Purpl - #ExpectTheExpected

First, please check their website here. So with Lebanon becoming a cash economy, with people have little to no faith in banks at this point and those who already have accounts have sought ways to empty them or cash them out or are in the process of doing so (to varying degrees of success, the smaller the account the easier one can do that and the bigger the account the more complicated the issue), and with Western Union and OMT basically making a killing, Purpl is looking for its share of the pie.

OK so the process is a bit convoluted, read it here, but since this is physical and tangible money we are speaking of, and since fraud is to be eliminated I guess one has to go through many steps to establish an account and eventually send/receive money via the app (which can be cashed out at ATM points).

I do like the #ExpectTheExpected to be honest, because it riffs on the "expected" money but also on the fact that one gets their due as it was sent (which if I understood correctly from a different ad this is what was to happen).

Again, with everyone trying to avoid banks, Purpl colors us red in envy.

So apparently stoicism was the answer all along for the Lebanese

Zeno of Citium (Founder of the Stoicism) - Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

So lately I read an article about stoicism (here). As a Lebanese person in the middle of the never-ending storm, who lost all his finances in the crash despite all the measures I had taken, and as someone who struggles daily with the multitude of problems surrounding us, the word "resilient" gets on my nerves.

I don't want to be resilient anymore, there's really limits to everything and we have crossed these limits long, long ago. But as Watson (Lucy Liu) told Holmes (John Lee Miller) in that wonderful episode in Elementary: "What if we are looking at it the wrong way?" (Episode's name "blood is thicker than water" in case you are wondering), maybe looking at things from a skewed angle could help.

What if with a "rebrand" or a "reword" we can actually look at the situation differently. First, let us remember that there is something called "Jantalagen" in the Nordic societies - basically it is that no one is better than anyone else. As a matter of fact, basically people in Nordic countries simply do not talk about their salary or about money. A CEO or a company once confided in me that what's with taxes being higher in Sweden with larger salaries he was bringing home less than his employees, so much that he had to construct his "summer home" (a term Swedes use for their second houses usually in peripheral or countryside towns) with his own hands because he could not afford workers.

So basically, if we replace "resilience" by "stoicism" - a fancy word related to a philosophical thought which has clear principles, perhaps this is the answer which was eluding us. To learn more about stoicism please go here.

I think what most impressed me in that discourse is (and I am copying from this source) the words of stoic philosopher Epictetus: "Things not in our control are body, property, reputation, command, and, in one word, whatever are not our actions." 

Now, I am short, thin, and diabetic since 2013 - this covers the body part. Reputation? Well, depending whom you ask I have been either praised to the highest level or trashed to the lowest one - I developed a thick skin so it is fine (my record still remains 23 hate mails from a local agency in 2011 though). Property is the tricky part - the financial crash affected me mentally more than I dared even imagine - sure I am very proactive so I saved whatever I could save no matter how big or small but all this was incredibly challenging to me because the money was supposed to some "future insurance" for my old age. 

Marcus Aurelius one of the most famous stoics wrote: "When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: the people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous and surly. They are like this because they can't tell good from evil." which makes me wonder which Lebanese bank exactly did Marcus Aurelius place his money in. 

Because at this point things are indeed that way, and one needs to be resilient stoic to deal with it on daily basis.

OMT - more reliable than a bank for the Lebanese

 OMT - well, trust me Lebanese people trust OMT at this stage more than any other bank or financial institution. For a long time, OMT was one of the rare players in the financial industry which actually gave what it promised, and allowed people to send - though let's be honest, mainly receive - money in what is now called "fresh" Dollars (as opposed to the stuck Dollars in the banks). So for many, this has been a breathing lung.

So their campaign "next to you no matter the circumstances" is honestly not a stretch of reality because they have accompanied the Lebanese in the what is truly the worse, the most maddening, delflating  and trialing periods since the crisis broke in 2019.

The visuals, even if a little cliche, actually make sense - photos of families being close to one another because let's face it, when one bails you with much-needed money, this is how close families become.

Al Ghina riffs on banks this upcoming Ramadan

Ramadan is coming, and this year many NGOs and charitable associations are battling for the money people no longer have, which their work is exacerbated by the meteoric rise of the needy (with poverty at around 55% of the Lebanese population). This being an election year my fear is that politicians and political parties will use this month to extend their services (primarily foods and needed items) as benefactors to needy people in exchange for their vote on the ballots.

Which brings us to Al Ghina - which basically riffs on banks with their line "In the bank of the afterlife, they won't get confiscating" in a direct jab on how banks basically held the Lebanese people's money hostage and is trickling it back at a loss to depositors. Along with the ad two hashtags one goes #bank_of_the_afterlife and the other #white_market (as opposed to black market where Dollars are being traded). 

Lebanon: 2020-21 like living in Juliana Seraphim painting

Untitled - Juliana Seraphim 1980 (source)

There, this is the best metaphor I can give: In Lebanon, 2020 and 2021 were like living in a Juliana Seraphim painting. To be living the surreal as if it was a day to day occurrence, some Gabriel Garcia Marquez magical realism. Honestly how can one explain that Covid is not even in your top 5 of problems? The banks, the money or lack of it, the fuel or lack it, the meds or lack of it, the Dollar or lack it, and the list goes on. Did anyone notice I still did not go to the covid situation? I am twice vaccinated but missed the last marathon to get my booster - living outside of Beirut, I need to organize myself well before stepping out of the house (a small calculation led me and my cousin to average 500,000 Lebanese Liras as a budget for any out of home excursion!). I said it before, despite all this, I was one of the privileged one that managed to have a Christmas of some sort (nephews got a gift), the table was not exorbitant but at least present. 

But truth be told, it is difficult to live by comparison. I think in all of 2020 I clocked like 5 nights of sleep. Insomnia was a daily thing, and no sleep would come before daylight for a meager couple of hours. The stress level was off the chart, and the only thing that stopped my mind from going off the rails was working on my "Simulacra and simulation" video about the Lebanese collective memory. Was 2021 any better? Well, to begin with, sleep came back at some point. No, work was not much better (I left university lecturing at end of 2019 due to inflation because I was keeping a lousy sum of money in my pocket at the end of a teaching day!), and projects have been too far and in-between. 

Weirdly enough I have not been pursuing work in full force. Maybe I am still traumatized for having worked for fiercely for several years and lost all the money I put aside in the current financial crisis. So to start anew with the same vein at my age (note, I was born in 1974) is not really palatable. My current plan is simple: Salvage what can be salvageable, play a long game, and not plan much - the last time I planned is precisely what got me into the place I am in right now. 

So here we are, little or no logic, all shapes are distorted, "objects in mirror are closer than they appear" as the side-mirror engraved words so philosophically say. I suppose like everyone else, these two years seem both very fresh, haunting but also in the rearview mirror all at once. I did say that during lockdown, time is elastic. I guess for 2020-21, outside of lockdown too.

Lebanon: Defeats should not define us.

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly based on a Hussein Hajj quote

Yesterday on Linkedin Tahaab Rais posted about a man who was writing his own headlines instead of reading the depressing ones in the press. Things like "husband loves wife today". You can read the post here. Now this has been a strange weekend for me. Not my usual deep-thinking mode. More like thoughts passing through my head as I was reading. And I added a reply to Tahaab's post. Here it is verbatim: "being in Lebanon is not exactly an easy thing these days. I thought: OK, I lost an enormous amount of money at the bank, electricity comes in batches of 2 hours a day, I have not had any serious work since (I am afraid to think since when!). Meat, water, power all of them rationed. And still - I am able to care for my elderly mother (at 86 is it not a picnic), a friend just gifted me 5 boxes of impossible-to-find meds of hers, I am still able to pay the bills (again, no mean feat!), I live in a beautiful house (I actually almost single-handedly restored in 2003), and I inherited around 1000 books from a British journalist who had to be medically evacuated from Lebanon (which I read when the power is down and summer light still up!). All this to say, OK, the world is bleak right now (specifically in a place like Lebanon), but am pulling through (certainly not easily). That old man is correct - 2020 should not define us, Defeats should not define us as well. The world goes on, so do we."

And so here we are - who would have thought I would be putting a positive spin on what happened? But - again - I can lament as much as I can about what happened, my generosity included. But this will not change things. Or the outcomes. Without any doubt, this was a case of trial by fire - not just for me - but for the whole Lebanese population. Still, it was a perfect storm as I called it earlier, with each element just feeding the others. But again, onwards and upwards.

Defeats should not define us. But that one hell of a defeat.

Would a Lebanese trust a bank again?

Lately, a Lebanese banker said that if we combine what is left in the reserves of the Central Bank (currently 16 Billion Dollars), to what the Lebanese are hoarding in their houses as cash (estimated anywhere between 5 to 10 Billion Dollars), to what is left stuck in the Lebanese banking system (commonly known as Lollar, as coined by Dan Azzi), all this can be added together to relaunch the Lebanese economy.

On paper the idea makes much sense. In the end - what are banks for? Remember the ads with house loans, car loans, personal loans, business loans, heck, even plastic surgery loans, and all other loans? Those were supposed to sustain and launch enterprises, except of course for the bit when all this created a rentier economy based on interest rates, pseudo-Ponzi schemes, and the list continues (for details just check the daily life of an average Lebanese living in the age of hyper-inflation and super devaluation).

Now the bit where the banker went wrong is that - no person in his right mind would trust a bank in Lebanon for a long, long time. Granted, people have short memories, but really. Banks, as institutions have soiled their brands, their reason of existence, have breached the trust of their clients, and all in all have been either idiotic with people's money, or demonic in terms of self-enrichment for their management and top clients.

So basically, whereas the banker means well (I think, though not sure considering the antecedents), that man is not going to touch the money I managed to take out of the bank at a loss and which I am keeping at home. Not just me, I previously talked about how all Lebanese are doing this. In the end, it is this money that constitutes some sort of an insurance against - literally - poverty as the middle class is eroding faster than me writing this post.

Long, long time ago, Byblos Bank had an ad that went with a selling line "a bank for life"... But in English the saying goes, "he cheated on me once, shame on him. He cheated on me twice, shame on me", in my lexicon, banks have cheated us once. I do not want the experience repeated.

 

In Lebanon 2021 picks up exactly where 2020 left....

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

Wherever we go (and we are not going anywhere), there we are...

In Lebanon, 2021 is starting exactly where 2020 left off. 

Saluting the medical staff which is fighting covid (wait, haven't we done that enough?).

Cases of covid surging to unprecedented heights (haven't we gone to such heights before? Actually, no, with people being reckless after an original super tight respect for the law - as I predicted here - the number of cases is spiraling out of control).

We are heading towards our umpteenth total (?) lockdown with our (incalculable?) exceptions (again, haven't we seen this enough in 2020 - the best part was the nightclubs open but without dancing).

Banks are still running totally crazy. To begin with there is zero coordination between them. No bank is acting the same, and when a new policy is enacted, clients (remember it's the clients' money in there) are told after the fact not before it. Mind you all banks are acting this way, meaning, a client comes trying to withdraw money only to be told that no, this month the amount changed (usually decreased!) or what not.

We still do not have a new government (what else is new?). The political discourse in Lebanon is still very stagnant at this stage. Interestingly, everyone is waiting for outside signals to come by (mainly the US transition of presidency, which astounds me, because - in case you have not heard - the new administration has bigger fish to fry!).

The advertising scene - the focus of this blog usually alongside with communication - is still in, literally, the death throes. I recognize there are some campaigns running on billboards but this is no indicator that things are picking up. 

Many agencies are either handling their MENA accounts from Beirut (if they have international affiliations), tried to establish satellite offices somewhere in the gulf, are creating systems to avoid having to deal with banks when it comes to payments, and are trying to pick up the debris (literally) of the August 4 Beirut explosion.

Freelancers are really being hit hard. To begin with, companies are recruiting them on the cheap (very very cheap) under the guise of "fresh Dollar" (which means they are paid in new Dollars as opposed to "Lollar" or Dollar already stuck in the banking system in Lebanon) and considering the difference of value between the two, companies in the gulf are recruiting them to do work from Lebanon while abusing their need to survive here. 

Also, banks are blocking all incoming money which these freelancers have gained - the excuse is usually "fear of money laundering", and this only leaves companies like Western Union as a way of payment (the payment is deducted by 2% upon arrival by the way, unless it comes from an American bank). Interestingly, companies cannot send by Western Union, it needs to be individuals - which added a further layer of trying to jump through hoops!

If so far you are not dispirited just by reading this, try living this on day to day basis.