Move over, cigar bars

Hookah lounges are a big hit in Philly and around the world

On a recent Saturday night, the hip and wannabe hip alike are on the prowl for a good time in Old City. Pedestrians zigzag along the cobblestones, hailing cabs and shouting into cell phones, creating the ruckus that's become a typical night out in the neighborhood.

Just around the corner on Chestnut Street, there's a refuge from the commotion. Inside the Aromatic House of Kabob, five Villanova students take turns pulling thick ribbons of apple-flavored smoke through a green glass bulb of water, then slowly exhale streams of sweet vapor into the air.

Worldbeat music laced with Indian sitar bubbles in electronic loops in the background.

With faces painted Villanova blue (fresh from rooting on their team at a basketball game), common wisdom would tell you these students would be out funneling shots and doing beer stands on a Saturday night. Instead, they're relaxing, thoughtfully discussing religion (seriously), and smoking hookah.

"It's very conducive to getting to know people better, so I like that a lot," says Andy Kropt, 22, of St. Davids, Pa. He's been looking for a local place to hookah with friends since he was first turned onto the water pipe when he lived in Germany a few years ago. Now, he goes to hookah bars as a bonding experience with his frat brothers.

His friend Kevin Kokoszka, 21, of Plainsboro agrees that sharing conversation huddled around a hookah is a nice change of pace from the typical college weekend scenario of drinking 'til you puke.

"It's nice to have some deep conversations and not just get wasted," says Kokoszka. "Plus, you remember everything that was said."

He also pointed out that his group's "DD" (that's designated driver for readers over 22) can have a good time and not feel left out of the fun.

These five friends, a co-ed group of American college kids, are typical clientele for the contemporary hookah lounge.

Hookah is hot

An ancient practice, the hookah resurgence began with youth culture in the Middle East, spread through Europe, then became popular in West Coast cities like San Francisco and Seattle before showing up on the East Coast.

It's been estimated that hookah is offered in approximately 1,000 establishments across the United States, and that 45 percent of colleges and universities have a hookah bar nearby. There are more than 20 hookah bars in New York City already. It's a bona fide craze, like cigar bars in the '90s. (Look for a glossy magazine cover featuring Demi Moore, body-painted like a caterpillar, toking on a designer artisan-crafted water pipe a la Alice in Wonderland on newsstands soon.)

Dia Sawan, co-owner of Fez and Byblos, Center City restaurants that offer hookah, knows the business. A member of the thriving Christian Lebanese community in South Philly, he first offered hookah to customers at Fez on Second Street about four years ago. He says that back then, most people coming in for the couscous weren't yet familiar with the ornate glass structures adorning the window.

An astute businessman, Sawan watched as interest bloomed into a fad, then opened Byblos last year. The yuppie-hipster hookah palace and restaurant packs the pipe for the Rittenhouse set. He plans to open another hookah restaurant named Mango a couple doors down by May

Foreign relations

In a country that created the freedom fry, it may seem a little strange that the latest fashion is borrowed from Middle Eastern culture at this juncture in history.

Sawan surmises the war may actually be one of the reasons hookahs are hip. He says hookah became more popular in the States as more Westerners traveled to the Middle East, whether for the military or big business.

"They come back and they ask for it. I've met a lot of Americans who have been to Jordan, Iraq, Istanbul, and the first thing they ask for, the most common thing they say, is that they've been there and smoked hookah," he says.

Historically, smoking hookah was a social activity enjoyed by older men in a sedate atmosphere while sipping tea. (Sorry, but slurping alcohol while smoking hookah is not traditional.)

Such details tend to morph when new cultures rummage through old cultures in search of fashionable novelty. Especially when that culture is the perpetually shiny-new American Pop Culture, a state of mind where Gwen Stefani rocks both a bindhi and a Harajuku posse and Madonna ties a Kabbalah string around her henna-tattooed wrists.

Other than appealing primarily to the young, the biggest reversal from tradition is the number of women eager to try to hookah. Sawan sees more women than men passing the hose at his establishments.

"They think it's hip for women -- sexy and exotic. And it doesn't leave your breath with an aftertaste," Sawan says.

At traditional parlors in the Middle East, a stronger tobacco called assfahani is smoked straight. Here, a milder tobacco is mixed with fruit or flavored glycerin to make it less harsh.

Popular flavors include apple, apricot, mango and mint. This new version of hookah seems to be another example of a traditional masculine vice repackaged in a female-friendly form, like Virginia Slims to Marlboro cigarettes or the Cosmopolitan cocktail to the classic martini.

"The girls, they like it more than the boys," agrees Ali Bisharat, co-owner of Jaba, a recently opened eatery that offers hookah down the street from House of Kabob. Though right now Jaba is confined to a brightly lit storefront area, he says he is opening an upstairs lounge by mid-February.

Hookah hipsters

Most American hookah lounges are decorated in a Middle Eastern style and serve Mediterranean cuisine. But some places mix it up more, like uptown at Byblos, where scenesters smoked hookah between sips of birdbath martinis brimming with bright-blue concoctions while listening to a Biz Markie remix on a recent Sunday night.

"The hookah experience is very cool," says Jeff Tubbs, 28, of Philadelphia, while hanging at the Byblos bar. "I don't smoke cigarettes. It's like a whole different vibe, it's relaxing. When you inhale, it doesn't hurt your chest. There's a whole ambience it creates. I definitely invite friends here."

Jeff's wife, Kate, can tell you a thing or two about the trafficking of trends. Originally from a town called Chelyabisk in Russia, she says the hookah bars that are all the rage in Russia don't bother to cash in on Middle Eastern exoticism.

"At first it happened in Moscow, then it happened in my town," she says of the explosion of hookah bars she discovered during her most recent visit back home. "Everything happens in Moscow first, then spreads to the towns. Moscow is very progressive, very Americanized -- it doesn't matter that the hookah is a Turkish invention, it's that it's an American trend."

She says that in Russia, any old beer bar serves hookah just because it's perceived as an American thing to do, like eating at McDonald's. And just like there are concerned citizens tracing the global impact of the Big Mac, there are scholars and public health advocates paying attention as a whole new generation -- one that smokes fewer cigarettes than their parents -- are lighting up.

Up in smoke

Back at House of Kabob, owner Helen is serving our five friends another hookah. This time it's packed with orange-flavored tobacco. Tonight is the first time Laura Klatka, a 20-year-old college junior at Villanova, is trying hookah.

"This is my first hookah. I like it," she said, tilting her head back and blowing a cloud skyward. "It tastes like an orange spice candle. It's really relaxing. You smoke it, then you get this little buzz when you're exhaling. It's really quick and doesn't last, but it's a pretty good buzz."

Tara Murtha can be reached at murthatara@yahoo.com.