Daily Archives: September 29, 2010

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Is Gemmayze Doomed?

Could Gemmayze suffer the same demise as Monot? Gino Raidy writes an excellent piece for BeirutNightLife.com where he explores the tensions between the residents, the politicians and the club goers.

Here’s an excerpt about how the club owners bribe their neighbors:

One pub manager admitted to beirutnightlife.com, on condition of anonymity, that his establishment provides air conditioning, electricity and soundproofing, free of charge to the residents of the building where his pub is located. This pub stays open well into the night, disobeying the set curfew with no consequence, since none of the neighbors file a complaint considering the sweet deal they are getting.

Read the whole thing.

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Lebanese Bloggers "Pioneers In The Arab World"

Tony Saghbini:

A recent survey of readers of the more than 400 blogs in Lebanon shows that their numbers are close to the online readership of the most well-known Lebanese newspapers: both averaging 14,000 visitors daily. This is a clear indication that blogs have become one of the main media sources for Lebanese youth to access diverse information and various opinions.

You might think he’s exaggerating, but he’s not. This blog had more visitors in August than the websites of Almustaqbal and Al-diyar combined. But that is simply because the bulk of the readership of those newspapers are in the paper versions (and I am still easily trounced by the “well known” Annahar, Al-Akhbar and the Daily Star‘s websites)

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"caution and suspicion"

How the March 14 coalition sees the upcoming visit by Iranian President Ahmadinejad:

“We look in much caution and suspicion to the Iranian President’s planned visit to Lebanon due to his anti-peace positions and his insistence on considering Lebanon as an Iranian base in the Mediterranean coast,” said a statement issued at the end of March 14′s weekly meeting.

That’s your boilerplate “moderate Arab” position right there. But I’m sure the tens of thousands of cheering supporters that are planning to greet him will beg to differ

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Beirut's "Cat Whisperer"

She’s not just an urban legend:

For over 11 years now, Layla has been feeding cats in specific areas in Beirut, on a daily basis. Although a few institutions where the cats gather have recently been paying her a modest salary for her work, most of the money she receives is spent on supplying food for the cats.

There was a woman like her in AUB. I remember seeing all the cats gathering together waiting for her to show up.

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❊ Lebanon's Heartless Capitalism

Lebanon’s capitalism has a lot of beauty, but very little heart.

Broken Heart

Yesterday I linked to two stories that are more related than you think. In the first, the minister of public works authorized a fashion show to take place in the middle of an important bridge, shutting it down for three days and causing a traffic hell to the commuters. In the second story, a charming 100 year-old coffee house is to be shut down and replaced by a bank.

I’ve been having this idea growing in me for a while. But yesterday, it finally took shape because of the two stories above. It hit me like an apple falling from the Naccache bridge: Lebanese capitalism has a lot of beauty, but it has no heart.

Before you dismiss me as a communist, I want you to know that in fact I’m as capitalistic as you can get. I’m a businessman when I’m not blogging and the only magazine I can read from cover to cover is The Economist, a vanguard of free market and capitalist thinking. I’m actually one of those people who are regularly caricatured in Lebanon: I make good money abroad, and then visit during the summer to splurge on Items that are more expensive than many people’s salaries. I own an appartment I don’t use and a car that I only use for one month every year. You get the picture.

A look in the mirror

And yet, even I look at our capitalism in Lebanon and see no heart. To understand what I mean, let’s take a good look in the mirror and see if we can recognize the monster we have become:

  • We don’t care about the plight of foreign workers if the consumers (the ‘Madames’) are satsified.
  • We don’t care about people stuck in traffic if a modelling agency paid enough money for a cat walk
  • We don’t care about old historical houses and cafes being destroyed because the replacements will bring quicker money
  • We design billboards that say “My Jewelry, My right” and we don’t care about the countless people who pass by everyday and can’t afford jewelry .
  • We treat rich-looking people like royalty and not-so-rich people like shit.
  • We shut down entire neighborhoods for months to make a political point, and we don’t care about the countless people who will lose their jobs because of this

Get it? The list goes on, but the conclusion remains the same: Lebanese capitalism has a lot of beauty, but it has very little heart. And that is breaking mine.

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Note: Posts with titles starting with an ❊ (asterisk) are my opinion posts. I used this system to separate long posts from quick links and comments.

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The Egyptian Justice System Just Couldn't Hang The Rich Guy

Octavia Nasr wrote that the Suzanne Tamim case in Egyptian courts made a promising start, but then went all downhill:

For a short period of time, this case seemed like a model for the kind of justice many Arab citizens yearn for; blind to power and connections, fair to all. Instead, a “technicality” sent the case for retrial and the death sentence was reduced to fifteen years in jail. Will there be more “technicalities” leading to more trials until a guilty but powerful man of Egypt is set free?

While I’m happy that the death sentence was revoked (I’m against it in principle), I agree that 15 years is way too lenient a sentence.