[ad_1]
Inas Sherry wrote in Asharq Al-Awsat:
Passersby in Mar Mikhael – Gemmayzeh, which was damaged as a result of the explosion in the port of Beirut, cannot help but notice her determination to try to come back to life. For a large number of Lebanese, it opened its doors to customers even before maintenance work was completed.
It is true that the number of restaurants and cafes that have returned to work in this restless street is not great, but it appears clear among the workshops, receiving customers and giving hope, although “there are”. As Raymond, a cafe employee, says, adding in an interview with Al-Sharq al-Awsat: “I don’t know if the street will go back to its previous state, but I remember how the owners of cafes, restaurants and shops here took turns from the first night after the explosion to protect what remains of your property. Fearing theft … most of us repair what we could at our expense, waiting for government compensation to complete the rest. We don’t want the street to die. His death means the death of our source of sustenance. “
Some stores were back in operation even a week before the explosion, like the restaurant and cafe owned by Saeed Al-Mulla in the center of Gemmayzeh, which opened its doors to customers 5 days after the explosion … ” There was still no outside door or entrance, I decided to quickly return to work. . The store was full and I didn’t know where these people came from. Al-Mulla said in an interview with “Al-Sharq al-Awsat”, adding that he had the strange feeling that he wanted to go back to work, but knew that something had changed, for example, he could not even put music in the store during a whole month after the explosion.
Saeed does not deny that work in tourist establishments, especially restaurants and cafes, was not in the best condition. Since the beginning of the year, this sector has been experiencing successive setbacks that reached their peak after the spread of the Crown epidemic, and then came the explosion, and “the mud got worse.” Like he said, but he used to go on and get out of crises.
The reopening of the store is not related only to the economic aspect. For Saeed, the theme is “the need to be on a street where he used to work” and his refusal to see the street, which before was only full of life, a dead street in distress, thus contributing to his bring life back, not just through reopening. The store; But also by providing their kitchen for free to prepare the food that an association distributes daily to the volunteers or the afflicted.
Not far from Saeed’s store, another coffee shop opened about two weeks ago. Some customers sit at their tables that can barely be seen from the outside due to the iron pillars that support the building badly damaged by the blast.
The cafe scene that opens its doors while reinforced with iron and has not finished maintenance work is no exception. During the walk through the main street that used to be crowded before the explosion due to the number of bathrooms, restaurants and cafes that are in it, you can see a restaurant or cafeteria that receives customers without windows or doors, and another is satisfied with a number. Of the chairs that were not damaged or that could be temporarily insured until compensation arrives.
Nabil, the owner of the small cafe, cannot repair all the damage, since he is awaiting compensation that, apparently, no one of the owners of the tourist establishments has received so far in this area; Everyone we met repeats the same story about dozens of associations and organizations that came to relieve the damage, but none of them paid compensation again. Nabil doesn’t see reopening his store as a decision, as he doesn’t have much choice but to keep working, noting that the cafeteria and other stores in the area have started to witness a move that may predict an imminent return to life.
According to a field survey conducted by the Ministry of Tourism of establishments affected by the explosion in various areas of Beirut, it is shown that the percentage of damaged establishments providing food and beverages reached 67%, the percentage of accommodation institutions affected It is 17% of the total, and the percentage of tourist agencies affected is 16%. The percentage of institutions that suffered minor damage was 33%, the percentage of institutions that suffered moderate damage was 37%, and the percentage of institutions that suffered significant damage was 25%. The Achrafieh region had the highest number of affected institutions (of all grades). The Al-Medawar region also recorded the highest percentage of “major damage”, followed by Rmeil, then Saifi and then Mar Mikhael.
Most of the cafes or restaurants that returned to operation were those that did not damage them to the point of demolishing the building or part of it, as happened with one of the most famous restaurants in the Gemmayzeh area, the restaurant “Umm Nazih” , whose owner William McLennhan does not know if it will reopen or not.
“I want to give life to the restaurant, but if the political and country situation improves, I will continue the matter, but I do not know at the moment if I can take this step. I don’t want to come to the same conclusion again, ”says William, adding in an interview with Asharq Al-Awsat:“ Even if the situation improves, I cannot reopen it alone. I am trying to find funding, the damage is too great. There is an entire building destroyed and another cracked. “
As for Mac, the American who came and invested in Lebanon, he feels no regrets, and says that if the days had returned, he would have returned and invested in the same place, but confirms that when the project opened in 2010 he was young and he did not know “the depth of the corruption in Lebanon and how it could affect it.” In the lives of people in this degree.
[ad_2]
