By Noemí Jabois
Syrian youths in a bar in a Christian neighborhood of Damascus on December 18. EFE/Noemí Jabois
Damascus, Dec 20 (EFE) – In the bars of the Christian neighborhoods of Damascus, waiters are once again serving drinks to the sound of English and Arabic pop music, amid the uncertainty created by the arrival of the Islamist groups that toppled the regime of Bashar al-Assad on Dec. 8.
As the international community calls for the rights of women and minorities to be upheld in Syria, the capital’s nightlife is recovering, with near-full tables on weekdays despite the uncertainty about the country’s future.
The Mad Monkey bar was closed for a whole week after the rebels, led by the Islamist Levant Liberation Organisation (HTS) alliance, arrived in the city.
“We were afraid of all the chaos there, people are afraid too, and they still are. People are not like before, they are slowly returning to their old lives, but it’s still a bit scary for them,” the bar’s owner Bissan Nseir, told EFE.
“We decided to open because no one told us to open or not to open. Nobody told us anything, so we tried our luck,” she said.
The groups that have been deployed across Damascus to start setting up the istrative system appear to be accepting the reopening of these establishments, some of which have received visits from the rebels, including the Mad Monkey.
“They came, asked us for the bar-restaurant license, and started asking some inappropriate questions, but we dealt with it, it’s fine. I don’t think it’s important because now it’s in the past and we’re trying to focus on the future,” said Nseir.
According to her, the strange situation in the country means that even the alcohol suppliers do not know when they will be back in business, although they have been told of their intention to continue.
Sitting at the bar of another pub nearby, Ahmad (not his real name) explained how the spot is his “safe space.”
In the absence of new regulations that clearly regulate lifestyles, regulars like Ahmad have decided to continue going to the same bars where they used to meet with friends before the Bashar al-Assad regime fell.
“So far it’s the same life we were living, I hope it stays that way,” he said.
Another customer, who also prefers anonymity, contrasted the low presence of HTS in Christian neighborhoods like this one with incidents in alcohol shops in some Muslim suburbs, where some have even been vandalized by the population.
“I think with their new pragmatic mentality, HTS thinks that if they don’t touch the Christian neighborhoods, let them do what they want, they still have the rest of the country (…) You don’t see that kind of tolerance in other areas, you can’t open a liquor shop in a Sunni area right now,” he added.
The man recalled that most bars in Damascus are located in one of the few Christian neighborhoods, even though most of their customers, like himself, belong to other religious communities.
“The reason these bars stay open is so that HTS can say that it is tolerant, that it is nice. But that’s not the reality,” he said. EFE
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