Jaredbiz.Blog

Nearing the end of the grueling two-year pandemic, 19-year-old me stood in front of my parents with a PowerPoint presentation and probably gave them a few heart attacks. I was trying to convince them not only to let me study abroad in Paris for the spring, but to let me go to Tunisia first. Yes, Tunisia. A small North African Arab nation. Not exactly your average study abroad pick. Cue the raised eyebrows.

Even now, people still ask the same question. Sometimes with genuine curiosity. Other times with the kind of panic that feels like it should come with a travel warning.

“Why Tunisia of all places? Why not London? Barcelona? Amsterdam?”

Translation:
Why not somewhere more Instagrammable, more familiar, more white?

The answer isn’t simple. And it isn’t profound. It started with a class. A sample lecture at the University of San Francisco where Professor Gifford unraveled the West’s fear of the Middle East. Even in Disney’s beloved Aladdin.

That lecture stayed with me. I’ve since taught it to every student I’ve had—from wide-eyed first graders to high school juniors asking tough questions about the world.

Within days of starting college, I declared a minor in Middle Eastern Studies. I never looked back.

Where Curiosity Led Me

That decision cracked open a world I hadn’t known I needed. Even the term “Middle East” is debated among scholars. Is it West Asia? North Africa? The Levant? Regardless of the label, this vast region is constantly flattened in the Western imagination—reduced to conflict, headlines, and fear. One American president even called it a “desolate car parking lot.”

But I had started to see something else. Layers. Beauty. Depth. Civilizations that predate and outlast every empire that ever tried to claim them.

Classes like Intro to Islam, Middle Eastern Peoples and Cultures, and Politics of the Middle East gave me a foundation. Meanwhile, I was majoring in International Studies with a concentration in Global Politics and earning a minor in French. It might have looked messy on paper, but it wasn’t. I was building a bridge between all the parts of myself—academic, personal, and linguistic.

And that’s when Tunisia began whispering to me.

Choosing Tunisia

I ruled out Morocco pretty quickly. No shade. Just instinct. I’m a Taurus, after all. Stubborn but intuitive. I could’ve gone to Lebanon. That left Algeria or Tunisia. Something about Tunisia tugged at me like a thread I couldn’t ignore.

The more I learned, the more I fell in love. Especially with the story of the Arab Spring.

During a fall semester Zoom class from my childhood bedroom, I studied how the Arab Spring began in December 2010 when Mohamed Bouazizi, a street vendor in southern Tunisia, set himself on fire in protest of government injustice. His act sparked a wave of revolution across the region. From Tunisia to Egypt, Syria to Yemen, millions took to the streets demanding change.

But true regime change? That only happened in three countries: Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya.

And Tunisia—where it all began—became the beating heart of the movement.

The role of social media in the uprising? That became the focus of my honors thesis, published in 2023.

Convincing Everyone (Including Myself)

By then, I had chosen my program through the School for International Training. It would start in Palermo, Sicily and then move to the coastal town of Sidi Bou Saïd, just outside of Tunis.

But getting there wasn’t easy.

I had to convince my family. My friends. And if I’m being honest, myself.

I pitched Tunisia with extra sparkle on the Italy part. And somehow, maybe through sheer willpower or the magic of a well-designed Canva slide, I was headed to Tunisia in the fall of 2022.

The months between committing and boarding that plane were a blur. I worked nonstop delivering Round Table Pizza across Calaveras County, saving every penny I could for my year abroad.

But what I remember most wasn’t the hustle. It was the quiet fear that hummed beneath it all.

“Why Tunisia?”

What they meant was:
Aren’t you scared?

Aren’t you scared to be a blue-eyed, white, openly gay man in a Muslim-majority country? A place where queerness can mean legal danger or worse?

Of course I was scared. I smiled through it, nodded, gave my rehearsed answers. But I was terrified.

It was unknown territory. For me. For my family. For my small-town community.

But here’s the thing.
It was unknown to us.
That didn’t mean it was unknown to the rest of the world.

What I Couldn’t Have Dreamed

I did my homework. I studied. I listened. I practiced French and took Arabic. I could name every Tunisian president, recite parts of the constitution, trace the nation’s story from Ancient Carthage to the 2019 elections. I led with curiosity, not fear.

And I had no idea, not in my wildest dream, what would be waiting for me on the other side of that plane ride.

Love.
Heartbreak.
Friendship.
Community.
Late-night drives with the windows down and the sea in the distance.
Endless cups of mint tea with floating pine nuts.
Feral cats who became familiar companions.
Moments that cracked me open and stitched me back together.

I fell in love with a nation and its people in a way I’ll carry with me forever.

This is only the beginning of those stories.
More to come.

Yaishek (thank you),
Jarouda (Jared)