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UID:863@test.arabamerica.com
DTSTART;TZID=America/Detroit:20150429T193000
DTEND;TZID=America/Detroit:20150429T213000
DTSTAMP:20150402T233617Z
URL:https://test.arabamerica.com/events/diana-darke-on-my-house-in-damascu
 s/
SUMMARY:Diana Darke on "My House in Damascus"
DESCRIPTION:CALIFORNIA\n\nIn 2005\, British travel writer Diana Darke bough
 t an Ottoman-era courtyard house in the Old City of Damascus. One of the o
 nly foreigners to own property in the Roman-walled center of Syria's capit
 al\, Darke began to build a life for herself in a mixed Sunni-Shia quarter
  of the Old City\, in a house known as Bait Baroudi—the "House of the Gu
 npowder Seller." It was splendid but dilapidated\; a three-year restoratio
 n made the house look old again\, "as if the inhabitants of earlier centur
 ies had just left."\n\nThen\, of course\, everything changed. Civil war br
 oke the idyll of the Old City as violence raged outside its walls\; Jebel 
 Qassioun\, the mountain that overlooks Damascus and a popular picnic spot\
 , became the Assadregime's launching pad for artillery and chemical weapon
 s on rebel-held suburbs below. The narrative that resulted from Syria's br
 utal descent is Darke's powerful\, moving new book\, My House in Damascus\
 , a hybrid memoir and travel book that elegantly contrasts a real estate d
 ream with Syria's ongoing violent reality.\n\nMany more have suffered far 
 greater pains in Syria in recent years than Darke\, who spent the last 30 
 years working in the Middle East as a consultant\, fluent in Arabic\, befo
 re buying her house in Damascus. Yet her sensitive\, knowing story capture
 s a rare view of Syria and the stakes of the conflict from an up-close obs
 erver deeply versed in its culture.\n\nMore:\nhttp://www.levantinecenter.o
 rg/event/diana-darke-my-house-damascus\n\n
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://test.arabamerica.com/wp-content/uploads/
 2015/04/11096600_889845377720911_56376351207569876_n.jpg
CATEGORIES:Community,Lecture
LOCATION:Levantine Cultural Center\, 5998 W Pico Blvd\, LA\, CA\, United St
 ates
GEO:34.0520487;-118.3710309
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 4.0520487,-118.3710309
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DTSTART:20150308T030000
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