Ronnie Chatah started giving his walking tours of Beirut in 2008, during a period of stability for the city. He would guide tourists through the city, telling stories of Phoenician ruins, French architecture and Ottoman houses. He’d also talk about Lebanon’s civil war, and the political unrest that came to follow it. But these were stories about other people, other eras and other lives. Until December of 2013, when Ronnie’s personal life was sucked into the tapestry of Beirut’s history.

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