We are fine in Lebanon, set our mind at ease about you.

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

In 2021, I wrote about the fact in Lebanon, problems shared are not problems halved (here).

But 2021 seems like a different life altogether even if problems were still going strong. Because now we got turbo-charged and the whole country seems completely adrift on all levels, specifically economical level - oh mind you, the fact that we have no president, a caretaker government and a parliament which is hanging by a thread seems like something "in the background of the photo". If you have not bought anything as of late, you might be excused not to understand, if you did, you might be excused to be too exhausted to lament.

Still, I often wonder - is a problem a problem? No matter the magnitude, the scale, the proportion? I keep hearing from people I know in the UK that tomatoes are no longer present on the shelves in shops. A friend in Brussels wrote about how people are renting a bed in a room for 750 Euros a month. Oh yes, and the French are up in arms because of what is supposed to be the retirement age going up from 62 to 64. And the list goes on.

Why am I writing this? I honestly don't know. I mean, a friend in Germany tried consoling me saying "oh just have a mug of hot chocolate" - until I linked him to the page of a local supermarket and translated the prices of the said hot chocolate options. His eyes popped.

I mean seriously, I am sure there are parts of the world where the situation is worse than Lebanon. Hey, even in Lebanon, you might say I am remnants of what used to be the middle the middle class (for an analysis of the middle class go here) meaning I still have means of survival when others do not (ergo, "why are you complaining?"). 

But again, it is like we are drowning in problems, yes, even the remnant of the middle class is. A person I know - who prior to the crisis was extremely affluent - had to forego his rented apartment and moved back to the villa of his parents and he has to readjust the basement floor to fit him, his wife, two children, mother in law while his mother and househelp where in the first floor - honestly I felt for the man as his wi-fi kept breaking in the basement as he called me as he does periodically and explaining to me that he is adjusting the screws of one of his children's beds.

This is where the "but there are people worse off than you" kicks in. Or - what someone told me lately - "Tarek the rich man is not the one who has the most but the one who needs the less". Well, I have always been frugal, I have always needed very few things. Then why is it that when going to the store it looked as if I robbed Fort Knox while leaving home? I was carrying a wad of cash so big it was embarrassing.

I am reminded of the wonderful satirical song by Khaled El Habr "we are fine in Gaza, set our mind at ease about you" (nahou bi kheir fi Gaza tamminou ankom). So, I guess we are fine in Lebanon, set our mind at ease about you.

So how bad is Balenciaga doing post-crisis?

Remember how recently Balenciaga was in crisis mode?

You do? Or maybe you don't as yesterday's news is.... Yesterday's news.

Which, in a way, it is.

Remember how everyone was up in arms boycotting Balenciaga (which normally they could not afford anyhow). And how everyone vowed not to buy from them (as if they could afford their products), and - never mind - a quick search on major online retailers such as Net-a-Porter, its male equivalent Mr. Porter, Seense and so on reveals.... tadam:

Their new collection which has been just dropped, and which has items at 500, 1000 Dollars and full-sticker priced items is... selling like hot cookies. Sure the xs sizes are still there, but - make no mistake - the usual sizes for men (medium, large etc...) have all but vanished from the online pages.

What does this mean? This means that the core luxury consumer is immune to such "kiddie games" (sorry, bad pun!) as online trolls wanting to boycott a brand out of their reach, the same way Gen Z was aware of what Uber treating its drivers badly but still wanted to take be a customer of theirs. 

So how is Balenciaga doing? Fine thank you very much. All that brouhahah was nothing.

On that horrific week Balenciaga just had

Not even sure how to start this post. Maybe with just the facts.
Balenciaga just had a horrific week. It released two - unrelated - campaigns. One called holiday campaign where children were seen holding toy bear bags in harnesses while the kids were surrounded by sadomasochistic paraphernalia and the other of Isabelle Huppert with some legal documents behind her on the table. A printout of the 2008 United States v. Williams decision, which ruled on the constitutionality of a law prohibiting the pandering of child porn is found underneath a Balenciaga bag which mind you retails at $3000.
Balenciaga designer Demna (who now goes without his family name - which is Gvasalia) was slated to receive the Global Voices award from respected fashion industry website Business of Fashion at their BoF Voices gathering this week, but the award was rescinded. Kim Kardashian who even walked in the brand's couture fashion show was said to be re-evaluating her ties with the brand after being one of their most recognizable faces. Actually, this must have been such a slow news day because Fox News Tucker Carlson jumped on the bandwagon of "cannibalistic pedophile" storyline. Apparently, Miss Kardashian had an offer to continue fronting the house in 2023 – the offer according to fashion sources came prior to the scandal – but in the wake of the controversy she refused it (and was slated to wear several looks by the brand for different events but changed her outfit choice).
Interestingly, fashion sites were a little torn on the matter. Remember, these fashion houses butter their bread so it is only understandable. And Balenciaga itself did not handle the crisis correctly, first suing the production house of one of the ads, then later – which means several days later – accepting the blame on the scandal. Of course, in crisis time, “several days later” is close to decades later when your brand name is trending everywhere on social media.
Now, of course, this being social media, people started connecting several dots together. The company that owns Balenciaga is actually Kering (which also owns Gucci which just parted with its head designer Alessandro Michele, but this is digressing) which is 41.7% owned by Artemis. Now Artemis is controlled by the Pinault family (François-Henri Pinault, the head of the family is married to actress Salma Hayek if you wish to know) and Mr. François-Henri sits on the board of auction house Christie’s, and Chiristie’s sells the work of British artists Jake and Dinos Chapman who have sculptures that replace children’s heads with genital organs.
Balenciaga also have dealt heavily with Stylist Lotta Volkova, but their last collab dates back to 2018. Now Miss Volkova apparently had to change her Instagram to private following harassment by people who saw “questionable” (in their lexicon pedophilic) art on her page there.
You see how far and wide this is reaching?
Naturally, the major mistake Balenciaga did was – simply not owning up to their mistake, no matter if they were at fault or not. The brand thrived on controversy that is for sure: The completely destroyed Paris Sneakers? The “trash bag” bags made from the softest leather? The completely outré fashion shows? The triple S sneaker which was a total sensation for years and years?
Of course, at some point – just like Gucci – novelty tends to either become the norm or simply goes too far. There have been questions by serious industry sites in the line of “can Balenciaga ever come back?”.
Well let me tell you this, this week a brand you might have heard of called Dolce & Gabbana took over Miami – at a time when Art Basel Miami is taking place. And in May 2022, they hosted the wedding of Kourtney Kardashian and Travis Barker in Italy – a coup that netted them 35 million Dollars in free media impressions when the whole wedding must have cost just 1 Million.
Why am I mentioning this? Because – a long, long time ago (again, time is relative!) in 2018 – Stefano Gabbana had been widely reported to have written someone (who produced screenshots of the conversation) that China is a "country of [five poop emojis]" and "ignorant dirty smelling mafia." In case you are not aware, China is literally the biggest market for luxury brands.
Following the controversy there were questions by serious industry sites in the line of “can Dolce & Gabbana ever come back?” (yes, I repeated the same sentence above for a purpose, thank you for noticing).
Wait, it gets better – do you know the story of Patrizia Gucci who hired an assassin to kill her husband? Her husband being no other than the scion of the renowned Gucci family (funnily now owned by Kering!). Am sure at the time there were questions “will Gucci ever come back?”. It did come back to the tune of 10 Billion Dollar annual sales. The story was actually the backbone of the film House of Gucci with Lady Gaga in the role of Patrizia.
Side note - have you heard of the shady reasons of why a certain designer by the name of Coco Chanel was the only non-German resident of the Ritz hotel during the second world war? I wonder if the brand she founded ever "came back"...
Heck even the normally blameless Prada released a keychain which was later pulled from the market for analogies of "blackface".
Just like Dolce & Gabbana came back, Balenciaga will too.
And those people “boycotting” Balenciaga and up in arms on social media about the brand? Well, these are the same people who cannot afford to buy the brand to begin with. So calm down, the brand will come back – sure, they could have handled the crisis better no matter whose “fault” it is (at this point Balenciaga has initiated a lawsuit against the production company of the ad that contained questionable legal documents but now dropped it).
At the end of the day, it's your logo on the ad, so take ownership of it.

Lebanon: Living in the age of frugality

Artist: James Gillray (Temperance enjoying a frugal meal)

Apparently I am frugal.

Maybe if I spent more in the past I could have saved more money from the one that got lost in the banking crisis. But seems I am quite frugal.

I read an article today about how in the UK with the obnoxious rise in bills, how people are resorting to saving money by all means necessary. The many ways listed are so dépassés by my standards.

What? Cooking in batches? We already cook for two days in a row for myself, my mother and our househelp. Being cautious about what to buy? The other day the only "luxury" bought at the store was a cheap chocolate (usually mother likes those sometime in the afternoon). Gandour "lucky 555" biscuits can really last and last due to the specific number we eat daily.

Cutting down on clothing? I bought a thrifted cashmere pullover from one of those sites on instagram - it worked so well I got another one. All told, with the delivery service factored, the whole thing cost about 20 Dollars (original value of the pullovers is about 360 Dollars or more - depending where you shop them, yes, I checked online).

What is funny in my case, is that when I shop for anything, something needs to go out of my originally basic closet. Did I get a thrifted shirt from Depot Vente? (Do visit that great shop here!) Or a vintage high neck (which has been my style ever since I stopped wearing proper button down shirts during the pandemic, which mind you saves on ironing) from Vintage Something (here)? Then guess what - an equal amount or more was given to charity.

People are these days rummaging in broad daylight in bins on the street, that's how bad the situation is. Poverty has risen to the very alarming level of 55% in Lebanon. Did I inject a large amount of money on my solar panel system? (here) Yes, I did but it also saves me a lot in the long run. Already I told the generator guy (yes, the communal generator guy I subscribe to) to cut my line because just keeping the subscription - with no use whatsoever - costs an amount of money (which to be honest is quasi-obscene!) I'd rather spend elsewhere.

With many medicines no longer being present in the Lebanese market, doctors and pharmacists are resorting to prescribing generic medicines (see here), which saves people and patients money while guaranteeing they still get the appropriate care.

Sure, I did not skim on my insurance - which this year is paid in Dollars to avoid any issues of coverage (last year I paid in Lebanese Pound which meant that whenever I needed to make payments at the lab for my bi-annual diabetes check up, I needed to pay a difference in price due to the Dollar varying). Neither do I own a car - which both saves money but also makes me organize 3 appointments to give myself a pretext to go out of the house (to actually divide the cost per outing).

I know how this sounds - I am leading a boring money-pinching life. Perhaps I am according to "regular" standards. But for some reason, I have always been a homebody, whenever I go out I am never shabby or that I am on some "home owner - extremely shabby edition". But perhaps I am - at my age (born in 1974!) less inclined to buy things. My house is quite lovely to be honest, my home office is quite enticing to work in, I can still afford food and the bills - though yes, like everyone else I am feeling the pinch.

Perhaps I was raised in a frugal environment - my late father (was a government employee) and my mother (formerly a teacher before marriage) had three sons back to back in record time. Raising three kids in such a way needed extreme planning. But then again perhaps not - who knows? Still, the other day I was talking to someone and I said that "I loved items that tell stories" (meaning things already lived in, with a history, with previous owners).

Perhaps this is why I thrift. Or perhaps I am just frugal...

So, in Lebanon, what do you do on the days you can no longer continue?

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

A couple of days back I went to the airport. No, no, not to travel - I did not even bother to renew my passport when it expired. So why did I go to the airport, you ask? To meet someone who was bringing me medicine boxes my brother had sent from out of Lebanon (most of them for mother, and some for me). The time was 12:30 A.M. - earlier that same day I went to another meeting place to meet a friend who secured me a box of a well sought-after medicine  for mother which - in July - took me 11 days to reach and when I managed to get one such box on July 13, its expiry date was... July 2021 (that would be the same month I got the medicine in, thank you for calculating). 

As I was going - on foot - for the meeting place the outstanding heat we were having in Lebanon only accelerated my metabolism and I had a hypoglycemia attack right in the middle of the road. Going back home was a drudgery, going to the meeting place was another, collapsing there and then was a third.

Oh sure, someone from abroad then texted me asking me how "my summer was going". Honestly, I did not even sure how to reply to that one. Where do I start? "Let me count the ways" as poet Elizabeth Barret Browning said. 

The bank? Well, everyone is still in limbo about that 158 thingy. Naturally at this point that's it, the money is gone along with it the future security that it was supposed to bring. Actually, the mother of the friend I was meeting for medicine box told me "I worked like a mule for 12 years after the death of my husband, even the interest rate I was not withdrawing. I told the bank to add it to the original sum. That was my son and grandchildren can spend them. Well, there you go, two million Dollars now gone!"

Electricity? The other day it took three days to do the laundry. You see, the generator cannot handle to turn the washing machine - on the first day we had the laundry in the machine we had total cumulative 10 minutes of government electricity that way. Then the next day it was patches here and there. Also not sufficient. So I had to stay awake till 12:10 A.M. on the third day, when the electricity finally came to see for the said laundry and remain awake lest it went off again (to unplug the washing machine!) so that took me safely to 1:40 A.M.. Funny, as I write this post, I had a power cut right this instant. OK, come to think about it, not funny at all since the generator guy himself is rationing the output and therefore too many times when the electricity breaks generator fails to take the baton.

The diabetes tests? I paid my insurance in full as I do yearly. And yet when I went to the lab the difference between what the insurance covers and what the lab asked for was - substantial. Why? Because insurance companies are still dealing at the Dollar having a 1507 Liras parity, when ithe laboratory people are dealing with it at the banks' parity (i.e. 3900 Liras). Because, you know, there are about half a dozen Dollar parities now in Lebanon. Which of course brings us back to the beginning - banks, and parity rates.

So how is my summer going? Honestly there are days when seriously I can no longer mentally go on. And take it from someone who is tough as a rock. Still, there are those days where I am sinking, literally. Like some juggler with 19 plates at a time and who cannot stop because if they did, all plates would come crashing down. But hey, it's been a while we have been using Melamine plates rather than the fancier glass ones - they're easier to wash you know.

And these days, anything that gives you a bit of respite is welcome.

So, in Lebanon, what do you do on the days you can no longer continue? There's only one thing to do.

Just go on. Just go on, like a Bunny on a Duracell battery. there's no other way.

Lebanon had a KFC in 1973 (which proves that the golden age never existed!)

So, apparently, we had a KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) branch in Beirut in 1973.

This is news to me. Not the least because when KFC was introduced to the Lebanese market sometime in the 90s (apologies, have no exact date) they forgot to say that it was a re-introduction to the market. So, I know what you are thinking: Lebanon in the "golden age" and cosmopolitan Beirut at the height of its glory, when the country was "the Switzerland of the Middle Middle East" and "Beirut, the Paris of the orient".

OK, now chill.

I found the ad in an old Annahar issue Dated December 1rst, 1973, when Lebanon was navigating its umpteenth political crisis - if it was not a strike, it was the government falling apart, if it was not the Palestinian fidais, it was an Israeli infiltration, if it was not the president threatening to step down, it was the Prime Minister stepping down, if it was not journalists being arrested, killed or kidnapped, it was the whole convoluted Arab situation where Lebanon always had a dog (but no arms) in the fight.

As a matter of fact, that particular issue of Annahar has a "manchette" that read: "International movement to stop reignition of the fight" in an allusion about the then flammable situation between Egypt and Israel.

Which brings us back to KFC. Actually, what I was doing was researching an artistic project which had a very large "political" angle. And as usual, my findings confirmed by central theory: The was not just one Lebanon, not even a country "a deux vitesses" (on two speeds), but rather on 100 different speeds.

Ads for Christmas regalia cohabitated with political crises, news about political misadventures stood side by side with new play reviews or artists inaugurating their exhibitions at hip galleries with lovely words by the late May Menassa. Confusing? Yes. But doesn't it remind you of anything?

Well, Lebanon has always been this odd, strange, cacophony of voices which happen to live in a land smaller than the Disney World parking lot. Of course it is exhausting, tiring, trying, and exasperating. But digging through so much archive (I admit, more than the original project needed), only made me too aware of the never-ending cycle of political issues of Lebanon. Even through its so-called "golden age", which I repeat - to me never existed (case in point, all those political issues and that teetering at the edge of the abyss we always experienced).

And hey since we are on lockdown they had a day and night delivery service, all you have to do is call 319810-312513. Hmmm, make mine hot please.