Notebook
The Building as Republic
In Lebanon, the apartment building is often the smallest functioning state.
The building has a generator, water tank, WhatsApp group, doorman, feud, treasury, emergency plan, and unwritten constitution. It negotiates fuel, fixes pipes, settles noise complaints, monitors strangers.
The nation failed downward until sovereignty lodged in the stairwell.
Sometimes the building works better than the republic because shame still operates there. You cannot disappear into abstraction when your neighbor hears the leak.
