Invisible Leavings

August 2017, Halifax, Canada:

There are energies associated with places, I have come to believe. The character of a certain venue may not be simply about the light quality, decor, finishing, colors or its smells. I think an important component is its energy, it's own specific vibe. And that is not merely the charge you get off the people that are in that place at the time you're in it; it may also involve the energy left by people who were present in the past. The "invisible leavings" of people, I've started to call it in my mind...the ghosts of the place. 

Not in a horror movie kind of way, but in the way that you enter a quiet tidy coffee shop and you're struck by an intuition that it was loud a few minutes ago. Or when you go into a room full of coworkers who greet you with perfectly pleasant politeness, but you can tell you've been dissected with their judgement just before you walked in. And in that way that old cities such as Cairo and Alexandria emit their own particular energy, the imprints of past souls in their very air.

I remember when I was living in Dubai and we'd visit Cairo each summer, I'd receive a distinct vibe once off the plane at Cairo airport. It felt like...old stubborn strength and suffering. And then we'd hit the streets of old Cairo and I would smell romance, literature and poetry, and hearts so big and chivalrous they dwarfed my own. Then a few days into the summer, we'd travel the 200 kilometers to Alexandria for a week by the sea, and the coast would call to me with songs of victory and pride. With salty tales of courage and undying faith.
Such smells, such sounds...such "energy" is to me as much what a place is as anything else that gives it character. Unseen but definitely there. 
And then there's Halifax...this tale be told another time. It deserves some detail...