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Since it ended 32 years ago, the weight of the memory of the Lebanese civil war still lingers on everyone’s mind, even on those of us who did not live it.
Maabar, a 12-part podcast series, has recently been launched. "Through this project, the aim is to expand the conversation around the civil war, in a way that was not properly addressed since it ended 32 years ago," says Anthony Tawil, co-creator and producer of Maabar, the podcast.
Cutting across two genres - Oral History and Documentary - the podcast dives into the layers of what was experienced, remembered and what therefore still exists.
Following no particular chronology, the podcast traces themes and shared experiences, removing time and space, giving room to the opening of a different conversation about the war.
Indeed, the producers embarked on a journey, interviewing more than 50 people across the country over the course of two years and asked them to share their stories of the Civil War. What did they remember about the war? What happened to them? What did they go through? What did they live for? What did they lose? And how do they make sense of it today?
Stories and anecdotes are combined into episodes, each focusing on a different theme in order to paint a different narrative of the war as remembered and told by the people.
Instead of a two dimensional image, or a timeline of events, the past becomes a textured canvas allowing the listeners to deeply understand the warp and weft of the different perspectives woven together.
“Listening to all these stories took us beyond the individual experience, and tapped us into the memory of a country,” explain the producers.
Maabar is created and produced by Anthony Tawil and Cédric Kayem.
Anthony is a creative director and partner at Operation Unicorn, a boutique creative agency behind many of the most viral and effective communication campaigns of the past 10 years in Lebanon. Breaking away from advertising in 2020, Anthony and Operation Unicorn have shifted focus towards original content in various mediums and formats, merging with prominent distributors Front Row Filmed Entertainment to act as their writers room and creative partners with several podcasts and TV series among the work in progress.
Cedric is a music composer and sound editor who has been working in Lebanon and abroad for the past 10 years. He pursued a degree in audio-visual at Saint Joseph University, then specialized in sound at the SAE institute. As a production sound mixer, sound editor and music composer, he has worked on a number of shorts, features and documentaries, many of which were recognized and awarded in local and international festivals.
A Production in partnership with forumZFD and funded by The German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development.
