Rahbani's History Repeating Itself
The following is a translation of Rahbani's "History Repeating Itself. However, to really understand it, and to feel the saddening humor behind it, you do have to listen to it in Arabic. There are phrases that cannot be translated, and for some of these, I have left them "as is". Besides that, this is basically a work in progress ... so let me know if things should have been translated differently.
History Repeating ItselfThey say, that at times, history repeats itself. But our history, I don't know why, always repeats itself.
Now it does happen at times that history repeats itself. But our history, I don't know ... I don't know why, it always does repeat itself. And it has become sick (Oo balashet til3i nafso)
And if it keeps on getting sick, our history will throw up.
I know that a long time ago, Fakhredin was content with Balouneh and it grew, today Kamel El-Ass3ad is there and it is shrinking. And history repeats itself, and is becoming sick of itself.
Our history is unbelievable. It always repeats itself. But for how long?
Till when will it keep repeating itself? Maybe our history has been punished - they've given him a 100 lines, they've given him a sentence to write out a 100 times. A government of heros, a national unity government, national peace, peace between the country's zuama.
He has to write it a 100 times. Our history is unfortunate (m3atar). He begins to say something else, he starts to do something different, and then he just begins to repeat himself.
Whenever the oppressed in Lebanon try to come together, they find a hundred ways to cluster, the Muslims alone, the Christians alone. So these unfortunate are influenced by the game, and history repeats itself.
Yaami if history is repeating for us, tell him thanks but that we've memorized it. We always insult them, and everyone joins against them, but when the elections come, we have to run and catch people so they don't vote for them. And we can't get everyone, people always slip out to vote for them, and they get reelected.
The Lebanese have a very special talent - they forget. They always forget, and what can history do if they forget? So history begins to repeat itself.
Every time a new hero arrives, these oppressed come up from their dark corners, they look at him, and say this is him, they run towards him, and have the smallest hope. Then, he either goes up to Bkirke, or goes to Aramoun. And history repeats itself.
We always get a strong hero, and is all for the people's needs, the poor leave their clothes behind and follow him. Again they follow him. And then news comes out that he is embezzling from some place, or that he has secret agreements.
And this, it's not that its dissapointing, it's not that its surprising or shocking. No, no because the people are used to the shocks. This has actually become boring. It is tiring. And history repeats itself, and still hasn't gotten bored. It hasn't become tired. I don't know how he has the patience to repeat himself this much.
Everytime somethings comes up that might spart a revolution, a church burns, a mosque is attacked, and the strings of ignorance are unraveled, and people take advantage of what they can, and George grabs Mohamad, and Ali attacks John. And they become a team, and someone prophecizes, and there is always someone who prophecizes that "We are all brothers".
And history repeats itself.
Damn it. As if it has nothing else to do. The deprived in Lebanon need only a quarter of an hour. They only need a quarter of an hour to meet somewhere, without anyone noticing them, without anyone knowing that they had met, without anyone talking to them, without anyone telling them what they should do. They only have to meet once. Meet. Look at each other, at each other's clothes to see that they are the same. To see that poverty is the same. That poverty has no religion. And that the religion of poverty is poverty. To see that the caloused hands are all the same. But history repeats itself, and they have never met, not even once.
The history of 6 and 6 repeated (
siti wa siti m'karrar) never let them meet, since it repeats itself so much. Our history is 6 and 6 repeated.
At the end of every school year, we have a group of students who know French history, and another group who know Arab history. And no one who knows Lebanese history. And Lebanese history, at the end of every school year, repeats itself. When students revise before the exam, they revise others.
Some french history, others arab history, and our history itself.
Every time a war starts in Lebanon, sectarianism comes in and transforms it. Some go with this transformed war, and others don't. And there are people, like us, who complain that sectarianism is muddling the true war. And there are people who listen to this, and are convinced, and nod their heads and say you are right. And they are sorry. And history repeats itself.
Ya akhol shliteh ya tarikhna.Ya akhol shliteh ya tarikhna, I know all our zuama are part of you (
dakhlin feek). And all of us are part of you.
Bas ya akhol shliteh ya tarikhna. Where are you from? Wlek what's your nationality. What are the days that pass through you?
Bas lek, look at me good, I'm talking to you. There isn't a person who doesn't understand, there are people who take time to understand, sometimes he takes a very long time, but then he does understand. And there isn't a nation who won't come around. There are people who take a long time to come around. At times they'll take a very long time, as much as we have, but eventually they will finally wake up.
Rahbani
Based on a discussion at
Lebanese Bloggers, that started with Hassan's posts on Rahbani, I have decided to start translating some of Ziad Rahbani's early radio shows. The first one that will be posted soon is "History Repeating Itself".
Politics Googlized?
I had to mention this: go to
Google and type "young syrians".
Look at the
Did you mean: option at the top of the page ...
A Moment's Glory
"There is nothing in it for me here" he mumbled. She just looked at him, then focused on the road again. "I'm bored. I feel useless." He plays with the radio controls, switching through the different stations, settling on each for less than a second. "You know, I spent my life working towards a goal, and now I see that it was all a lie. This wasn't the right path."
She turned off the radio and just sped along the road. There was no one else, and all they raced was the soothing wind. "So why don't you leave?"
"Leave? Go where?"
"Anywhere else." She slows down and takes the curve. "Anywhere else. You have been complaining ever since you graduated. This is what this area has to offer. You knew that. I knew that. I know your work is boring you. I know that you can achieve much greater things. But you can't keep complaining."
"What else is there to do?"
She turned the radio back on. Conversations like this weren't meant to end. Questions were asked and suggestions were given, but it was anyone's guess to what was the right way. The Right Way. What the hell was that supposed to mean anyway?
"Listen" he said. She was puzzled, and then picked up Peter Gabriel's song on the radio.
Still loving what's gone
Said life carries on...
Carries on and on and on...
And on
The news that truely shocks
is the empty, empty page
While the final rattle rocks
Its empty, empty cage...
And I can't handle this
I grieve...
For you
"I can't leave." he continues. "I can't leave her alone."
She held his hand. His mother had died several years ago. Although he never directly discussed it, she knew he would never get over that. He was caught on one side of a rift too large for him to really ever cross.
They reached the end of the road, and parked the car. He slowly opened the door, and pulled himself out, walking to the edge.
He could see the entire city from this spot. The lights flickered, and a thin fog waved over the buildings and the roads. She followed him out of the car. He had a small smile on his face. "No matter what happens, no matter if things don't go the way I want to, I know that this is my city. This is my home."
He stared on at nothing in particular. His rythmic breathing complemented the throbbing trees as they swayed in the wind, and his eyes flittered around, trying to make the city whole. He watched on, as did she. This was his home. This was his world.
In this moment, nothing else really mattered.
Lebanon, and its truth
So ... I was discussing some Rahbani with my friend, and he has posted some of his thoughts at the
Lebanese Bloggers.I'm also going to paste the poem he has here. If only the Lebanese can do this. We need a leader. I have had enough with our political followers, who adhere to nothing more than their own short-sighted goals. We need a new
thinker.
In Remembrance of Loose Cannons
Thursday 2nd June 2005, by Doug Soderstrom
AW yes,
To be an honest human being,
Honest with one’s self,
Honest with God,
Honest with others.
Enough of,
Being an organizational man,
A team player,
A status-quo oriented,
Whatever you say boss,
Yes I’ll kiss your ass,
Anytime you want,
Kind of guy.
What the world does not need,
Is another bunch of,
Scum-sucking sycophants,
Back-slapping toads,
Submissive slaves,
Grinning fools,
Yes men,
Truckling turds,
Groveling,
Boot-licking,
Brown-nosing,
Stooges,
Cowering,
Cringing,
Kowtowing,
Ingratiating goons,
Submissive,
Obsequious,
Sniveling,
Wheedling,
Well-wishers,
Mealy-mouthed,
Mortimers,
Fawning,
Groveling,
Partisan flunkies,
Ass-kissing,
Good old boy,
Government lackeys.
Enough of that shit!
To hell with that kind of life,
No more being just another,
Damn wage slave!
However,
What the world does need is more,
Whistle-blowers,
Free-thinkers,
Iconoclasts,
Infidels,
Insubordinates,
Doubting Thomases,
Devil’s advocates,
Scoffers,
Rebels,
Recalcitrant radicals,
Reprobates,
Revolutionaries,
Iconoclasts,
Individualists,
Insurgents,
Insurrectionists,
Liberals,
Mutinous mugwumps,
Liberators,
Emancipators,
Seditious subversives,
Scalawags,
Mavericks.
People who,
Quite frankly,
Don’t give a good damn,
About anything,
Except what is right.
What the world needs,
Is a few more,
Leo Tolstoys,
Henry David Thoreaus,
Martin Luther Kings,
Mohandas Gandhis,
Bob Dylans,
Jesus Christs,
A few more,
Loose cannons.
That’s what the world needs!
Doug Soderstrom, Ph.D. May 14, 2005
War Generation
It wears off they say. Time will make you change, they prophetize. The elders talk about the days long gone, wistfully churning tales about fortunes and happiness, looking down at their progeny with a deterring sadness melted with youthful love. These children can reach the skies they claim. But they know.
They know that we have been born in wars.
They know the lives some of us have lived altered the cliché concept of "tomorrow".
They know because they were born in wars too.
War has its role in defining us.
I once crossed the line and asked someone close how she "found the war". She said nothing. I wonder if she will ever really overcome it.
People tell us that we can become great. That our country can soar around the world and back. I wait for that day anxiously, because I want to be there when it arrives. But typing this, I have a grudgingly frustating itch that this day will not surface.
Do the endless wars explain the Middle East? They are one of the reasons that we are the way we are. How many wars have been fought on our lands, for how many years/decades/centuries?
In the end, people want to survive. To do that in a war, you need someone to protect you. This explains our politics. This explains our behavior. This explains our corruption, our semi-selfishness, our acceptance of what is.
There are those who don't understand what war is. They see it as glorious. To them, war has a just cause. This can be seen in the attitudes, the speeches, and even the arts. Look at a poem that was writtedn just before WWI.
The Soldier
If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam;
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.
And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.
--Rupert Brooke
And look at the difference in a poem written during it.
Dulce Et Decorum Est
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.
GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum estPro patria mori*.
--Wilfred Owen
War is not something you will understand until you see its effect. Dulce est decorum est pro patria more* is used as bait for those who have enjoyed the colors of peace. People advertise the heroism of war, the courage it needs to join a war, the lasting effects of justice due to war. Even today, movies are made that attempt to exonerate war from it destruction, and add to it the flame that makes it worthy of losing your life too.
But it is the effect of war that really matters ...
... and the effect will not be forgotten. We are the war generation. My parents were a war generation. My grandparents were also a war generation. They lived it.
This is our broken wing. We cannot soar because of war. We can sit and talk about how things
can be better, how they
should be better, how we can all
work to make them better, but until the mentality of war is lifted from future generations, things
will not be better.
Will this happen? I hope so.
But for today, all we can do is confront its effect. Today, we must do our best to prevent the future from glorifying war.
No more.
------------------------------------------
*Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori: It is sweet and right to die for your country.
Simple Delights
This was taken at Santa Monica, LA several months ago. It is a view I wouldn't mind waking up to ...
11 years later ...
Note to the politically intense: I make alot of sweeping generalizations below. Alot. So don't hang on every word ...I was 13 when my family first moved back to Lebanon in 1994. We had only gone back a few times before, and even then, it was only for several weeks. Life had changed drastically for us when we first went back, and it wasn't only the move. My childhood had been spent with people who came from around the world - USA, England, Scotland, France, Bolivia, Canada, India, Pakistan, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Nigeria, South Africa, Belgium, Russia ... and a fundamental aspect of the early years of education was looking past the differences.
I am not going to say that it was perfect. There was racism. There was hatred. There was antagonism. But this was a minority.
In 1994, we had arrived in a country that had just recently come out of a war, which I did not know much about besides what you hear and read. But this is never the same as living it. I had arrived in a time where the country was still unstable (not that it has actually stabilized now), where my grandmother would talk about the "ayem" (good old days), my mother would worry about whether she had taken the right decision, the electricity would barely be available for 6 hours. We were introduced to the now bland concept of the generator, the water citern, and the continuously disconnecting phone line. I became the electrical expert of the family, dealing with issues that had before been taken for granted. We moved into schools, my brother into AUB, and began to really live in Lebanon.
One of my first memories there is coming back home on a bus (yes, those blue ones) from Mezraa to Antelias. Two soldiers came on, and as they looked for free seats, began asking the passengers "Are you with Aoun or Geagea?" and getting the different answers, with the inevitable angry retort. I was relieved at the time that they did not pass by me. But this was nothing compared to learning how to sense the uneasiness some people can have towards entire sects. I spent a year in a school in Ain Aar (somewhere past Rabieh), and continued the rest in its branch in Ras Beirut. Discussions varied. There was hatred. There was antagonism. But this was not a minority.
What's worse is that it was hard to keep these things from rubbing off ...
Now, 11 years later, not much has really changed. 11 years. 11 years is a long time. Empires have been broken in fewer years. 11 years later, the discussion is still about that sect, and this sect, Aoun and Geagea, Jumblatt, Hariri, Berri, etc. It is still about the zuama who decide our fate. It is still about the people who blindly follow these leaders who had led them into war, led them out, and who have not changed.
It is still painful to watch.
March 14 came and went. How many of us actually believed that things were going to change? It's nice to speak about that day, where the image of the guy holding the cross and the Kur'an was viewed around the world. How many of us really believed that the government would actually advance, that our semi-feudalistic community would actually develop? March 14 has now become a day that people look back on and use to blame to the politicians for the current state.
Look, they say. We united. You destroyed.
Just last week, a friend told me that the shape and form of a government reflects its people, and I disagreed with him. I am not so sure anymore. We are to blame for March 14, because it didn't really exist. When March 14 happened, another friend smiled and said "We beat them." My answer was simple: We didn't beat them (and he meant Hezbollah) if you are still thinking in we and they. He replied (and he wasn't the only one) "They are the ones who started flexing their muscles first."
11 years. I finished school, graduated from AUB, and have just finished my MS. 11 years later, we are still waiting for others to save us, and still look for a scapegoat to blame our problems on. Why did March 14 fail? Was it really our politicians who destroyed it?
Some will say yes. They will point to the elections. I will point to a 6 year old girl I saw on TV who was so adamant on supporting candidate X because, as she said, he is "za3eemna".
Some will point to Berri being reelected. I will point to his supporters who went out shooting their guns. (I was in Zkak el blat at the time) (There were also LF supporters when Geagea was released, or the skirmish between LF and Amal, LF and Franjieh's supporters, etc.)
Some will point to Franjieh, Geagea, Aoun, Jumblatt, Nasrallah, Hariri ... but behind every person there is a following. We voted for a person, and not for his politics. I was in Lebanon during the elections, and the raging colors would have looked like some basketball match to the less informed. Ask someone why he is voting for X, and he would look at you with a surprised look "aren't you?" I was in the US during their elections: Ask someone here why they voted for Bush or for Kerry, and they would give (good or bad, that is besides the point) reasons.
What does it mean when someone you respect for various reasons tells you that he will work for his sect before his country? Or a manager who looks to hire someone from a certain sect?
We destroyed March 14. We attibute different opinions to different sects. We discuss sports in terms of sects. We watch TV, and think of it as a sect. We breathe in and are intoxicated by these "sects" and then go on and blame our politicians, when in fact they are just playing to the audience ... We talk about change, but are afraid of letting the "other sect" have more power. We want a democracy, but we want "our sect" to be on top. We want justice, but won't accept it when it incriminates one of our own.
This (among some other fundamental issues, such as the judiciary) is one of the evils of our society.
It is not ok to
just tolerate the fact that your neighbor is Maronite, or Sunni, or Shiite, or Druze.
It is not ok to be
friends with someone and then to discuss him/her in terms of his sect.
It is not ok to be
afraid of the other sects, because of our own ignorance of people outside our own community.
It is not ok to say that if that sect behaved, Lebanon would become better.
It is not ok to say that you are
secularist and then discuss the political arena in terms of sects.
It is not ok, even to the faintest degree, to
believe that your sect is on a higher moral ground.
Free
Taken in LA, on Venice Beach a few days ago ...
Lebanon's Photomosaic
Ramzi, from
Ramzi's Blah Blah came up with a mosaic of the
Lebanese Flag.
Christopher Walken for President?
Is this for real?
Once again ... مسلسل التفجيرات
At least two people were injured when an explosion took place in the Zalka suburb of the Lebanese capital, Beirut."I was sitting on the balcony with my children when we saw a flash and heard a loud noise," local resident Fadi Yacoub told Reuters.
"The kids fell about screaming. We were all covered with dust and broken glass." "We were sitting in this cafe when suddenly the glass shattered all over us," said Georges Yazbeck, a witness. "We didn't know what had happened.""The sound was terrifying, very strong, I was astonished when I went down and learned that no was killed, thank God" Ani Nahabidia a resident in Zalqa told Aljazeera.net.
Language Matters ...
Some people just never understand that.
Elie Weisel is a Nobel Prize Laureate, and a Holocaust Survivor.
His misleading (and racist) article was published in the NYtimes and the Herald Tribune, among others. I have been irked (to say the least) by reporters (such as Thomas Friedman, and now, Mr. Weisel) who use their writings only to stir emotions, removing their tale from the basis of reality. They fail their responsibilities as journalists. They
misuse language.I have just put a few segments below.
In 1991, when Saddam Hussein's Scud missiles fell in a deafening din on TelAviv, some Palestinians danced in the streets and on the roofs of their houses. I saw them. I was in Jerusalem, and I could see what was happeningin the Arab quarter of the Old City.It happened again later, each time a suicide terrorist set off a bomb on abus or in a restaurant. I evoke these scenes with sadness, and for areason: We have just seen them repeated in Gaza.
The images of the evacuation itself are heart-rending. Some of them are unbearable. Angry men, crying women. Children, led away on foot or in thearms of soldiers who are sobbing themselves.
Let's not forget: These men and women lived in Gaza for 38 years.
...
And here they are, obliged to uproot themselves, to take their holy and precious belongings, their memories and their prayers, their dreams and their dead, to go off in search of a bed to sleep in, a table to eat on, a new home, a future among strangers.
...
And here I am obliged to take a step back. In the tradition I claim, the Jew is ordered by King Solomon "not to rejoice when the enemy falls." I don't know whether the Koran suggests the same.
...
Yes, imagine that President Mahmoud Abbas and his colleagues, in advising their followers, extolled moderation, restraint, respect and a little understanding for the Jews who felt themselves struck by an unhappy fate.They would have won general admiration. I will perhaps be told that when the Palestinians cried at the loss of their homes, few Israelis were moved.That's possible. But how many Israelis rejoiced?
"No man is an island", John Donne
...No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee...
No Victors - a lament of today
So this is what is has come too. Half a century later, past lessons hidden for decades unearth themselves, and speak out to the mortals below. There shall be
no victors and no vanquished.
Religions cannot compete, nations cannot feel superior. Yet it seems that time wipes away old wounds only to create new ones: one need not look futher than home to understand this.
The settlements will soon be completely abandoned. Is this the right path? Tomorrow's History will decide. But this is already fertilizing hate. Palestine is celebrating. Israel is not. It was not so long ago when things were different ... yet the past will revisit. Only today a jewish reporter attempted to subdue the history of the settlements by claiming that although Israel itself has removed Palestinian homes, Israelis (and jews) never celebrated that. His point: The palestinians are being evil by rejoicing.
He is not alone.
In Lebanon, the fetus of Lebanon's government in the aftermath of the syrian control (and end of) has stopped developping. The essence of dialogue has lost itself in the do's and don't of sects. The people do not matter. The individuals are forgotten.
1917, 1943, 1948, 1958, 1967, 1975, 1990 2000, 2005 ... these are times that are spoken about but that we fail to understand.
We have not understood that
we are not better than
they, that
they don't think about eradicating
us, that
you are not
my enemy.
There should be no they and us.
There are no victors, and no vanquished.Only losers.
I HATE Robert Fisk.
Well, not really. I just hate the way he bursts the bubbles we live in.
His book, Pity the Nation (which was actually banned in Lebanon until a few years ago) is one of the few that dealt with the realities of the War, and one of the least biased ones.
There are those who claim he was biased towards the PLO - they forget that he wrote articles about an arms smuggling ring run by them.
There are those who claim that he was biased towards Syria - he was one of the few reporters that actually made it to Hama, Syria to report on the massacre.
He reported on the Sabra and Chatilla massacre.
He reported on the Israeli invasion and occupation.
And now he reports on
Iraq.
While others churn stories like
this. Do you really care?
A Fable of Home
He knocked lightly on the door and asked "You called for me, father?"
"Yes. Come in. I have some things to tell you. You are a grown man now. You have spent many years helping me in my work, and now it is time to fulfill your destiny. Past this sea are lands filled with glory and wealth and success and happiness. You must go and seek them."
The son travels on sea and on land, stops at every town he can, lives in every city he hears off. He finds glory in his work. He finds success. His wealth soon knows no bounds.
Years later, he has not heard of this happiness that his father spoke to him about, so he keeps searching. He parted the seas and tore the clouds, until finally he came upon a familiar route. As he approached the first door he could see, he recognized the patio, dusty as it was. He knock, and an old woman opens the door. She looks, pauses, and then shouts "My son. My son is back." and he finally comprehends.
Burton's Art
Tim Burton is an underrated cinematic genius. Finally watched "The Nightmare before Christmas" yesterday evening. Edward Scissorhands, Big Fish, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ... to cut things short, Tim Burton let's his imagination swim and rise above the cliche movies that are being churned out today. He is a king in this land.
"Invictus", by William Henley
OUT of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
Sidenote: Timothy Mcveigh read this as his "last word" before his execution. I wish he didn't . . . not after what he had done.
Spam
Two days old, and already got hit by blogger spam . . . there goes the anonymous posting.
Window Seat
On the way back from Leb . . .
Winter's Welcome
It was the smell that first signaled it. The dryness in the air that came before the showers and the storms ruffled the leaves, which soon began to fold onto themselves. They hadn't lost their color just yet, but their roughness was apparent with a simple touch. The air was crisp, and deep breaths were followed by slight coughs, almost as if this was the way it was meant to be. The ground was not as soft, the grass was not as green, and the sky was just a shade of blue darker. Even the squirels bickered less, as they carried and stored their food. I sat on the balcony, watching the jackets and the boots replace California's trademark shorts, trying to touch upon and find the simple lines of continuity between yesterday and today. It would come. We all know it will come, as we all know that it will also go.
Today, only for today, I wish the world would stop changing. A short pause is due.
The Jihadist version of the War
Check
this. Don't you love it? Somethings are just too funny to take seriously...
Kamal
I've started reading a book by Kamal Joumblat called: Lebanon in its Arab position.
Tarboush, Hariri, and Aoun
So ... yesterday we went out to Tarboush ( a jordanian turned lebanese restaurant in the bay area) with some lebanese that a friend of mine knew. Mezah, argileh, almaza ... at one point the conversation turned into politics (when doesn't it):
A: You know, I think if Hariri did things properly, he could become a nationalistic leader.
J: Probably. But he has the wrong impression of what a nationalistic leader is. It isn't someone that everyone HAS too like. It's someone that can lead the nation forwards. He is taking the wrong parameters into consideration. He's still trying to please the Sunnis, the Shiites, the Druze, the Christians ... and he'll never succeed that way. He should, for example, try to see what people under 35 want, and work for that. Cross the sectarian boundaries. That's what a nationalistic leader is.
A: Maybe, but I guess he's trying to treat Lebanon as a business.
J: (laughing) Yeah, he came with an already wired mind, and doesn't seem open to politics. But most of our politicians are like that. They're imposing their past behaviors on Lebanon.
A: Like Aoun. He still has a military mentality. Look at his party. They don't go against him.
J: He's even worse. He's a populist. He says what the people want to hear, and no more. He just invokes their emotions.
Read this ... NOW
Go to this
link. May God bless her soul ...
"You have your Lebanon, and I have mine", Khalil Gibran
You have your Lebanon and its dilemma. I have my Lebanon and its beauty. Your Lebanon is an arena for men from the West and men from the East.
My Lebanon is a flock of birds fluttering in the early morning as shepherds lead their sheep into the meadow and rising in the evening as farmers return from their fields and vineyards.
You have your Lebanon and its people. I have my Lebanon and its people.
Yours are those whose souls were born in the hospitals of the West; they are as ship without rudder or sail upon a raging sea.... They are strong and eloquent among themselves but weak and dumb among Europeans.
They are brave, the liberators and the reformers, but only in their own area. But they are cowards, always led backwards by the Europeans. They are those who croak like frogs boasting that they have rid themselves of their ancient, tyrannical enemy, but the truth of the matter is that this tyrannical enemy still hides within their own souls. They are the slaves for whom time had exchanged rusty chains for shiny ones so that they thought themselves free. These are the children of your Lebanon. Is there anyone among them who represents the strength of the towering rocks of Lebanon, the purity of its water or the fragrance of its air? Who among them vouchsafes to say, "When I die I leave my country little better than when I was born"?
Who among them dare to say, "My life was a drop of blood in the veins of Lebanon, a tear in her eyes or a smile upon her lips"?
Those are the children of your Lebanon. They are, in your estimation, great; but insignificant in my estimation.
Let me tell you who are the children of my Lebanon.
They are farmers who would turn the fallow field into garden and grove.
They are the shepherds who lead their flocks through the valleys to be fattened for your table meat and your woolens.
They are the vine-pressers who press the grape to wine and boil it to syrup.
They are the parents who tend the nurseries, the mothers who spin the silken yarn.
They are the husbands who harvest the wheat and the wives who gather the sheaves.
They are the builders, the potters, the weavers and the bell-casters.
They are the poets who pour their souls in new cups.
They are those who migrate with nothing but courage in their hearts and strength in their arms but who return with wealth in their hands and a wreath of glory upon their heads.
They are the victorious wherever they go and loved and respected wherever they settle.
They are the ones born in huts but who died in palaces of learning.
These are the children of Lebanon; they are the lamps that cannot be snuffed by the wind and the salt which remains unspoiled through the ages.
They are the ones who are steadily moving toward perfection, beauty, and truth.
What will remain of your Lebanon after a century? Tell me! Except bragging, lying and stupidity? Do you expect the ages to keep in its memory the traces of deceit and cheating and hypocrisy? Do you think the atmosphere will preserve in its pockets the shadows of death and the stench of graves?
Do you believe life will accept a patched garment for a dress? Verily, I say to you that an olive plant in the hills of Lebanon will outlast all of your deeds and your works; that the wooden plow pulled by the oxen in the crannies of Lebanon is nobler than your dreams and aspirations.
I say to you, while the conscience of time listened to me, that the songs of a maiden collecting herbs in the valleys of Lebanon will outlast all the uttering of the most exalted prattler among you. I say to you that you are achieving nothing. If you knew that you are accomplishing nothing, I would feel sorry for you, but you know it not.
You have your Lebanon and I have my Lebanon.
Written after the first World War, in the 1920's.
Internal Redemption
I was blind, and now I can see. I spent years swimming in the depths of the ocean, and I have finally surfaced. I have washed out the haze in my eyes. The world has spun its 360 degrees, and I can finally feel it turn.
The world in gray is not the world, but one seen with the colored lenses forced upon me. I could only see shades and nuances, but never noticed everything else. There were times when I stumbled through shadows that I thought were truths, only to have them incomprehensibly melt before me. Only now do I understand. Only now can I see.
I have finally reached the top of the mountain, and look down at all that I had never known, and I weep. Life, true life, begins now.
"On the Waterfront", Marlon Brando
"You don't understand.
I could had class. I coulda
been a conteder.
I coulda been somebody,
instead of a bum,
which is what I am,
let's face it.
It was you, Charley."
One of the greates lines ever said in a movie. Rest in Peace Brando.
Sunset in Beirut
Pan-Arabism
Yes, it is dead. Politically speaking that is (although there are some who still use it to further what ever cause they think is just). But that does not imply that a Lebanese cannot feel Arab.
This is the typical identity crisis that Lebanese constantly argue about - are we Arab, just Lebanese, or have we descended from the great Phoenicians! There are quite a few that do spread this around. They don't seem aware that in the same way arabism (which is different than islamism, with which it is commonly confused) was created as a political movement in the late 19th century (by Christian circles, by the way, which some historians attribute to the islamic nature of the Ottoman Empire), this Phoenicianism was also a political movement, although not as widespread between the different communities as arabism.
Why am I discussing this? Today, a friend sent out an article about how the "I'm not an arab, I'm a Phoenician statement" is fundamentally wrong, and he got a flurry of replies. The antagonism of being even categorized with arab was hilarious. Yet some of the comments had some decent logic behind, such as debunking some of the main reasons that Lebanese seem to consider themselves arab - such as culture, geography, belonging the "Arab League" ... but then they go on to state things such as "we are closer to countries such as Cyprus, why don't we consider ourselves European". And thus it comes out . . . the true reasons why Lebanese don't want to be Arabs . . . if you want a reason not to be arab, don't let that reason be superiority.
It's funny though - I have never heard a Cypriot wondering why he didn't have the same image as Lebanese, or complaining that he didn't have enough identity with Norway to actually be labelled European.
There are some who don't really comprehend that identity isn't exclusive. I don't have to be only Lebanese, or Arab, or Phoenician (if you must) ...
I happen to be one of those people who does enjoy meeting other "Arabs" when I am away from Lebanon. And that is what makes me feel "arab".
But I guess Lebanon's identity crisis is deeper than that. Am I Christian, or Muslim. Am I from this town or that town. Am I . . . the list goes on. It has been relatively well understood that people can have different identities, and if you think you are a half breed of the Greek and Roman empires, so be it - just as long as this doesn't cause real problems with the rest of the county.
So this is it - we are the House of Many Mansions (great book by the way). Pan-arabism may be dead, but I won't deny that I am an arab if asked. I just won't make it my political way.
Sidenote: The Lebanese identity itself is new. A century ago Lebanon was just Mount Lebanon (Jabal Lubnan), which is a
geographical label, just as
bilad al sham was just geographical. And this identity hasn't yet been forged, as you probably know only to well. There are those who try to bring it up in their speeches and conversations, which is great, but only goes to show how disconnected they are. Ziad Rahbani (a political prophet for those who haven't heard his plays, or his radio skits) poked fun at all this before, during, and after the war. There are also those who dwelve on the differences between the different Lebanese groups, and call for a Federation, which would basically reshape (euphamistically speaking) Lebanon as we know it. I won't get started on that now . . .
The Lebanese Spirit
I miss the sea. I hardly ever see it here, even though I am in California. There is nothing like waking up in the morning and staring at at the window to have the ocean blanket your vision, its waves rhythmically pulling you towards it. It becomes an addiction, simply because the sea gives you hope.
"Pity the Nation", by Khalil Gibran
Pity the nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion.
Pity the nation that wears a cloth it does not weave, eats a bread it
does not harvest, and drinks a wine that flows not from its own wine-press.
Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero, and that deems
the glittering conqueror bountiful.
Pity a nation that despises a passion in its dream,
yet submits in its awakening.
Pity the nation that raises not its voice save
when it walks in a funeral, boasts not except among its ruins,
and will rebel not save when its neck is laid between the sword and the block.
Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggler,
and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking.
Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpeting,
and farewells him with hooting, only to welcome another with trumpeting again.
Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years and whose strong men are yet in the cradle. Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation.
Solve Lebanon's social issues, and the rest will follow. Too much time is being spent on other concerns - Hezbollah's weapons, SLA amnesty, etc. - while the people are suffering under some fundamental concerns. Keep the bigger picture in mind.
Instead, we have insults and deconstructive dialogue flying all over the place. Read the news, listen to the radio, and you have the choice of either laughing or crying. There is no in between. With each comment some politician makes, he tries to prove that he is more powerful, more original, more "caring" about the lebanese masses, and thus places himself above dialogue. This has been going on since before the war ...
Just look at the issues now - if only people were aware of how similar today is to the 50's ... will we ever learn. Will we ever understand that the Past is Prologue?
The sun casts its shadow below.
The winds have settled,
bored of chasing the trees.
I wait, not accepting,
Not believing, scratching
At surfaces long gone.
The Pleasure of Having your own office: doing What you want When you want ...
So, this blog was meant to be mostly apolitical . . . but there are some things that can't be seen without at least mentioning.
The cloud has begun over the so called Israeli withdrawal - "so called" because the Israeli government still wants control over the land, air, and sea passages. This brings to mind the old and cliché (and fitting) analogy of the Gaza strip being a prison, where the residents are prisoners: They too have 95% control of their land, and the prison guards have only 5%.
So what is this cloud? Several weeks ago, an Israeli soldier attacked and killed some Israeli Arabs. Today, a Gaza (ex)-settler killed three Palestinians on his way back from work. Hamas replies with "This crime is not going to pass without tough punishment. The enemy is opening the gate of revenge". Sharon has already stated that any "action" from the Gaza Strip will not be ignored and Israel will retaliate. How will this play out?
Update: Sharon wants to "continue and develop" Israel's settlement activity in the occupied West Bank.
Great. That's the way to approach peace. Prediction 1: West Bank will not be given up for at least another 10 years, if ever. Why? Prediction 2: Israel will reenter Gaza.
A color swirls around my head, stripping down walls and barriers and doors. I try to catch it as it splits into a million shades, and teases me as I stare in wonder. I raise my hand, and they brush past it, leading me past the blacks and the grays, and then I see. I finally see.
The Next Step
He finally reached the end of the world. He looked over the edge, and saw nothing. He stood, drew a globe, and marched on ...
War
Let us come in, he says, banging his fist on the door. His shouts and screams and fits reap passion in the crowds, fermenting their anxiety and hatred. He stand there, yelling at those behind him to hurry and open the door, while those behind it cower in the only shadows they can find. They whimper, shying away from the door, sliding against walls, wondering and wandering in circles.
The door is smashed. He rages into the room, unquieting the uneasy silence. He walks around, shielding his eyes from the light. The crowd has followed, chaos swimming alongside.
Those in the shadows are caught. There is one who walks out of the shadows, and welcomes them. He does not smile. He only says that what is in this house can be shared. He wants them to spare his family.
Chaos has closed the doors and the windows. It has painted the walls black. When the sun finally rises in the morning, it will weep at what once was, and what has become.
The Beginning
This is the beginning of my online mind. Welcome to my world of fiction.
