What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
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Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#2No post body was provided.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#3Lots of places in the Middle East were more European like this before the colonial influences weakened and the Muslim majority populations got back more power over their own countries. Egypt and Iran are similar. The nostalgia is somewhat uncomfortable because in some respects things were better because they were better, but in others it’s the perception of things being better because they’re more relatable to Europeans.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#4I follow the referenced instagram account and I actually find it depressing.
I've probably visited Beirut 20+ times over the last 7 years. Last visit was summer of 2019, so haven't been since COVID. My company has an office there.
It's one of my favorite cities in the world. It's also one of the most heartbreaking situations in economic and humanitarian terms. The country has experienced one of the worst currency crises in history, did not wether COVID well, and then had one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in history go off right in the city center. Two years later, nobody has been prosecuted.
The country is in complete deadlock politically - all of the warlords from the civil war just became politicians and then systematically looted the country. There isn't much optimism that the situation will turn around, and almost everyone I know who lived there has left, accelerating an already problematic brain drain.
Beirut and Lebanon has to be one of the largest missed opportunities or what-could-have-been situations of the last 100 years.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#5This strikes me as tremendously sad--how a city can go from lively, productive, and engaging to something else entirely in such a short time span. The writer speaks positively about the Beirut of today. I won't pretend to know anything about Beirut, but is it really "lovelier" (author's word) today than it was back then?
It's a cliche at this point to wonder whether the same thing can (or will?) happen in the United States, but I still found myself thinking about it nonetheless while reading the essay.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#6Lots of places in the Middle East were more European like this before the colonial influences weakened and the Muslim majority populations got back more power over their own countries. Egypt and Iran are similar. The nostalgia is somewhat uncomfortable because in some respects things were better because they were better, but in others it’s the perception of things being better because they’re more relatable to Europe…
Lebanon became independent in 1945. Civil war began in 1975, largely as a result of radical Islamist Palestinians who had left Palestine and wanted an Islamic state in Lebanon.
Lebanon beforehand, it is important to note, was not Muslim majority at all. It was Christian and Druze, and that was the very foundation of the country itself. It was never the country of Muslims in the first place.
Iran was also never colonised by European countries. Its decline began with both theocratic rule as well as sanctions, but even despite this it’s still remarkably functional and developed in comparison to a ton of countries that weren’t put in such a position.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#7This strikes me as tremendously sad--how a city can go from lively, productive, and engaging to something else entirely in such a short time span. The writer speaks positively about the Beirut of today. I won't pretend to know anything about Beirut, but is it really "lovelier" (author's word) today than it was back then? It's a cliche at this point to wonder whether the same thing can (or will?) happen in the United…
I think it already is happening in the US, even in cities that are currently considered "nice". There is no overarching ethos that the citizens hold regarding small economies and city design, and so anywhere with a lot of Americans is subject to the centralization of commerce and the development of cookie-cutter, investment-group-owned cheap buildings.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#8Lots of places in the Middle East were more European like this before the colonial influences weakened and the Muslim majority populations got back more power over their own countries. Egypt and Iran are similar. The nostalgia is somewhat uncomfortable because in some respects things were better because they were better, but in others it’s the perception of things being better because they’re more relatable to Europe…
No post body was provided.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#9Lots of places in the Middle East were more European like this before the colonial influences weakened and the Muslim majority populations got back more power over their own countries. Egypt and Iran are similar. The nostalgia is somewhat uncomfortable because in some respects things were better because they were better, but in others it’s the perception of things being better because they’re more relatable to Europe…
It was nicknamed "Paris of the Middle East", including because of the French influence. There's also a large Christian population in Lebanon, which I suspect made 'absorbing' European influences easier.
Re: What Beirut was like before the war (2019)
#10Lots of places in the Middle East were more European like this before the colonial influences weakened and the Muslim majority populations got back more power over their own countries. Egypt and Iran are similar. The nostalgia is somewhat uncomfortable because in some respects things were better because they were better, but in others it’s the perception of things being better because they’re more relatable to Europe…
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