A Year in the Fulbright Life: Silva’s Story

7 min readDec 3, 2022

A Year in the Fulbright Life, a FulbrightMENA blog series, showcases a handful of Fulbright Foreign Students as they navigate one program year, month by month, from orientation to graduation in the United States.

Fulbright Student Silva shared highlights from different months throughout her two-year program in her A Year in the Fulbright Life article.

October 2022

I’ve really enjoyed my life in the United States as a Fulbrighter so far! But it has not always been easy. Thankfully, I have a solution: fulfilling my cravings for mouthwatering Lebanese cuisine. I recently decided to make some after I saw that most of my fellow students were mainly eating frozen pizzas and mac-and-cheese. I began managing my time to practice cooking some dishes, Lebanese and Mediterranean, in order to share with faculty and friends. I’ve also had the chance to share Lebanese cooking outside the university! Recently I visited a middle school where I had the chance to teach students how to make Tabbouleh salad. We made the famous salad together, and afterwards I was able to teach them some of the Lebanese language!

Fun fact: Tabbouleh is a vegan salad and has the same colors as the Lebanese flag!

November 2022

In addition to my studies, I’ve been enjoying dancing while on my Fulbright Program. Not only did I prepare a PowerPoint presentation to talk about the numerous types of Armenian dances and performa solo dance, but I also taught the class about my hometown’s traditional folk dance! I was so happy to share my culture, and we all enjoyed learning and dancing together.

December 2022

I decided to escape the East Coast cold & spend it in San Francisco, California. I enjoyed exploring the city and seeing the Golden Gate Bridge, one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World. I visited Silicon Valley, the world’s technology hub, Chinatown, Little Italy, and Santa Cruz, I then spent New Year’s and Christmas time with my relatives. One of my favorite experiences from the holidays was driving through the most crooked street in the world, Lombard Street.

February 2023

I decided to make heart-shaped manakish for Tea Time to share with the Math Department on Valentine’s Day. Manakish is a popular Lebanese /Levantine food consisting of dough with zaa’tar, cheese or any other topping.

March 2023

I decided to spend my Spring Break volunteering at an Elephant Sanctuary which is located in Hohenwald, Tennessee. It is the only sanctuary in the United States that focuses entirely on elephants! I spent one week with the Community Engaged Leadership group helping with different types of activities at the Sanctuary (building enrichment items for the elephants, reorganizing the office, painting…), meeting the retired Asian and African Elephants, and advocating for animal rights and welfare.

April 2023

I am Lebanese-Armenian and recently hosted an event on campus to commemorate the Armenian Genocide which took place on April 24th. I gave a presentation on how it all started and how my great-grandparents ended up in Anjar, Lebanon from Musa Dagh, Armenia. After that, we watched the documentary “Anjar: Flowers, Goats and Heroes” together which served as a visual representation of the traumatic but heroic stories of the Musadaghians.

January 2024

In January, during the winter break, I went on an unforgettable trip to Las Vegas. I particularly enjoyed the incredible replicas of monuments and buildings from Paris, Egypt, and New York. On the last morning, I got out of the city and visited the mesmerizing Seven Magic Mountains. Seeing the Grand Canyon while I was on the flight to Las Vegas was also a plus.

One other highlight of this month, and even of my Fulbright Program, was the great cultural experience of attending a Chinese Lunar New Year celebration. It was enlightening to learn about different traditions and preparations for the Chinese Lunar Year.

I greatly enjoyed the food, and I even won a gift by answering trivia questions.

Fun fact: I learned that eating chicken feet is a thing.

February 2024

The Amideast 2024 Reentry Workshop was one of the highlights of the Fulbright journey. Being able to attend a workshop surrounded by Fulbrighters both from your country and surrounding ones was a great educational and social experience. What gathered us all besides the award and our thriving passion for our fields was being pinned with the feeling of homesickness. That was easily solved by singing the Lebanese song “Sahar-Layli” by Fairouz on the streets of DC while we were on our way to visit the Lincoln Memorial. It truly felt like déjà-vu when we went to get Shawarma, my favorite sandwich, which I had not had in a while at a Lebanese restaurant, and were surrounded by familiar faces; Washington, DC, being the great cosmopolitan city that it is.

March 2024

Nashville was one of the best trips I have had, especially since it was only a few hours drive from Boone, North Carolina. The city was lively with music and performances everywhere. I finally tried the Original Nashville Hot Chicken and enjoyed visiting the murals in east Nashville.

April 2024

As a cultural ambassador at my host university, it was a pleasure to be on an international student panel, along with other international students, where I answered numerous questions about studying abroad and what my experience has been like as a Lebanese-Armenian Fulbright Student in the United States. To introduce my culture more vividly, I performed an Armenian dance, “Naz Bar”.

May 2024

And boom! Two years flew by just like that! Just because my studies were over, did not mean my part as a cultural ambassador was. With a dear American friend who has a Lebanese background, we were able to host a graduation party with some Lebanese food which we catered ourselves and everyone enjoyed. It was great having some of my friends over who supported me throughout my journey!

June 2024

During my program, I participated in the program Upward Bound. Not only was I teaching students mathematics, I was teaching them research skills. I am so proud that my rising senior students were successfully able to research and do a presentation on Abstract Algebra, which is a specific course for Math major students.

As my Fulbright journey in Boone, North Carolina was ending, I wanted to share two of the things I enjoyed during my Fulbright Program in a small college town surrounded by nature. The first one is hiking the mountains that my university is surrounded by! The picture below was at the Beacon Heights summit.

Secondly, for me, if you are searching for the best sunset view, visiting the mountainous town of Boone, North Carolina, is a must! Boone is located in the Appalachian Mountains which offers great viewpoints!