Najwa Zebian

The Bekaa valley in Lebanon is where Najwa Zebian spent her childhood. She moved to Ontario at sixteen, during the 2006 war, and spent her first years there feeling out of place; teaching a class of young refugees some time later turned her back towards writing. Mind Platter, which she brought out herself in January 2016, gathers more than two hundred short reflections of roughly a page each on hurt, friendship, respect and self-worth, and the first $2,300 it earned went to a Syrian refugee fund. She trained as a teacher, not a counsellor. A biology degree from Western Ontario came in 2010, a master's in curriculum studies in 2013, and a doctorate in educational leadership in 2022. The Nectar of Pain and Sparks of Phoenix followed. She works now as a speaker as well as a writer, and lives in London, Ontario.