I’m nearing the end of my time here in Lebanon. Pages are turning, chapters are closing, narratives are being bookended, and parentheticals are emerging like ducks in a row. It’s gratifying, for example, to see how far @ridersrightslb, the afterlife of the @busmapproject I started working on 10 years ago, has come. I might say more about that at some point. It’s good to put faces to internet names and make new friends. It’s also nice to go with the flow more often. This country isn’t kind to sticks in the mud. There have been days when I’ve slowed down long enough to really think about what I’m experiencing. I even sat on a bench for two hours yesterday just letting life happen around me. Cats playing, couples on lunch dates sharing their childhood traumas within earshot, metal scrappers calling out for batteries, fridges, washing machines in their trademark monotone. It’s all so fragmentary, like these posts I’ve been inundating you with. Like these photos I can’t stop taking. I hope I have enough time when I’m back to process it some more. Maybe I’ll get to do that with some you, over more fragments or face to face.
I’m noticing a pattern in myself. I’m finding myself easily triggered by a certain know-it-when-you-see-it atmosphere I associate with the Maronite petty bourgeoisie I’m supposed to spring from. That air of entitlement; that inflated sense of self; that inability to read the room. I’ve been set off twice in this trip, and both times, it was from choking on those toxic fumes.
I’m probably projecting to some degree; my inner child is likely stamping his feet; but my alienation is real. At least I’m noticing it now. I didn’t know it was there.
But it’s been good to hear other perspectives; to make new friends so deeply in love with this country, they’re doing whatever they can to decouple from the west and grow roots here. Their perspectives are situated differently; they’re literally embodied in ways quite foreign to mine. But I see their logic and I’m touched by their sentiment, and while I’m under that spell, I’m equally enchanted.
Beirut it not just plural; it’s multiple. There is a Beirut for everyone, and when they’re not ignoring or crashing into each other, they’re comingling and cogenerating. And that’s Beirut at their best.