Retired Lebanese-American Professor Unites with Long-lost Relatives
Retired LebaneseAmerican Professor Unites with Long-lost by lau Staff Relatives in June, 2008, Dr. lawrence aleamoni, a retired professor from the university of arizona, in the united States, was invited to lau to evaluate the Department of education as he had done dozens of times serving as a consultant to over 100 universities across the globe. but unlike his other trips outside the united States, the visit to lebanon presented an opportunity to discover his roots, as both his mother and father had emigrated from the country, but had never brought their son back to be introduced to his relatives. Curious as anyone in his position would have been, aleamoni began asking questions and sought help to find his relatives. “We had friends, faculty and administrators at lau all trying to locate any known family members, with only vague ideas of where my mother and father had lived in lebanon,” he said. “unfortunately, we were not successful.” One year later, aleamoni was again invited to lau by the Department of education, this time to lead a week-long workshop
Aleamoni with extended family
on research methods and statistics. Having discovered the name of his mother’s village, he was more optimistic about his chances of locating his relatives this time around. During a meeting over coffee with the chair of the Department of education, Dr. ahmad Oueini and his wife, Katia, aleamoni discovered that Katia came from the same village as aleamoni’s mother, Jebrayel aaqar. Within 10 minutes, Katia was able to locate aleamoni’s last living uncle. the following day, aleamoni paid his uncle a visit, and soon after, met other members of his extended family. “this was an overwhelming experience as i had never met any of these family members before,” he said. “this reunion would not have been possible without the dedicated help of the lau faculty and administration, as well as a great deal of luck!”
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