- By Greta Medawar and Carissa Gilham
In May 2017, Shaam Group presented the inaugural Shaam Syrian Film Festival in Melbourne and Sydney with the objective of providing a platform for Syrian cinema to be screened in Australia. Sponsors of the festival included Melbourne travel agency, CedarJet Travel, and popular Sydney based Knafeh Bakery that specialises in Jerusalem street food....
This recipe is from 'Kan Ya Ma Kan: Folktales and Recipes of Syria and Its Ethnic Groups', by Muna Imady. It's published by 'Beloved Syria' with the permission of Muna's mother Elaine Imady.
Muna pointed out that the recipe comes from Deir Ez Zor. As explained in the book:
The city of Deir ez Zor, like Raqqa, stands on the shores of the...
"To write well, express yourself like the common people, but think like a wise man" -Aristotle*
Ahlan wa sahlan
A warm welcome**
This post is dedicated to Syrian writer Ms Muna Imady (1962 - 2016) and the country and people she loved.
In an interview for ‘Beloved Syria’ (September 2019), Muna’s mother, Elaine, spoke about 'Kan Ya Ma Kan: Folktales and Recipes...
Luke Cornish is drawing on his experiences travelling through Syria to paint a picture of the country beyond the news headlines. (Aired SBS World News February 12th 2017).
Permission to publish on Beloved Syria from Brianna Roberts
First published on 5 March 2017, SBS World News
Extract from interview with Luke Cornish by Maggie Brown, for Beloved Syria, 2nd Issue:
Since being a...
Once upon a time,
There was a paradise.
It was on earth.
It was in Syria.
It was a haven for great civilisations.
It was a haven for Mother Nature.
It was a generous land with generous people.
It was an incubator of remarkable inventions.
It was the land where life was lived richly.
It was the theatre where love danced joyfully.
It was the place where million-year-old souls...
In September 2019, Rasha Milhem - Syrian journalist, translator, writer and filmmaker - spoke about 'Restart', the short film she wrote at the end of a diploma course. In April 2019, it won her a 'best scenario' award.
Rasha explained that the movie focuses on people who remained in Syria during the war and their family members who left Syria;...
by Leslie Hemphill
“You are welcome”, or “You are family” were words we heard so often in Syria when we travelled with daughter-in-law Ghada on three visits to stay with her parents and family in Damascus.
Ghada was one of six children raised in a little house - really a two-storey apartment. It was possible to climb out a window onto...
This video interview with Professor Maamoun Abdulkarim took place in a Damascus cafe on 22 September 2019. It wasn't the best environment to discuss a serious subject, and I had no external microphone for my mobile phone, but we made do.
Susan Dirgham
(For a transcript of the interview, please go to the bottom of this page.*)
During the worst years of...
‘Beloved Syria’ is honoured to present this beautiful documentary featuring the Gardenia Choir, a women’s choir based in Syria which has performed both in Syria and abroad.
At the start of the film, the choir sings 'Barcarolle' from Jacques Offenbach's ‘The Tales of Hoffman’, a song that must be familiar to tens of thousands of choir members and opera lovers...
Over lunch, I interviewed Hana about Fairuz, the Lebanese singer that Syrians across the country listen to in the mornings. Hana's daughter Karla helped translate.
