Cultural awareness

"Lebanese are so rude". "Lebanese are so aggressive". "Lebanese are so inconsiderate". These are only some of the statements that I hear often from both foreigners and Lebanese.

I don't know at what point I started actually believing in this. As you might remember, I was quite enchanted with the good qualities of the Lebanese for a while (especially their hospitality). But lately, I have found myself being very rude, aggressive and incosiderate in Lebanon. And to me, it was very interesting to see how differently I behave when I am abroad.

In Lebanon, I have started to be aggressive with people in the car and in the street. I have started saying unkind things to strangers when they cross me. I have started going through red lights, parking the car everywhere and rushing to get ahead of the line...

I have written before about how the environment affect me and how I have become more aggressive in Beirut.  But there is a choice I haven't been making about my own behavior that became very apparent to me in 2 recent interactions.

I was recently visiting a friend's apartment who is out of town to feed his cats.  I parked my car right at the entrance of the building, when the building's concierge came out and told me to move. There was something about the way he said it that occurred as very rude. In a second, I was livid, and ready to kick the guy's butt. The funny thing is that I didn't even understand what he said (he was speaking in Arabic). It was the way he moved his head, the way he looked at me, I don't know. I just found him very rude. So I told him something not very nice and drove off.

In another recent instance, I was driving up a crowded street and there was a soldier on a scooter driving towards me. I was in the right direction, he was driving against traffic. He told me to move. I interpreted his non-smiling face and hand gestures as "Get out of the way". I was livid in a second, and told him again a not very nice thing and drove off.

What do these 2 interactions teach me? Besides the fact of who is right, who is wrong, what the intention of the 2 guys was, what they intended to communicate... I realize how little time and patience I have left for people now. How quickly I just assume people are attacking me. How little I am willing to question my own shortcomings.

So, coming back to the statement "there is a choice I haven't been making about my own behaviour". I have realized that in Beirut I have given up my choice on how to behave, and I have started mimicking others and believing what we say about each other. I have given up the choice to believe that this place is good and that people are kind. I have forgotten that the only thing that has changed is my attitude towards the place (I can guarantee you that the Lebanese did not act differently the day I arrived to Beirut).

So, talking about New Year's resolutions... In 2012, I will treat people out of what I am committed to in life (love and respect) and not out of an impulse and a reaction on how I think they are behaving. I will behave as I want to behave, not as how I think my circumstances push me to. I will embrace my inner jerk and choose to bring something sweeter to the mix. And I will give people the benefit of the doubt.

This is not just an empty promise, but what I see as the great exercise of personal freedom in life. I am sure I'll fall at some point and bark back at someone in the car. But it's worth the try!

I will tell you how it goes...

Green space in Beirut

For those of you who live in Beirut, you know that this city is not what you would call "green". Parks are not particularly common, especially since taking care of them is expensive. Near my house there is actually a park called "Sioufi Gardens" that is so run down that it is almost depressing to walk around it.

So you can only imagine our surprise when one day my husband and I found Horsh Beirut, this amazingly beautiful park in the middle of Beirut.

This park has been there forever, and was completely burned during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. From a pine forest of over 1,250,000 m2 in 1696 to a park of over 800,000 m2 in 1967 (≈ 5% of Municipal Beirut), today Horsh Beirut is only a park of 255,000 m2. But still, it is huge!

After the war Horsh Beirut was restored and opened to the public.

However, some said that the crowds were starting to do some real damage to it, while others were afraid that sectarian fights would erupt in its grounds, so the municipality closed it. Today it is this beautiful green space surrounded my closed gates, between the Muslim side and the Christian side of town that can only be seen when you pass it while driving.

Yup, this magical place is actually closed to the public. And most Beirutis have never entered the park.

We felt like little kids who were been given a candy, and had to give it back after the first bite. "What do you mean we can't go in?", we asked the guard.

So this weekend we beat the system and spent actually a whole morning in the park... How did we do that??

Well, with a group of 32 friends we took on helping Zahra, a lovely Lebanese woman in her late 40s who takes care of the "Greenhouse", a garden located in the heart of Horsh Beirut.

As you might imagine, the gigantic greenhouse was a bit run down too, and Zahra does not receive any funds from the municipality to buy new tools. "We work with what we have" she says, while showing me broken shovels, twisted scissors and old buckets.

With the help on an incredibly generous person, we were able to buy Zahra new tools. Our friends were totally on board to spend a Saturday morning getting dirty and enjoying the fresh air, the flowers and plants and the tremendously calming effect of working in a garden.

Zahra walked us around the park and showed us the trees and the medicinal plants that you can find in it: remedies for a tummy ache, leaves to kill feet fungi, trees that absorb bacteria and clean the air... We all felt healthier, more knowledgeable and connected to one another.

Zahra told us stories of reconciliation, personal growth and atonment. She recalled how she was afraid of the "others" after the war, and that through receiving little kids from different groups in the park, she has been able to embrace human beings, no matter what religious background they have. She has also brought together people who wouldn't normally come together, to have fun while working in the gardens.

I think these stories left us all full of hope and with a renewed optimism. Spending time in the park was healing for all of us. And the only thing it took was offering a couple of hours of our Saturday morning.

So whoever is reading this post and lives in Beirut: the park is NOT closed to volunteers. Just go to Horsh Beirut on a Saturday morning and ask to speak to Zahra from the greenhouse, or send her an e-mail to zouzou_wr@hotmail.com. She will welcome you with open arms.