Syria: An Innocent Abroad (Part V)

Beirut or Bust

My not-so-dramatic unknowing escape from Civil War

Just two days before deadly violence broke out, I had left Beirut a quiet and peaceful (albeit tense) vacation spot. On Sunday May 4, we made a leisurely three-hour taxi ride back to Damascus from Beirut. We stopped for tea before the Lebanese border, shopped for cheap booze at the Duty Free, and waited patiently in the shiny 2008 Nissan that was our makeshift taxi ride home, while the driver handled the stamping and paperwork of our ins and outs through international customs. It cost 400 Syrian Pounds...about eight dollars...for the serene ride home with Miriam and two strangers. If I had lingered in Lebanon until Wednesday to catch the Lebanon and Jordan international soccer match like I'd considered, I may have been spent the remaining week of my pilgrimage twiddling my thumbs on a nice cot, courtesy of the U.S. Embassy.

On Tuesday May 6, the borders in and out of Lebanon were closed, after the government shut down Hezbollah's private telecommunications network within the country. They also removed a head of airport security, who was accused of installing spy cameras on behalf of Hezbollah at the Beirut International Airport, and the nation was now flirting with implosion. In the words of Ron Burgundy..."My, that escalated quickly."

On Wednesday Hezbollah's party leader responded with an apparent call to action. All of Damascus had its eyes and ears quietly fixed on Hassan Nasrallah—while I naively shopped for family souvenirs, trying desperately to filter through his Arabic to catch any one of the 7 words I know, and make some sense of the situation. Even as an outsider, new to the conflict and the implications of his words, as I annoyed Miriam with sheepish requests for a translation-- I could feel the gravity of proximate War, for the first time in my life. Within hours, several indiscriminate factions of Hezbollah and other miscellaneous oppositional forces set up blazing road blocks, creating an air-tight vacuum in Beirut, sealing it off from the world, and bringing the Mediterranean Sea-- where I'd danced around jellyfish and burned to a pinkish Caucasian crisp on the beach three days earlier-- to a rolling boil.


On Thursday as I waited on my favorite lunch in the old city-- Shish Tawouek (a toasted-sub style sandwich with grilled chicken, garlic mayonnaise, and vegetables, with a Pepsi for 65 syrian pounds...about a dollar and ten cents...) Miriam wandered to the nearest television inside a sandwich shop, as the streets quieted, and locals were magnetized to the nearest broadcast within earshot, as the tick-tack of AK-47 fire and the inaudible shouts of militant officers filled the Damascus radio waves. Armed Hezbollah militants were returning fire at the Lebanese army, in the same neighborhood where I tenderly rubbed aloe into my sunburned shoulders and nursed an Almaza (Lebanese beer), while watching shitty Arab reality tv, four days removed.

I was in disbelief. In retrospect, I realize at this moment, while searching for something in my generation's American history to liken the anxiety to, the feeling I had in my stomach while taking in the gravity of the battle was familiar...

the feeling was miles off, and at a quarter of the volume...but it was like sitting in third period again, trapped in a state of incomprehension, where you put your head into your hand and mumble distressed prayers; it was the white noise feeling of watching the news on September 11, 2001.

It is important to reiterate that the feeling was not on a par with my reaction to mass murder on civilians in my own country-- I mean to say only that it was the same sinking feeling of helplessness and disappointment in humanity-- and general distress for the well-being of our own people. I use the comparison only because it is the only other time a country I've stepped foot in has been attacked in my lifetime-- and that, I learned, is the only thing that can make war "real." Lebanon was no longer Mars-- some distant and inaccessible body of inconsequential interest. It had become very real, very close, and very important to me. Most Americans don't want to see anything bad happen to anyone. But when you get to know the affected hearts and fall in love with a landscape-- the plight hits your chest just a little harder.

*****

Beirut: The Big Lebaneasy
What happens in Beirut, gets posted on an alternative newsweekly blog page.

It's still difficult for me to understand-- it was less than a week earlier when I had crossed over the Lebanese border, mildly bitter that Lebanon had started charging a $25 48-hour visa fee. A soldier explained to Miriam that the new fee was only for Americans-- at last, I thought, some of the fabled anti-American sentiment that I had feared about my trip had reared its presumed head. It turns out that the soldier was either screwing with us, or didn't know what he was talking about-- the fee was for all foreigners. At first the inconvenience was frustrating and seemingly asinine, until I remembered how many thousands of dollars and connections it costs an Arab to come to an America. Okay, Lebanon, spend my $25 well.

The drive into Lebanon was beautiful. The highway snaked around green mountains, overlooking small villages against a blue sky and patches of farmland-- it reminded me of drives through Tennessee in my childhood, drugged out on Dramamine and going through the Smokies toward ocean. It was all the more refreshing to be in a green and free country after spending the last week in Syria, which despite its own distinguishable charms and beauty, is largely tan, dusty, and mildly oppressive. Then, once in Lebanon proper, I saw-- for the first time in my life-- a soft reality of political turmoil. A tank sat perched on the roadside, with its cannon vigilantly fixed on the "Anti-Lebanese" Mountains, as they are called in Syria, protecting against the ambitious President of their Eestern neighbor. To my left, I snapped a picture of an enormous and towering bridge-- with a 50-foot gap in the middle. It was under construction, being rebuilt from an Israeli attack.

The Lebanese soldiers are built like U.S. Marines, gruff and fit, with either black/grey/white or jungle green camouflage uniforms, disciplined and seemingly vigilant. Meanwhile, the Syrian military looks more like teenagers or volunteer police officers, who sneaked into their father's closets and swiped puke-green garb from the '80's. Their shirts are always two sizes too big, their hats fall down around their eyes, and their pants are pulled up to high-water level, while they smoke two packs a day and apathetically direct traffic. Bashar, it would seem, recruits them young, and outfits them with room to grow. They look like nerds...like the Lebanese should be dunking their heads in the toilets while they scream uncle. Yet, somehow, Bashar's military threat still lingers in Lebanon. It is a band kid's wet-dream; a world where the nerds realized there are more of us than there are of them. Only these nerds have rifles, aren't good at math, and live in a world without pornography to cope with their misplaced sexual frustration.

The streets of Beirut were more ominous in some areas than others. On streets near Martyr's Square, where many of the oppositional forces were camped, most of the shops and residential areas were vacant. There was massive reconstruction on towering buildings, while a parking garage and three story house sat in the foreground, bombed out and untouched from the Lebanese Civil War. Walking toward the beach, a tank sat with a .40 Caliber Machine gun pointed directly at what seemed to be a very specific hotel room, while a handful of soldiers stood guard around the tank. I walked by, trying to use my peripheral vision to take in the scenery of political strife, without arousing suspicion of my interest. I know-- I'm a regular Jason Bourne. I was confidently safe, but not terribly brave.

On a long walk along the Mediterranean, I could have been on South Beach in Miami. Palm trees, people walking, roller-blading, bicycling, pan-handling, jogging, laughing, pissing on the beach, embracing their lovers and taking pictures against the sunset over the Mediterranean...it was a beautiful and scenic free society. The residential area was heavy with what I perceive to be the French influence of architecture (I say boldly, having never been to France). We ate dinner overlooking the Sea, and had a tea at the base of a lighthouse, while the waves crashed against the rocks alongside us. There I was informed, a week into my trip, that crossing your legs and exposing the bottom part of your foot is considered a paramount insult in Arab culture; showing the dirtiest part of your body in public (Unless Miriam was making that up to screw with me). We went out for drinks in the legendary Beirut bar scene. There was a Coldplay cover band and complimentary shots and beautiful women in scantily clad clothes. This is one of the most appealing cities in the world-- with its beautiful green mountains, electric bar scene, affordable restaurants overlooking the Mediterranean, modern malls and free women, and a long, clean, wide sidewalk filled with the best-looking Arabs in the region along the beaches of the Mediterranean. Maybe I'd fight over it, too.