After the crash - on memory

Anyone who knows me, knows I have a very strict way of organizing my digital files. So nothing is labelled xxny7 or what not but rather "Ksara - Valentine's 2023" or something like that. So looking through my archives, which I often do if you follow the blog or any of my other digital presences, is super easy. Yet, for a long time now I have been hit with a series of unfortunate events (a la Lemony Snicket). Anything that could go wrong did do wrong.

The latest event in the series involves me waking up the other day to find my PC broken in half. It never happened before, I have never seen it happen before, yet here it was - my PC was broken in half. Before I got to copy any file on the desktop, the screen crashed. Apparently the technician told my brother that the hard drive was kaput to boot. Which means all my 2023 archive was lost. Including the soundtrack of my new film which only had 11 seconds to cut before it was final - considering the soundtrack is 2 and a half hours long you can imagine my dismay.

Still, yesterday I went through the gargantuan task of reassembling said archive from the very few people I talk to via Whatsapp. Personal family photos were shared with my brother - so I got to download these again. And considering that usually the bulk goes to my nephews, and with them growing older, so there was much less photos taken this year. I lost the photos that were taken by my nephew who is an excellent photographer mind you - which I had saved in a special file. 

Well, it helps I rarely attend events so basically the very few photos of me in places were recouped as they were sent to a friend. Actually, come to think about it, I only speak to about 3 people via WhatsApp - my brother (my other brother phones rather than writes) and 2 friends. So basically I got the photos back from the said convos. 

This has been a very bad year business wise, so basically very little "work" was lost. I think the only silver lining was that the major humongous 1994-2022 archive was already saved in a double copy on 2 external hard drives - you know all my work (artistic, advertising, personal creations, tidbits, archival images, family photos and the whole lot.... Just the folder "making of" which is the file which saves how my artistic work was done runs through hundreds of Gigabites).

So basically, yesterday, after all the snooping, downloading, this and that, about 95% of the archive of 2023 was rescued. No mean feat. It helps that I run a blog, so basically all ads I shot this year (or most) were already on the blog waiting to be downloaded. But all of this exercise, made me think about "memory" and what remains. 

Not to stereotype, but for a long time, major photo studios in Lebanon were held by Armenians (even mobile ones were at the Burj square to offer instant photos to people). So my brother labelled me once "Artine" (a common Armenian name) because I used to take photos maddeningly at family events or gatherings. Yet, when our father passed away, both of my brothers wanted his photos - especially those taken with their kids.

As my nephews and niece grow older, there is less interest for them to be taken in photos. But, in each of our houses as a family there is one special photo that was taken of the three of them when they were kids. People who see the image do the oohing and aahing etc.... Except the image has a secret - it is not real. When I was supposed to take it, the kids being kids, when two of them stood still, the third would start fidgeting. And when the fidgeting one would stand still, one of the other two would start moving. So in the end I took a photo of two of them and inserted the third digitally. 

Maybe I am just saying that even our best memories are just reconstructed in our minds. We just build them up and hype them and embellish them, just to pretend we had something to hang on to. Which is both, sad and beautiful at once. 

Murr Tower ad dating back to 1975

Ad cleaned and rearranged by Tarek Chemaly

And how about this time capsule of an ad.

The Murr Tower, which still stands empty and incomplete after all this time, was supposed to be - as per its ad which appeared in Annahar newspaper in 1975 - as "the first skyscraper of the Middle East" (interestingly, it was not the first skyscraper-inspired structure - look here), and the ad boasts its 40-storey high length. And that it is the highest building in Lebanon. 

The ad specifies that the first stage of construction of the first 20 floors started and finished within one month, and that the second one started on April 5 1975 and was supposed to finish "at the beginning of May" - the war that erupted on April 15th 1975 had other plans. The building included as per the ad 400 offices, a cinema, a restaurant and cafeteria, telex and telegraph center, a telephone for every office and other amenities which were high-end for its time.

If you wish to see the current inside of the tower, which was taken over by various militias over time (specifically during the war) please look at the fascinating images here. For a while there were plans to turn the tower into a fancy high-rise but these never materialized (here).

The tower still remains as a hollow, empty, and macabre reminder of a Beirut with a questionable past, and sadly, murky present and uncertain future.

The story of the Tokyo restaurant, Beirut (by way of De Freige palace)

Yesterday I was contacted by Mrs Christine Simm inquiring about my photos about the Tokyo Restaurant. By way of explanation Mrs Simm said, "that flat had previously been our home for 13 years and, what I presume became the restaurant had been my parents' bedroom, the only semi circular bedroom I have ever come across."

Here is the photo Mrs. Simm wanted to see:

Photo credit: Tarek Chemaly

The Simm family moved there in 1954 and her father sent her grandparents this particular image (by way of explanation, Mrs Simm's father "was the Middle East Agent for a British Engineering Company. We started off in Egypt but then moved to Beirut as a better place for the family to live while he was travelling."):

Photo credit: Christine Simm

Interestingly whereas there is speculation about the date of the building with architect Karim Andary presuming it dates back to the 1930s, Mr Simm provided an image of the pristine building when they moved in which means it was not built way prior to then.

Photo credit: Christine Simm

"They then put up the Lord's Hotel which blocked the view. My bedroom was right at the back behind the curved balcony."
Just to imagine the scene, please look below:

Or this one:

Photo credit: Karim Andary

Mrs Simm goes on: "We did not use the house as it was designed. What should have been the living room was my parents' bedroom, the main 'entrance hall' was my father's office and we always used what would have been built as the back door for coming and going. Then there were the living and dining rooms and 3 bedrooms. We children used the large balcony at the side, with the arches, as our playroom. At the back there was the kitchen and another balcony which was the maid's domain.

There was a widow, Madame Saab, who lived below us. Her flat was only half the size of ours because of the hill. In the flat next to us, for the whole time we were there, were the Kekhia's, with their two sons. We were often bothered with stray cats which used to jump in the back windows as they were on ground level."

Mrs Simm goes on reminiscing about Beirut, saying the family lived there in the 1950s and 60s "and my brothers and I attended the British Community School. To start off with it was in Rue Abdel Aziz and then it eventually moved to the Airport Road. But in between these 2 it was in temporary accommodation in the Marquis De Freige Palace."

In case you wish to see the palace in question here it is:

"I clearly remember my classroom, which was the biggest room in the building even though there were only 8 of us in the class. Our teacher was the headmistress and we had to be there so she could be near the telephone. It was a lovely room with stained glass windows, such a pleasure to look at when you were trying to learn french verbs or do arithmetic. I can remember we were strictly not allowed to the upper floor, even though rumor had it there was a room with rat poison in it!"

Sadly here is what the palace has been substituted with today.

Source

Mrs Simm now lives in Scotland and has never been back. "I don't think I would like the changes as the Lebanon was such a wonderful place to grow up in at the time."
"Wonderful childhood!" she concludes. Meanwhile last time I was there which was in November 2019 only the K and O still held strong from the letters which once indicated a restaurant and prior, the Simm family residence.

And during lockdown, time is elastic.

Well, you know how people are saying that all days feel the same during lockdown due to lack of measuring parameters when one does not go out to work, or knows when the weekend or when Easter is? Oddly, I do not face that problem. Yet, time is indeed elastic. My serious lockdown started way earlier than anyone due to a combination of trying to save money (you know capital controls oblige and all that....), to me quitting my university lecturing (nope, I will not be paid by head rather than by course!), severe winter (that Friday the 13th storm!), and an all-around other family factors. Meaning that to me - working from home is not a novelty. With work being so scarce to begin with, what's with shops/companies/institutions shutting down left and right.
Yet, the time I speak of during lockdown being elastic is a different kind. For a long time I hanged on to a useless past with its relics, objects, boxes, and dwindling emotional significance: Natural Born Killers soundtrack I used to listen to on loop, Red Hot Chili Peppers CD which I introduced as the agency's official sound to the creative department of the ad agency in KSA, my old university books whose info by now is quasi obsolete...
These objects meant something.  At least they were sent to the recycling which is being run by the municipality. Hanging on to these objects was perhaps a way to keep possibilities, a way to go back to a life that is now done with and too far back. Today I look around to a present that is too fractured and to a future that is as odd/perilous as ever (what will happen to my money in June 2021, will I get back the missing money that was supposed to come from Oman? Will this? Will that?). And yet, spring has come with its cleaning - make that springs and cleanings - considering what was thrown away.
Maybe in time we will look back at this period and say it was a new start or perhaps it will be business as usual when things go back on track. Whatever happens/does not happen, time proved to be elastic and disposable and getting rid of an economics book will not negate the person I am today.
"By the way, I tried to say, I know you from before".
No you didn't, but we will leave that to another post.

New ArcheWALLogy find via +961 (Rawad Mansour)

Image by Plus961 (slightly altered for visibility)

Fellow blogger Plus961 fell on an impressive find! A Sport Cola mural dating back to (he estimates and I concur) the 60s. The gem can be seen on the Kaslik highway, right next to Benito shoes in the building that hosts Classic Burger Joint and Bankmed. Sport Cola is one of the defunkt brands that used to be in Lebanon. Is this the oldest mural? My own estimate goes to this one for JVC appliances:

April 13 commemoration of the onset of the Lebanese war: Tenzakar ta ma ten3ad

Artwork by Tarek Chemaly

Tenzakar w ma ten3ad - a popular Lebanese saying that means "may it be remembered and not repeated", as we remember the onset of the Lebanese war on April 13 1975, the slogan was changed by an ad agency (am guilty of not knowing which agency!) for a civic campaign that went "tenzakar ta ma ten3ad" - which means "may it be remembered so as not to be repeated". That simple stroke of genius in terms of linguistics makes it one of the most effective post-war slogans and my fear is that maybe we did not learn the lesson.