10 Things Your Lebanese Parents Do When You Move Abroad
Overprotectiveness is embedded in Lebanese parents’ DNA, and when you make the decision to move abroad, these tendencies reach their peak. If you decide to move abroad, watch out for these behaviours that you are bound to face.
1. You’re blamed for abandoning them.
Your mother will cry, your father’s forehead will burrow like it has never burrowed before, and your leaving will become the biggest tragedy. It doesn’t matter that you’re going to move somewhere nice to achieve new things, you’re abandoning them in their old age. What did they do to deserve this?
2. They parade you around on a goodbye tour.
After accepting your move, they begin to treat it like a death sentence, and they want you to say goodbye to all your relatives. It doesn’t matter if you hadn’t seen them in the last 15 years, or if you’ve even met them before, you have to say goodbye to everyone who shares any blood with you.
3. They pack all the world’s food for you.
It would be cheaper to fly your actual mother (or father, if he does the cooking) out to wherever you’re moving to than to pay for the excess weight that all the food they’ve packed for you is probably going to cost you. Whether you like the packed foods or not is irrelevant, what matters is that you now have enough packed Sheeshbarak to feed a small village.
4. They track your flights like the CIA.
At any moment in time, your parents will know where your flight is, what terminal you have to be at (before you even do), and if you’ve landed. Thank god for the internet.
5. They call you. Incessantly.
You end up talking to your parents more than you did when you were living in the same house, and overall, more than you had spoken to them your entire life.
6. They force you to befriend others expats.
Your parents will find that one third cousin from your grandad (who you never knew) that lives somewhere on the same continent that you moved to, and force you to take the 7 hour trip to meet them. They then will ask you every day if you guys are friends and if you have plans together, and you have to explain to them that you can’t feasibly befriend someone who lives so far away, and just because there are trains that can connect the two of you doesn’t mean they should.
7. You get a crash course on basic chores.
At some point in time, you’ll realise your complete incompetence when it comes to adulting, and you’ll make the call of shame, i.e. you’ll have a three hour phone call that is basically a crash course on all things laundry, cooking, and cleaning.
8. You become a news reporter for your parents.
Whenever anything happens in the country you’ve moved to, you’re presumed to be the victim. So, you always keep your phone charged and your notifications on, because if someone got murdered in Texas, your mum will worry that it was you, in New York, who’s the unidentified dead person. Meanwhile, watch as they downplay whatever explosion happens in their literal street as “masar she!!”
9. You’re your family’s AliExpress.
Acceptance is achieved, and your family begins to slyly ask you for favours, especially around the times you’re planning to visit Lebanon. You suddenly see yourself transformed from estranged child to a postal service, receiving your cousins orders from Amazon and your neighbours parcels, and you go back home having packed one shirt among all the gifts you have to take back with you. At least no one’s crying anymore.
10. Drama ensues when you visit.
Your parents show up early to the airport, and await you with anxiety similar to parents awaiting the release of revolutionaries from Israeli prisons. You’re hugged like you’ve never been hugged before, and you’re set on another nationwide tour to greet all your relatives. Bonus points to your parents if they try to introduce you to a good Lebanese husband/wife so you’d have “she bezakker bel balad “.
