here, from those who were here in the 40s and 50s, to people like us here in the 60s and 70s, and the youth, here now, dressed as they are, certain they are moving toward a more democratic place. A secular, spiritual and intellectual democracy, that rises like it always has, out of the smoke and soot, the blood and tears of everyone whose set foot here.

Tomorrow we go to the beach, and bathe in the blue. Tonight, a little lit, I watch stars sparkle through this haze and dream I never left.

Newphotablums - Byblos & BeirutDay7. Please enjoy.

Comments

[Linda]

All I can think of as I read & view the pictures is: AHhhhhhh. By the way you guys looked MAHvalous at the gala. I'm very curious about the responses from the women in your family to all the sights & smells. Pictures of some of the more exotic clothes Leslie is finding would be of interest to at least moi. I have emailed you but was not sure if they reached you....

[David]

Enjoying your pictures & insights, well done.

Bonne Chance,
dc

[Gordon]

Great pics, thanks. Love your white suit, too. :-)