ESSAY FOR VITTLES: How Lebanon's Wineries Remain Rooted
Take pride in our makers and our people
It’s an honor that the folks featured trusted me to write this during this time. Big thanks to Abbas, Rami, Carol, Tatiana, John, and Sari.
I also want to give big hugs to my friend, N.A. Mansour, for choosing me to write this but also for being my confidant along the way. We’d been talking about this piece over the summer but as things worsened here and in Palestine, it took me a while to find my way back to this essay as it changed form with the times.
The thing that didn’t change? I was adamant about how we as people were going to be depicted while enduring this war. I did not want us and what we are going through to be reduced to the typical winemaking in the tumultuous Middle East story. As Rami El Sabban said when I spoke to him last month, “there is an awakening happening, we don’t wanna be perceived as such.”
You can donate to his collective’s mutual fund which is providing food, clothing, hygiene products, and medicine to those in need.
Please read the full essay and then take action in ways that support those on the ground.
