Lebanon, as it emerges from its long mourning, gradually savours its newly found peace that seems almost reflected in the coffee houses of the Zahl region, lying along a lazy river, facing which customers peace-fully smoke the hookah, some of them even as they sip the local spirit known as arak . Hikes in the price of cigarettes during recent years have drawn a large number of smokers to the hookah, as acknowledged by no less a source than a World Health Organisation report. Whole groups of teenagers crowd the doors of the small cafe to sit on cushions spread out on the floor and to smoke from this exotic object known as the hookah. At the same tine, they play droughts, chess or charades, the same kind of innocent games, which the traveler Jean Chardin described in the Persian coffee houses of the 17th Century. Conversation flows easily, thanks to this conversation piece-whose main role is precisely to help people chat.
Conversation therefore flows freely in an atmosphere of freedom, equality and brotherhood.
As a cultural relic it re-surfaced in the 1960s with the impromptu performances of certain musical groups, mainly in the Oran area. According to an observer singers would not sing until they were presented with their rguila . This habit continues even today in other countries where musicians, producing popular music can be seen smoking a few puffs from their hookah during intervals. Set up close to the stage, their hookah can sometimes keep burning for up to two hours at a stretch. In the Greece of the Twenties, the bards of the Rembetiko culture uniquely praised it in their moving lamentations.