“But don’t get me wrong, I’m not Middle Eastern,” Uncle interrupts. “I’m from the Levant! A proud descendant of Hellenistic culture. The Mediterranean and the Near East were one. No one talks about this anymore, but it’s a fact. Smyrna, Alexandria, Beirut—they were profoundly cosmopolitan. We weren’t in separate boxes, the Greeks here, the Syrians over there. We constantly mingled.
