Fairy Tale

Fairy Tale Night: The concert of the legendary Fayrouz.


Beil, 7th October 2010:

I had lunch in Café Blanc ABC Achrafieh, where they serve tasty oriental Lebanese food, I had my lunch accompanied with Ziad Haddara and a lovely Egyptian friend. We finish our food around 6:30 PM watering our mouths by sipping the unique white coffee (Hot water and natural Rose flower water mixed). Ziad drive me back to the hotel at 6:55 PM, where I rush into the Hotel lobby asking for my concert ticket that wafaa (my travel agent) delivered in the morning. I checked the ticket and make sure of the date and price, then the fly to my room. Placing the suit and the shirt on the bed, the cuff links and watch on the dressing mirror aside to the perfume bottle, and the shiny black shoes with the socks on floor near to the bed. I took a hot fast shower, I fit myself in the garments in 15 minutes and I went down to the lobby asking for a taxi to drive me to the BIEL (Beirut International Exhibition & Leisure) where the concert held.

The taxi driver was driving as crazy as Egyptians’ microbus driver, yet his welcoming chat when he knew I’m Egyptian was enough to overcome the bad driving. There was Traffic in our way to the concert, the Corniche of Beirut was very crowded, that I had to leave the taxi 1.5 km away from the BIEL. After few minutes of walking I noticed the crowd source is coming from the BIEL side, I was not the only one wearing the formal soiree and heading towards the concert hall “The BIEL”. Soiree robes, unique hair dressings, purses matching colors with high heels, perfumes, and suits were the dress code 1 km far from the BIEL. The crowd make many of the attendees walk on the Corniche and in the street leading to the BIEL. Club cars were driving the VIPs and aged audience from the parking area to the Concert Hall entrance. Those club cars had a lighten poster on their sides and on their back sometimes for Fayrouz new alum “Eih Fe Amal” or “Yes, hope exists”. The club cars with Fayrouz profile gave the sense of privacy for the attendees.

I reached the BIEL’s entrance gate with its white marble floor and the high crystal glass doors., where security asked for mobiles and Cameras as not allowed to have inside the concert hall. I was lucky to have this caution priory (I left them in my hotel room). I over passed the mobile and cameras handling queue, and I went inside the high ceiling wide reception area walking on dark red carpet to find big white booth on the right side selling The Leagenadry Fayrouz new Album. I went toward the guys in the booth to buy the album, he told me that costs around 26,000 LL, I asked him how much will cost in dollar, he was busy to answer me or might find it silly to answer, yet I found the guy next to me handing me a copy from the Album, I thanked him for and get back to the booth guy with the same enquiry, which he finally answered me 13 USD, before even getting the money from my pocket, I hear the guy next to me telling the guy it is covered and he paid for it. Looking back to the guy next to me, I found him looks like the mad fans and I asked him to pay for it he answered with a loud voice while was walking about “It is a gift, it’s an inspiration for Fayrouz” I got freeze, speechless, and with a smile growing widely on my face announcing appreciation, happiness and inspiration. I hold the Disc and went towards the stairs that has the dark red carpets as well as the reception.

The moment the stairs ended, I saw the Concert Hall. Was as wide as one kilo meter long, with a well noticed and smooth sloop down towards the stage. That was around 2 meters height covered by dark black carpet, the stage took almost all the front side like a big theatre one, with a long red carpet stripe starts back stage and ends in the mid-center of the stage with a microphone hanged on the its end. The musicians chairs and the choras steps were equally placed on the stage divided by the red carpet stripe. The ceiling was very high and all covered by black cloth in Sindbadian way as well as the walls. The whole Concert Hall was in black and the audience white seated seats. I took me few moments to realize that my dream is coming true and that I’m attending a live concert for Fayrouz. Most of the audience were talking to each other in low voice giving the concert hall a nice acceptable live gossip spirit. My seat was next to a young couple who works with the Rabbani’s sons, one is a fashion designer and his young wife is a vocalist who visit Cairo early in 2006 and admired her experience in Cairo Opera House. We talked about the latest Court order of preventing Fayrouz from singing her old songs, they were not accepting the Court decision nor the escalation of the conflict to the court from the first place. I was glad for having them aside as their ideas mached mine. But few minutes later, I discovered that my over whelming with the atmosphere drove me to the wrong seat. I had to go back few lines. Finaly my right seat, the worng one was better, yet I still can see the stage, and the musicians clearly. Few minutes later the musicians and the chorus walked on to the stage, we all clapped and they started to rhythm and sing few songs from the old songs of Fayrouz. Then the moment came.

The Hall’s light dimmed a lot, only the stage has few light on the musicians and the chorus, and full light on the red carpet that cuts the back ground ending in the middle of the stage. Few moments of silence, then a piece from a white dress came out behind the stage curtains cutting the silence with a loud clapping all over the hall, in less than second the whole white dress followed by around 2 meters white tail was on the stage having the 75 years old live legend of inside walking with confidence and pride toward us, saluting deeply happy inside but without showing as her usual action. It was a unique moment for me, the audience and Fayrouz, all of us love her and she loves us back, our clapping, name calling and whistling came deeply from our hearts and reach hers immediately. We kept clapping for almost 5 minutes, our clap even stopped the musicians from playing. After whole 5 minutes of clapping the Orchestra started to play and with the first few words of singing we all started to clap again. The Legendary Fayrouz kept singing forcing us to stop clapping and to start to enjoy her warm voice.

I can’t remember most of the songs she sang that night, they were from the new album, only two or three songs from her oldies. There was a magical force sourced through her voice, the music, and the legendary atmosphere slaving me.

Expectations

When you are down, tired from expectations, and you cannot stop yourself. When you do good things to people you love even before they ask, when you do an effort knowing their taste but they don’t do the same. While you expect they do, but the fact is that they either don’t fell you or don’t care or might even don’t bother to go out of their way to know. Moreover, they accuse you of being over expecting person and that you don’t differentiate things. They push you to reach the fact that you are the one who is mixing cards and you start to believe them. Until you hear a sound comes from the back to interrupt the flow by inquiring “Since when did we differentiate? Or is it the words that people use when they want to escape from facing things?” It is hard to prove people wrong, but it is easy to see them crystal clear in hard times. At this time, you have nothing to do but let your tears down and erase them from your life. Everyone wish others can see the world from his/her eyes, being selfish enough by criticizing others showing how stupid they are. Few are those who reaches the peace of acceptance and understanding.