COLUMBUS — Julia Bowling is home for the holidays following a rocky five-month stay in Beirut, Lebanon, a country whose crumbling economy has been exacerbated by a political crisis.
A Columbus native, Bowling, 25, is currently in the midst of her second school year teaching the children of Syrian refugees in the heart of Beirut at the Beirut Bridge of Hope. But for three short weeks, Bowling has been living in the comfort of her family’s Columbus home, back in Indiana to celebrate Christmas and her brother’s wedding.
Last fall, Bowling was considering enrolling at Indiana Bible College close to home or the opportunity to teach a year in Beirut after attending a session about the Lebanon school at the Apostolic Tabernacle of Edinburgh.
Beirut Bridge of Hope founders Toufic and April Azar and their family spoke at the church about the Syrian refugee crisis and the need to help families who had fled to Lebanon from Syria.
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Syrian refugee children ages 5 to 8 may attend the school to learn math, English and Arabic writing. Intrigued, she looked into the school further and decided it would be her destination.
Over the last summer, Bowling raised funds to go back to Beirut to teach a second year at the school, and in mid-August, she was back where she said she belongs.
“I thought my second trip would be easier, but I feel like it was almost more difficult because you know a little bit more of what you’re going into,” Bowling said. “Yeah, you can prepare better, but at the same time, you know all these different feelings and emotions that are going to hit. And the different things you’re going to struggle with. It makes it almost harder.”
When Bowling arrived for her second stay in Beirut, her original plans changed slightly after school was delayed because of political turmoil in the city. During that time, Bowling assisted in different areas at the church and continued to prepare for the school year. Shortly after a week into the school year, protests broke out in Beirut in October, focused on blocking roads, reclaiming public spaces, staging sit-ins and protesting outside key state institutions.
The nationwide Lebanese protests are being called a reaction against the government’s planned taxes on gasoline, tobacco and online phone calls through communication apps like WhatsApp. The revolution has also been attributed to the state’s failure to provide basic services like water, electricity and sanitation.
On Oct. 29, Lebanon Prime Minister Saad Hariri announced the resignation of his government in response to the protests.
Bowling said the revolution has not affected her majorly, however, she did have to seek shelter away from her apartment because fumes from burnt tires polluted the air and she was unsure how the protests would continue to play out.
“It was really more interesting than anything else to see how things were going in a different country and how they worked through difficulties,” Bowling said.
During that time, Bowling communicated with her students via WhatsApp, sending them math problems, vocabulary words and educational videos.
“We didn’t know how long it was going to go on,” she said. “The boredom and thinking, ‘I’m not doing what I came to do,’ that was the hardest part for me.”
Bowling and the students went back to school in late October for about eight weeks until the Christmas break.
Since coming home earlier this month, Bowling has spent every waking hour catching up with friends and family, making and baking holiday treats, preparing for her brother’s Dec. 27 wedding and gearing up for the second stint of her stay in Beirut.
“It’s amazing to be home. It’s never long enough,” she said. “You try to pack everything you can into your time at home, but it’s wonderful. I told myself, ‘I’ve got to make it home for Christmas.’ Christmas, I need to be here because our family is very close and to miss them at Christmas would be very hard.”
Bowling said she does face a sort of culture shock when she comes home and tries to recall what is normal.
“The human body was not made to jump from that far away to over here in that amount of time,” she said.
Ahead of her trip back to Beirut, Bowling has collected several gifts to give her students and their families for Christmas, including books, Matchbox cars, ping pong sets, sets of cards, jump ropes and crayons.
Before leaving for holiday break, the school and church hosted a Christmas gathering for the students and their families, where they shared the Christmas story and the reason beyond presents why Christmas is celebrated.
Bowling said the students were so attentive and enjoyed the story. Spending time with them outside of the classroom, she said, was one of her favorite parts of her stay in Beirut.
“To get to have special time with them, to just have fun and spread the joy and love that we’re all used to feeling this season, to give them a glimpse and a taste of that is just so special,” Bowling said.
In April, Bowling’s own mother, Rhonda, spent a month in Beirut, where she was able to put herself in her daughter’s shoes and see just what it is she does everyday.
Rhonda Bowling said the visit was just long enough to build relationships with the children and their families, to learn about their situations and understand their circumstances. She recalled one family who invited Julia Bowling and her mother to dinner.
“You know their circumstances — they have nothing,” Rhonda Bowling said. “This one lady, through her son and the broken English trying to communicate, said, ‘We want you to come for dinner.’ These people have nothing, but just that hospitality, they wanted to give me whatever they had. The people are just amazing. They’re so hospitable, kind, generous.”
The trip gave her a greater appreciation for what her daughter is doing and a greater understanding of some of the challenges she faces living in a foreign country, Rhonda Bowling said.
Now, when Julia Bowling shares photos with her mother, Rhonda Bowling said she can instantly reconnect with what’s happening and who is in the photos.
“I’m really excited to get back. I wish everyone could experience being there and see what I see — their smiles, their eyes light up over something they enjoy or love,” Julia Bowling said. “Being able to work with them and be a help to them, sometimes I feel like I’m accomplishing so little and sometimes I question if they’re really learning. Then, you go and talk to the families and they see their children progressing and learning new things.”
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A GoFundMe page has been set up to help Julia Bowling in her teaching mission at the Beirut Bridge of Hope school in Lebanon.
To learn more, visit gofundme.com/Build-A-Bridge-of-Hope
To learn more about the school, visit bbhope.org.
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