It was the end of March when Daniel came to me with some news about a new European Project called CaBuReRa. We were having lunch at “Habib’s Donner Kebab” (what a coincidence) and, as he was talking, I could already feel the adrenaline rush, starting to build up… Overwhelmed, with positive and negative feelings – should I stay or should I go?! – we finally decided to have a meeting at Anje and ask for all the details and what did we need to do to sign up.
After this meeting the feeling was kind of numbness – too much information and, at the same time, the feeling of craziness – none of us had ever studied or worked abroad, not even out of our small city so this was REALLY going out of the comfort zone. This was one of the major reasons why we wanted to do this: we felt stagnated, we needed something in our lives to really feel alive and this could be a golden opportunity to grow in a personal and professional level, hopping that it could open some doors in the future.
And so we decided to go…
Our parents were in panic as some of our friends, saying that this was so dangerous, this was not a safe country, that we should stay, and so on…
The information mass media delivers can definitely get you feeling disturbed and scared, most importantly, miss informed. The picture in our minds about the Middle East, sold by the Media, is of people with big beards, scarves on their heads, women in their burka and war/destruction everywhere. I did not even bring any shorts because I thought it would be disrespectful…
Guess What? When we arrived we thought we were in America or something… Women are dressed in such a fancy way – high heels, short dresses, long nails and hair, always full of makeup and men (women too) proudly show off their cars (Mustang, Lamborghini, Ferrari, Porsche, Camaro…). Everywhere we look there’s an American restaurant or coffee – Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts, McDonald’s, KFC, Domino’s, etc…
The feeling we got was that for many of the Lebanese people (we live in Beirut so we are using it as the example) is better to look than to be, people want to be closer to the west!
We came here expecting to see and live the traditions of the Middle East but in Beirut it’s very difficult to find that, only if we get out of the big centres, if we meet someone that shows us the right people, we can get to see the real Lebanon and its traditions.
Besides all of this, Lebanon is amazingly beautiful and has so much to offer! That was, really, a very pleasant surprise. We came here without doing any research about the country, we came to discover it, so when we saw that it had so many green, mountains, rivers and beautiful places to see, we were really amazed! Once again, our idea of the Middle East was that it’s mainly a desert and camels everywhere…
The experience of meeting new people (not just the locals, but also our housemates) was amazing. People are extremely kind and giving, always wanting to help, even when they don’t speak the same language, we can always communicate. We found out that when you want, you can communicate with everyone, everywhere and about everything. We had a lot of funny situations where none of the players spoke each other’s language, and somehow we manage to understand each other using body language. That shows a lot about the character of a people! But that’s another story…