Jad Moustafa’s interest in juggling was sparked by a fire performance he saw five years ago. Trying it out himself, he became hooked by the simplicity of the act.
“It has this nostalgic thing about being a kid,” he said from his newly opened juggling store Just Juggling - the first shop dedicated to the hobby in Lebanon. “It reminds you of just running around, having fun, throwing a rock, clapping three times and catching it. That kind of simplicity - but with a bit more motor skill required.”
Located in Beirut’s Geitawi area, Just Juggling has a distinctly DIY feel to it. Moustafa, with the help of some of the friends he has made over his five years and counting of juggling, set it up himself. It makes sense for a group of people used to mending their tattered juggling “props” or “toys” after having bought them from overseas.
In addition to the more commonly seen props like balls, pins, the yo-yo-like “Diabolos” and spinning plates, the shop also sells playing cards used in tricks and a wide array of fire toys - for those who get kicks from dismissing the standard parental advice: “Don’t play with fire.”
Just Juggling also offers up orbs used in “contact juggling” that are not attached to strings and are manipulated around the body. You can also load up on LED poi - luminescent pods attached to the ends of ropes that have become a staple at music festivals for their dazzling trail-inducing lights, enjoyed at varying levels of altered consciousness.
There are LED juggling balls too. In fact, most items are available in either regular, LED or fire.
Particularly precious to jugglers are the white, unscorched Kevlar wicks on the business end of new fire toys. After the first burn, they turn black and must be covered with plastic bags, lest they stain car seats and walls with black soot.
Moustafa formally got into juggling with Cirquenciel, a so-called social circus that aims to spread “peace through circus arts.”
An offshoot of Lebanese NGO Arcenciel, Cirquenciel runs a circus school in Beirut, manages a professional troupe and runs a psycho-social support team that holds workshops for children at Lebanese schools and at refugee camps.
“Teaching in schools, the kids don’t look at you as one of the regular teachers, they look at us as people who come to play with them,” he says. “Even if they aren’t very good with authority, through juggling there is a certain barrier being broken.”
But the fun isn’t limited to kids. As Moustafa speaks, two friends in their mid-to-late 20s play with juggling balls and spinning plates, undeterred by the shop’s limited space. Stacked atop the shop counter, promotional cards bearing Just Juggling’s logo note in large pink font: “Two balls isn’t enough.”
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Moustafa envisions the shop becoming a kind of hub for jugglers. “I tell everyone who comes here that I’m gonna be practicing all day - I can teach you, you can teach me,” he says. And though the space is limited, “there’s always the sidewalk.”
He admits that some of his new neighbors were weirded out by the sudden appearance of dreadlocked men and women whirling around inanimate objects - but insists the general reception has been “great.”
While Just Juggling may be Lebanon’s only brick-and-mortar juggling shop, Moustafa has friendly competition from jeweler-turned-juggling prop craftsman Paramaz Yepremian. Working from his Burj Hammoud workshop, Yepremian sells his wares online and at festivals and farmers markets. “The first 10 attempts failed, like zero function, man,” he says of his foray into the craft. “No. 11 worked.”
Yepremian also started out at Cirquenciel - the veritable mothership of jugglers in Lebanon. After leaving, he founded Circus Hub in 2016, a platform for him to sell the toys and bring jugglers together.
He says kids have become his main target market. “We see them filling their time with tacky things and forgetting about hands-on activities. A lot of kids come to my stall at farmers markets with a tablet in their hands and leave holding juggling balls.”
Moustafa concurs. Little, he says, can replace the instant gratification of getting a new trick right for the first time.
“Let’s say you want to learn three balls,” he says, juggling pins as he converses. “The first few times it’s hard, but when it actually works it’s like, ‘Ah, OK. Wow. Very nice. I want to do another trick.’ It’s the reward system - actually having something in return for your hard work.”
A young child walks by as Moustafa plays, and is taken by his mastery of spinning the objects. He asks to play, and Moustafa obliges, quickly tutoring him not to be too excitable. “Don’t throw it too high,” he says.
“Start with one pin, then work your way up,” he patiently adds. “You can’t do everything all at once.”
This article has been adapted from its original source.
