Iznogoud's Oudventures

CODA.

2008-09-16T18:02:00.009+03:00

Brookline MA, USA, September 16, 2008

Self-reflection.

I’m putting the finishing touches to my blog to the tune of Fairouz’s Qasayed album, sitting at my apartment in Boston, chasing another dream which looks to take me towards even more sounds and shades. I realize that as much as I’ve written here about my experiences in Lebanon, I’m still at a loss for words. I just don’t quite know what to say.

I’ve been unable to keep the blog updated regularly as things were happening, but in hindsight, I saw and experienced so much that it has taken a lot of time to even begin to process it all, so I don’t know if it would’ve even been possible to finish this earlier. I’m at another crossroads now, in yet another country, among yet more new people, new surroundings, new mentors – and I’ve started feeling anxious about completing this chapter, at least in the form of these diary entries, to move on with a clean slate. Not that it’s been dirty; full would be the word.

To those who stumble across my blog for the first time now, please begin reading from the bottom-up, in the July entries starting with "Intro". The entries are in reverse chronological order, newest ones on top.

It occurred to me that one pattern of my life tends to recur. On the one hand, I’m firmly rooted in the European way of life and culture, and on the other, I feel such a strong pull eastward, particularly towards the Middle East and most of all towards Lebanon. Sometimes I feel like I’m literally standing with one foot in Rovaniemi and one in Beirut, both walking their own paths.

I’ve been chasing some form of a unique musical identity – finding the mie in minä (‘me’) – for quite some time. I’d like to reach a place where my sonic handwriting is instantly recognizable. I have a growing feeling my other foot started walking one branch of that path a long time ago, but only took its first real steps this summer in Beirut; as for the other foot, that branch of the path is the one I’m pursuing now here in Boston. In time, I hope the two converge.

I have little else to add but thank all my beloved friends in Beirut – the ones I reunited with after 12 years away, and all the new friends I made. I know who you are.

Thank you for giving me a second home.

-J

OUTRO. Jul 14th - 16th

2008-09-16T17:18:00.021+03:00

Mon 14th Jul 2008

After returning to Samir’s from our escape into the Chouf, I’d discovered Sam’s MTV colleague Kris Brady was crashing at his place as well. A genuinely nice guy, who by coincidence turned out to share my battle fatigue with 24/7 partying, he was more than welcome. Come morning, we woke to find Samir still sound asleep and wanting to sleep it off some more, so Kris and I went out to hunt for breakfast out on Mar Elias Street.

(Maltese-) Irishman in Beirut. Kris Brady.

I needed a new oud. Desperately. Mine wasn’t weathering the climate changes too well at all – not in Finland, not in Lebanon – with the tuning pegs snapping out of tune making playing the instrument pretty close to what I’d call awkward. I was due to meet a very busy Ziyad – who had his hands full as it was, not only preparing for his own tour in Egypt that was to begin the following week, but also selecting and arranging songs for his group’s stint as the house band on a Lebanese television show which meant shooting 21 episodes during August alone, each involving an extensive, entirely different repertoire. Not even mentioning all the gigs he was playing with a sore neck. And yet here he was, honking from his small black car in front of Samir’s building, ready to take me oud-shopping and still promising to meet me for a lesson later that day.

I had a bit of a guilty conscience since this was also the day Samir was flying back to Dubai, and we hadn’t really had any private face time. Now I was torn between perhaps my only chance to have Ziyad as oud counselor and Samir leaving while I was away. I did have to go, though – I had only three days left of my stay – and we both knew this, so Samir understood. After warm goodbyes with promises for the next reunion not to take twelve years, I hopped in Ziyad’s car and off we went.

Our window of opportunity was about two hours. Which, in Beirut traffic, isn’t exactly a panorama. At first the idea was to visit Ziyad’s luthier in Baalbek, but after adding up my time frame to my budget, we resolved to trying to find a reasonably priced oud inside Beirut, but one that would sound, play and hold tuning better than my current one. After driving back and forth visiting music stores discussing local politics in-between, and a surprise phone call from Home that made me very happy, we finally came across a Turkish oud in a regular music store right in the heart of Hamra that wasn’t only more than reasonable costwise, but also played like a dream. The somewhat crude finishing of the little minute details of the construction made me a bit apprehensive, so while Ziyad had a meeting to attend to, I mulled it over. Ziyad strongly recommended the oud, saying he’d be happy to play concerts with it himself, even though the price was no more than $450 with a hard case. He also said that if I didn’t buy it (which read as a would-be huge mistake between his lines), he’d take me north of Beirut to another luthier he said made excellent instruments that would be a lot more expensive, but that he thought I wouldn’t necessary find a better oud than this one even if I forked out a $1000 more, surface shine notwithstanding.

I SMS’d Maria inviting her for lunch, so we spent an hour or two at Café Younis chatting. I figured the female perspective on my possible financial venture wouldn’t hurt, so she unfortunately ended up having to witness my AraFrench bargaining skills in action back at the music store. I have a feeling she was more than a little amused by the exchange. You try asking for an extra low C-string for an oud to seal the deal when you don’t even remember your quatres from your quatre-vingts.

Yes, so I was weak. I bought the oud. I think I'll call her Poirot.

Poirot. She goes down to low-C, bitches.

My baby's mitey feine behind.

Back at Ziyad’s for the lesson, he was very happy I had decided to buy the instrument. “You bought a good instrument, yani…” After an extended crash course in the Hijaz maqam I rushed back to Samir’s to pack and move out since the renovation was going to resume the next day.

...

A cautionary tale, kids, the moral of which being, even the almighty Lonely Planet doesn’t always get it right:

It was already around 11 pm by the time I’d gathered my things and took a cab to Ain el-Mreisse to the Pension Home Valery, which according to the Bible of travelers worldwide was described as “cheap, clean, with friendly, English-speaking staff”. One out of four isn’t too bad, I guess – the only thing I could agree with at $10 a night was that it was cheap.

The hostel was on the third floor of a very seedy building just off the Corniche in Ain el-Mreisse (interestingly, the building also housed a second hostel of the exact same name - Pension Home Valery – on the second floor, where the wise men of Lonely Planet advised not to venture. I wonder how much the fish were there). By the time I got there, I was exhausted, feeling eery reminders of my earlier stomach illness rearing its ugly head, and didn’t have the time or patience to reconsider my options. One night, what the hell, right?

Bad move.

My room smelled like dirty detergent, if that’s possible. The room was on the third floor, didn’t have a wall but instead a tent fabric that was hung so that it covered the shell holes in the wall that had been roughly patched up with cement. A very questionable mattress, not even mentioning the pillow. A fan that made a noise which made it impossible to sleep. Then again, with the smell and the humidity it was impossible to sleep without it, so catch-22.

Shell holes. Pension Home Valery.

Avoid. Please believe.

I tried my luck at taking a shower, only to find a foreigner, British perhaps, taking a leak in the sink although there was a perfectly functioning toilet right next to it. After praising the good lord of good manners I ducked back into my room and went back into the toilet-slash-shower only to find that he’d also shit the toilet. Very thorough work, too.

Who are these people? I mean, within the confines of a man’s own bedroom, hey, whatever floats your boat, but in a public hostel? Please. Luckily, I found a second bathroom, where I spent a considerable amount of time being sick, not as much from the previous as from the stomach illness having its way with me and caressing my bowels until all was empty. After a very uneasy shower not trying to dirty myself (ah, come to me, sweet irony) I unsuccessfully tried to sleep. The tent fabric wasn’t exactly the best noise gate in the world. I resolved to getting up early and returning to my original hostel in Achrafieh come first light.

A weary traveler.

Tues 15th Jul 2008

Sleep, the sweet escape it always is, didn’t enjoy its stay at the hostel either. After a very restless night tossing and turning and wondering what in the world was going on upstairs, I got up very early and immediately called B&B Mehanna in Achrafieh about a free room. The lady said that yes, they had free beds but that I’d have to wait until 11 am before the room would be available. I tried again to not get dirtier in the shower and headed out.

I had some time to kill so I took a stroll around Ain el-Mreisse, stopping at the corner store for a sandwich, and after walking around for a while I went back to the Pension and eagerly checked out. Incidentally, the well-groomed foreign gentleman from the bathroom the night before was in the reception area with his friend – neatly-dressed, looking like the quintessentially etiquette-equipped tourist. Ta ta. I wonder what he was thinking I was thinking when I tried my best to glare at him disapprovingly. Aina saa kärsiä ja hävetä. As if I was any better a person for all my jesusing about, but still, I repeat – who are these people?

Never has a hostel room looked more inviting than when I back to the Mehanna. Same room as before, coincidentally. Compared to the previous night, it was like coming home; an interesting contrast to the feeling I’d had when I first got there when I came to Beirut. I always find it interesting how when you first come to new surroundings, you feel so out of place, but after a while the very sights and sounds that at first seem so foreign start to not only bring you comfort and safety, but also to give an impression of a home base. I spent a considerable amount of time in the shower and, feeling refreshed and finally clean, went to work on my new oud. I can’t even begin to say how good it felt to finally felt to play an oud of my own that not only sounded beautiful from the outset, but didn’t fight me all the way in doing so, either.

...

A moped in Beirut traffic is one hell of a way to travel. Do try.

I had a shopping date with Morgan, who’d promised to take me to some stores where I could buy gifts to take home and souvenirs for myself – on a moped. Morgan picked me up at Place Sassine and off we went, me holding on for dear life with backpack and oud in tow, Morgan laughing at the intensity of my grip. And who needs a helmet when we both had suave oversized sunglasses?

I hadn’t been on a moped since I was 12 or 13, when me and a dear friend used to pretend we were motocross racers in the forests of Oulunsalo in Finland, so I was exhilarated. Morgan seemed even more amused at how into it I got the more Beiruti his driving got. In three words, I loved it. Even got compliments on how easy a passenger I was. After stopping for the best falafel sandwich I’ve ever had in my life we criss-crossed the city in search of traditional Arabic clothes, books and an external hard drive.

Yes, a hard drive. Jean and Ziyad have been assembling an Arabic music library for years and years, which existed in only two copies, one each. And here I was, having been offered to have the third copy. There were tens of thousands of songs from old turn-of-the-century recordings to Mohamed Abdel Wahab to obscure Qasabji songs to Turkish fusion to just about everything I’d ever day-drooled about. Though I was nearing bankruptcy, I couldn’t exactly pass on an offer like this, so Morgan, Jean and I stopped by the computer store across from Jean’s place in Hamra and I left my shining new hard drive with Jean to copy overnight.

Back at Ziyad’s for the day’s lesson, I seemed to be making slow progress not only with the music, but with his baby niece as well, who ventured as far as to wave to me from afar. Without crying. Too much.

Jean had a gig later that night at T Marbouta in Hamra playing latin music with an Italian singer who’d just come to Beirut, so I made a pit stop in Achrafieh dropping off my oud, showered, took a taxi back to Hamra, and found myself on the receiving end of a lecture from the driver comparing prostitutes of different nationalities. Interesting. Maureen, who joined me for the gig, gave me a lesson on using the manual features of my camera, so we spent the evening not only enjoying the music and the atmosphere but also taking more photos. It’s amazing, the difference what a little know-how with a camera can make. Daniel-san must practice.

T Marbouta.

Maureen, painting-esque.

Flash on, flash off.

Wed 16th Jul 2008

The last day. Wherever had my two and a half weeks gone? I hadn’t even packed and I was getting homesick for Beirut already.

I woke up over the moon about the fact that I found myself in a clean bed in a clean room in a clean hostel. Not much more one can ask for as far as accommodation goes. The Madame at the hostel was very pleasantly surprised to see me again (I’d checked in the previous day with her brother, apparently). We ended up having a long conversation, exchanging pleasantries and comparing the conditions of Beirut hostels.

And at the end of the chat I realized I’d been speaking French.

I don’t know if a longer stay in a foreign language environment triggers and activates some language center area or other of the brain. Be that as it may, I was still quite surprised to notice that the cobwebs from my supposedly forgotten French had been all but dusted off; at the beginning of my stay in Beirut I’d failed miserably at virtually every attempted French conversation, which had resulted in me falling back on English and gesturing wildly when misunderstood. So who knows – maybe I hadn’t lost as much of my high school lessons as I’d thought.

I had some last minute errands to run, plus I had a little financial problem as I’d managed to max out my credit card. In dire straits iz. As I was all out of clean clothes, I tried but was unable to find a place to have my laundry done before my flight, so I returned to the hostel with my sack of dirty laundry in tow, resigned to flying out smelling iznotsogoud. As it turned out, the Madame had warmed to me to the extent that she promised to wash them all, exclaiming “You are like my son!” Problem #1 solved. Problem #2 was solved with a call to the credit company in Finland, who temporarily raised my credit limit, so said prodigal son breathed two sighs of relief; now I could get back to Finland without having to borrow cash from Morgan, who’d promised to help if I was in need. And smelling at least halfway decent, at that.

As I was going in and out of shops in Hamra doing some last minute shopping, I noticed that many were either already closed or closing fast, and it was only two in the afternoon. A jeweler mentioned something offhand about his brother calling from the south and that as a result he’d have to close shop. I couldn’t figure out if this was some public holiday that I didn’t know about or what, since there was no immediate logic to some stores closing and some staying open. Regardless, I was hoping I’d have enough time to find the exact things I still wanted to take home with me - like having a certain necklace re-engraved in Arabic and buying a bunch of Oum Khalthoum and Fairouz live DVD’s from a music store on Ronnie’s street. Once again, things you don’t come across at Free Record Shop in Helsinki.

Maureen called me up on her lunch break from her new job at an architect firm, and we decided to meet for coffee at Starbucks, with her promising to explain what was going on. It turned out that the Hizbollah were doing an exchange with Israel in the south of Lebanon – the bodies of Israeli soldiers returned to their homeland for burial in exchange for Hizbollah hostages released from captivity, including Samir Kantar, a fighter who was something of a hero to many Lebanese and who had been imprisoned for almost thirty years – and that Beiruti businessmen were showing their support for Hizbollah by closing their shops, celebrating the hostages’ release as if it actually were a public holiday. So you had some stores closed, some open – another sign of the ever-persisting divide behind the seemingly harmonious façade that is not only Beirut, but Lebanon.

Hamra.

I had a 3 am flight to Helsinki via Prague the next morning, but I wanted to have a get-together in the evening with everyone before I left. After texting invites to Ziyad, Jean, Maria, Morgan and Sara I finished my shopping and made another pit stop in Karm el-Zeytoun for a shower; Maureen and I planned to meet up later at my hostel where she’d pick me up.

In a taxi.

As I was practicing for the last lesson with Ziyad I heard that hauntingly familiar urban soundtrack that is so unique to places like Beirut – the crackle of gunfire on the streets. Looking out over the city from my balcony, it didn’t appear to be fighting; considering the day’s events in the south, I knew the people weren’t fighting. Another flashback to the night Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was murdered in 1995. They were celebrating.

Trying to capture gunfire.

Back in Mar Elias at Ziyad’s, it turned out that the last lesson didn’t involve any playing on my part. One eye on the television showing the proceedings in the south, Ziyad demonstrated an improvisation in the Ajam maqam before going into a detailed introduction to traditional Arabic song forms, which once again was virgin territory for me. Mitey useful information iz. Ziyad had an evening engagement to attend to with his fiancée, so we agreed to meet up later that night for a drink and goodbyes before my flight left.

After packing and showering (yes, again – if you come to Lebanon in the summer, get used to the idea) back at the hostel, Maureen picked me up and we headed towards West Beirut. We planned to spend the evening at the Barometre, a little bar-slash-restaurant right off Bliss Street which served Lebanese food, but we still had some places to stop at before we could sit down for drinks. We tried getting into Walima’s to pick up Ziyad’s records which he’d left for me, but the place was unfortunately closed, so we paid a visit to Jean’s to both collect my hard drive with the treasure chest of Arabic music inside, and to also invite him with us to the Barometre. Turned out Jean was so exhausted from a lengthy all-day studio session in his underpants (don’t X-Y…) that he decided to stay home. The Barometre wasn’t his favorite place to hang out, either, it turned out, so we bid our goodbyes and vowed to get together soon for more music and Bona. Nguyen Lö!

By the time Maureen and I’d found a place to park and got to the Barometre, Maria was already there with her friend Alice from the Arabic course. After introductions and throwing myself at the mercy of my beautiful hostess insofar as food went, Morgan joined us with a true surprise in tow – Cindy Saleh. I remembered Cindy as a curly-haired pretty girl a year below us at ACS, who shared a taste for the same Black Sabbath song as I did back in the day; now she was all grown-up, not only stunning as ever but also a successful author in her own right, having released her debut novel A Separate Realm as only a 17-year-old to much critical acclaim. Suffice to say I was both surprised and more than happy to see her again. And so my farewell feast also became a reunion.

Farewells at Barometre. Maureen and Maria.

Maureen, yours truly, Maria.

Great food, Almaza, lots of laughs and way too many pictures later, Maureen was already getting antsy about getting me to the airport in time. The problem was Ziyad, who kept sending me messages that he’d be there in twenty minutes – every twenty minutes. I decided to wait for him since I really wanted to bid him goodbye and thank him for everything, so once he eventually did show up – a bit drunk – we had another problem. He wanted to buy me arak. A full pint of arak. You have to understand, arak is a local anis spirit, not of the weakest potency, that is usually taken in shots. And I got the impression that Ziyad wasn’t in the frame of mind where he was likely to be persuaded otherwise. So I found myself with a tall glass of arak in my hand, trying to unsuccessfully live up to the good name my Finnish ancestors have made for us. Whatever was it they said about the sins of the fathers…?

Brothers from other mothers. With Morgan.

The goodbyes were expectedly emotional – going-away gifts and everything. I’d experienced so much during my stay in Beirut it was far from easy to leave, but then again, I knew more certainly than ever that I did have a second home in the world. If Antti Tuisku can pull off Rovaniemi-New York with a straight face, I’ll go one up on him with Rovaniemi-Beirut. Anjad.

"[A pint of] arak, yani...?"

Almazing.

Master, disciple, and the energy in-between.

At the airport I came across an unexpected obstacle – my luggage was 10 kg overweight. I tried to reason with the airline clerk at the desk, to no avail; she wanted $278 extra as penance, and of course I was loaded with all of $40 in cash, and a maxed-out VISA card. Rahaa – ON. I tried to argue that I’d brought the exact same amount of luggage with me to Beirut when I came – a minor white lie on my part – and that if it hadn’t been a problem then, why was it one now? She tried talking to her senior officer, who looked at me with a mixture of disapproval and frustration, but he wasn’t the type to budge. I asked if I could try and redistribute the weight between my carry-ons and my backpack, and finally the wall gave way. I unpacked my hiking backpack in a real frenzy, tried to cram as much of my things into my carry-on bag, but I still got an adamant shake of the head for my efforts. Until, that is, the first lady at the desk spotted Morgan’s going-away present, a Lebanese flag among my spread-out belongings. She looked pleadingly to her superior with an emphatic “Haraam…” [roughly translates to “Aww…”], which finally worked. The officer threw his hands up in desperation, and let me rush to passport control with a seriously augmented carry-on bag. I made the flight at literally the last minute, as some would say is true to my particular character.

I don’t know if I’ve ever actually had three pairs of shoes and my manly cosmetic bag – with all its liquids and chemicals – in a plane cabin before. And this in a post-9/11 world, on a flight from... Beirut.

I think the world has hope.

Anaheim pose reprise.

INTERLUDE. Jul 11th - Jul 13th

2008-08-04T01:43:00.014+03:00

Finally got around to posting an update, so here's another bit of backtracking. I'll post the final three days as soon as can set aside time to write.

-J

...

Fri 11th Jul 2008

Ziyad gave the green light for the lesson today, so after finally getting my laundry I spent some time going over my notes and doing some exercises before Samir, Wissam and I went out to Roadster’s to eat. Problem was, I’d accidentally (occidentally?) eaten a sandwich on my laundry tour of duty, so the half-eaten lunch at Roadster’s left me not only overstuffed, but with a guilty conscience. Food waste iznogoud.

The lesson took place at Ziyad’s place this time since Samir’s apartment was unavailable due to obvious reasons. I got to meet his family, scare the living daylights out of his baby niece for some reason, and we had a really good two hours drinking coffee and continuing where we left off. Ziyad seemed to appreciate the progress I’d made, and after answering an impressive amount of my questions he went on to give examples of improvising in the Rast and Bayati maqams. Meaning more microtonal scales to tackle. Absolutely beautiful moods.

I’d promised to go with Maria to Ziyad’s gig at Walima’s so she and Ziyad could meet and speak, so I took a cab to Hamra and was in for quite a ride, as it would turn out. I could tell from the second I did my regular “Marhaba! Kifak? Servis? Hamra.” routine that the driver wasn’t having exactly the best day of his life thus far. I think his maqam had his occidentals in a tighter bind than mine did.

All well and good, until we were approaching Hamra and neared a gas station. Some guy was standing in the middle of the street stopping the traffic so his friend could back up onto the street from where he was parked, but this didn’t sit particularly well with my driver’s mood. He floored the gas, almost ran the guy over, who dodged at the last second, and a verbal Celebrity Deathmatch ensued. After an exchange of several mutually affectionate kiss’ommaks and kiss’ehrtas the man on the street called out to his friend, who decided to contribute his two cents and started pounding the driver through the passenger seat window. Which left me, riding shotgun, in the middle of a fist fight inside the car. I ducked at first, then managed to grab both the guys’ wrists, yelled “Khalas! Shwei, shwei!” glaring at both of them in turn, and after they seemed calmed down, I let go. Mistake.

After some more exchanged blows I managed to push the other guy out of the window with another “Khalas!”, and I begun trying to calm the driver down. I don’t know why, but it didn’t exactly seem to help my peacekeeping efforts that the guy on the street backed up a bit to gather some momentum, then ran towards the taxi and kicked the side of the car in as hard as he could. By this time my driver was motioning to a steroided-up goon on his side of the street, with rapid-fire instructions in Arabic, I assume to beat the crap out of the window-immigrant-turned-car-saboteur. I grabbed my driver by the hand, did another “Shwei, shwei. Inta, DRIVE, yalla!” which finally got his attention and we continued towards Hamra. The cutest thing was, as he dropped me off at the We2 intersection, he looked at me apologetically, lowered his eyes and said, “Sori…”.

I wonder if he went back for a refill.

Some very creative territorial claims at Café Younis

Maria hadn’t received my message to meet me at Café Younes for some reason, so I went to Walima’s where she was already waiting, surprisingly, with a whole bunch of her friends from the AUB Arabic course I’d visited. Had a very pleasant evening talking, making new acquaintances and enjoying the vibe. Maria and everyone seemed to really enjoy Ziyad’s quartet’s music (this time, the trio from last week was augmented by Ziyad’s cousin playing the qanun as well).

Chad and Maria

More new friends.

Ziyad's quartet at Walima's

After totally stealing Ziyad's thunder with my supreme command of the dancefloor (yes, I was tricked into dancing by Maria and a Swedish journalist called Sarah. I tried to resist for the sake of courtesy for Ziyad, but failed. Mötley did have a point. Chicks = Trouble.) and making it abundantly clear to every naysayer and nonbeliever that Travolta had nothing on me, Maria and I ended up listening to Ziyad’s accounts of the Lebanese music scene and some insightful opinions on the music business here. I walked Maria to the AUB gate and took a taxi – sans fist fights, this time – back to Samir’s. I blogged until the Mayor returned from his excursion with some friends, Abboudi and Bass, for the mandatory afterparty at Samsterdam.

Maria, Travolta, Ziyad and fiancée Marie.

Sat 12th Jul 2008

A slow day for a change. Slept late, hung out at Samir’s and jammed, switching back and forth between electric and acoustic. More people popped in, Samir’s Maltese-Irish MTV co-worker Chris Brady and his girl Zehar, namely. Has to be more or less 12 years to the day since I played the intro solo to “Fade to Black”, “Orion”, “Sanitarium”… the classic menu was served. Good times.

After a very late lunch at Kitsch in Gemmayzeh – and an uncharacteristically healthy one, which bothered Samir to no end – where we were joined by Sam’s Duracell bunny friend Hasseeba with her sister in tow, we passed by the new apartment Bass had just bought, before heading to Cloud Nine in Gemmayzeh for Abboudi and Zalfa’s engagement party. Very informal, just drinks among friends. Met some more new people and had a good time. Bass, who’s been doing construction in Baghdad, had an Iraq story or two up his sleeve, suffice it to say. I wonder how it actually feels to oversee a construction site – let alone actually be one of the workers – with mortar and shellfire going off every four minutes around you aiming to destroy everything? I wonder if he ever feels that his work might be in vain?

Me, Zalfa, Abboudy, Samir and Bass.

The happy couple.

After a miserable failed attempt to get into Sky Bar – although we were prepared with table reservation, name, password, the works – we returned to Cloud Nine before the entire gang headed back to Samsterdam. Ordered out, and I ended up playing troubadour for both the happy engaged couple and the rest of the guys singing along.

Sun 13th Jul 2008

I don’t know if I’m aging too well.

SaMTV had been on air for only three days and I already started to feel the repercussions; this despite resorting to being more of a sideline spectator than a protagonist in the proceedings. So while Samir and the other guys still had some more Dubai to get out of their systems, I, in turn, needed to get out of Samsterdam for a breather, as big a blast as we’d had so far.

Morgan to the rescue.

...

[INSERT PARENTHESES, EXIT REGULAR PROGRAM, ENTER TANGENT]

Sometimes, regardless of whether your friends mind or not, evacuating the premises and thereby forsaking inebriation for recreation leaves you feeling like a nerd.

Then again, I guess I always was one.

I don’t exactly know why, but it brings back a certain episode from five years ago. Dejà vu, Morocco, 2003 – I’d met a British guy called Andrew at my hostel in Casablanca and taken the train to Rabat with him, on the outskirts of which we came across a blond curly-haired guy walking towards us. Turned out to be another Brit called Jules. So Jules and Andrew got talking.

ANDREW: “Where you from in the UK?”
JULES: “Cambridge.”
ANDREW: “Yeah? Me too.”
JULES: “What do you do?”
ANDREW: “Oh, you know. University”
JULES: “Yeah? Me too.”
ANDREW: “Where from in Cambridge?”
JULES: “I live at the dorms, on Driveonwrongsideof Street.”
ANDREW: “Yeah? Me too.”
JULES: “What number?”
ANDREW: “3”
JULES: “Yeah? Me too!”
BOTH: “Fo’in ‘euw! Fo’in small world, innit?”

So it turned out that Andrew and Jules were neighbors. And they met in Rabat, Morocco for the first time. Naturally, the next part of the conversation went along the lines of

ANDREW: “Fo’ me, we got to celebrate. Fancy a pint or four, or whaddaya reckon?”
JULES: “Oh, I know a place…”

And I wanted to backpack around the country and see places and meet people. It was kind of hard to justify this to the two Brits who didn’t quite understand my geekism, but I managed to excuse myself to venture out on my own.

While we’re on the subject of small worlds… Lebanon has to do with another “small world” experience of mine, when on the first day of school at A.C.S. in Beirut I thought I saw a vaguely familiar face with a familiar name in history class. Turned out to be Ramsay Geha, who’d been in my first grade class with Ms. Burnside – who my father thought was one hot newzealander – in Amman, Jordan. In the 8 years since ’87 I’d turned into a geek and he’d turned into an aspiring bodybuilder who idolized Beavis and Butthead and talked about his biceps 24-7. We made a great team.

So there you have it – how to go off on a tangent (or tangent of a tangent) about drinking in two non-related Arabic countries, small world experiences, and being a geek, Beavis and Butthead, and still be able to come back full circle, sound convincing and continue with the script without anyone noticing.

[EXIT TANGENT, RESUME REGULAR PROGRAM, CLOSE PARENTHESES]

...

I guess I just don’t like to party when I travel as much. If I want a hangover, I’d rather nurse it on Finnish time. And clubbingwise, I get my fill in if not one, then two nights in a row at the latest. An invitation for a day out in the Chouf with Morgan visiting his grandparents was a change that was more than welcome. After a brief visit to Morgan’s parents’ house right around the corner from Samir’s in Mar Elias, an affectionately loud father-son exchange and some delicious corn, we were off to Morgan’s village in the Chouf, southeastbound towards Batloun.

Driving through the Hizbollah/Amal –exterior-decorated illegally built area just outside of Beirut (the name of the area escapes me), I couldn’t help but think that some people had scored some prime time real estate during the civil war. Property squat on the shore of the Mediterranean, anyone?

The Chouf mountains are nothing short of breathtaking. After starting to feel the need for some space in Beirut, the view from the car alone was exactly what the doctor had ordered. As a part of Lebanon that is predominantly the home of the Druze minority (with a small Christian population as well), it was very revealing to get a glimpse of the Druze way of life – not only because most Middle Eastern news coverage all but overlooks anything outside the Sunni-Shia-Christian-Jew equation, but also because two of my closest friends, Morgan and Samir, are Druze. In my entire time in Lebanon 12 years ago, this was a curtain that I hadn’t had the chance to see opening. And visiting Morgan’s family as a guest was a priceless way to pull a little of the drape back, even for just a day.

The Chouf.

After stopping in the Christian village of Deir al Qamar briefly to try and find souvenirs to take back home, we pulled over to take some pictures of the beautiful view into the valley below. As we were Canon-izing away, an old man came up to Morgan asking if he could use his phone to call a family member with some very urgent matter. After being slightly amused by the old timer’s handle on mobile phones (holding it far from his ear and shouting into the receiver so the other party somewhere unseen and far away could hear) Morgan started translating his conversation for me, ending up giving me one of my fondest memories and most treasured Lebanon-in-a-nutshell moments of my entire trip.

It transpired that a relative of the old man’s had just returned to Lebanon from abroad, a distant cousin or someone who he hadn’t seen in quite some time, and that the man had sold all the other fruit from his cart on the roadside, but that he’d saved his last 10 cm by 10 cm box of strawberries for the returnee, and that he just had to get the strawberries to him. Of course, the fact that the cousin had returned to the south of the country, at least 100 km away, bore no relevance. The conversation was a very animated one, going as far as to include poetry which even I could pick up on from the ending rhymes. He simply had a box of his best strawberries left, saved especially for the occasion, and all he wanted in the world at that particular moment was to get them to his cousin somehow.

Morgan trying to dial the old man's relative.

Strawberry...

... Fields Forever.

Strawberries. And there weren’t many of them.

I still can’t get over it.

Batloun, a Druze village of no more than 3000, seemed like a fairly rural community. I don’t think I can really put it better than Morgan, so I’ll quote him here –

“All the scattered villages in the depths of the mountains we saw - the sprinkled lights were all Druze villages, tiny and sporadic, but closer and closer to the earth. During the day you'll see herders and black, brown and white spots all over - the sheep grazing. My gramps had chickens too in the back I never got to show you and small herbs gardens with a few veggies - just the essentials for salads and additions in meals - also lots of other plants for teas and drying in the sun.”

The importance of family in Lebanese life is great, much more so than at least in Finland. “The mountain”, which is where everyone seems to go, is a place of peace, quiet, safety and getting together; families living in Beirut seem to spend a lot of time in the summer visiting with relatives, parents and grandparents during their time off. Second houses are bought near childhood homes, and it’s not uncommon for hordes of grandchildren, aunts, uncles and cousins to gather at the grandparents’ home for extended periods of time.

The warmth with which Morgan and I were received at both his grandparents’ – first maternal and then paternal – was truly something. Though it was a pity we just missed his mother who’d gone back to Beirut right before we got to Batloun, I was introduced to more cousins, aunts and uncles than I could keep a head count of, so company was aplenty. Morgan had a lot to report on his life and plans in Dubai, so I sat back, watching and listening and truly enjoying myself although I didn’t understand most of what was being said. Kisses, hugs, opinions and advice were received and returned.

A family gathering at Morgan's grandparents' house.

Morgan's paternal grandparents

I’d brought my oud along, so after a delicious meal and coffee at his paternal grandparents’ house, and a distinctly Druze type of sweet tea at his maternal grandparents’ place, I was talked into playing for the family that had gathered in the living room. Morgan’s grandmother, whose father had played oud when she was a child, was particularly taken with my efforts in putting Ziyad’s teachings into practice, exclaiming a broken “I love you!” although she spoke no English whatsoever after my first improvisation. Another Moment.

Batloun by night.

Morgan and I with Batloun in the background.

It had already grown dark by the time we left the house, but we still had places to visit. Morgan wanted to take me to his Spot, his private personal Place where he went to take the world in, to refocus, to contemplate. I felt very honored, like I was being let in on the Holiest of Holies to top off everything else that Morgan had shown me during the day. We first went by car and then walked to the ruins of an old house overlooking a spectacular view of the valley below. After talking about wine, women and song for quite some time we started taking artsy photos trying to capture the moment. Nothing seemed to quite really translate until we started getting creative with shutter speeds and a lighter.

Getting wild ideas with a lighter. A prayer.

Circles...

...can be...

...infinite.

How I managed this I have absolutely no idea.

Getting...

...spooky.

A downright scary shot of Morgan.

Circle of fire?

Our retreat to Morgan’s sanctuary from the world provided us with another exercise in perspective, courtesy of the festivities from the village below us. I mean, how many times do you have the chance to see a display of fireworks… from above? The scale and scope of things truly has more than a little to do with one’s perspective.

…but the strawberries. STRAWBERRIES.

Quick update

2008-07-22T15:42:00.002+03:00

For those who got concerned the blog hasn't been updated in a while --

I'm back in Helsinki, safe and sound. Quite a lot to write about during the last part of my trip so I just haven't finished it yet. I'll put it up ASAP.

It's just... hard to find the words, I guess. Homesick already.

-J

CHORUS. Jul 7th - Jul 10th

2008-07-12T12:57:00.025+03:00

On the activity front, at first not too much and then too much to report. Hard to keep up with maintaining the blog; I’ll upload pics later when I have the chance. See, Samir’s in town. And when Samir’s in town, Samir’s in TOWN.

-J

EDIT: Pics added.

...

Mon 7th Jul 2008

Allow for some streams of consciousness first. And streams, of course, as we all know, all lead to the almighty Kemijoki.

The main determining factor in my daily schedule has been my oud lessons, since that was one of the main things I came here for. Unfortunately, Ziyad has been suffering from pain in his neck that has prevented him from playing at all, so he texted me apologizing that he had to cancel again, and we resolved to see what the next day would bring.

Not that I didn’t have enough to digest as it was, with the amount of information from the first session that we had. I figured since I was given extra time before our next session, I’d continue transcribing our previous one further. From a western perspective, the biggest difficulty – and the one that I came here to find even partial answers for – in playing the oud or Arabic music is, how do I make myself sound genuine? The fact that the oud as a sound and instrument is so foreign to the western ear, and that it has a characteristic tone that immediately screams “Middle East”, often gives the untrained ear the first impression that the player is automatically a master of the instrument and style if they’re able to get a sound out of it in the first place. So while personally, I feel that a little bit of the technique is there on a good day, I came here pursuing substance.

And not that I’m a musical purist by any means, either; I wanted to get deeper into it all, to quote Ziyad, “to know the rules before I break them”. My main assignment for the next lesson was to create my own taqasims in both the C Nahawand (Aeolian/natural minor, for the occidentally inclined) and C Rast (Ionian/major, but with a microtonal 3rd and microtonal 7th, both between minor and major) maqams; however, the Arabic way of improvising within scales is very different from the western one. I’ve spent a large amount of time sitting with my headphones on, writing out phrase after phrase of Ziyad’s examples so I could internalize the way notes are approached, how decorations and ornaments are applied, and so on. I figured the best way to get an ear for it all was to do it without an instrument, meaning I could be immersed in study and still take in the vibes of Hamra at one of the cafés. Not a bad deal. Sly Iznogoud iz mek a naice learn inva ironmental planning!

I met Jean and his girlfriend Nayla at Café Younis in the afternoon for some coffee and general hanging out, after which Jean and I took a taxi to FWD Studios, which is where he works. I don’t think I’ve ever been to a studio with an atmosphere quite the same, roof top terrace and everything. Seemed very professional, with a great energy between the guys who worked there. Jean played me some tracks they’d done. They do love their effects on the electric guitar here… After the studio tour we headed over to Jean’s place to watch some live videos (Bona, though this time with Bobbi McFerrin) before I went back to Samir’s to practice.

Jean and the owner at FWD Studios

The FWD lounge

The rooftop terrace at the studio

In the driver's seat, or riding shotgun?

Maureen took me on a tour of Hamra’s selection of cafés and bars later that night, giving me some background information on each place. Apparently, pretty much every joint in Hamra has a very particular crowd – one for those leaning more towards the left, one for those on the right, one for the pro-government people, one for this, one for that… you name it. I got the impression of a division accentuated in times of conflict. I’d been happily oblivious to any of this until now, just sitting in any place I felt like (and resolved to continue doing so, regardless). There truly is something for everyone – Irish Pubs, Lebanese restaurants, American chain cafés like Starbucks, urban lounge-type dives (Rovaniemians, think old Café Tivoli like it was always supposed to be; Helsinkians, think Saunabar a couple of years back) with AUB students chilling to ambient music – everything. We ended up having a very interesting conversation comparing Arabic and western/Finnish culture and the generation gaps in both. Fascinating.

Tues 8th Jul 2008

Got up earlier than usual, which made me proud to no small degree.

I’m not one for big cities. I’m from Rovaniemi, and from the outskirts of Rovaniemi, at that. I enjoy a big city up to a point, but then the country boy inside starts demanding peace and quiet. When I need to focus and concentrate on doing something like practicing, for instance, I like my solitude, and privacy and especially silence. This is what gets me even about Helsinki at times, which, compared to Beirut in terms of size or noise or especially general chaos, is peanuts. So you could say I’ve had some difficulties concentrating on practicing here at times.

I’ve felt a bit torn between the inner (militant) disciplinarian, the over-achiever, the humble overworker having a hard time giving himself a little rope every once in a while, and the Curious George wanting to see as much as possible now that I finally am here. Ziyad’s neck to the rescue. Because of the cancelled lessons, I’ve had more time to relax and kick back and try and convince myself it’s actually ok to not do as much as you can all the time. In hindsight, I’d say it’s done me good, would you believe it...? Sometimes it seems just really hard to let go; given this kind of a chance to come to a place like this to study music I think I almost started pressuring myself to make the most of it. Which, as we all know – in theory, of course, forget practice (pun intended) – is counterproductive at best.

As the noise from the street at Samir’s place seems to generally calm down towards late afternoon, I decided to try and reverse my daily routine – observe and/or study away from the instrument in the morning and practice towards the evening. I took my laptop and sheet music pad to Graffitti in Hamra, a bar Maureen had showed me the other night, which she’d said was very peaceful during the early mornings and afternoons for quiet work and study. Ended up spending quite a few hours there with my headphones on, jotting down more notes, mental and musical, from the first lesson with Ziyad.

After frying my brain with maqams I ventured out to fry it in the sun, as it would later prove. I walked to my old middle school, the American Community School between Bliss Street and the Corniche, to see if I could actually get in and go reminisce in the halls I used to drag my heels contemplating the finer points of the gospel according to White Zombie vs. that according to Machine Head. Unfortunately I got in just a little too late as the school had closed 20 minutes before and the guard wouldn’t let me in. Better luck tomorrow. Still, taking pictures from the outside, it really stopped me in my tracks that the gate actually had a huge “Welcome Back” sign painted on it. Someone’s having a laugh on me somewhere.

The A.C.S. gate

My father has a thing with Hard Rock Café beer pints. I Walked Like a European along the Corniche to Beirut’s HRC to get him the standard souvenir I always do when I travel (the Hard Rock Café didn’t exist yet when we lived here). Ate a burger, medium rare gone medium raw, and went back to Samir’s since I started feeling really tired.

More Corniche scenery

Hard Rock Café

I took a nap and practiced for an hour or two, but realized I really wasn’t feeling too well. Miekka -5, lactophilus +3, a 5 on the D20 says not enough defence points, roll over and power down Sir. Decided I’d try to sleep it off instead of going out. Thanks to multiple ritual sacrifices at the altars of the lords Imodium and Burana I started regaining my vitals after a night tucked under two thick blankets, no air conditioning, and literally freezing my royal ass off. Which, in this heat, was a bit… odd. I'd guess it was some kind of a combination of sun stroke and some digestive disorder or other.

Wed 9th Jul 2008

After waking up late with the sheets soaked in sweat but feeling brand new again, I spent most of the day in Mar Elias, taking my laundry to the shop, taking it easy, eating and practicing. Very thankful I felt so much better.

An old friend of mine from ACS, Saamira Halabi, sent me a Facebook message out of the blue saying she’s in town for the summer from Pennsylvania where she’s doing her PhD, is teaching an intensive six-week Arabic course for foreigners at the American University of Beirut, and that would I like to come and talk to the class about Arabic music and play the oud for them? After talking to her on the phone, catching up and going through a checklist of all our classmates and what-are-they-up-to-nows, I promised her I’d be there, but that I’d ask Ziyad if he was free so the class could get the real thing first-hand.

A '69 VW Beetle for sale. Groovy, baby!

Ziyad was playing in BIBA in Gemmayzeh again, this time as a duo with his percussionist, so I made plans to go see the gig, and after texting me asking what I was up to, Maureen joined me. Great gig once again, though this time listening from the audience’s side of the fence, the acoustics of the place truly are difficult. Ziyad was running his oud into not only his EQ and Line 6 Delay Modeler again, but also into a laptop for some further processing, but he had to give up on the fancier sounds by the third tune and run it more or less dry since the place just wouldn’t play with him. Shame, as I would’ve been very interested in hearing what he’d had in mind. It turned out Ziyad wouldn’t be free the next day for the AUB lecture, so it looked like I’d have to pull myself together and cook up something.

Thurs 10th Jul 2008

The American University of Beirut has a campus which I’d not be surprised could very well be the most beautiful one in the world. It’s like an entire academic universe tucked away inside a magnificent tropical garden, on a hilltop overlooking the Mediterranean. The contrast between the tranquility of the campus and the chaos of Hamra is pretty drastic. The fact that there’s this kind of an oasis in the heart of West Beirut, and one that has survived both the civil war and the conflicts since and before then relatively unscathed (bar some shell damage and a kidnapping or two) feels just surreal. The minute I walked in through the gate I found myself wondering how I’d never been here once during my year in Beirut. Took some pictures while I waited for Saamira, and after a quick lunch with her at the cafeteria her class begun.

The American University of Beirut campus

More AUB scenery.

I hadn’t prepared anything besides resolving to talk about Arabic music from the perspective of a westerner studying it; the hows and whys as I’ve understood them so far, the challenges I’ve faced trying to learn the music, the differences between western and Arabic music and so on. I sure wasn’t going to go in trying to come across as the quintessential CNN expert giving a factual guest lecture on Arabic Music 101. That woud’ve been Ziyad’s turf, had he made it.

It was a group of 30-40 students or so, all either in college or grad school or already working, from all over the world – Americans, Swedes, Portuguese, and many other nationalities – all wanting to get a grasp of Arabic for personal and/or career purposes. A very welcoming group.

I started out by introducing myself, the good-mannered and well-raised young upstart that I am, speaking a bit of my background and why I got into the music, then went on about the differences between Arabic and western music, introduced the oud, previewed my homework for Ziyad’s in front of a live studio audience with a taqasim in C Nahawand; after that the ‘lesson’ took on a very informal and interactive tone. Conversation, questions and answers where I was able. I mentioned that Ziyad’s band would be playing Walima’s again on Friday if anyone was interested. At any rate, once I was done I realized I’d been foaming at the mouth for over 45 minutes, and since I wasn’t burned as an infidel I think I did alright.

AUB.

The campus gardens.

After the lecture Saamira called me saying one girl wanted to talk to me more about the music, so I met her at the cafeteria. She turned out to be a Portuguese cellist, Maria Rijo, who’d been doing flamenco singing in Spain, was now studying in London, specializing in Middle Eastern music and especially Arabic vocal improvisation, which was why she was taking the Arabic course at AUB. She asked some more questions about how I’d got in contact with local musicians so I promised her I’d introduce her to Ziyad if she wanted to come to his gig on Friday.

AUB from along Bliss Street

After a failed attempt at picking up my laundry (fell asleep, shop had closed) I came back to the apartment to march headfirst into a bearhug ambush courtesy of Samir, who’d just flown in from Dubai with two of his friends who’d come to party in Beirut for the weekend. 12 years went whoosh. After laughing like two idiots in disbelief for an embarrassingly long time, I was introduced to the rest of the guys. Wissam was Samir’s ex-coworker from MTV Arabia, a Saudi with a serious brotherly rivalry going on with Samir, and Wanho “One Ho” Chung was a Korean who’d grown up in Jordan, considered himself Jordanian, spoke better Arabic than Samir or Wissam, and was now quite the Middle East celebrity doing Arabic stand-up comedy both onstage and on television. Then there was Majd, an old Beiruti friend of Samir’s who came to hang. Quite a crew.

The mayor of Samsterdam

Samir had threatened with a no-sleep-allowed nonstop 4-day party at his place, which he affectionately called Samsterdam, so I, not being too much of a party animal in recent years anymore (old, who, me?) was very interested where all this would lead, to say the least. The guys had already copped a buzz on the flight so with SaMTV on air nonstop, the scene started getting pretty wild pretty quickly and I tried to keep up.

This just struck me as... the cutest and saddest thing at the same time.

An interesting custom also came up – when you go to a club here, your group has to have a (more or less) equal number of guys to girls, apparently thus to keep the teams in the Game equally strong, so Samir had two phones running calling up friends of the more beautiful gender asking who might want to go clubbing with us. We tried to get into The hip club in town, the Sky Bar, but without a reservation we couldn’t, so we headed over to the Gauche Caviar in Gemmayzeh instead. Some drinks and laughs later we switched to the Mye, where another old friend of mine, Morgan Kays, joined us. Another reunion, some more drinks and even more laughs.

Wanho and Wissam.

A toast to 12 years with Samir.

We had to make sure we still had our metal moves. We did. Iz street cred.

With Morgan.

Morgan and Samir.

And what is the logical conclusion to a night out like this?

Three old high school friends, one acoustic guitar, a balcony and Alice In Chains, naturally.

...

VERSE 2. Jul 4th - Jul 6th

2008-07-07T11:19:00.017+03:00

First, thanks to all those of you who sent me encouraging e-mails about this blog. Sara even told me I got the facts right, so thus far, consider me reliable.

I didn’t exactly know how something like this would be received; see, we Finns don’t talk that much, so this might be a bit heavy to digest for some.

For the benefit of Mr. Kite and those who recognized themselves from the above, I spent the last couple of hours laboriously shortening this down to the most crucial main points, elaborating at large where necessary, so behold, the standard Finnish version:

Begin conversation.
MAIRE FROM FINLAND: “How was Beirut?”
TOPI FROM FINLAND: [grunts]
End conversation. Drink some more in silence.

...

For the rest of us, here's a bit of back-tracking from the last couple of days. I'll go immerse myself in the words of Kahlil Gibran and get some more coffee.

-J

Fri Jul 4th 2008

Today was the first and only day so far when I was in a less than upbeat mood. I got up on the wrong foot with the internet, trying to upload pics to the previous entry, working from a slow connection, and Murphy being The Man upstairs, my computer crashed the second I’d uploaded the very last photo and written the very last caption. Remember, kids, thou shalt not blog without thine power supply. Since the last thing I want to do on a trip like this is spend hours glued to my laptop screen, you might say my mood went sour faster than you could say kiss’ommak.

Ziyad and I’d agreed to have my first lesson at 6 PM, but then I got a Facebook invite to Jean’s regular jazz gig at Hamra Terrace, where Ziyad was listed as one of the guests, also beginning at 6. He also had a second gig with his regular trio at Walima’s in Hamra at 10, so I put two and two together and we postponed the lesson again for the next day. Samir’s brother Khaled called me up to say that he’d call me again around – guess? – 6 PM so I could get my stuff (hiking backpack, regular backpack, oud and guitar) to Samir’s empty apartment in Mar Elias in West Beirut, so I spent the day just strolling around.

I decided to take the walk from Hamra along Bliss Street and the AUB (American University of Beirut) campus – which has to be the most beautiful university campus in the world – to the Corniche, which is the ‘beach boulevard’ in Beirut. Felt like the same stereotype Asian tourist Michael Hsu was mocking with my camera in overdrive, playing tourist and taking photos of just about everything.

A sea view towards East Beirut from the Corniche.

The Corniche towards the west.

The contrasts get to you. They really do. This is probably one of the few places in the world where so many seemingly polar opposites co-exist side by side. Some more successfully than others; at least the buildings don’t wage war against each other. Walking along the Corniche towards the new Downtown (aka former Beirut Central District or BCD), you’ll see totally bombed ruins of former buildings full of shell holes standing side by side with 5-star hotels luxurious enough to take on any posh hotel anywhere in the world and most likely come out on top. Nowhere did this strike me more than between the obliterated old Holiday Inn (a feared sniper look-out during the war) and the new Phoenicia Intercontinental, literally rubbing shoulders with one another. Back in ’95-’96 when we lived here, the entire area now bursting at its seams with architectural jewels was little more than a bulldozed pile of rubble and ruin. And, of course, the skeleton of the Holiday Inn was still standing even then. We passed that gruesome reminder of the war every single day as my father drove us to school.

The lavish Phoenicia Intercontinental. Note the destroyed Holiday Inn in the background on the left.

Three sides to every story... the Holiday Inn from another angle.

Then there’s the statue of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri. You’ll notice behind the statue the ruins of the old St. George Hotel. This is where the car bomb with which he was assassinated in 2005 went off. Makes you think.

Rafiq Hariri's statue looks on from the rubble of the car bomb that assassinated him.

Ana habibi, inta Hariri.

I continued along the seashore towards the new Downtown area, which struck me as very… I don’t want to say Disney-esque and quote the Lonely Planet guidebook, so I’ll use “Muscat-esque”. Immaculately clean streets, (even traffic lights for pedestrians), no traffic whatsoever with the center being a pedestrians-only zone, beautifully reconstructed houses. This is probably the most visible part of Hariri’s legacy. Yet there’s something a bit unsettling about the picture. Sitting in one of the myriad cafés by Place d´Étoile drinking another café mocca I couldn’t help but think that this had very little to do with the Beirut I knew. Beautiful? Unquestionably. Absolutely breathtaking. Still, it does seem to stick out of the rest of the cityscape like a, uh… manicured thumb.

Another seafront view closer to the new rebuilt Downtown.

Exhibit 1 from Downtown.

Exhibit 2 from Downtown.

Exhibit 3 from Downtown. The architecture is unbelievable. Note the absence of cars.

Downtown near Place d´Étoile.

The Rafiq Hariri Mosque (background) by day.

A typical modern Downtown street with its cafés.

And behold, my future was revealed.

I met Samir’s brother Khaled back at Place Sassine and moved out of the hostel into Samir’s place in Mar Elias in West Beirut. Another Lebanese hospitality trip, having an empty three-bedroom apartment all to myself for the rest of my stay – for free. After Khaled made sure I was settled in and comfortable, he left and I took a quick shower before I headed out and walked to Walima’s just off Hamra Street where Ziyad’s trio were to play at 10 PM.

That’s another thing about Beirut. If you like to walk from place to place, you’re a weirdo. Period. Beirutis don’t walk. They go by car or take a cab. Try to argue that a 25 minute walk is actually a great way to get to know the city, and the response you get is “fucking Europeans, man…”.

It was great to see Ziyad again, though I was a bit bummed I’d missed him guesting with Jean’s jazz band at Hamra Terrace earlier because I’d had to move my things. Interestingly, they’d done Miles Davis’s song “Nardis” with Ziyad playing the theme on the oud, and I’d toyed with the exact same idea a while ago. I always thought the melody was just begging to be played on an oud. We talked music and it seemed like word of my performance with the guys had traveled, which took me by some surprise. Met new people once again. Felt good. Ziyad’s band consisted of him on oud and vocals, a bassist on fretless and a percussionist on cajón. The two sets were a mixture of his original compositions as well as rearrangements of old tunes by the likes of Mohamed Abdel Wahab. After the dining tipped its scales more towards the wining, the people at the restaurant really got into it and it was impossible to see the band behind all the people dancing. By the end of their second set I was more than ready to hit the sack so I took a cab back to Samir’s and dozed off.

Ziyad's trio live at Walimat. Note the ever-present cigarette.

Sat 5th Jul 2008

Air conditioned bedroom sez the stocks in quality sleep went through the roof.

Spent the day having a look around my new neighborhood and practicing to prepare myself for my first lesson with Ziyad. Mar Elias seems like a very vibrant area of the city. Though relatively close to Corniche al Mazraa which has been the scene of a lot of the recent unrest, Khaled assured me it was safe and that if something started happening, he’d let me know immediately. Bustling streets, noisy traffic, once again newer apartment buildings side by side with older ones with bullet holes in them, lest anyone forget. I felt more at home, and besides, I was a (European) walking distance from Hamra.

Iz my babies.

Ziyad came by Samir’s at 6 PM and we started with the basics of traditional classical Arabic taqasim improvisation with three different maqams (scales). Ziyad didn’t bring his own oud to the lesson, so we kept switching back and forth. The first things he asked me to do was improvise something so he could get an idea of my level on the instrument, and once I did, I quickly realized that as far as authenticity goes, I wasn’t even in the vicinity of a neighborhood of a ballpark. Ziyad went over several basic ‘rules’ of the classical way of taqasim improvisation in his laidback drawl, punctuated with more “yani, bas…”’s than I could count. Maybe I should – I recorded the entire lesson. He seemed to have a very clear way of putting things, and the fact that he had also studied jazz and music involving harmony in general (Arabic music in the traditional sense has no harmony, but is based solely on melody and rhythm), gave us some common ground. We seemed to speak the same language. Not that I could automatically carry out what he was teaching me, but in principle, I understood. In the 90 minutes we spent I learned more new things than I probably had in the past two years. The whole tetrachord concept for instance was totally new to me.

After the lesson I spent some time at Café Younis interwebbing again, and after Jean texted me I went to his place to hang out and delve into his enormous music library. Talked, ate and listened to great music until about 2.30 AM. He asked me to drop by the next day to do some recording with him, which I gladly agreed to. I also managed to pull the rug out from underneath him when it came up that I’d seen BOTH Richard Bona and Jonas Hellborg live. I don’t think he’s quite recovered yet.

Sun 6th Jul 2008

Hmm. Woke up (late, what is it with me?). Played some guitar, did some solfege exercises and went to find something to eat. I realized that my coffee intake had diminished an unforgivable amount ever since I got here – meaning no morning coffee to get me started for days – so I rewarded myself with two espressos. My parents called to check in.

Went back to Samir’s to start transcribing Ziyad’s lesson from my laptop. Spent quite long writing notes of all his comments, trying to get everything down as exactly as possible. Didn’t finish it so there’s still work tomorrow. Ronnie’s girlfriend Maureen called me up and we decided to get some coffee and take another look at Downtown Beirut.

Taking notes.

With Maureen as the resident (Asian) tour(ist) guide, we spent a couple of hours taking photos, talking about our backgrounds, the country and its history, and had a long conversation on the war at Martyr’s Square. She also managed to take some truly amazing photos which I’ll put up as soon as I get them; my camera didn’t quite seem to cut it as well as hers. Also went up to Virgin Megastore’s roof, which was a great view.

The Rafiq Hariri Mosque by night.

Maureen dropped me off at Jean’s with my guitar in tow around 9 PM. We started working on a tune he’d done with Ziyad and some other players, which was an atmospheric mix of Arabic oud, flamenco vocals, flute, bass and electronica. Very interesting. I had to improvise all the guitar parts off the top of my head as I’d never heard the tune before, but we seemed to really think alike and speak the same musical language. Great guitar tone too, my Flaxwood direct into his computer with some tweaking and effects care of Amplitube.

It’s not the first time on this trip that I’ve felt like all the elements that I’ve dreamt of putting together in my own musical-statement-in-the-making are finally within an arm’s reach. Both Jean and Ziyad seem to be so hardcore into so much of the exact same stuff as I am, it’s unbelievable. Even the fretless stuff I’d done in Frankfurt which I showed Jean was received with nothing but enthusiasm. Wish I’d had that guitar with me here. Jean kept telling me I should really move here so we could work more. Seriously considering.

Recording at Jean's home studio.

A great, relaxed session. We were both very happy how it turned out. Again, quite an honor to get to record on the same track as guys like this. Jean said we might do another one with just oud, bass and guitar before I leave. A chicken sandwich and some videos courtesy of a sick Turkish trio later, I was in the cab (getting better at bargaining already) on my way back to Mar Elias.

As the icing on the cake I think I finally resolved what I’d play at a certain audition in September. Water closet maketh the heart go ponder.

...

VERSE 1. Jun 30th - Jul 3rd

2008-07-04T12:57:00.012+03:00

I’ll try and update the blog regularly, but I can’t promise I can do it daily. Writing takes time and needs a quiet moment. I’ll be backtracking every once in a while. I’d also imagine my entries will vary a great deal in length, more details at first and a lot less later.

Setting the scene – the first couple of days

Mon Jun 30th 2008

My flight landed in Beirut at 2.25 am. The first thing you notice coming to Beirut is the heat, the humidity and that familiar smell I can’t quite describe. It smells like… well, Beirut. I also got a preview of things to come on the flight, sitting next to a Lebanese family who reminded me once again how friendly and accommodating the Lebanese are. After getting through customs I met my friend Sara el-Yafi who came to pick me up with a Chinese-American friend of hers from Harvard, Michael Hsu. Turned out to be a hilarious guy (over)driven by curiosity for just about everything.

The thing with navigating in Beirut is, street names, excluding the main ones, are pretty much useless if you want to get somewhere. Nobody knows. People find their way according to landmarks, not specific addresses. So of course nobody had any idea where Bed & Breakfast Mehanna was – finding Rue Cheikh el Ghaby 64 in Achrafieh might as well have been trying to find a needle in a haystack. After getting a tour of Hizbollah-influenced south Beirut, we started asking for directions in Achrafieh from people on the streets. Asked one guy, who gave us some directions, and when we accidentally came back to the same place twice, he appeared in front of us in his own car, took Sara’s phone and called the hostel, and lead us there. Only in Lebanon.

Not so surprisingly, my hostel booking seemed like a total surprise to the couple who owned the place. They turned out to apparently be renting out rooms in their old family apartment after their children had moved out. Charming. My room was right next to their personal bedroom, so forget privacy for anyone. No air conditioning, but otherwise more than decent for $25 a night. Spent the rest of the night catching up a little with Sara and getting to know Michael, eating a snack somewhere in Achrafieh, then blasted Nightwish until 6 am in Sara’s car, who’s a huge fan. The irony made me laugh out loud.

My room at the hostel.

We planned to visit south Lebanon with Sara and Michael – who had surprised Sara the day before, calling to say he was flying in with 24 hours notice on his way to Lahore through Damascus. Didn’t sleep too well because of the heat. Shower, then went out to try and get a grasp of my surroundings. It seems like every time you arrive in a huge city, the first impression you get is a bit intimidating; although Beirut has changed immensely since ’96, the one thing I didn’t remember for some reason was that it was this chaotic.

The view from my balcony.

The traffic is legendary. It’s pretty much total anarchy on the streets – cars driving two (sometimes three) ways on both lanes, stopping mid-traffic to reverse all of a sudden, you name it. Honking seems to be the only common language everyone speaks. After getting a shawarma and some coffee near Place Sassine, Sara picked me up with Michael and Antoine, and we went to have a traditional Lebanese lunch at ABC mall.

Lunch Lebanese-style.

Antoine, Michael and Sara.

We picked up Sara’s ex-roommate from Harvard, Yelda, and headed for the south. The Hizbollah-controlled southern part of the country isn’t a place I’d necessarily venture into on my own, but with local friends who know what they’re doing showing us around it felt safe so we went. We drove to Beaufort Castle, which has been fought over for centuries and in turn controlled by just about all the sides of just about every conflict here. It’s unique in that you can see so many sides from the top of the mountain – Lebanon on one hand, Israel on the second, and the disputed Shebaa Farms on the third.

At Beaufort Castle in Southern Lebanon

A dusky view of Lebanon.

It felt more than a little surreal to stand in the bullet hole-filled Hizbollah guard post, yellow and green flag and all, at the top of the Castle. Makes you think, more than a little.

At the Hizbollah guardpost at Beaufort Castle.

Sara wanted to take us closer to the Israeli border as well, but the Hizbollah checkpoint wouldn’t let us through since Michael and I had foreign passports. Apparently, they don’t want to take responsibility if something happens to us, and we didn’t have permits from our own governments to go there. No reason to try and be foolishly courageous so we headed back to Beirut. Dinner with (and on) Sara’s parents and brother at a Thai restaurant, then back to the hostel, shower and sleep.

Tue Jul 1st 2008

The plan for the day was to go to the Bekaa valley, again with Sara and Michael, in central Lebanon to visit the ruins of Baalbek, which is the best preserved temple of the Roman era in the world (also known as Heliopolis). One of the signature sights of Lebanon. Got up, took my oud with me since Sara suggested it’d be an experience to actually play inside Bacchus’ temple in Baalbek, popped in at the internet café up the street to check my mails. The rates here seem to vary a great deal – this one was 1000 LL (Lebanese Lira) an hour (less than 0,50 €), but the cafés in Hamra take up to 3000 LL (2 €) /h. The country operates with both US dollars and Lebanese Liras, but because of the inflation caused by the civil war, the value of the Lira has gone from about 2,2 LL to a dollar before the war to 1500 LL to a dollar after the war. Makes sense to use both currencies.

On the way to Place Sassine to find breakfast (same shawarma, same coffee; a creature of habit, who, me?) the security card of a jewelry store noticed I was carrying an oud so he stopped me and asked if I played. After a typical foreigner-Beiruti conversation involving his broken English, my less-than-elementary Arabic and rusty French, and a great deal of body language from both parties, it turned out that he was also “an average oud player”, as he put it. “Yani, not good, bas…” I asked him to play something for me, so he did. He played and sung some Fairouz songs while I filmed him, and I timidly improvised something for him. Curious passers-by stopped to watch and listen. Although he commended my playing and especially my left hand technique, this whole episode sort of epitomized why I came here: the depth of phrasing and authenticity in his playing, even though he said he was “not” a good player, was way beyond my level. It’s a cultural thing, it runs that deep. It has to be. Although I was taken aback by what he played, I was even more certain that I did the right thing in coming here. Took some pictures together, and we both probably made each other’s day.

"Yani, not good, bas..." - oh, come on.

After Sara picked me up and we fetched Michael from his hotel we headed for Baalbek, over the mountains and eastward. I was planning on going to listen to Jean Madani and Ziyad Sahhab playing at the BIBA club in Gemmayzeh the next day, but on the way I got a message from Jean saying that I should come and play with them. “It’s mainly improvisations. Oh, and – guitar, not oud.” Flattered but getting a bit nervous, I found myself promising to play. Quite an honor to get to play with musicians like them, and I hadn’t even met them yet; crazy or not, how could I say no?

Driving over the mountains, we stopped in Chtaura for some food. Again, the driving was interesting, to say the least. When we reached Baalbek we were immediately surrounded by pushy merchants selling souvenirs. Ended up buying a prayer band, while Michael got himself a Hizbollah t-shirt. Wasn’t going to wear it ever. The tour guide turned out to be a hilarious guy; I’d never had this much fun at any historic site in my life. We were bending backwards laughing, all four of us, the guide included. Took a lot of goofy pictures and ended up in deep conversation inside Bacchus’ temple, the scene of more (apparently very creative) orgies than even I’d like to think about. Played a little oud inside the temple, which was another Moment for me. Afterwards things really got out of hand with Sara and Michael dueting on tunes from the Little Mermaid by heart. A truly memorable tour.

Who's your Venus?

"Täällä on paljon rakkautta ilmassa." -Anonymous DJ

Perspective.

The temple of Bacchus.

Having a Moment.

Kimmo Pohjonen and KTU have nothing on this...

Baalbek by night.

Back towards Beirut, we stopped at Chtaura again to drop Michael off, since he was going to take a taxi to Damascus to get to his friend’s wedding the next day. After some very impressive bargaining we left a very emotional and happy Michael with promises to keep in touch and head for Beirut with Sara. Ended up pondering the ins and outs of relationships over burgers, and comparing thoughts on heavy metal drummers before I went back to the hostel to sleep.

Wed Jul 2nd 2008

Slept late, maybe too late. Got up in the afternoon to find the power’s out. Couldn’t see a thing in the bathroom so I put off showering and decided to practice the guitar a little, since I hadn’t played in over a week. A bit nervous about the gig, but also excited. Spent some quality time with a metronome on the balcony, then plugged into my laptop and played some more. Still no electricity, so had a dark shower, hit my head on a shelf and got a nasty cut, and headed out hoping I wouldn’t get a headache.

I walked past a house that had burned – burned cars and police everywhere. This being Beirut, my first thought was, a car bomb? Turns out the Total gas station across the street had had a gas leak, its generator had exploded and set the neighboring building and quite a few cars on fire. The house had totally (no pun intended) burned, with two people hospitalized. I guess I seriously sleep soundly, if I can sleep through an explosion just a block away. Took a taxi to Hamra, the main street and ‘heart’ of the city, in West Beirut.

...and I actually slept through this?

The likely thing is, if you’re a foreigner, taxis and shops will try to rip you off. A taxi from Achrafieh in East Beirut to Hamra in West Beirut should be about 5000 LL (just over 2 €), but chances are you’ll be asked for 10000 LL. With a servis taxi, meaning the driver can pick up other people as well on the way if they’re going in the same general direction, the rates should be 2000 LL, but again, they’ll want at least 5000 LL from a foreigner. On the other hand, compared with the initial starting fee of 7,20 € in Finland, before the taxi moves an inch, it’s not that bad. Bargaining is the way to go, of course. Same thing with me trying to get a Lebanese phone line instead of sending expensive SMS’s and calling people from my Finnish cell. An MTC line with no credit cost $100 in the first shop I asked, “last price”. The second shop sold the same MTC line for $110, including $47 worth of prepaid credit. People tend to SMS each other here a lot; makes sense at $0,09 a message vs. calling at the outrageous $0,50 a minute.

Beirut has many faces, depending on which area you visit. West Beirut seemed much more familiar, and much closer to the way I remembered the city. The school I went to (A.C.S. or American Community School) was and still is in Hamra, so for the first time during my stay, I started feeling at home in my surroundings when the taxi dropped me off on Hamra Street. Memories, memories. Bliss Street, the Corniche, Hardee’s… this was the Beirut I remembered and had missed. Bought a map and went to eat.

Grabbed a cab back to the hostel, changed clothes – while they’re not out of the question by any means, generally shorts aren’t considered smart attire here – took my guitar and took a servis taxi to Gemmayzeh and the BIBA, where I was supposed to meet Jean at 8.00 PM. The taxi driver – who ripped me off big time – stopped in midtraffic when someone stopped the car. Turned out to be Jean, who recognized me from his own car (ah, the power of MySpace); a quick change of cars and we headed for BIBA. Got acquainted over Almaza beers, and waited for Ziyad, who later showed up looking more like Kim Thayil from Soundgarden than Kim Thayil from Soundgarden himself. After the owner of BIBA, Nino, showed up, we did a quick soundcheck (bass and electric guitar straight into the PA, not even a DI, while Ziyad played his oud through a Boss EQ pedal and his new toy, a Line 6 Delay Modeller) and realized that the room was a difficult one. Very muffled, very heavy on the low end. Talked some more with Jean and Ziyad, both of whom turned out to be very nice guys, Jean a bit more bursting with energy than Ziyad, who was more laid back. Still had no idea what we were going to play, but the atmosphere was very welcoming, so I started to relax. Talked to Wissam, who works with Jean at the same music production company, as well as Ziyad’s fiancée Marie, who’s an actress and local television series star. Very nice people, felt right at home. Ziyad still looked like Kim Thayil, although Jean told me Marie had just forced him to cut his beard.

The gig started eventually, and while I thought I’d only sit in on a tune or two towards the end, Jean invited me onstage right away. “C minor”, and off we went. The music took on the form of atmospheric, open Arabic free improv, but not in the sense of free jazz. Moods, yani. Decided to just listen at first and gradually find my way in. Ziyad started with a solo oud improv, toying with reverse delay effects from his pedal, and I could’ve just listened to him for the rest of the evening. One of those what-the-hell-am-I-doing-in-this-company moments. Felt my way through the twists and turns, took a solo. After the song Jean said, “Fucking great solo, man”, and I was able to relax a bit. Second song started, Am - F/A - E7b9 something Ammaj7 something something, ok… got approving looks over a montuno impression. After the song I got off the stage to listen to what the guys would do by themselves, closed my eyes and zoned out. For the last tune Jean invited me back, “Come back for a last one, yalla. You lead.” Started jamming on a riff from a song I’d written for Unveil, “Quicksilver”. Ziyad went off on a tangent with his effects and we were done. Whew. Still alive. That was interesting. And to think I’d soon be studying with Ziyad. Both Jean and Ziyad seemed very happy.

Performing with Ziyad and Jean at BIBA in Gemmayzeh.

Beer, more talking with the guys, Marie and her friend Ranya who is also an actress and Nino’s girlfriend. Ziyad and I planned to have a session every other day around 6 PM so I’d have time to practice on my ‘days off’. Agreed to start the next day. We also talked about going to visit his luthier in Baalbek the next week, so I could get myself a better oud than the cheap Moroccan one I’ve been having to keep together with glue, band-aids and pure intentions for quite a while. For an instrument with eleven strings, I wouldn’t mind one that actually stayed in tune, either.

Headed out for a late bite in West Beirut with Ziyad and Marie and met the rest of the guys at the restaurant. Got a tour of the former civil war –era demarcation line between the Christian East Beirut and the Muslim West Beirut on the way. Marie also promised to lend me a copy of the film “West Beirut”, a classic on life during the war. After a very enjoyable dinner which included lessons in both Arabic and Arabic wordplay, I got a ride from Nino and Ranya back to my hostel.

Thurs Jul 3rd 2008

I was supposed to move to my old high school friend Samir’s place to stay today. Samir and I had a band in 9th grade, my first band ever. Roadkill Café, baby! I played lead and he played rhythm. We had two original tunes, “Mr. & Mrs. Chips” and “Shallow 306”, had a live set also including “Paranoid” and “Little Wing”, a drummer who almost always found ‘the 1’ and a singer who thought he was Perry Farrell from Jane’s Addiction. At 15, he wouldn’t sing “Paranoid” since he didn’t like the lyrics. We thought we owned Beirut.

Samir’s working for MTV Arabia in Dubai these days, so he’d arranged with his brother that after his empty Beirut apartment had been renovated, I’d move in to live there for free. Another example of Lebanese hospitality. Which creates an interesting situation: Finns by nature don’t want to impose themselves on anyone or be of any trouble whatsoever, and feel uncomfortable asking for just about anything. Ei tartte auttaa. A Lebanese friend can’t stand and absolutely will not accept the idea of you coming to visit their country and staying at a hostel. If they have the possibility, they absolutely refuse to let you stay anywhere but at their place. I was recently lectured at length on the unacceptability of being a typical Finn in situations like this (or in Lebanese situations in general) by another old friend of mine, Morgan, so I knew better than to decline. I accepted his offer happily.

After getting up I went out for a walk and got a call from Samir’s brother, saying that the apartment wouldn’t be ready until tomorrow, and that he was very sorry for the inconvenience. Not a problem, couldn’t help but smile at the un-Finnish gesture. I decided to stay at the hostel for another night. Another former A.C.S. friend of mine, Ronnie Chatah, called me up so I passed by the hostel and picked up my oud for the lesson with Ziyad, and took a cab to Hamra to see Ronnie at his place. Smiles, hugs, catching up – it was like 12 years hadn’t passed, aside from the fact that we’d both grown longer hair and actually developed some hair on our faces.

A reunion with Ronnie after 12 years.

I got a message from Ziyad asking if we could postpone the lesson until tomorrow, so I hung out with Ronnie and his girlfriend Maureen at his dorm, which was unlike anything I’d ever seen. Right off Bliss Street in the heart of West Beirut, in a building that used to be a music school so there were was a grand piano and a double bass lying around the communal living room. Every one of the 12 people living there had their own room, most of them with their own terrace (Ronnie had made his into his private living room, couches, TV and all). It was far from fancy or luxurious, but the vibe and atmosphere was the kind that made you want to move in. Luxury comes in many forms. Ronnie said the place was regularly frequented by foreigners either living more or less permanently or just for a longer period in Beirut, and that he was the senior inmate having lived there for two or three years. And this included being stuck there during both the Summer War in 2006 and the recent clashes in May when he and Maureen were trapped in the house for days while there was fighting on their very street and they had snipers on their roof. Scary shit.

Maureen, Ronnie and Yours Truly.

The rent, he said, was around $300, which seriously got me thinking. I started asking about the possibilities of renting a room there if I manage to come back to Beirut later and spend a longer time studying music here. A pure dream of a place to live in. If that happens, I definitely know where I’ll try and get an apartment first.

Ronnie was leaving for Berlin tomorrow, so I left him to pack and spent the rest of the day at Café Younis drinking espressos and lattes and writing this. Took in the atmosphere in Hamra, enjoyed every second. It really is unique. Went back to get my oud, visited a record store and found a treasure chest of Oum Khalthoum DVD’s, got a very pleasant phone call, ate, went back to Café Younis for a quick e-mail check and started to head back to get some sleep.

Hamra by night.

Managed to rip off the taxi driver by accident. I asked for his fee to Place Sassine, he said 10000, I said 7000, and he agreed grudgingly. I said I’d guide him to my hostel from Place Sassine. Once we got there, and I started giving him directions, he started complaining that my hostel is actually in Karm el-Zeitoun, not Achrafieh, and that Achrafieh apparently ends at Place Sassine. Had he known we were going to Karm el-Zeitoun, he probably would’ve wanted more. I gave him the 7000 and bid him good night. Sly and clever Iznogoud make a very naice businessing ee yes!

-J

INTRO.

2008-07-03T19:08:00.002+03:00

Lebanon has a strange effect on the unwary. Beirut in particular. The nature of this war-torn country is that it’ll seduce you without you noticing, and before you know it you’ve already lost your heart and given yourself – willingly – to her charms. The Lebanese people have to be the most hospitable and warm people in the world, which may seem like a paradox to those whose only glimpse of Lebanon is through their TV screens and newspapers, all depicting an often colored version of little else but conflict, sectarian violence, civil war and more civil war. But that’s religion and politics, often having little to nothing to do with the regular people. Get past that and you meet a people who – regardless of sect, view or belief – will stop at absolutely nothing to go out of their way to make you feel at home. The Lebanese love their country, and want to make sure you do too.

I know I do. I lived in many countries with my family throughout my childhood, moving back and forth from place to place between Finland, the Middle East and East Africa because of my father’s work – sometimes I might argue a tad more than the necessary dose. In many places, I lived for longer periods, but the year we spent in Beirut in ’95-’96 did a number on me. I’ve wanted to come back ever since. Throw in a fascination with Arabic culture and especially Arabic music, a couple of years trying to learn to play the oud (an 11-string fretless Arabic lute), a stroke of luck finding the right people from the Beirut music scene to study with, and I was more than thrilled to finally board that plane on June 29th after 12 years away.

As luck would have it, a shot-in-the-dark message to the right person through MySpace put it all together. I’d been trying to contact Lebanese music schools and conservatoires asking where I could get private instruction on the oud and in Arabic music, but never got a reply. Browsing through MySpace looking for Lebanese musicians – I even messaged oud master Rabih Abou Khalil – I came across a guy called Jean Madani, a Beiruti bass player. Never heard of him before, had nothing on his background, nothing. Sent him a message introducing myself, who I am, what I’ve been doing, and would he know any oud players I could possibly study with. It turned out Jean was one of the busiest players on the Lebanese music scene, and a regular character in bands and projects with the very best Lebanese musicians. I flipped when he wrote back to me and said that not only had he just returned from a tour with Fairouz – a living legend throughout the entire Arab world and a Lebanese icon – but that yes, he’d love to help get me connected. He recommended two oudists to study from, Ziad el Ahmadie and Ziyad Sahhab, and confirmed that they were both willing to teach me. Jean and I kept in touch throughout the spring, planning more of what we’d do once I got to Beirut on May 15th, as my original plan was.

Then the May conflict happened with the Hizbollah taking the Beirut airport and much of West Beirut hostage, and my trip got cancelled. I was pissed off and angry. Not at not being able to go, but I was fearing for the safety of all my old friends who were sending me dramatic e-mails from their homes in Hamra where they were being held captive, with gunfire in the streets and snipers on their roofs. In Finland we tend to have ‘kisastudios’ [you know, biting your nails at home watching the game] for ice hockey or football, but this made for a rather different kind of kisastudio over gmail and MSN.

Fortunately, things calmed down after about a week, and no one that I know of got hurt, although the violence did have casualties as always. The Hizbollah opened the airport again, West Beirut slowly came back to life, and the tent camp in downtown Beirut was taken down. I managed to postpone my flights to a surprise gap in my gig calendar, and I started rearranging everything so I could come down like I’d planned. Ziad el Ahmadie – who’d been very kind and open to suggest the idea of me studying the oud with him for free in exchange for me teaching him about jazz harmony – and I unfortunately couldn’t meet up anymore since he left Beirut two days before I got here to work with an opera in Geneva. I confirmed through Jean that Ziyad Sahhab would teach me, and things seemed to be back on track. I finally managed to come here on June 30th.

Since this blog is about Lebanon, I want to underline that I write nothing from a political stance. This is NOT a political blog. This is NOT a blog taking sectarian, religious or political sides. This is simply a diary about my personal experiences here, written not only to share what I see and hear, but also for me to have an outlet to organize my thoughts.

Peace on you.

-J