A House in Damascus - Before the Fall

by Brian Stoddart

  My favourite nut shop became the one directly across from the top of the nearest alley by which I could reach Straight Street from the house. I could be there in a couple of minutes: out the door and down the steps, left into Jabri lane, past the shops and the fruit stall, left at the sweet factory and up to Straight Street passing all the sweets shops, most of which I had visited by the time I left Damascus. Then it was across Straight Street, watching out for cars, which the legionnaires never had to do, and into the shop. I started going there because it was the closest place where I could buy drinking water, with half a dozen large bottles being my limit to carry back at once. Naturally, I began to notice more than water. It was a narrow fronted, glass windowed place stuffed full of nuts and sweets to the point where no more than about three or four customers at a time could squeeze into the narrow space in front of the counter. There was a small desk at the back where the owner did his books, and took phone calls while directing other family members to their tasks. Immediately behind that desk a set of stairs led to a mezzanine where even more goods spilled out, threatening to topple onto the floor and customers below.

  Typically, people would reach their arms in and around the front door to snare their desired goods while people in front took their time in choosing. There were those who knew what they wanted, and others did not. I was mostly in the latter group, because every time in there I spied something new. After the first couple of visits the owner started giving me additional samples, and next time in there I would usually select a couple of those samples. He would then line me up with yet another new sensation, knowing he would have a firm sale next time. It got to be a game: me trying to resist (failed) and him trying to see how many new things he might sell me (succeeded).

  There were other sellers, yes, but my main sweets and nuts agents, in the souk and up on Straight Street, were more than merchants, they became guides and I never tired of learning from them.

  Hubble Bubble

  ~

  On any walk along the laneway at the bottom of the steps, especially from later afternoon onwards, I frequently encountered a man walking up and down swinging a small, metal container trailing smoke vigorously in a circle from his shoulder. When the swinging stopped, it revealed a container of glowing hot coals that were then fanned to keep their intensity and heat while being taken inside one of the restaurants or a shop.

  This was one of the nargileh men who provide Damascenes with one of their most distinct pleasures, the water pipe or hubble bubble.

  Throughout the city, but especially in the souks, a profusion of shops sold nothing but nargileh and all the necessary accoutrements, including the coals scuttle. Rows and rows of the metal pipes were lined up in all shapes, sizes and colours. Then there were the smoking attachments themselves, and the mouthpiece reeds that go in the end of the flexible hoses. And, of course, there was the tobacco.

  The principle is simple enough. The tobacco is placed in a small concave container at the top of the pipe. That tobacco is mostly fruit flavoured, so gives off a distinctive smell wherever it is used. The nargileh man then places a piece of foil over the top of the tobacco, pierces that foil then tops it with some of the prepared coals. That creates heat inside the concavity and smoke comes off the tobacco. Meanwhile, a mouthpiece has been attached to the smoking tube attached to the bottom of the pipe, near the base on which it sits upright. The smoker draws a breath through the tube, the smoke travels down through the pipe and through water, creating the sound that gives the pipe its popular name, the hubble bubble.

  These modern pipes are all brass and other metals with flexible pipes. In 1822, Robert Richardson reported on the earlier Damascene models. At that point, according to him, there were no long pipes, so he thought the shape unwieldy to the point of being "hideous". It had a head like a hookah, but there was a long cane stuck in the side of the body whose stalk was so short it could not be placed on the ground. He was not attracted to it or its product, the smell of tobacco drawn through "dirty water" being "terrible", in his view. It was taken only because of fashion, he opined, "poison and stupefaction" coming from "the end of a stick" hardly being a useful social habit.34 Well over a century later Bob Newhart, the American comic, created a sketch (available on YouTube) in which a functionary at the court of Queen Elizabeth I takes a phone call from Sir Walter Raleigh, promoting new products from America. Raleigh is unheard, but is clearly explaining the attraction of this new substance he had discovered, tobacco. The courtier says, "so you take these leaves, stick them in your mouth, and set fire to them? It will never catch on, Walt."

  It had taken in the Levant because the pipe was a social glue, as it remains. Couples might share one. Groups of people will have one each. Young women are now particularly prominent smokers, and may be found practising in all the smart café/restaurants late in the afternoon. The traditional, men-only coffee houses produce a cloud of smoke whenever they are open. Pipes are on hand in the hammam for a post-bath smoke to go with the tea or coffee. Shopkeepers will be outside in their chairs, paper and or coffee in hand, and the hubble bubble alight. It is common to see people walking through the souk, new nargileh or replacement part in hand. Hubble bubbles are always on the move, the nargileh men taking a fix to a customer somewhere.

  All over Damascus the sight, sound and smell of the nargileh was ever present. A few lanes away from the house, one small juice shop had an independent contractor in attendance. Every day, his small van would draw up to the shop, and the back door opened to reveal racks of pipes and all the rest. Outside the door, even in winter, he would fan and protect the coals for his customers inside. Every so often he would check on his customers, replacing those coals burned to ash. A good nargileh man will keep a pipe going for an hour or so.

  Smoking is ever present in Syria, as throughout the Arab and Asian worlds, a constant shock to Westerners now reconciled to smoke free environments, and to social outcast status for any wretch who continues to smoke. Even though government buildings are allegedly smoke-free throughout Syria, some senior official or other will always light up a cigarette. The Vice-President at one of the universities always lit a cigarette when we arrived, an impish grin daring us to say anything. He was in Homs, so would have had little to grin about not that much later. Young people of both sexes smoked freely and furiously, their elders, too, if they could still breathe. Smoking in restaurants was permitted, but non-smoking sections were available, especially in the places used to greeting Westerners. In smaller and less compromising places, the non-smoker is at the mercy of the horde.

  While most cigarette smokers took the hubble bubble almost automatically, non-cigarette smokers would also frequently take it, too, not so much because of the smoke but of the ritual. The time it takes to smoke a pipe suggests it was almost made as a form of ritual interaction. Once the pipe starts, people stay until it finishes, and that provides a lot of talking and friendship time. It is common to see different individuals within a group take the pipe at different times so that the total time involved goes well beyond an hour, ensuring that everyone joins the conversation.

  Watching the veterans confirms this view of it being a ritual. There is a studied steadiness and rhythm to their smoking. The coffee, sometimes a pastry is at hand. Talk, smoke and listen. Talk, smoke and listen. It creates a conversation pattern, perhaps a more elaborate version of the "peace pipe" smoking always observed in the old cowboy movies.

  But it is clearly a health risk, some critics reckoning that one pipe produces the same amount of tar as a packet of cigarettes. The choice of tobacco was always an important matter, though. Karl Baedeker reported that the Lebanese variety was prized around the turn of the twentieth century, but because of the Ottoman rule it was banned in favour of the Persian strain which was excellent for the nargileh. Even so, he added, smuggled-in Lebanese was readily available.35 Tobacco was an important commodity then as now, not just for the smoking but also for the occasion. It was for that reason a 2008-9 proposed "smok
ing in restaurants" ban in neighbouring Jordan raised such a controversy—it was not about the tobacco, but about the nargileh.

  Backgammon and Cards

  ~

  On any given evening, a quick walk into the Old City confirms the continued existence of another great social ritual. It is most noticeable in Straight Street. Shopkeepers along there, even those fully reliant on the tourist trade, very rarely press their goods. They prefer to let the potential client look around, and will turn the lights on and off to enable a better view, but there is no hard sell. It is tempting to think they have a more urgent mission, and in many ways they do. On those evenings the shopkeepers, their neighbours, colleagues, friends and even passersby will be engrossed in what is theoretically leisure, but in reality is almost their main preoccupation.

  For some this will be playing cards. All along the street, small tables are set up. Grander affairs will have folding or even the highly ornate and stylish Damascene chairs brought out from the sale stock, but others get by with upturned milk crates or fruit boxes. The tables all have coffee or tea cups strewn about, often a little gas burner nearby keeping up the supply of caffeine. Ashtrays abound and cigarette smoke is palpable, and many players bring out their nargileh. This is games season on the high street, and it is serious business even though the banter is incessant. The play is intense, along with the concentration. Hovering experts pass knowing looks and even comment on the play. Winning players flourish their cards, perhaps slamming them to the table to emphasise victory. Comments and counter-comments fly. Scores are kept or argued. Having started early in the evening, the games stretch into the night with either shop lights or oil lamps allowing continuance. Depending on the state of the game, any customer may or may not get served.

  Card playing has a long history around the world and the Levant, Syria in particular, is no exception. Almost all visitors throughout the ages commented on the presence of cards in the coffee houses and restaurants, along with the accompanying tobacco. As with so many other aspects of life, though, the long Ottoman reign produced change. Many of the older forms of card games became more codified, and different forms of games appeared. By the early nineteenth century, for example, tarneeb, a form of bridge, had appeared, remaining popular but not exclusive in Syria and in the Old City. The commercial opportunities in all this were soon realised and, even now, the Khabbaz Industrial Company in Aleppo describes itself as the Middle East's leading supplier of playing cards, with several different varieties on offer. Another trader carries a pack bearing the ubiquitous "I [heart] Syria" message, yet a further reminder that for a country allegedly isolated from the world, Syria carries a lot of outside trappings. Interestingly, Khabbaz stresses that one of its strong points is its attention to European detail in the cards, an indication of just how long, how pervasive and how continually surprising the forms of that cultural interchange have been and remain.

  Over in Souk Sarouja, there was a small alleyway between the main arms of the Saturday flea market. It hosted, among other things, an exotic junk/antiques shop that features old oil lamps from the 30s, battered ouds (the Arabian guitar-like instrument), branded ashtrays, Russian books from the 60s, some interesting pictures and old bicycles. Elsewhere, the lane contained audio cassette and DVD shops, some clothes shops, and several coffee shops where those not interested in the market could while away a couple of hours. Outside one of these, in the middle of the lane, the same four old men seemed to sit everyday with their coffee or tea, cigarettes or nargileh, and their cards. They were certainly there every Saturday, each of the four with his own playing style: one sat back relaxed and open; another closed up and literally with his cards to his chest; the third cautiously laying his cards flat on the table, then raising a corner to check if he really had the cards he thought he had; the fourth a variation on all the others depending on how his game progressed. They sat literally in the middle of the alleyway, pedestrians laden with goods and bags streaming around them while they obliviously got on with their game.

  Cards continue to be significant, not only as a playing form but also as a representational one. During 2011, Paris became a centre for the myriad forms of oppositional alternatives that sprang up in the latest version of the "Syrian Spring". There were the usual reports of meetings, coffee and tea. One intriguing story, though, announced the arrival of Syrian "revolution" playing cards. The Kings and Queens had their heads removed and blood trickled down their necks. The only form still with a head was the Joker. In true Syrian style, the meaning was open to interpretation, but there was no coincidence about the use of the cards as a vehicle for the message. There was military intent in Iraq when the Americans issued their troops with playing cards bearing the pictured faces of those most wanted within Saddam Hussein's entourage. Here, the Syrian version was about passing a coded message, and using one of the oldest forms of Syrian pastime.

  The greatest Syrian participant sport, however, has to be backgammon. There were versions of the game found in the Levant, where it emerged, as early as pre-Christian times. In one of those curious paradoxes it then found its way to Europe, by way of the Arab arrival in Spain, where it took on more developed forms and became known as tabula (meaning, literally, "board"). Ironically, the Crusaders took that form back with them to the Levant, so the circle had closed. This was rather like the British discovering a horseback game with stick and ball (a skull in the purest form) in the Himalayas, taking it back to England, renaming it polo, then returning it to India for the princes to adopt as an elite sport. Over time, the Levantines again modified the European rules of backgammon, partly as a form of rejecting the Frankish overlord, but retained the Arabic form of the name, taawli, which it still largely remains today.

  Backgammon has a deeper, even superstitious aspect embedded in the representation of the board. In total it has twenty four points, taken to represent the number of hours in the day. Each side of the board has twelve points: the months in the Zodiac. The thirty counters match the days in the month, the two dice represent day and night. The number seven is the most frequent score set up by the dice: the days in the week. Given this direct connection to daily life, it is scarcely surprising that backgammon is found everywhere: homes, offices, cafes, shops, restaurants. Every night at Brokar, clients would arrive either clutching their own boards or asking for a house set. One gang had a regular meeting three times a week and sat at a particular table, their noise and merriment filling the place for hours, the sounds of the counters indicating precisely why the French called the game tric-trac.

  The Ottomans were again instrumental in the growth of the game, and its commercialisation—well, to be precise, in the commercialisation of its equipment. In the Khalili Islamic collection based in England there is a beautiful board dating from the turn of the nineteenth century, painted on wood then varnished over, the artist thought to be the court painter, Muhammad Hasan. It has three interconnecting boards that, when unhooked, create a box in which the counters and dice were kept. It is beautifully coloured and designed, the Ottoman influence evident in the presence of two apparently European couples and a Persian couple. This was part of a new artistic expression of the backgammon board, and Damascus was to the fore in that production. Over time, the design thinking was reversed: instead of the board being transformed into a box, an opening-out box was created to contain the board inside and be able to carry counters and dice. This box became a renowned Damascene product, and especially in marquetry form.

  My favourite Damascene marquetry shop remained the very first one I went into, a tiny place in Lazaristes Street (alley, really, if a wide one) in the Christian Quarter, where much of the amazing wood ware comes from. On that first visit I met the brothers who now run the place, having taken over from their fathers and grandfathers. The really chatty brother habitually wore a singlet rather than shirt, had a pot belly, a balding head, Marty Feldman-like eyes and the loveliest smile and sense of humour, neither of which ever left him. The Damascene box boys sh
owed me not only the showroom but also the workshop where the dust of ages lay amidst the huge range of works in progress. Unlike some of the more traditionalist makers, they had a bandsaw and other modern equipment to speed things up.

  Their work was stunning. At the top of the range were the marvellously intricate games tables that disassembled down to a small flat pack ("Excellent for travel, sir!"), but when assembled had tables for cards, chess, checkers, and backgammon. That design was startling enough, but was outdone by the craft work in the pieces. Damascus has long been known for the beauty and brilliance of its wooden furniture and right down to smaller items like boxes, coasters, pen boxes and, of course, backgammon boards. All of these items piled up in the shop, the few visitors who could cram in to the showroom at once being surrounded by a dazzling array of options. The quality and variation of colour in the woods glued together then shaped to make these items was impressive, but what makes the work really distinctive is the mother-of-pearl inlay. That practice began in the early Ottoman period. By the nineteenth century, Damascus was the acknowledged centre of excellence for the work, though the mother-of-pearl itself is these days more likely to come from Taiwan rather than Deir ez- Zor as it did back then.

  One afternoon we sneaked into the tiny showroom on yet another visit, skirting the massive German horde crammed into what was the not-much-larger factory area. We selected a box for a gift and Marty Feldman began to wrap it up, just as tour group members drifted in to check what was available of the things they had just seen being made.

  "How much?" I asked.

  He looked up, this short, ageing and balding man with the mirth-lined face, and whispered,

  "For you, 600."