From Souk to Souk (16 page)

Soon, we reached the harbour where a rather decrepit collection of fishing vessels, speed boats and pocket-sized pleasure cruisers bobbed languorously in the murky water, a sad reminder of Byblos' 1960s heyday when, fleetingly, the town was a favourite of glamorous film stars. Now, peeling paint, frayed flags and oily water were the order of the day. On the north side of the waterfront, a trio of half-empty restaurant terraces, including one styling itself as ‘
le rendezvous des personalités internationales
', was perched above stone retaining walls, the few diners there showing little interest in the harbour view below. We continued past parked cars to the breakwater and joined families and teenagers ambling along the broad concrete walkway to the end. Groups of young boys, tanned and slim, sat on the rocks, chatting, throwing pebbles into the sea or shouting encouragement to those who had ventured into the water to join the plastic bottles and other flotsam that drifted with the current. I wondered if they ever reflected on their town's long history or thought about their ancestors: great kings such as Ahirom, whose name was literally carved in stone on his sarcophagus, now in the National Museum of Beirut, and countless others whose lives went unrecorded and who returned to dust to be forever forgotten.

We walked back around the harbour and entered the few lanes that make up the old part of Byblos, traditional stone houses occasionally interspersed by a modern villa with a perfect sea view. As the land rose behind the harbour, streets were replaced by pathways and, in just a few paces, we found ourselves in a less manicured world where the small homes seemed to be locked in an existential struggle with the thick vegetation that grew all around them. Twisted fig trees and windblown palms were joined by gangs of weeds and tangled bushes that crept between walls and silently gripped wrought iron gates as if determined to reclaim the core of this ancient town. Renovated, the buildings could have been quaint, but as it was they were merely dilapidated and sad. Seeing a narrow flight of stone steps lead off between two walls, we headed up them, brushing away the insects and flies that dropped off the overhanging leaves and branches as we pushed our way past, for a moment schoolboys once more. After a few steps turning this way and that, we found ourselves on a grassy platform overlooking the sea painted with the first lines of copper and auburn as the sun began drifting towards the horizon. In silence, we watched as a small boat slowly sailed towards the harbour.

Behind us, on the other side of the path, a dense patch of low vegetation covered the ground between the grass and a crumbling stone wall. At first, it seemed to be nothing more than more weeds, but then I recognised the familiar shapes of parsley, chives, sage and other herbs thriving in the cool half-shadow of a nearby tree. As soon as I realised what they were, I suddenly became aware of their fragrances floating around us, mingling with a faint smell of rosemary I had already noticed.

A voice broke into the early evening air. We looked round to see an old woman, a housecoat over her simple clothes, slippers on her feet, slowly making her way towards us. Only now did I notice a few garments hanging limply from a washing line a short distance away and realise that the run-down buildings beyond them were occupied: we had strayed into her garden. She spoke again, her guttural Arabic tones unintelligible to me, but the timbre discernibly friendly. Her gait was uncertain, her thin legs supporting a lean body, perhaps a deflated version of her former self. Apparently undeterred by the lack of response, she continued her monologue. I apologised in English and then in French for trespassing, but she did not react; instead she bent down and began tearing at the plants. I tried to catch Paco's eye, but his regard was focused on the old woman. Straightening up and still speaking, she held out a handful of basil as if it were a posy and nodded for me to take it. Surprised, I hesitated before reaching out and taking the small gift from her hand, rough from years of hard work and burnt almost to the colour of leather by the eternal sun. I expected her dark eyes to glisten with kindness, but they were just weary and dull.

‘
Shukran
,' I mumbled, repeating my thanks more loudly as the old woman turned away.

She continued her soliloquy, making a sweeping movement with a thin arm in the direction of the harbour below. I was unsure whether she was speaking to us or to herself, but endeavoured to look as if I were listening. The tone of her voice recounted a tale of better days, infused perhaps with regret and nostalgia for a time when her hair was sable rather than silver. After a while, she seemed to tire and bid us what I assumed to be a farewell.

‘Au revoir, et merci
,' I called as she walked slowly back along the path.

‘Allah yasalmik
,' said Paco, who had listened discreetly but not reacted to the old woman's ramblings. He turned to look at me and shrugged his shoulders, his intensely blue eyes as bright as ever despite the fading light.

I contemplated the basil and then the herb garden before turning to follow the path a short distance where another, wider flight of stone steps led further up the hill. Unkempt, dishevelled, this seemingly forgotten part of town was beyond the route most tourists chose.

‘What did she say?' I asked Paco, a couple of paces behind me, as I passed an upturned plastic chair in a tiny, overrun garden that had known better times.

‘What everyone of her generation here says,' he sighed after a pause.

At the top of the steps the path continued a few paces before broadening out into a lane. The overgrown world of the hillside melted away and once again we were in a carefully maintained street.

Ahead of us loomed a small square building; a modest dome on top and a couple of arches attached to its side looked more like afterthoughts than an integral part of a planned design. A petite bell tower rising from the flat roof added a delicate touch to an otherwise squat, solid-looking structure, the tiny cross atop it standing out against the startlingly azure sky. Its masonry was of the same rough stone as most of the old buildings in Byblos, yet it stood surrounded by paving that evoked a modern art interpretation of a chess board. High up, bunches of greenery clung to the stonework as if seeking sanctuary, their dainty flowers out of reach of those who would pick them as an ephemeral souvenir, only to discard them hours later. Even so, the small windows, set at various heights in the thick walls, gave it more the aspect of a tiny castle than the Romanesque-style church it was. As we arrived at the twelfth-century building named after St John the Baptist, we were not alone: men in sharp black suits and women in haute couture mingled around the entrance, oblivious to passers-by. It could have been a fashion show, it could have been a film set, or it could have been a wedding: in Lebanon, it seems that even the participants are not always sure.

We ambled on and eventually found ourselves back at the market. It was busier than when we had first walked round it, but there seemed to be just as many flowers and plants. From a row of little cages filled with canaries and finches birdsong floated through the early evening air. We contemplated cacti and perused plumbago, our pace determined by the shuffling mass of day-trippers who now filled the square. Suddenly, I realised I was gazing at jars of honey of the deepest amber and, looking up, saw the young man we had noticed before. He was perhaps in his early twenties and somewhat slimmer than the average Lebanese male, whose body is given form by military service and further honed in the gym. He smiled shyly as if suppressing a firmer emotion. Paco took a jar of honey in his slender fingers and, giving it a cursory examination, began to speak to him in Arabic. The tone was matter-of-fact, but my friend is a poet and I knew his words would be carefully chosen and elegant. The young man laughed nervously, white teeth flashing. Paco spoke again and, after hesitating, the young man nodded. The transaction was executed quickly and we walked away, my host now the owner of a jar of finest Lebanese honey, apparently produced by bees that live among the country's few remaining cedar trees. The day was drawing to a close and the market would soon be over. I told Paco I would like to watch the sun go down.

***

The orange disc has almost reached the horizon and is about to slip into the sea and into the underworld beyond, guided by
Shalim
, the god of dusk. This small town has outlived many of its great contemporaries: Palmyra, Ur, Babylon and Uruk lie in ruins, their erstwhile grandeur of legend now nothing more than bare stones and crumbling mounds. The buildings in Byblos, which once stood coevally with the fine architecture of such cities, are now also reduced to mere relics, but, in contrast to the others, Byblos itself has survived. Like the plants adorning the town's ramparts and the flowers among the ruins, it has constantly renewed itself, retaining an alluring youthfulness and flourishing centuries after others have faded into the desert. Over time, hundreds of generations have enjoyed the splendour of the setting sun from this spot, including the fisherman of my daydreams. Illiterate he might have been, his life uncomplicated by today's comforts and technology, but he would still have been able to take pleasure in the beauty of the day's end. Although separated by millennia and our understanding of the event, it was an experience we shared: it was his sunset and it was mine.

My thoughts drift on the warm evening air to the old woman in her cottage. The ascetic lifestyle I envisage her leading might not be so different from that of my imaginary fisherman of antiquity. I look at the wilting spray of basil, the herb that represents best wishes, and wonder if anyone will buy her a Mother's Day gift. Perhaps a washing machine. Somehow, I doubt it. But maybe the glow of tomorrow's sunset will bring her a few moments of familiar joy.

I am sitting on a yellow plastic chair looking at an unloaded handgun and reflecting on the day's events. The evening air is warm and the chatter in the background lends a sense of the ordinary to a world that is anything but. I consider myself lucky to be here, but even luckier to be able to leave.

***

Like some slain monster the capsized ship lay motionless on its side, the murky waters lapping against its rusting hull. Where once white paint had gleamed, corroding metal now crumbled away, flake by flake, while the last vestiges of wooden decking clung precariously to the vertical. Two bearded fishermen crouched near the stern on what might previously have been the wall of the ship's bridge; a third, wearing a khaki-green bucket hat, sat on a curved piece of brown metal, the stump of a missing leg tucked underneath his light grey
thobe
. The trio watched as we sailed slowly past, their fishing lines hanging limply, faces expressionless. The ship, blown out of the water by fighter planes during the Iraq war, was now a rotting carcass, just one more ugly scar left by the bloody conflict that flashed onto television screens around the world in the early years of this century. Since the war ended, media interest has gradually faded and the public in the West has enjoyed the luxury of boredom setting in as post-conflict violence drags on over the years. For the people of Basra, however, the aftermath is still visible and, even if the television crews have long since packed their bags and left, the consequences of the invasion continue to unfold, inexorably changing the culture and life of the city.

We cruised on in our little boat towards the metal pontoon bridge that spans the Shatt al-Arab – the Stream of the Arabs – the broad waterway formed by the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates. A line of cars and minibuses, many going to or from the border with Iran just a few kilometres away, clanked and clunked their way slowly over the temporary link. The boatman, a lean figure with chestnut-coloured skin, steered a course under a gap at the side where the bridge rose to meet the riverbank. We continued across the rippling grey water, the zephyr created as we sailed ahead providing a welcome, if small, relief from the otherwise muggy air.

Eventually, we came alongside a large motor yacht moored on the right bank. In better condition it could have been the sort of boat a Russian oligarch would keep in Antibes or Monaco, but the erstwhile polar-white paintwork was now grubby, as if starting to take on the colour of the river. Around the waterline it was beginning to peel away in the humid heat, revealing dark rust below. A funnel and a fading stripe along the boat's side, both cobalt blue, were the only concessions to colour on the sober exterior, but we knew that, inside, the vessel had been extravagantly decorated with arabesque opulence. Not a soul was to be seen on deck, the yacht's windows a corpse's lifeless eyes. The pitch of our small engine dropped as we slowed down before passing along the length of the dormant ship. Staring at the silent vessel, I tried to imagine how different life on board must have been in the past. Eventually, we reached the square stern where the name
BASRA BREEZE
was painted in large capital letters. The superyacht, previously Saddam Hussein's floating palace, now lay silently awaiting a buyer, a dictator's widow seeking a new husband. Captain Hassan and Sergeant Ahmed, the plain-clothes guards from the Ministry of the Interior, took photographs as eagerly as would any tourist. Omar, the forty-something guide and interpreter sitting with his arms outstretched along the sides of the boat, had obviously seen it all before. In his limited English, Hassan asked me if I liked it; I returned his smile and said I did. The joviality of the two men made it easy to slip into a false sense of security, but, behind their gum-chewing, laid-back style, I knew they were carefully watching everything around us.

The boatman revved up the engine and we moved on. With one bony hand on the tiller, he used the other to adjust the black and white chequered scarf that was balanced on his head like a loose turban. My thoughts drifted to the legendary Sinbad whom I imagined sailing along the same waterway as he set off on his adventures from Basra, his home town. In those days, it was a major centre of culture and learning that had grown out of a military encampment founded by the second caliph, Umar Ibn al Khattab, the man whose conquests spread Islam across vast swathes of the Middle East. Surely Sinbad had enjoyed a more uplifting view, I thought. In the course of his seven voyages, the intrepid seafarer encountered many perils and endured much suffering, but, in the end, he became fabulously rich. Now, ahead of us, evidence of latter-day wealth was looming into view, yet the collection of two-storey sandy-pink bunkers, their roofs as flat as the surrounding landscape, was not my idea of a palace. Weary palms, browning fronds hanging from lopsided crowns, and flowing pistachio trees softened the angular design of the low buildings, but could do little to beautify what were essentially unsightly concrete boxes covered by a veneer of rose-coloured stone. Ali, the young photographer mysteriously sent by the Ministry of Tourism to accompany us for part of the trip, lifted the weighty camera that hung on a strap round his thin neck and began snapping picture after picture. A native of Baghdad, it was his first trip to the south of the country and Basra. Although he tried not to show it, he was evidently excited and regularly asked Hassan to take a photograph of him standing in front of the historical sites and mosques we visited. His fingers, unusually elegant for a man's, grappled with the focus while he pointed the camera towards the shore. A few figures wandered around the broad balconies and behind the rolls of barbed wire and sandbags that surrounded the abandoned residence. Here, in days gone by, Saddam and his family had surrounded themselves with dictator kitsch and enjoyed pleasures beyond the wildest dreams of those they ruled. Like the famous Saladin, he was a native of Tikrit, but, unlike the sultan who died leaving only one gold coin and forty seven pieces of silver, Saddam did not give his money to the poor. And yet for all the wealth he amassed, the former leader of Iraq who, from the terraces of this unsightly edifice, once cast his gaze over his dominions, ended up seeking refuge in a hole in the ground near his birthplace.

I took a last look at the dingy palace and then we turned round to head back. We cut a wide semi-circle in the river and sailed on past dusty fields and stony beaches strewn with litter. A group of feral dogs ran along the top of the bank that rose just a couple of metres above the shoreline. They paused to sniff at something, then trotted inland towards a mass of straggly bushes where they disappeared from view. I watched as we passed occasional buildings and huts at the edges of the fields, eerily empty, the palm trees behind them little more than silhouettes in the haze. A small sphere glowed white behind the grey cloud that covered what should have been a sunny land. As we made our way back to Basra, a narrow, wooden boat spluttered past, clouds of white smoke billowing from its stern, its wake spanning out until it gently rocked our vessel. With its yellow canvas roof and old tyres hung along its sides, it seemed like the twin of our own little craft. I looked at the handful of passengers huddled along its gunwales. The men were all in white, the women completely in black; they could have been borrowed from a human chess set. In another time perhaps: board games, such as the once popular backgammon, are now frowned upon by the increasingly religious establishment in Southern Iraq. As the buildings and trees disappeared from sight, the view became one of overwhelming greyness, as if the water and sky had given up being blue and instead sunk into some sort of cosmic depression. It was strangely appropriate for the setting and I tried to determine if the dullness created the gloom or merely reflected it. Only the river bank, a horizontal band of green topped with sandy earth broke the monotone, its edges blurred against the opaque sky.

A while later, we passed back under the pontoon bridge and headed towards our mooring place. Slowing down, we chugged past a forest of broken wooden pilings that rose from the water's edge like rotting, black teeth. Between them lay pieces of rusting machinery, chunks of concrete and abandoned digging equipment, scattered like a child's toys as if the city had been subjected to a visitation by a rampaging giant. Just a few paces behind this impromptu junk-yard stood a run-down fairground where a Ferris wheel was gently turning, even though most of its thirty or so brightly painted cabins were empty.

We sailed on to the mouth of the creek and the small landing stage from where we had set off. A group of young boys in grubby, ill-fitting clothes watched with curiosity as our boat drew up, the battered tyres along its side breaking the impact when we finally came to a standstill beside the quay. As we clambered out, an Iraqi family was waiting to board after us. The father, a middle-aged man whose light-blue shirt stretched over his paunch, stood in front of his wife and teenage daughter, each of whom was wrapped in a black polyester
abaya
. I caught a glimpse of denim touching a golden sandal and imagined the suffocating heat beneath the sticky fabric. Three small boys in Western clothing, hair cropped short, and their younger sister, no more than six or seven years old, followed closely behind. She, too, was in an
abaya
, her wide eyes staring out from a face surrounded by black cloth. Not for the first time in this country, I saw a child covered in a robe intended to temper the libido of any men who saw her and found myself trying to understand why she should need to wear such a thing.

We began walking towards Lion of Babylon Square, along the way passing buildings that resembled a jumble of cardboard boxes tied together by the network of cables criss-crossing between them. A few billboards advertising washing powder and telecoms brightened up the place, but men in dark suits staring out from rows of political posters were an omnipresent reminder of the fragile political situation. The faces were trying to look friendly, reassuring, but their only saving grace in this increasingly intolerant country was that they did not have long beards and were not wearing turbans. We made our way towards the entrance to the souk and an open-air market in front of it that had been set up between a couple of rows of parked vehicles. I could see people wandering about. From a distance, those draped in black looked like gaps in the scene before us, shapes of
personae non gratae
cut out of a photograph. The Iranian influence was seeping over the border like an oil slick, contaminating all it touched, covering women in black as crude clings to seabirds. The market itself was a sad display of cheap Chinese goods in flimsy boxes, with plastic toys, batteries and disposable lighters laid out on sheets placed over the uneven ground. I felt I had entered a parallel universe, a world in which the people around me were trapped, but from which I could walk away.

We headed into the souk, swapping daylight for the glow of economy bulbs. I knew Hassan and Ahmed, one in front of us and one behind, were keeping a discreet lookout for any sign of trouble as they sauntered past the stalls. The souk was a jumble of colours and textiles: polo tops,
thobes
, shirts and
abayas
filled the walls and shelves of the tiny shops from floor to ceiling and hung from the roof of the aisles between them, a dense kaleidoscope of oversized bunting. In a country where so many people have lost limbs through conflict and terrorist attacks, it was disconcerting to see legs of mannequins hanging among the pendent clothes, a thoughtless reminder of what had been so brutally taken away. Wherever the passages were wide enough, tables had been set up and covered with packets of socks, T-shirts and men's underwear. Storeholders chatted, shoppers inspected goods, the guards kept an eye out and, of course, people stared.

As we ventured deeper into the souk, the crowds thinned out and there was more space between the little stores, providing us with glimpses of older walls. Even so, it was a far cry from the exotic markets I had seen elsewhere in the region and a world away from the Basra of
Tales from the Thousand and One Nights
. At the far end of the bazaar, there were a few stalls selling army and police surplus. Ahmed examined a pair of desert boots, turning them over to look at the grip, a stark contrast to his own smooth-soled, pointed shoes. Laughing, he said something to Hassan before putting them back. For a brief moment, I pondered how an entire uniform might be fun for fancy dress parties, but then, with a sense of unease, realised how simple it would be for anyone to disguise himself as a representative of the very forces of law and order that had accompanied us throughout the trip.

***

I was standing in the old Jewish quarter. The haze was starting to lift and the sun beginning to glare down on us pitilessly, as if determined to compensate for its earlier absence. With its canals and fine architecture, Basra had once been known as the Venice of the East. The narrow channel in front of me, though, bordered with one-time magnificent merchants' houses, was now a stagnant waterway filled with garbage, its thick stench pervading the ever warmer spring air. The houses themselves, now perhaps no more than half a dozen or so, were crumbling, their beige bricks holding together as a man who feels it is too early to die clings to life. The occasional window pane or insert of tiles the colour of lapis lazuli brightened up otherwise dull façades while ornate brickwork decorations around windows and doorways recalled better times. Above me, dark wooden balconies and
mashrabiyas
, the bay windows typical of Arab city houses, spoke of a distant era when – relatively speaking – lives could be lived without fear. I looked at the rickety structures with sun-bleached traces of turquoise clinging to the splintering wood and their weathered slats hanging like broken wings. Once upon a time, from behind the privacy of the latticework, the houses' inhabitants would have been able to observe the goings-on in the street below. As the residents watched the world outside, the updraft created by the sun heating the dark wood of the
mashrabiya
would have drawn the heat out of the adjacent rooms, in turn sucking cooler air from the cellar to provide a gentle but refreshing draft for those indoors. It was a simple but effective system and one that worked with the environment rather than against it.