Beirut boys gone wild

Here are some pictures I took during last night’s festivities in downtown Beirut. In a bid to ‘rejuvenate’ the posh city center–after it had been occupied and thus economically suffocated for the last 17 months by the Hezbollah-led opposition– rich downtown landowners and other wealthy corporations (i.e. the other side) organized a series of free concerts to stimulate activity in the area.

Thousands attended and performers included top-selling artists such as Rami Ayache, Fadel Shaker and Nancy Ajram, arguably the Arab world’s biggest pop star.

What struck me though was the enormous amount of testosterone in the air. The male-female ratio was about 20:2 and those who attended were clearly not the crowd that was expected to spend money in downtown’s trendy cafes and restaurants.

Yet the lack of the opposite sex didn’t seem to be a problem for the young men who happily danced among themselves.

But revelry quickly gave way to rambunctiousness; pushing and shoving ensued, and the overall atmosphere verged on the aggressive.

They did not appear to be under any influences (alcohol or drugs), in fact many seemed religious: chants praising the Sayed Hassan Nassrallah often erupted spontaneously. They were not the “cool” ecstasy-taking wild of the privileged breed seen in the country’s most expensive night clubs and concert venues; they were simply zealous in their machoism, as if they had been freed from oppressing circumstances. When I look back at the scene, it almost reminds me of a prison yard.

I was amazed at the speed in which they rushed to pose for photos.

If I could command so much wild enthusiasm with my tiny digital camera, I wondered how easy their unbridled energy could be harnessed with other incentives. A lucrative population indeed, especially for those with desire, and the means, to rally bodies for political gain.