Rebuilding Faith: The Iraqi Mandaeans of Worcester
Rebuilding Faith: The Iraqi Mandaeans of Worcester from Tim Fitzsimons on Vimeo.
Iraq's Mandaeans were targeted by sectarian violence following the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Chased from their country, these refugees have scattered around the world in search of safety.
But the delicacy of their religion, which is closed, has presented serious challenges to its survival. A small group of Mandaeans is forming in Worcester, Massachusetts, where they hope to rebuild their community.
This is their story.
This movie was produced by Tufts University students in the Experimental College course "Producing Films for Social Change."
The filmmakers are:
Jess Bidgood
Kyle Chayka
Nora Chovanec
Tim Fitzsimons
and the fixer/translator is:
Aseel Maarij
Hey all, this is the production I have been working on for some time in my course Producing Films for Social Change at Tufts University.
It's a story I have touched on before in some work I did in Jordan. Please comment and let me know what you think.
Gold
Gold is the power of the history of the city. It has a golden age, a golden glow, and golden bodies. Gold is why people come, gold is why people return, gold is why Beirut exists. Its golden memories give the city its life. These memories are so pervasive and so convincing and so obscuring that everyone—everyone, from the youngest child to the oldest man—can recall the glory days as if they had lived them. Foreigners too recall their own glory days—the line of taxis waiting outside the Commodore, where correspondents would drink Black Label and wait for disaster to strike. The specter of Beirut’s formerly high caliber of war continues to lure journalists to this day.
They call the 1960s the "golden years," which fits. Photos from back then are sepia. The storytellers say that old Beirut imported more gold and jewels than any other foreign product. Its people tell stories of scents and sounds, carnal stories that fit our empty spaces like tailored puzzle pieces, tuned to our deepest and guiltiest wants.
We all know personally the qualities of the city’s modern gold: it’s the baking warm glow of the sandstone of the French Embassy, peeking distantly through the flowers bubbling over its walls. It is the glint of sunlight on the Mediterranean Sea and of excavated Corinthian columns. It is also the golden glow of burning phosphorous, the golden glow of whiskey, the golden glow of wealth and celebrity temporarily gracing its shores, the golden glow of stately homes and beautiful streets and distant mountains.
But its color has always just been a façade; it’s always been dirty. When the next war comes, the storytellers will look back at these years, our years, through the golden lens of optimism and see only the north side of Corniche al Mazraa, see only the 6 pm glow of the setting Mediterranean sun and hear only the soft, belly-shaking conversation of harmless men sitting on vegetable crates in Hamra’s endearingly dirty streets. They won’t remember the mountains of trash pushing into the sea, they will forget the unpleasantness south of the city. They’ll forget the bandanaed gangs of bored unemployed boys zooming around on their mopeds and causing occasional death. We’ll forget all that, too, because those too uneducated to write down bad memories will be the first to be killed or deadened, leaving this weighty task to the privileged few whose understanding of the city evolved from the commanding view from their twentieth story balcony gleaming shiny white tile from the sweat of seven Filipina maids.
Like a phosphorescent flare streaking down from heaven during an Israeli attack, Beirut glows gold. It is bedecked with gold like its women are with jewelry, like its buildings are with pockmarks, like its beaches are with trash.
So when all of what we know is gone, they will remember the golden time. They will remember themselves and how their hopes and dreams were right, and they will remember that everyone else fucked everything up because they just didn’t realize that it should have been done this way, and it will go on again and again.
(click "continue reading")
Building in East Jerusalem
Haaretz today ran an excellent editorial denouncing the eviction of two Palestinian families from their homes in East Jerusalem. It makes the very critical point about how the whole dispute over building in East Jerusalem is an exercise in skillful duplicity on the part of the new Israeli government, and is worth quoting at length:
A Palestinian woman confronted Israeli riot police as she was evicted from her home in the Sheik Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem on Sunday. Abir Sultan/European Pressphoto Agency.
...The sight of the evicted Palestinian families, who had lived in these houses for decades, paints Israel in the world's eyes as a country that maintains a cruel regime of occupation, oppresses the weak and strives to create political facts in the disputed city under the guise of the "rule of law."
But for all its importance, this international criticism is not what makes the eviction of these families completely unacceptable. A democratic state that strives for peace and justice simply has no right to uproot families who became refugees in 1948. They left homes in West Jerusalem behind them, and were subsequently granted modest accommodations by the Jordanian government. The claim that the houses in Sheikh Jarrah were purchased by Jews in the early 1900s is a double-edged sword that opens a political and legal Pandora's box.
No thinking person will be persuaded that Jews have a sweeping right to return to their homes in East Jerusalem as long as Israeli law not only bars Palestinians from returning to their homes in West Jerusalem, but even evicts them from the houses where they have lived for the last 60 years. The Israel Lands Administration's regulations do not even allow Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem to buy land and houses in many parts of the city.
So for all of the Israeli government's complaints about American racism in demanding that Israel stop building housing complexes for Jews in occupied parts of the city, there is the trump card of Israel's own actions in its regulation of housing for Palestinians in Israel and in the West Bank. (Stay tuned for my eventual critique of a memo on "talking about Israel," which is relevant to this.)
Anyone who is not totally ignorant knows that while Israeli law doesn't forbid Palestinians from inhabiting West Jerusalem (for they live there), building codes and other smokescreens create a situation where Palestinians essentially cannot buy property there, and Jews can. The situation Netanyahu described is more true in West Jerusalem than in East Jerusalem:
We cannot accept the idea that Jews will not have the right to live and purchase in all parts of Jerusalem. I can only describe to myself what would happen if someone would propose that Jews could not live in certain neighborhoods in New York, London, Paris or Rome. There would certainly be a major international outcry. Accordingly, we cannot agree to such a decree in Jerusalem.
There should be little sympathy for Netanyahu's crackpot attempts to smear critics as racist or anti-semitic, when, to quote the New York Times, "[a]s soon as the Palestinians had been forcibly removed from the houses, Jewish nationalists moved in..."
Prisoners of art
Bernard Khoury and Akram Zaatari at Beirut Art Center
by Tim Fitzsimons, NOW Staff
Are Lebanese artists prisoners of war? A provocative new exhibit by renowned Lebanese architect Bernard Khoury posits that they are. In a show at the Beirut Art Center on display through October 3, Khoury uses images from various Lebanese artists, including himself, to suggest that contemporary Lebanese art is trapped in an endless cycle of reference to the 15-year civil war. However, if Khoury illustrates the dilemma facing contemporary Lebanese artists, a divergent – if in final calculation complimentary – exhibit is being shown simultaneously at the center. “Earth of Endless Secrets” by Lebanese artist Akram Zaatari suggests a possible way out.
The architect’s apparatus
Bernard Khoury is perhaps the most internationally acclaimed architect currently working in Lebanon, and he has produced some of the few icons of post-war design in Lebanon. Khoury’s most feted buildings, the Gemmayzeh restaurant Centrale and the Karantina night club BO18, are critiques, with Centrale riffing off quaint notions of preserving Beirut’s architectural heritage, while BO18 confronts the legacy of the civil war directly though its location on the site of a famous massacre and by employing coffins as its central motif. Those buildings made Khoury an international star, but they also helped pigeonhole Lebanese contemporary art in the eyes of foreigners, who seemed to say, “If it’s not about the war, we’re not interested.” In his exhibit at the Beirut Art Center, Khoury attempts to take the ax to that somewhat-debilitating association.
“Prisoner of War”, described in the catalogue as an “apparatus”, is a man-sized sculpture that resembles a miniature version of an iconic and sinister-looking American stealth bomber, without the wings. It sits on the floor bathed in light. Behind it, a video of the sculpture in motion plays on the wall.
The captions for the work, under the faux-militaristic heading “Concept of Operation”, reads: “The POW is a self-propelled apparatus for the use of returning Prisoners of War to enemy lines.” The screen behind the sculpture plays a video of this journey from the two cameras fitted in the front windows of the apparatus. The two feeds, much like two eyes, show a ground-level view as a POW shuffles over rubble to commands of “Straight! Right! Left!” being shouted in Arabic.
The sculpture on the floor at BAC is empty, but the video and the description create for the viewer an understanding that is based on its imagined use. There is no view out, so as “prisoners” return across enemy lines, they are forced to act as an intelligence-collecting tool: the ultimate Trojan Horses. The prisoner always remains blind to, yet protected from, his surroundings.
On their own, Khoury’s apparatus and video – which were designed for a different exhibition in Italy – are perplexing. It is only in the third piece, “Catherine Wants to Know”, which Khoury designed especially for the current exhibit, that the thrust of his message becomes apparent. The photomontage consists of images of the civil war by well-known Lebanese artists. We see the Cedars in snow with skiing soldiers floating down the slopes, the mountains and the city in war, soldiers by the sea, a military jeep, painted colored balloons, Khoury’s own BO18, children by the beach, and, finally, the POW sculpture in use with human arms emerging from under it – a landscape of the war. The cumulative effect is to elucidate and mock the plight of the contemporary Lebanese artist, trapped in a cycle of endless reference to the civil war.
The artist’s answer
At first glance Akram Zaatari would seem to be just the sort of artist Khoury is critiquing in “Catherine Wants to Know”. Indeed, Google Zataari’s name and the first hit describes him as “exploring Lebanon's postwar condition through collecting testimonies and various documents…”
Zaatari’s focus on a Lebanese prisoner of Israel would seem to be subscribing to the dichotomy Khoury mocks; that Lebanese artists must address the war in some manner or another unless they want to be ignored. But by taking an almost microscopic focus to the experiences of a single individual, Zaatari’s “Earth of Endless Secrets: Writing for a Posterior Time” transcends the conflict itself.
The exhibit, the other half of which is featured at Sfeir-Semler Gallery, is a photographed correspondence of a single prisoner, Nabih Awada, a former member of the Communist resistance in Lebanon. Nawada was first imprisoned by Israel when he was 16 and didn’t regain his freedom until a decade later.
“Secrets” consists of two series of photographed documents: “Neruda’s Garden”, which features images of Awada’s letters to his family and theirs to him; and “Untold”, which features Awada’s correspondence with his fellow prisoners and a video.
In one sense the work has a documentary interest independent of its artistic merits. For instance, in the “Untold” video, Awada writes a letter to Samir Kantar, the most infamous of the Lebanese prisoners held by Israel, which he put into a capsule, making reference to the way in which secret messages were passed through furtive prison kisses. Also in “Untold”, 48 photographs of prisoners with notes scribbled on back are displayed, showcasing correspondences from prisoners to Awada, or “Neruda”, his revolutionary nickname.
While many of the messages displayed reflect the emotions we associate with detention, namely boredom and misery, others are unexpectedly comical: “Comrade Nabih… A revolutionary greeting… I offer you this portrait of me… I ask you to accept this one even if it’s ugly… If you like it, then welcome. Otherwise, goodbye… Finally, please accept my cold salutations, kneaded in a mountain of ice. Peace, Ali Balhas, Askalan Prison, July 21, 1995.”
The photo-notes were permitted only after a 1993 hunger strike forced the hand of the Israeli captors, and there is a certain irony in the notion that a decision by a random Israeli bureaucrat is partly responsible for the window into the world of resistance prisoners of Israel that Zaatari has put together.
The most affecting images are in “Neruda’s Garden”. Written on Red Cross stationery—prisoners are warned in bold letters at the top of each page not to discuss anything other than personal family matters—Awada’s letters to his mother are tender and meticulously illustrated.
In addition, Zaatari features two large photos of the collected correspondences, from both sides of the divide. In the photo, his mother’s worn satchel holds his letters from prison, but the viewer notices the care with which the notes are folded and meticulously organized. Like the folder Awada created to hold his mother’s letters, her satchel and the thoughts it contained were the one connection she had to him, and so she cared for it in his absence, endowing it and its contents with his missing personality.
“Secrets” draw attention away from the loud, postwar hysteria to the silent little economy of emotions that persists in spite the best efforts of his jailors. By focusing on unadorned evidence, Zaatari creates a work that is more interested in the human condition in captivity than any broader political argument.
View of the Beirut Art Center
While I finish my review of the new Beirut Art Center exhibition (mostly good, you'll soon be able to read why), here is a photo of the opening.
The opening at Beirut Art Center.
I took these pictures early in the evening. It really filled up and was quite the social sight to see. But before the evening even began, there was an old man on crutches who had been taking advantage of the free wine for a lot longer than anyone else.
Keep your eyes peeled for the review, which I will post here by Monday.
Bureaucracy
Today I attempted to set right my visa overstay, which was met with fun bureaucracy at General Security. In order to leave Lebanon, I cannot simply renew my visa before my departure a week from Friday. I must either leave before Wednesday, July 27, which will be within the one month grace period of my overstay, or I must go to Syria before that. So, in order to leave Lebanon, I must leave Lebanon, or else they will not let me leave Lebanon. Perfect sense, right?
While searching for answers on the General Security website, I came across this gem of bureaucratic mumbojumbo. I have highlighted the best parts. Apparently "artist" and "masseuse" means erotic dancer. My translation: if you marry a Lebanese man, as long as you're not a dancer in a super nightclub, you can leave with an overstayed visa. If you are a dancer, you must have not shown your face in Lebanon for a year before you will get any special treatment.
The following cases are exempted from all the conditions concerning the address, the round trip ticket, and the prematurely approval from the General Directorate of the General Security:
- The wife of a Lebanese man, who didn’t work previously as an artist or a masseuse, after presenting a document proving the marriage.
- The wife of a Palestinian refugee in Lebanon or a holder of a valid identity card under consideration and who didn’t work previously as an artist or a masseuse, after presenting a document asserting the marriage.
- The wife of a Syrian man accompanying him and who didn't work previously as an artist or masseuses in Lebanon, provided that the marriage is written on the husband’s family register or by presenting a document proving the marriage.
- The coming females who didn’t work previously as artists or masseuses in Lebanon, accompanying one of the parents, one of the brothers, the husband, or a son.
- The mother in law of a Lebanese man, after presenting a document asserting the kinship.
- The females coming within official delegations, or those holding private, special or diplomatic passports.
- The wife of a Lebanese man who already has worked as an artist or a masseuse and left Lebanon for a period of more than one year, if she is accompanied by one or more children from this marriage after presenting the documents proving the marriage.
- The wife of a foreigner non Arabic man who has already worked as an artist or a masseuse and had left Lebanon for a period more than one year, provided that she is in his company and that she holds a document proving the marriage.
- People entering Lebanon via direct, prematurely, or consulate visas are allowed to enter the Syrian territories and to return to Lebanon within the period of the visa’s validity and within 5 days.
A Beirut night
Begins like this:
Travel to Zico House, an artist's collective on Spears Street. There, an event combining freestyle rap with freestyle drawing is going on. Watch for a bit, have a drink, then leave.
Travel to Gemmayzeh, where you have another drink at a rooftop bar with a retracting cylindrical ceiling. Note that they have repositioned the bar so that the retracting roof is now over your head. Leave.
Walk across the still-to-be-completed downtown area to the "Egg" or "Dome," the bombed out cinema in the center of the city. Recently, it has been hired out to various events, including the electronic concert during Fete de la Musique. This evening, it is hired out for a(nother) Michael Jackson event.
Inside, about twenty people stood around in a vast spherical space, still haggard from the old days when men peered from the air vents to snipe at what was once the war's front line. Chunks of the ceiling were missing, as were all of the seats, and here and there on the stuccoed ceiling little holes and chunks were missing, from who knows what sort of damage.
They were playing DVDs of Michael Jackson music videos very loudly, and the effect was sort of overwhelming. His videos are entrancing and even more so on a gigantic silver screen. The falsetto reverberated in the vast, empty space, and the apocalyptic feeling of this half-destroyed, half-resuscitated cinema was further enhanced.
Click through to see the full versions of these photos until I figure out how to do an HTML scroll frame.
- A panorama of the Beirut dome, an old cinema that was destroyed during the civil war.
(In this photo, you'll see on the left some barriers used to separate the construction area from the street, a bombed out church [this is all looking south], the rebuilt areas of downtown [west], the Dome, and the Hariri mosque [north].)
Inside the dome
Inside, you see the view from the screen.
Food initiate
Aside from writing about the Middle East and making snide remarks about politicians (today I had an idea for a Lebanese politicians cocktail party; I think it is an infallible idea), I intend to use this blog to post pictures of food.
Here is an oldish picture, but a good one nonetheless.
The back story: while in Jordan researching with Tufts University, we met Khalid, a Jordanian-Iraqi who facilitated countless interviews with Iraqi refugees. He was invaluable to our research. He also liked to eat, and he brought us to eat at a few restaurants around Amman, including this more traditional place. The food was amazing and, thankfully, I didn't puke from overeating as I did the other time I had a mensaf feast.
And, to be fair, I'm not 100% sure that the word "mensaf" is correct for this dish, but it was in many ways very similar, except with less yogurt sauce.
Mensaf in Jordan. June 2008.
Tweetup in Gemmayzeh
A few days ago, I went to a Twitter meetup - or "tweetup" - in Gemmayzeh at the invitation of my more Twitter savvy friend, Josie (or, @josiensor on Twitter).
Though I am a Twitter user myself, I was surprised that I found the whole thing to be very fun - I met a bunch of Beirut's bloggers, (Blogging Beirut, Plus 961, others I think), a few AUB students, and others.
She wrote it up for the Daily Star. I am going to copy the article here since it will disappear to the Daily Star's terrible pay-only archives in a day or two, but the link is here.
Growing social phenomenon unites Beirut strangers at Gemmayzeh sushi bar
By Josie Ensor
Daily Star staff
Friday, June 26, 2009
BEIRUT: Have you ever been to a dinner party where you don't know a single person? The scenario sounds terrifying, and frankly not too likely, but it is becoming a regular occurrence in Beirut. I went to my first Lebanese 'tweetup' last night at a sushi bar in Gemmayzeh and found myself in just this situation.
Searching for the elusive Beirut connection
It's hard to keep yourself connected here. The power doesn't cooperate, the internet doesn't cooperate, the traffic doesn't cooperate, and the weather doesn't cooperate. Everything fails, shuts down, sputters back to life, and then dies again.
Many things about this country don't make a lot of sense. However, like it did for the interminable Doctor Samir Geagea - former warlord and current head of the Lebanese Forces - somehow, everything works out in the end. (Obviously, I eventually found a connection.)
With that I leave you with some quotes from his gem of a (auto?)biography, found on the Lebanese Forces website:
Strong and irresistible, Samir Geagea can be compared to the majestic cedars of Lebanon that have characterized the Lebanese Mountains since Biblical times. These trees, arguably the most beautiful in the world, growing for thousands of years on the pinnacles of his hometown Besharri, are not dissimilar to his robust physique and principles. ...
Dr. Geagea, stong like cedars.
Just as straight and haughty as the great Cedars of Lebanon against storms and attacks of the elements, he too resisted the obstacles of those that tried to derail and humiliate him. Samir Geagea, a true stalwart, maintained the true vision, the right vision for his country. ...
This man, the imposing stature, with black piercing eyes, bare forehead and moustache that crosses a constantly smiling face, has a faith that can move mountains. Able and determined, preferring occasionally to compromise to avoid the worst and achieve a positive result, Samir Geagea has never confused strategy with tactics. Before all political steps, he analyses local, regional and international factors with perspicacity and intelligence. He consults and works with others. Calm and serene, especially in moments of crisis and tensions, he is at the same time Cartesian and pragmatic. He reacts as an intellectual and thinks as a man of action. He hardly forgets the past but never takes refuge in it. He knows how to apply the past to present situations in such a way as to achieve a better future. His appreciation of silence stems from his belief that "silence is an element at the heart of all that is great". He loves and knows how to listen, he never ceases to repeat the proverb: "it is in listening and not through speaking that we learn."
