undiscovered country . Two tales of a city

Some places get stuck with a certain image, and it’s difficult to imagine them as anything other than that. Lebanon is one such place.

For the many who have not visited the country, it is a site of war. Wedged between Israel to the south and Syria to the north, this tiny nation of five million people has endured decades of civil war as well as conflict driven by more powerful neighbours. And then, there is the Hezbollah, one of the biggest militant groups in recent history.

There is more to Lebanon than conflict. Its capital Beirut was known as the Paris of the East — for its cosmopolitanism and snobbery alike. It remains a place where people go to party and relax, as they have for decades. It has also been a refuge. It was where the poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz spent his years in exile from Pakistan. It was where Talal bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the so-called Red Prince of Saudi Arabia, went in 1962 after seeking constitutional reform in his country. He would make speeches from Beirut, demanding elections and democracy in his country of birth.

For me, Lebanon will always be bound by the works of Amin Maalouf. I discovered his writing when I came across The Crusades Through Arab Eyes . One of the first quotes in it was by the great Kurdish general Saladin — or Salahuddin ibn Ayubbi. “Regard the Franj! Behold with what obstinacy they fight for their religion, while we, the Muslims, show no enthusiasm for holy war.”

The ironic sense of humour appealed to me, and as I read more by the man, both fiction and non-fiction, I have become even more attached to him. Origins , the last Maalouf book I read, was about the author’s grandfather and their family in the early 1900s. It was a splendid insight into the complex layers of history washing over an old Christian family in the contested West Asian region, with colonialism, evangelism, nationalism and idealism playing important roles.

Little wonder, then, that when a diplomat friend suggested we visit him in Lebanon, we took the invitation seriously. It required some calculation. Lebanon was far away, next to the horror of the long-running civil war in Syria. My wife and I spoke no French or Arabic — the languages of the country. All we had was a friend.

But we thought it was enough, so we landed in Beirut the day before Christmas. Three things were immediately obvious on the face of the city. The first was the conflict, in the bullet holes and other forms of damage on the façade of buildings. The second was money — in the form of banks that we had never heard of, and sleek, towering buildings, newly built or under construction. The third was the graffiti that covered many walls. These were quirky and delightful — an astronaut holding a Lebanese snack, a soldier in a tank with a microphone and shooting hearts out of his cannon, and an elaborate one of a child working on a circuit board. This last one, painted on a derelict building, was at least 40 feet long, and covered the sides of the second and third floors. There was also a statue of protesters against Ottoman rule, right next to a huge Ottoman-style mosque. Maalouf might have liked the irony.

We drove from Beirut to Byblos, but the number of houses crowding the 40-km stretch between the two cities gave the impression that they were extensions of each other. There is a Crusader castle in Byblos, which rests on the ruins of older structures dating to Roman times, perhaps even earlier. The different styles merge and clash, and, within the little museum in the castle, I found a notation that trading had extended all the way to Afghanistan as far back as the third century.

From Byblos we went to Baalbek in the Beqaa Valley, known both for being controlled by the Hezbollah and its grapes and wine. An odd mix, one would think, but the town was like that, as well. There were Hezbollah banners on every electricity pole along the main street, but also advertisements with Santa Claus for Christmas. And in the centre of town were the magnificent and beautifully maintained ruins of a temple of Jupiter and a temple of Bacchus from Roman times.

What remains with me from Lebanon is the wealth of history — contested maybe, but preserved, something to marvel at and think about.

Omair T Ahmad

Omair Ahmad is the South Asia Editor for The Third Pole, reporting on water issues in the Himalayas

Twitter:@OmairTAhmad

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