Viera Obeid
About me
I am a Slovak, born in 1983, who has studied international politics in Prague. I lived in Prague for 9 years before I met my future husband who happened to be a Lebanese from Beirut. At the moment we live here with our family, I work with the local university, and the kids have started school.
Why Beirut
I’ve lived in Beirut since 2011. When I first came here, it was the time of my life! I just dropped a career at a multinational to move to this charming gem in the Middle East and pursue my PhD studies. Imagine more than 300 sunny days a year!
Beirut is not a beauty at first sight, you need to take your time to discover it and to cherish all its scars. It is definitely a city with a soul that lives, breathes, suffers and celebrates together with its kindhearted inhabitants. What is amazing in Lebanon is that you can quite effortlessly grab three languages. Most of the population in Beirut will speak Arabic, French and English. So any taxi driver or owner of a coffee shop will try to communicate with you.
You might be surprised how personal Lebanese people are: they just pose you a question you would prefer to avoid answering but they don’t give you this option. Well, my advice is to relax and enjoy it, they are not investigating you, they are only genuinely curious 🙂
