_A Broken House_ — Re-creating the Syria of His Memories, Through Miniatures _ The New Yorker - video Dailymotion

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00:00This is where I source all my found objects, my dried plants, my miniature furniture, Christmas

00:16ornaments, shells, paints, nails, stones. This knob here is a radio switch, but what I see in it is an

00:27exploded engine. This is my stash of miniature toys. Sometimes the furniture I find is already broken

00:36and the shop owner says, well, I can't tell you that it's broken. What are you going to do with it?

00:43This is from my previous marriage, wedding cake. That's what's left of the marriage.

00:57Before the Syrian war, my art was very therapeutic, was very cathartic.

01:17I was just making, making, making.

01:20I wanted to build the Damascus of my memories.

01:25A lot of generations came here. A lot of paint happened on these walls.

01:35So this is exactly what I'm going to do. Paint, scrape, paint, scrape.

01:43Before you know it, the architecture was telling the story of the human that lived within.

01:48And that would bring me home.

01:53And that would bring me home.

02:01Mommy!

02:02Hi, my mom! Hello!

02:04Bobby!

02:04Hi, my boy!

02:05Hi, my mom!

02:06Hi, my mom!

02:07I'm sorry, my mom!

02:07Hi, my mom!

02:08Hi, my mom!

02:09Hi, my mom!

02:10Hi, my mom!

02:11Hi, my mom!

02:12What's your name?

02:13I don't know what you're wearing.

02:14You're wearing a mask.

02:15I'm wearing a mask.

02:16What's your name?

02:17I'm wearing a mask.

02:18I'm wearing a mask.

02:18Yes!

02:19Yes!

02:20Yes!

02:21What are your stories?

02:22What are your stories?

02:23What are your stories?

02:23How are your days?

02:24What's your days?

02:25I'm seeing them in five seconds.

02:27Yes!

02:28Yes!

02:29Yes!

02:30Yes!

02:31It's a mess.

02:32Yes!

02:33Yes!

02:34I always wanted to come to the United States to study architecture here.

02:57After 9-11 happened, there was a travel ban in place that wasn't called a travel ban.

03:09My visa was stamped as single entry only.

03:12And I realized that I was stuck here.

03:17I was extremely homesick.

03:20I was given up being with my parents, being with my older brother, my sisters.

03:31I missed my sister's wedding and the birth of her children.

03:35I was very close to my grandmother and I couldn't go to her funeral.

03:41It felt horrible.

03:43I would say to my parents, okay, this is it. I'm coming home.

03:46I'd say, no, don't do this. Don't jeopardize your career.

03:54It was one of those nights, it might have been Thanksgiving break.

04:00Nothing's open. Where is everybody?

04:03They're at home.

04:06They're with their families.

04:10And I was in this open architecture studio space.

04:14And I was the only person in there.

04:17I remember I was so frustrated.

04:19And I had a photograph of an old Demacian facade that was on a candy wrapper.

04:26And I think a little bulb turned on in my head.

04:31And I told me, well, stop whining.

04:35If you can't get home, why don't you make home?

04:43And I would collect all the wood scraps that my peers would throw away on the floor.

04:48The plastics, the styrene.

04:50That's when it really kind of clicked, like, okay, this is me.

05:04This is where I'm from.

05:06It's hard to pin down when exactly the war started.

05:33My parents hesitated to leave home.

05:39It's not until the clashes broke off 100 meters away and shook our whole house.

05:48They realized, okay, the conflict is now on our doorstep.

05:53And we need to leave.

05:55They came and lived in my small apartment.

06:04I was a very young designer, pitching 200, 300, 400 million dollar buildings.

06:14I had to keep a straight face at work and still perform.

06:17But I was very troubled.

06:22Extremely troubled.

06:26I had a monitor literally on news channels 10 hours a day.

06:36I'm working and I'm seeing the Arab world blow up.

06:41I lost my appetite.

06:50I didn't do any art for maybe two years straight.

06:56And I've internalized it, internalized it.

07:00And I'm boiling.

07:03I took to my models like an explosion.

07:16If something did not look right, I took a hammer to it and I broke it.

07:20And I snapped it and I would throw ash at it and burn it.

07:24People were so sick of seeing blood and bodies as a way to build empathy.

07:41And I get that.

07:42I was sick too.

07:43I mean, how many dead bodies can we see?

07:46You just go like, oh my gosh, not another Syrian kid washing off the shores.

07:50Swipe away to the next story.

07:54There was this fire inside me to start humanizing refugees.

08:02And to tell their stories.

08:24you just go with the land.

08:25You just went and start with it differently.

08:26You just like what?

08:27Because I got 2 kids on the ground after 123.

08:28After...

08:29You just go with that.

08:30Yes.

08:31I came here with the Renat

08:44and killed their children.

08:46Though I retire, they're gonna pris 9 days later.

08:49My family also left their house in Damascus.

08:54Where did they come from?

08:56God, it came from today.

08:58It's nice to meet you.

09:00What's going on with me?

09:02You're sitting here a lot.

09:05Yes, of course.

09:07There's a glass table, a glass table, and a glass table.

09:11Where did you go?

09:13I went to the 10th.

09:15I went to the 3rd.

09:19I was interviewing a refugee one time.

09:26And the man started crying.

09:30And he said, I'm very grateful for their help.

09:34But the night we arrived here,

09:37the lady welcoming us was teaching me

09:40how to turn a light switch on.

09:43Could you please translate to her

09:46that I had a very beautiful house in Syria

09:51with a lot of appliances and a lot of things in it.

09:56And I really know how to switch a light on.

09:59We come from established lives.

10:06We had a life.

10:09You can't explain millions of people with one step,

10:14refugee, full stop.

10:16full stop.

10:25Heriath is a Welsh word

10:27without a direct translation into English.

10:31It describes a state of extreme homesickness

10:35to a homeland that is no longer existent

10:41or has never, ever existed.

10:48I have certainly fallen in love

10:51with the idea of Damascus in Syria.

10:54I only had a moment there.

11:03When I opened my eyes,

11:05I was swept away.

11:07When I opened them up,

11:09I would see you on your side.

11:10This antennas was working

11:21Holescent's region of the oldest family.

11:22To the latest family

11:24I've found you all like the second family.

11:25That wasn't too old.

11:26It doesn't make sense.

11:28I told you to run myini in the third family shape.

11:30Had to walk away just by theести,

11:32this belle 경 resume may fail.

11:33It's a different village.

11:34Why don't I work?

11:35What are you eating,

11:36I'm going to come in, shall we?

11:39I'll do it soon.

11:41I'll do it.

11:43We'll have a little bit.

11:54The Syrian war resulted in a lot of marriages failing.

12:01My mom moved back to Damascus because she became extremely homesick.

12:10She was saying in Arabic,

12:14whatever happens to everybody will happen to me as well.

12:19I can't go to Syria because I will get drafted to the military.

12:24Going and seeing my mom in Lebanon is the closest I can be to home.

12:30My nice lemon, growing and growing.

12:49I love my lemons.

13:00The news was not showing what we were losing culturally.

13:07Undoubtedly, the most expensive price being paid in conflicts is the human life.

13:14No question.

13:15But also there's something to weep over when you see a thousand-year-old minaret being bombed out of existence.

13:24You wipe a nation's history.

13:39You wipe their architecture.

13:42Two generations later, it's as though they've never existed.

13:49What does a civilization leave behind when they live there for thousands of years?

14:04How many layers do they leave of paint and stories?

14:16I was painting a picture so that people can fully understand the magnitude of destruction.

14:41human life will have their minds and understanding the fact that people can really learn how they do more.

14:43I was painting a picture in a rest of the day.

14:44In a phase of 20 years,

14:46you're completelyaways on a plane.

14:48When we're learning how we can,

14:50In a day of 20 years,

14:51you're coming.

14:52When we're learning how we can,

14:53For these chants and teenagers,

14:54you're coming out of the day and about the day and about the day,

14:55we're coming out of the opportunity,

14:56all we've met at the time,

14:57for a split second,

15:00you're getting transported to a different place.

15:02transported to a different place.

15:32And you're ready for your job, but I don't have...

15:38You're the one who hit me and I'll go to New York.

15:41Come on, if we're in America.

15:44I'll see you in New York.

15:46Thank you, New York.

15:58Come on, Anna.

16:01I'm gonna separate it.

16:03Okay, okay, okay, okay.

16:06Come on, you're coming.

16:07You have to be a member of the city.

16:09You're a member of the city.

16:11I'm a family and my mother.

16:13Are you a member of the city?

16:16Yes.

16:18Are you a member of the state?

16:20I'm a member of the state.

16:23Are you a member?

16:25You're a member of the city, and you're a member of the state party.

16:29What do we do?

16:31OK...

16:33OK...

16:34It's not like you.

16:38You're a citizen.

16:40Do you know?

16:41I'm in Chicago.

16:43I'm in Chicago.

16:45But where are you?

16:47OK.

16:49Do you have a solution?

16:51OK...

17:01Wars tend to change people, they change souls.

17:17The memories that I have could very well not exist today.

17:24The grace and warmth could very well have vanished.

17:54The energy in the heart, the light, the light, the light, the light.

18:03The light of life can be the hue.

18:11The light inside of the heart is the sun.

18:15We don't have a full family portrait that is newer than 1999.

18:35The four siblings of us and the two parents have not been under a single roof in 14, 15 years.

18:43I stopped counting and I miss it.

18:47I miss home.

18:50I miss home.

19:13I miss home.

19:16I miss home.

19:20I miss home.

19:22I miss home.

19:23I miss home.

19:25I miss home.

19:27I miss home.

19:28I miss home.

19:30I miss home.

19:32I miss home.

19:33I miss home.

19:35I miss home.

19:36I miss home.

_A Broken House_ — Re-creating the Syria of His Memories, Through Miniatures _ The New Yorker

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