On Place

As I hinted at in my introduction, my first piece centers around the importance of “place” in our lives. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Lebanon is at the forefront of this post. Yet while I intend to share specific stories from my time spent in Lebanon in a subsequent piece, here, Lebanon primarily serves as a case study to better understand how places can shape how we think about our future, our priorities, our intentions. Maybe you will relate to the power of place that I discuss, or maybe you will discover that you rarely factor in place into your decisions. Regardless, I hope this piece will at least shed light on how places can quietly, yet forcefully, direct the course of a life. So here you have it. “On Place.”

Places shape us as surely as people do, yet I have come to the conclusion that we - humanity, let’s say - fail to devote adequate attention to the importance of “love of place.” The topic of love writ large, on the other hand, receives plenty of attention. We distinguish between romantic love and platonic love; we acknowledge love felt towards one’s parents, partners, friends, God or gods, children, pets, etc. Yet “love of place” is rarely mentioned. The objects of our love tend to be people, rather than places. To center your life around the importance of a person, or job even, is admirable, accepted. “Great loves,” in the minds of many, are rarely places. I, on the other hand, have revolved my entire life around the importance of place.

Let me elaborate. For anyone who has interacted with me in the last four years, my deep-seated, borderline manic obsession with the Middle East is well known. Ever since I began studying Arabic my freshman year of college (a random decision that I will expand upon later), I quickly became fascinated by the region. I became convinced then, and am still now, that the Middle East is the next great, global economic and political locus; it is the future of the most dynamic economic advancement projects and the site of the most crucial geopolitical issues. After spending the summer of 2022 working at a newspaper in Morocco, I decided that I wanted to move to the Middle East post grad. The “where” of my future has therefore been set freshman year. The “what” remained far more fluid.

All infatuations, however, have its focal point, and the most extreme element of my Middle Eastern obsession lies in Lebanon. It’s crazy to consider that I first went to Lebanon only two years ago, because in such a short span, it has come to dictate the vast majority of my future. To my high school friends, this obsession with Lebanon is endearing, if not perplexing. To my Stanford friends, the Middle East, and Lebanon specifically, is half my personality.

There is a Lebanese flag in my bedroom (stolen off of Stanford SNU’s wall), a “See you in Beirut Whatever Happens” sticker on my phone, and a curated, much-listened to playlist titled “Lebanon” on my Spotify While I would characterize myself as a fairly confident individual, I’m pretty sure my biggest insecurity is the fact that I’m not Lebanese. Although my Lebanese friends have assured me that I was most definitely Lebanese in another lifetime, I envy their Lebanese passports and Lebanese blood. Sigh.

While I first characterized my relationship with the Middle East to you as a “manic obsession," what I feel towards Lebanon could only be described as love. A powerful love. One of the strongest loves I have ever experienced. My love for Lebanon once almost broke my heart, but that’s a story for another time. For many, though, such a powerful love does not extend to places.

My mother recently told me that, during a conversation in the not-so-distant past, when discussing my upcoming plans to move to Beirut to a friend, she explained that I “spent a summer in Lebanon and fell in love!”

“With what?” the friend responded. “With someone? With her job?”

My mother then had to clarify that the source of my love was not any person or professional experience but rather Lebanon itself. Her friend’s reaction, however, was a logical response. Fiercely loving a person is easy to understand. A place feels more opaque.

In my quest for a deeper understanding of love of place, I have found few answers. If anything, most mantras deemphasize the importance of place. “The people make the place,” we say. I don’t buy it. Well, no, let me be less harsh. I agree with this statement - yes, people are critical to any given place - but “a place also makes a place.” A place is more than the people who inhabit it, who fill its boundaries, who comprise its population. That cliché isn’t incorrect insofar as it is incomplete.

Take Stanford. Stanford is nothing without its entrepreneurial-focused, quirky-yet-brilliant students, but put it in Kentucky and the result is an entirely different university. A place breeds a people, it feeds a people. People are nothing without a place.

Many tend to assume that I had to have met a “special someone” in Lebanon. Of course, the Lebanese people are a huge component of why I love my time there so much. I have often joked that I’ve yet to meet a Lebanese person I’m not obsessed with, and it’s true. You will meet many of these people in my upcoming stories about Lebanon. Their joy, their hospitality, and their sense of fun resonates with me deeply. I feel at ease with them. They make me laugh. We click, effortlessly. I have always said that Lebanese people know how to live better than anyone else. You do not just exist in Lebanon, you live. They live fully, freely, and without restraint. But again, the people alone can’t fully account for this forceful love of mine. There is something about Lebanon - the place - that pulls me to it, and this something transcends its lively, spirited population.

So if not the people, then what? Perhaps it is the language? As I hinted at earlier, my initial love for the Middle East began with Arabic. It is an astonishingly beautiful language. I will be devoting a piece to Arabic alone, but for now, just know that I quickly became captivated by the language. I wanted to speak it, to read it, to hear it as much as possible. I can do so in Lebanon and thus Lebanon satisfies a linguistic love as well.

A place is its people, a place is its language, a place is its history, its art, its music. A place is its geography and weather, its natural resources and agriculture. Places can carry trauma and anguish. A place, like its people, internalizes the horrors of war, famine, disease, conflict. Places, however, can also be resilient, they can possess grit. You would be hard-pressed to find another place half as tenacious as Beirut. If you consider everything it’s been through since the advent of the Lebanese Civil War in 1975, it’s a miracle it’s still standing.

There is this beautiful quote in Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being (which is SO GOOD please go read immediately) in which one of the main characters, Tomas, is reflecting on his love for his partner, Tereza. As he considers the improbability of his encountering, and then loving, Tereza, he wonders:

“Is not an event in fact more significant and noteworthy the greater the number of fortuities necessary to bring it about? Chance and chance alone has a message for us. Everything that occurs out of necessity, everything expected, repeated day in and day out, is mute. Only chance can speak to us.” (48)

This quote struck me deeply, as my own encountering of and subsequent love for Lebanon is the epitome of a series of “fortuities,” the confluence of the result of several random occurrences. It was a far cry from a “necessity;” in many ways, it was pure “chance.” I’d like to conclude this piece by walking you through such fortuities. Perhaps to you they won’t feel that random, I’d be curious to hear your thoughts. But here you have it: my Lebanese fortuities.

Fortuity #1: Studying Arabic

As I touched on above, my initial interest in the Middle East came from Arabic. Without a love of Arabic, my love of the Middle East, and then Lebanon, would never have arisen. Yet most people are surprised to learn that I did not pursue Arabic in high school but rather began my freshman year at Stanford. They are then even more surprised to learn that my decision to study Arabic was fairly arbitrary. While I entered Stanford knowing that I wished to study another language, I was rather apathetic about which language that would be. I somehow found myself debating between Arabic and German (not sure how we even arrived at that decision) before picking Arabic, because I was intrigued by the idea of learning a language with a different alphabet. Arabic, once a random decision, is now the linchpin of my Middle Eastern love. Fortuity #1.

Fortuity #2: The Study Abroad Foil

I will spare you all a full-throated rant on Stanford’s disturbingly weak selection of study abroad offerings, but one particularly egregious weakness lies in its lack of a study abroad program in an Arabic-speaking country. And no, contrary to what my freshman year advisor believed, Istanbul does not count. They speak Turkish there.

Since I planned on studying abroad with Stanford during the fall of my junior year, I decided to use the summer following my sophomore year to complete an immersive Arabic program. A quick Google search revealed two potential programs: the first was with the Sijal Institute in Amman, Jordan, the second at the American University of Beirut in Beirut, Lebanon. Stanford’s failure to offer an Arabic-focused study abroad, it seemed, might just be a blessing in disguise. Fortuity #2.

Fortuity #3: The Phone Call

Before applying to the two programs in Amman and Beirut, I knew very little about either city or Jordan and Lebanon writ large. In another crazy coincidence, however, at the beginning of sophomore year, I had spoken to Gabby, a Stanford grad three years above me, about her path with the Middle East, since she was about to move to Dubai to work at BCG’s offices there. It was Gabby who had put AUB on my radar, as she had studied abroad at the university during the fall of her junior year. So I gave her a call. “Tell me about Beirut,” I said. And she did. The call only lasted for several minutes, but I was hooked, entranced. The way her voice rose with excitement when describing her time there was intoxicating. I wanted to make her experience in Beirut my own.

“It might not be as safe right now,” she added towards the end of the call. “Beirut has changed since I went.” She was right. Beirut had changed. In 2023, Lebanon had no president, its government was incapacitated, and the country was still reeling from both the economic crisis of 2019 and the 2020 Beirut port exploitation. But her warnings fell on deaf ears. Instinct now told me Beirut had to be the site of my Arabic studies, and any concerns about its safety became a problem to address at some later point. I thanked Gabby profusely for her advice and hung up. Fortuity #3.

Fortuity #4: Convincing the Parents

Armed with this new conviction, I then embarked on the task of persuading my parents to go along with Beirut. I knew they would prefer Amman, but the beautiful thing about my parents is that they listen. They have heard me out each time I come to them with some new, farfetched plan involving the Middle East. That doesn’t mean they instantly cave in to all my requests, however. They push me for answers, they challenge what I hold to be true, they question my priorities. I have to enter these conversations with a game-plan, a strategy. But if I do so, if I can prove that what I am seeking to do is not only meaningful to me but possesses some sort of compelling advantage, they give their consent.

By the time I was pitching Lebanon to them, I had already spent a summer working in Morocco and had just returned from a two-week program in Saudi Arabia. Morocco had been easy. Saudi took slightly more convincing. In other words, strange Middle Eastern related requests weren’t exactly new territory to them. They were already on board with my decision to study Arabic that summer. They had heard me complain enough times about Stanford’s lack of an Arabic-speaking study abroad location to know that completing some sort of language immersive program was important to me. Where I was to study Arabic, however, was yet to be determined.

I remember informing them that I had been accepted into two Arabic programs, one in Amman, the other in Beirut. That Sunday, during our weekly facetime (yes, I had a scheduled Sunday facetime with my parents throughout college), they shared that they wished for me to study in Amman. Given Lebanon’s political and economic instability, they explained, Amman made more sense. Their words did not surprise me. Amman was the safer, easier option. I could not argue with that. But remember, I was prepared for their skepticism, I had “briefed” myself on Beirut. As I launched into my response, I acknowledged the validity of their Amman preference, but walked them through why Beirut was more desirable. After I made my case, they paused and told me they would take some time to think about what I said.

Three days later they called me again. It was a Wednesday, and I was standing outside Coupa, a popular outdoor café on campus. “We would still prefer that you study in Amman,” they began, “but we understand why Beirut is appealing to you. If Stanford allows you to study in Beirut, we will figure it out.” I forget what the rest of the conversation entailed, because I essentially blacked out with excitement after hearing their approval. My parents were on board. Huge. Fortuity #4.

Fortuity #5: Persuading Stanford Global Risk

After I had applied and successfully received funding to study Arabic from Stanford’s Abbasi Program (a prominent Middle Eastern department at the university), the next step was to gain approval for the specific location of my studies. When I informed those in charge of Stanford’s overseas funding for students that I wished to put such funding towards a program in Lebanon, they freaked. Such freaking out was highly problematic on my end, as Stanford could pull my funding at any time, and then poof, there went Beirut. In Stanford’s defense, they were somewhat responsible for my well-being abroad given that I was using its money to pay for my program. In my defense, this fear was overly zealous and at least slightly misinformed.

In the end, thanks to the help of the wonderful Associate Director of the Abbasi program Farah El-Sharif who helped put Lebanon’s unstable situation into context, Stanford gave me the green light. All I had to do was meet with the Global Risk team “for an assessment/mitigation brainstorm before [I] go.”

Given that this meeting was described as a “brainstorm,” I was under the impression that I would be working with members of the Global Risk team to determine various contingency plans should something go awry. It would be a collaborative meeting, I figured. Right? Wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. When I logged onto the appropriate Zoom link, I was met with three members of the Global Risk team who, after confirming my name, immediately began a rapid-fire interrogation of my upcoming Lebanon travels.

“What will your access to water be? What about electricity? What is AUB’s generator system like? And your medical care? What do you plan to do if you get injured? Who is your emergency contact in Lebanon? How is your Arabic? And your French, do you speak French? Remind us why you don’t want to go to Jordan again?”

To give you a sense of my headspace entering the Zoom, I took this meeting from the floor of Stnford’s Green Library, right by the interactive zone. I’m pretty sure I was wearing workout clothes. I answered their questions as calmly and thoroughly as I was able, but I was rattled. I felt unprepared, utterly caught off guard. They listened, took notes, and told me they would inform me of their final decision by the end of the week. Final decision?! I hadn’t even realized the question of my going to Lebanon was still up in the air.

When the Zoom finally ended, I panicked. Just when it felt like my studying in Lebanon would actually materialize, my entire plans had once again been thrown in jeopardy. But I was stubborn. Lebanon was this close. Not going to Beirut was simply not a possibility in my mind.

So I locked in. I spent the afternoon composing an incredibly long email that detailed precise responses to each of their questions and included the University of Pennsylvania’s information page concerning their own study abroad program at AUB (because yes, other schools allow its students to travel to Beirut!) and AUB’s “practical guide” that detailed the university’s health insurance plan, accommodations, security on campus, and its access to water and electricity.

Several days later the Global Risk Team responded: “We completed our risk assessment and support your travel plans to Lebanon this summer. As discussed, travel is not permitted to Beqaa Valley, Tripoli, southern areas/suburbs of Beirut (outside of the Beirut international airport), areas within 10 miles of Syrian or Israeli borders, and refugee camps.”

MASHALLAH! *I didn’t know that phrase yet* but MASHALLAH! Finally, finally, Stanford was on board. Fortuity #5.

So there you are, my Lebanese fortuities. Perhaps they are less “fortuities” as opposed to “challenges” but nevertheless, the fact that I managed to set foot in Lebanon felt miraculous. I had fought to study in Beirut, I felt. I was thus fiercely protective over Lebanon even before I arrived.

In the introduction post to this Substack, I reflected on the prevalence of unexpected events in my life and the gifts that these events unwittingly became. Lebanon is the epitome of such an unanticipated yet cherished development. Yet for all its unpredictability, for all its randomness, there is no version of my life in which I didn’t end up in Lebanon. If not for that summer program post sophomore year, I would have found myself in Lebanon eventually. And once I arrived, I would have never let it go.

There is no reason for me to feel the attachment to Lebanon that I did, and now still do. I am not Lebanese. My parents are not Lebanese. Before I went to Lebanon, I did not have Lebanese friends. And yet, in the course of two years, it has become my guiding star.

My love for Lebanon makes no sense and that is how I know it is the purest of loves. If love were rational, if it could be logically and linearly explained, it would be stripped of much of its beauty and mystery. Lebanon was incredibly irrational, and thus, it is, my most cherished and unadulterated love.