The techno beat falls away for a moment as the DJ lines up another song.
asserted
DJ → fall → song
Its opening chords pulse through the speakers and the room erupts.
asserted
room → pulse → speakers
In the crush of the club, people cheer and scramble onto wooden tables and chairs, craning over one another for a better view of the woman stepping onto the dance floor.
asserted
people → cheer → floor
As her white silk skirt floats around her, Naima Yazbek, 55, twirls to the sound of the classical Arabic song Alf Leila wa Leila (One Thousand and One Nights), letting the music carry her through every flick of the wrist, every spin.
At Madame Om, a bearded man with broad shoulders snaps a paper fan to the beat, his clapping setting off others around him.
asserted
clapping → float → him
For the length of the song, no one appears particularly concerned about whether the woman before them can speak Arabic, which passport she carries, or where she was born.
asserted
she → appear → passport
The crowd simply wants to watch her dance.
asserted
her → want → ?
Outside this room, those distinctions have followed Naima for years.
asserted
distinctions → follow → years
A few days before the performance, sitting beneath towering pine trees outside Cafe Younes in Beirut's Hamra neighbourhood, she crosses her tanned legs and lights a cigarette.
asserted
she → sit → cigarette
Large black fans turn slowly around her, stirring the hot city air.
asserted
fans → turn → air
Between puffs of smoke, she explains that dance was bound up with another reason for coming to Lebanon: understanding the culture she had grown up knowing through her family.
asserted
she → explain → family
“As a belly dancer and singer, I wanted to be here, [to] learn the language, the culture, [and] to understand my family roots.”
asserted
I → want → roots
Born in Sao Paulo into a family of Lebanese descent, Naima says her relationship with Lebanon began long before she first set foot in the country in the summer of 2009.
asserted
she → bear → 2009
Like millions of Brazilians whose family histories stretch back to Lebanon, she inherited a relationship with a place she knew first through other people's memories.
asserted
she → stretch → memories
Eventually, she would decide to make that place home.
asserted
place → decide → ?
Inherited homelands
Naima's Christian ancestors were among those who left what was then Ottoman-ruled Greater Syria for Brazil in the late 19th century.
asserted
what → inherit → century
Economic hardship, including the decline of Mount Lebanon's silk economy, helped drive migration to the Americas, where expanding economies offered the prospect of work and a different future.
asserted
economies → include → work
The migration would eventually create one of the world's largest Lebanese diasporas.
asserted
migration → create → diasporas
Brazil's foreign ministry estimates that as many as 10 million Lebanese people and their descendants now live in the country.
asserted
people → estimate → country
For generations, Naima's family built its life there, often marrying within the Lebanese diaspora.
asserted
family → build → diaspora
But the idea of Lebanon never entirely disappeared.
asserted
idea → disappear → Lebanon
In 1928, her great-grandfather even persuaded his wife, Odete, to try living in Lebanon.
asserted
grandfather → persuade → Lebanon
The experiment lasted only a few months.
asserted
experiment → last → months
He returned to Brazil, feeling that the Lebanon he encountered was no longer the country he remembered.
asserted
he → return → Brazil
More than 80 years later, their great-granddaughter would make the same journey and reach a very different conclusion.
asserted
granddaughter → make → conclusion
Sitting in Beirut, Naima recounts taking a 23andMe ancestry test.
asserted
Naima → sit → test
It estimated her ancestry as 70.9 percent Lebanese.
asserted
It → estimate → Lebanese
She repeats the figure proudly, an authoritative-sounding number, however imperfect, for a connection she had long felt without needing to measure it.
asserted
she → repeat → it
Naima does not hold a Lebanese passport.
asserted
Naima → hold → passport
Lebanese nationality law generally allows fathers, but not mothers, to transmit citizenship to their children on equal terms.
asserted
fathers → allow → terms
Naima's Lebanese ancestry runs through women on both sides of her family: her mother is of Lebanese descent but does not hold citizenship, while her father's Lebanese heritage came through his mother.
asserted
heritage → run → mother
Neither parent could therefore pass Lebanese nationality to Naima.
uncertain
parent → pass → Naima
When she first arrived, she needed an iqama, or residency permit, through a sponsor.
asserted
she → arrive → sponsor
The country she regarded as part of her inheritance regarded her, legally, as a foreigner.
asserted
she → regard → foreigner
But the feeling she describes was quite different.
asserted
she → describe → ?
“From the moment I came here, I felt this thing, something I don't know how to explain, like spiritual, or karma, or mission.”
asserted
I → come → thing
Her voice jumps up an octave.
asserted
voice → jump → octave
Her hands move through the air as though she might somehow make visible the feeling she is struggling to name.
uncertain
she → move → air
She had initially come for two months, intending to explore her Lebanese heritage.
asserted
She → come → heritage
Instead, it became something more permanent.
asserted
it → become → ?
“I came back to Brazil, and I couldn't sleep.
asserted
I → come → Brazil
…and 174 more, not listed.
The Aporia
