Musings on a Monday night in Beirut

I am tired tonight. The ups and downs are beginning to take their toll on me. This morning as I headed for the office, driving down the Corniche, the air was crisp with the remnants of a northerly wind, and the early joggers were huffing and puffing their way by a sea so deeply blue and so still you could have thought it a painting. Over there, in the distance, Mount Sannine rose through low-lying mists and stood high and magnificent, crowned in dazzlingly white fresh snow. A scene so achingly beautiful you’d want to wrap it and take it home with you.

The same stretch, tonight. A different affair altogether: in near pitch darkness, under streetlights for some reason turned off, hardly a soul to see, not even a single amorous couple, and two, heavily manned and nervous looking army checkpoints, separated by less than a mile and no less than two police patrols, driving slowly in the still night.

What is it about this country that can make the mood swing so violently in the space of a few hours? Why is it that a morning so full of promise, so pregnant with anticipation, can become a foreboding, brooding evening that closes curtains, shutters windows and locks up doors? Why is it that a people who has already had so much to endure, be condemned to endure further? Tonight I wondered why on earth I came back to Lebanon, just as this morning I was pitying those who have decided to leave.

Alain Peyrefitte, a distinguished French writer and politician wrote once of a tragic event that occurred during the winter siege of Leningrad in WWII. On that night, the horses of a Russian artillery regiment caught in a huge forest fire, galloped through the inferno and into the nearly-frozen waters of Lake Ladoga. Triggered by a phenomenon known as surfusion, almost instantly, and with the snap of broken glass, the lake froze solid around the horses, trapping them in a deadly, icy grip. The next morning, a terrible spectacle was awaiting the first Russian patrols: that of a mirror-like surface out of which emerged, eyes petrified in fear, the marble-looking heads of hundreds of frozen horses. In his book, Les Cheveaux Du Lac Ladoga, Peyrefitte saw in this anecdote a metaphor for justice between two extremes. I’m seeing it in a different light altogether tonight.

Comments

[Neda]

I just want to congratulate you on your exquisite style and depth of thought. I can almost picture myself there, some 25 years ago, feeling the same angst as you do. The only difference now is that we might have a chance to really be a sovereign country if only we could make all these so-called "leaders" accountable for their actions. There is no reason on earth for the continuation of the pitiful status quo, the festering of the tent city, and worse, the complete and slow anihilation of our country.

[Amir in Tel Aviv]

List of 110 sites that are being blocked by Syria:

http://abssyria.freewebpage.org/
.

[Jay]

Wow! beautiful piece... please write more :)

[Fawzan]

Deep and thoughtful. Remind me why you don't have your own blog???

[Lover]

Surfusion is a French word by the way, in English it's...Supercooling.

Nice insights, very clever use and choice of words.

[Solomon2]

It seems an excessively gloomy metaphor. If you don't want the physics, skip to the next paragraph. Water can be "supercooled" many degrees below its freezing point without freezing under certain conditions: there must be an absence of nucleation sites (no particles within a certain range of sizes suspended in the water) and the liquid must be perfectly still. When tiny nucleating crystals are present (soot gently deposited on the surface does nicely) and the water is disturbed, then SNAP! - it all turns to ice instantly. That's what happened to the horses.

I have a cheerier thought tonight. I'm thinking it's time to start making fun of Hezbollah. Not pretend, but for real. With all those soldiers in Beirut, what could Hezbollah do if someone drew a picture on a wall of Nasrallah in a ballerina's dress and ballet shoes? Is that worth starting a war over?

Not on your life! Perhaps people forget that Hezbollah avoided the UNSC 1559 axe because a previous Lebanese prime minister, supported by Lebanon's president, re-defined Hezbollah from a militia to "resistance" group. How likely is it that Hezbollah could keep that designation now if they started trouble? Time to wake up and spread the graffiti!

[Cedar Revolution/Gebran's Sons]

Thanks Naja for taking us along on a trip to Beirut. Capturing today's scene as transformed by the dark political blanket as it gradually covers and suffocates the city's joie-de-vivre. Your images are vivid, emotions well understood, insights both interresting and appropriate. Though I'm certain the dark cloud will pass letting the sun rekindle people hopes and love of life. Beirut is much bigger than any politician or ideology.

[zigfieldfollies]

Excellent post.
Fortunately, visitors to Lebanon still look up the scenery when walking the streets, the rest of us are so taken with our daily routines and frustrations that we miss it all.

There's too much politics and too little sports in Lebanon. And reversing this might bring the same contrast as "day and night in Beirut".