BEIRUT: What do overly loud Australian fireworks, a shooting in California, and roadworks in England have in common? Well, according to concerned local residents, they all leave the neighborhood “looking like Beirut.”

Jad Aoun, a 28-year-old Lebanese “news addict” currently living and working in Dubai, first noticed these comparisons when he set up his first news alert in 2000. Receiving notifications whenever “Beirut” or “Lebanon” were mentioned on the Internet, Aoun soon realized how widespread the analogy was.

Working in marketing and communications, Aoun set up a blog in 2009 and decided to address the phenomenon.

“I needed something that would create a more lasting impression. Sending emails is fast and easy but so is deleting them: The answer had to be something more solid and that can travel the world with ease – that is when I came up with the ‘Looks Like Beirut’ Certificate,” he says.

He has now posted 60 LLB certificates around the globe (although he has recorded 150 comparisons since early 2009, it is not always possible to find physical addresses for many of the culprits), each reading, “In recognition of the work done to keep the overused, worn-out, tired cliché ‘… looks like Beirut …’ alive.”

Aoun often receives responses from some of the recipients, which are often quite touching in their heartfelt regret at their sloppy use of language.

When a tornado hit Mapletown in Iowa this April, the county sheriff’s deputy, Roger Krohn, told the local paper that “Mapleton looks like Downtown Beirut.”

After receipt of his “Looks Like Beirut” certificate from Aoun, Krohn was prompted to respond.

“I was really surprised … pleasantly to get snail mail from you. What an ingenious idea … using this site as a means to communicate to the world on the beauty of Beirut. I stand corrected, and you have my word I will never use that cliché again. By the way, I will frame the award, if only as a reminder to myself to be more appropriately descriptive in the future. After Mapleton recovers, I truly hope that it does look like Beirut. Thanks for the reminder. Take care. Roger”

When Darrell Alper’s garage was subject to vandalism from local youths in Reading in the U.K., he told the local paper, “It looked a bit like Beirut … It was just an absolute disaster zone.”

But he retracted his comparison as soon as he received his certificate, emailing Aoun to say “I apologize for using this cliché, the statement made to the press was the first thing that came to mind. I would like to say that my sister has visited Beirut and was full of praise for the country and intends to return shortly with friends to celebrate getting married.”

But why is Beirut so often the thing that comes to mind when people are interviewed by their local paper on violence, destruction or loud noise?

“I really believe scenes from the Civil War are etched into people’s minds. The generation that grew up in the ’70s and ’80s heard about it on the radio and watched what was happening on the evening news,” Aoun explains. “And of course, there is also this awe of how the mighty Beirut, the ‘Paris of the Middle East’ has fallen which helps the phrase stick.”

And while the Civil War ended over 20 years ago, Lebanon’s most recent conflict, the July 2006 war with Israel, helped a whole new age group identify Beirut solely as a disaster zone.

“In my opinion, it provided a younger generation with a reference to continue to use the phrase. After 2006, I have seen it widely used on discussion boards and chat rooms among the younger generation, usually to describe the state of their rooms.”

But while Beirut has had an undeniable resurgence in recent years, often featuring as an international must-visit location, Aoun believes there is still some way to go.

“There is no doubt Beirut is happening,” says Aoun. ‘Beirut has this unique appeal to it – despite everything the city has gone through, it rebuilds and continues to stand strong. You see that in the people and in the buildings – you feel it in the air; giving up is never an option and it’s that resilience that makes it stand out. You know that no matter what happens today, Beirut will still be there tomorrow and there’s nothing on this planet that could stop it from existing.”