Who. Who live. On. The lebanese have seen the walls of their capital beirut for time and time again. But the catastrophic explosion of the 4th of august is described by many here as the biggest tragedy in the countrys history. Where. Wood is 18 years old too young to remember much of lebanons history but she sings this iconic song to be taught as if she has seen it all. Coming up in. Close to 3000. 00 tons of Ammonium Nitrate stored at the capital sports in an explosion that was heard cross the mediterranean. Around a 180. 00 people were killed thousands injured hundreds of thousands made homeless the repair bill will cost. Was. The government resigned but the consequences remain. Lebanese once again came out to pick up the pieces. Lebanon is described as the beginning of the orange and the beginning of the west its seen the flourishing of diverse civilizations. From the phoenicians to the romans and ever since. Its been at the crossroads of different faiths and beliefs conquered by the ultimate ends and the french. Enduring 15 years of civil war and conflicts with syria. And israel. Nobody knows what will come next but the lebanese capital has always been at the heart of this regions arts and culture a crutch in difficult times. Im Stephanie Decker in beirut the capitals Old Opera House still stands but broken no voices a feel that for decades since before the civil war and the ever changing journey of the lebanese nation has been written about in many history books and its been a rated painted and sung about by its artists and thinkers from tibet on. To fadal lose to sight on this edition talked to aljazeera will be joined by lebanons contemporary artists and intellectuals will be exploring how their work reflects what is happening here. Given aquino is a musician a pianist and composer and has recently produced a track to the american artist what. The proceeds will be going to charity to help rebuild and help its people off the catastrophic explosion of the 4th of august. The lyrics are really nice really deep and what weve talked about a lot like always the protest song the problem with the protest songs is that they always sound like both the songs whereas if you take like bob marley 80 percent of his songs were protest songs. They sounded like love songs. She said beard. To see the guy through the. Stage. See. Thats me to. The tune. Steady should. Be marched to the city. How long must you wait. How long. Even when the ball. Was on the rise. Thats of boy. You started i was ring you started thinking when you were 4 you know. Thats kind of now the good and bad things of being in love and i start at 4 because i was just for my brothers who are older than me and they used to play a trick i thought that 3 but i dont read they thought that i dont care that i couldnt play because my fingers were. Not look at the mouth they were quite right and. Then i got hooked to the piano because of really trivial and stupid things. At that time we had a lot of power shortages still though you still have. To say well still have them after like 40 years and the people of the need of christie so it was one of these stories that i had that didnt need batteries or restore something look i mean trivial youve got such a fragmented country yeah can you secure night. Yes of course music can unite course music can unite and music should unite the art in general should unite them not talking only about music the theatre should unite that is very important specially in and evolutions books might unite articles the newspapers. Most of them are that now we should revive them to tell me a little bit about how you use music i mean youve just produced this incredible song your composer europeanized where do you get your inspiration from and what is the message i mean is it about humanity as a political act how do you ive always been close to. Social. If you want things and and and ive always felt for having about the lebanon im totally in love with this country but i feel like im in love with a person that doesnt love me back i played a tune called i would love to play for a day called i want to be that many like i love you would know. And thats how out of nations ship is with lebanon. Its like when youre in love with about person and your parents tell you that this person is about your friends that this person is about weve all been there everything on you the relationship we have with this country is toxic but not because of the country its been run in a very bad way since the late sixtys weve lost our country since then. To love this country and were still has to believe that theres good in it if the right people drive to the right places and reforms oh damn. So when you talk about your music i mean where does it where does it come from how do you when you compose where does it come from daily life you know im always asked the question of how do you compose what do you do its the stupidest thing to do is to isolate yourself and to say that today im going to do music or to them to you have to live a normal life music and art comes from life itself so if you are not love you cannot make music if you do not love you cannot make use if you are not envied you cannot make music if you dont hate you can not make music comes from the passion it comes from everything and i always tell myself that every time im im im short on stories because at the end of day im telling the story in music or in song or whatever just go to the airport and at the airport at the welcoming rivals. You see the daughter coming back home after years. Coming back home to bury their grandfather or a mother or the. Kids waiting for their father to come because hes been working abroad and and. A woman. Who has a boyfriend or what i would like these are the stories that make me do music. The airports the concept of leaving returning. Artist. Exploring. This image that a lot of people post when they come from lebanon which is that you know im back to lebanon i think a picture of beirut from the from the plane and i think people think of it as all this very happy moment but its symptomatic of a very sad economic and political reality that we need to take. Grasp of and also the title of this series is. Perhaps the moon is beautiful because its far to try to describe kind of our paradoxical relationship with lebanon when youre there you want to be out when youre out you want to be there and its kind of a cycle that i felt many many times and then the 2nd one second part of the series is these the Chaos Associated with the migration that says we have this one we have the one next to you and these are like i think these are like. In lebanon has focused on you know the very obvious civil war like destruction and stuff but there is a much more. Psychological psychological and theres the language of the migration which is if you think about what our commonalities between there have been more from different sects and really. Their sects you dont have that many things except these things right the symptoms of. The system we live in this actually talk about how people are pushed out of their countries to become to some degree really so in terms of your inspiration i mean you didnt. Of the civil war is it a legacy that you do feel and you do have and does it affect your work when you say civil war like i think i think the general agreed is basically the Armed Conflict but if you think about what we what i lived i was born post ninetys ive never seen like civil war that most people talk about but the thing is the civil war was institutionalized to a large degree where the government became a vehicle for the same people that were fighting the war to take Public Office and basically run these kind of skirmishes or these battles with an institution stake instead of taking land physically in this and lebanon they were taking kind of positions throughout the government and draining the countrys resources are you trying to educate people raise awareness give hope give a message i mean how do you see your sort of journey as an artist has it changed i have a problem with i think personally with people who are indifferent to they say oh like for example i dont need to care about politics or the economy or the order we live in because like i just go about my own personal life completely separate separately but this is not true if you were where you choose to be located the oppression you feel at the airport and even even the most basic of utilitarian object which is the electric plug is defined by. Political economy politics the global or the other we live in then youre not indifferent youre just clueless about your what is what is designing your life so this is where the creations happen yeah the workspace. Going back to this theme of like people being indifferent and not being aware of how the politics and the kind of the global world impact their identity i think ive chosen the most irritating of objects that is really rich and its vestiges of all those dynamics of political economy and history that have happened and i think a lot of people travel really for you know superficial level they start collecting these outlets and sockets and converters and dont really match each other in these 2 out of frustration which is associated with being constantly in different places and i think the more you travel the more you need your assortment starts getting and it becomes something we kind of like your fingerprint but the more interesting thing is electric plugs themselves are very kind of political object that. The history of the world so for example japan uses the u. S. Standards because it was imposed on them postwar door to african countries. Most african countries have. Standard of European Countries that correspond to them for example in the gulf we have the post toward war 2 British Standards whereas india has the prewar door to British Standard and it does really really the story of korean isolation of economic powers it was like we were discussing that when you travel so much you need them you need to you need be a doctor to try to connect like we have to adapt and we keep travelling so much even the lexicon of these like its about power its about fitting and its like adapting its not converting all of those things its true right its also its a very nice symbolism to what you go through as you can change places no im never going to get up like going to adapt in the same way like it is its like a story like a diary exactly and i think this is kind of the point of like to some degree art is to change your perception about things and i think if these series this series changes your perception about the interpretation of what a blog means. So this is the entrance. To explain just a little bit. This is like the time when i was doing. These portraits. Are individuals. Presenting. The figures that typically see that. Politicians on the street i decided to put. Up with calligraphy so. Even though. Its actually composed of calligraphy which. Typically does not use figuration it uses. So this is iconic. I think this one was the 1st one. I think. It was there was a longing for being more represented in the public space being in the public space more like them and i think also there was a. Cord with people. Today. If i paint Something Like this it just. Might actually be. I think this kind of. To. Be able to like its kind of like a. Psychologist you try to understand. The different. People. Or the world. And then put them in a. In a way that makes people understand themselves i think this did it very well in the past i think mind your works the way for hopefully for what were going through today i think its about trying to on the becoming but understanding ourselves the understanding of self in our environment is something author and yes what he says is endemic to the process of writing and storytelling. Writing is a jordan is a very. Journey is adventure a journey is going out from yourself to others and giving yourself to 2 unexpected situations and in this. For me. This is how i understand the act of writing more or less you discover new things every time and every new experience you either discover. The parts of yourself which weve never knew existed before and this is of course the way to discover the others so in a sense you. People will see themselves in the mirror but the mirror never sees her said this is the treasure of heredity how much has what youve experienced. Affected how you like how you view things you write your condition right. Before you must be a that i wrote about many words i didnt invent the i didnt go to words words came to me i mean a living and instructional for since i was bored. We have been going through a catastrophe is this a least since 1948 since the on the Palestinian Network and and we are living there and this is our daily life youve spoken to a lot of people when it comes to research have you discovered anything about the human spirit about survival about dealing with catastrophe about dealing with the worst of times you know if issue if you read my books its all many of them you know for example the last book published. Which is a trilogy i published to 2 of the fit in 30 or children of the year 2 its about how how people. How the instinct of life. Was trying to adhere to a very come. Sort of peace and iteration. Because. The most important think thing in life is life itself there is nothing more important more precious than life and so human beings when they are faced with. A threat that the way that people are threatened in wars and catastrophe is. The instinct of life. Recreates that he invents them and gives them the ability to work to to live and to reinvent. This terrible. Explosion happened in beirut and. We went out of this place. Trying to find to go to the hospital and where you find hundreds of people. Running in the city so when you where with bleeding. And you feel that this is the end of the world but practically the next day you discovered. They were running. Not from life but they were running towards and they were running in order to defend in the aftermath of the explosion i want to get to the human psyche of how you see the situation now how would you write it what kind of characters would you put it you know you you use live in this is a very personal situation for you what has happened to barrett whats happened to lebanon for all of the lebanese how would you patrol the characters you know would there be energy or would there be something that is broken this long time since the beginning of the civil war of 975 who went through. Destruction and reconstruction and the destruction as if there is a cycle of destruction maybe this time this is the ultimate destruction the most. Savage the most brutal the biggest. Thing that happened in the city even you know in 92. 00 in august the 6th and i think to beirut was bombed for about 17 hours where this really be replaced during this really bitter. Nothing of all this cannot be compared to the explosions took place in the port this is what happened in the port was Something Like the ultimate more im not i dont want to compare of course hiroshima was a much more tragic. Situation but if you were to compare hiroshima with the end of world. Were not sure that this explosion is the end of fantasy. We have the feeling that this explosion is part of a process of continuous the seduction and in this sense people. How the how the people feel or i feel that i feel. That. This diary. There is something broken the sleeves. And because there is no perspective. Its not the end of anything its not the beginning of anything one of the of the major. Of the major signs of the city is that. Since the the 15th. Of just searching it has been near the city of culture and that of the many cultures when you thought the city of the arabic culture and it was a city of openness stewards of modernism 2 words change 2 words a new new style with a new approaches and this is that this makes this me somebody who. Does away when you look at the neighborhoods are destroyed you feel so sad for these now at this moment in a sense. After the war. These neighborhoods are now being able to move off are only going to be that of the. Cultural activities to be explicit there so my feeling that this explosion is an attempt to kill this pretty obvious. Never refer to that overthe belief is that the people in this now. For men. Are. More. Lebanese philosopher. Put on once wrote out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls the most massive characters are seared with scars. This is a city and a people that have been deeply would it. Serve. d learn of this song was sung by fighters during the civil war which destroyed much of the capital the words just as important today as they were that. Be taught from the depths of my heart i send you peace. The health of humanity is at stake a Global Pandemic requires a global response. W. H. O. Is the guardian of Global Health delivering lifesaving to lose supplies and training to help the worlds most Vulnerable People uniting across borders to speed up the development of test treatments and of that seed keeping you up to date with whats happening on the ground in the ward and in the lab now more than ever the world needs w. H. O. Making healthy a world for you. To everyone. Rewind return the optics of the best aljazeera is documentary. And its. The gift of sight. So sickly intervention is one of the few where you will see patients like this seize least 20 years younger than she was yesterday just within 24 hours on aljazeera. As a strictly a prepares for bushfire season survivors of the last summers catastrophic fires are still struggling what east follows one communitys road to recovery aljazeera. Understand the differences and similarities of cultures across the world a handy take it will bring you the news and Current Affairs that matter to you the. Ilo i Maryam Namazie in london our main story this hour has been a major escalation in the conflict between armenia and azerbaijan over the disputed region of no corny car back both sides have declared martial law and a blaming each other for sunday mornings flare up as a by john says a 5 members of one family were killed by armenian shelling going to car boxes 16 of its servicemen are also dead and then russia france and iran are among the nations