Loris

The last time Loris was seen strolling down the neighborhoods and alleyways of her native Pasteur street, Beirut was boiling with an unprecedented cultural and artistic Renaissance. 

It was the early 70s, and Loris, the unique daughter of a prominent textile merchant, was in the heart of it all: the gala dinners, the concert halls and the long Riviera tanning days. Soon after the city plunges into the buss of war, Loris sealed her yellow louvers, locked her front garden gate, and vanished without a trace. Years turned into decades; Loris's childhood friends and many young suitors became grandparents. Gazing at the lifeless garden of her old house, their wrinkled eyes light up as they remember her radiant smile, her perfect French accent, and, above all, her unmatched cooking skills.

Some say that she married a wealthy furniture trader and moved with him to Africa, others that she enrolled in a French sorority that shelters and cooks meals for the poor. It is therefore needless to describe their utter disbelief when, on a breezy winter day of 2015, they woke up to find her unclaimed ghost house bustling with life again: Fresh paint is drying on its walls and columns, tables and chairs have been laid out in the garden, and standing there, at the front door, as a radiant as ever, her smile barely tamed by the years, a whimsical Loris waves and calls at them: “Ahla W Sahla. Tfadallo!”