hopeful beirut

"Khallouna n3ich" i.e. Let us live

i have been trying to write for several days now, but my attempts have ended with a few lines and an empty page... what can i say, slogans are thrown left, right, and center, created and appropriated, beautiful words to no avail...

"Badna n3ich" i.e. we want to live! yes we do, but where? and how? in this politically charged context can we still be neutral? even if the options range from bad to worse? this is the dilemma i find myself in... yes, we want to live, and this local phrase that has been adopted by two opposing political forces reflects the will of a people to live with dignity, in union with one another, so that future generations can grow up strong and confident in a country that has their best interest at heart.

Now, people are camped out in Downtown Beirut; they are willing to sacrifice their time and livelihood for change. Not far away, prime minister and ministers are also camping out in a state office to continue going about their daily business. Both want change. Both believe they are doing their civic duty. Both think they have the answer. In fact, i think a screaming match is going on, with accusations being catapulted over protesters and soldiers, landing on deaf ears.

The main difference now, is that instead of being divided according to religious beliefs, the dividing factor is foreign allegiance... we are now looking at 2 boxes of sweets, each containing different flavors, but one that is made in the Arab world, and another made in the Western world. What they do not notice is that they each have an expiry date, after which their manufacturers will forget all about them and start baking the new batch.

Why are we still failing this lesson? How can we live in a battleground? What are we expected to do? Survive? And survive again?

Living is NOT surviving. It is not merely finding a way to reach tomorrow.
Living is having the possibility to dream, to hope, to create, and to excel! Yes, "badna n3ich", we do want to live. And we want our brothers and sisters and parents and grandparents to live too. We want to feel that we are doing the right choice staying here in our country, our home. We want to have the security of knowing we won't be laid off work, that we can depend on our economy, that we are being offered the best health care possible, and that we won't be judged by our religious beliefs or political inclinations. We want to be able to walk down the street without jumping every time we hear a firecracker explode and mistake it for something else, and we want to stop wearing black and mourning people who were taken too soon.

Maybe we too should appropriate the phrase "badna n3ich"... that evolved to "la2nno badna n3ich"... to make it "khallouna n3ich"...
i.e. 1.we want to live... 2.because we want to live... 3.LET US LIVE...

posted by hopeful beirut @ 16:55