My name is Jana, I’m 20 years old and this is my experience.

To me, Lebanon used to be home – it always had been. Like anywhere that you call home, you expect safety, stability and basic human rights, yet I feel as though I have been stripped of this.

I watch loved ones plead to leave, I feel plagued with fear and anxiety and I wonder how anybody can still call Lebanon home. 

At the time of the explosion, I was only on my second week of work at a wellness centre. I had planned to continue studying towards my Bachelor degree in Fashion Design but, due to the economic crisis in Lebanon, it was near to impossible for my family and I couldn’t afford my tuition fees. When the Coronavirus pandemic spiked in Lebanon, the economic crisis only worsened, leaving over half of Lebanon’s population either in or on the brink of poverty. It was as though the people of Lebanon were given a choice to die from the virus or die from poverty and the Government were not seeming to help us. As our money decreased, housing prices and rent increased, hospitals needed equipment and our stores lacked stock.

The explosion is something that I struggle to articulate. It’s the type of thing that shakes you and the people around you to the core and the only emotion you can feel is raw, sheer hopelessness. It’s heart-breaking. In fact, it alters you as a person. I live my life in a state of complete anxiety, haunted by the explosion and waiting every day for something else terrible to happen. 

Beirut is devastated. At the time of writing, the explosion claimed 220 victims and left thousands of families homeless and thousands injured. We are all extremely afraid.

Although, it saddens me that Lebanon is almost unrecognisable to the place that it once was – filled with love and hope. I used to think that I’d never stray away from my home and I’d always be close to the people I love. I assumed I’d always be surrounded by familiar sky-high concrete buildings and miles of greenery. Yet now, on the first chance for my siblings and I to leave, I now recognise that we will be amongst the first to go. 

Thankfully, the people of Lebanon are somehow optimistic and filled with life, despite our circumstances. We’re all working together to clean up the streets of Beirut. Although we are amongst crisis after crisis, we pledge to devote ourselves to helping one another and steering clear of corruption. Our government are extremely rich and have taken basic life needs away from us but we are choosing to piece ourselves back together. You can break the country but you cannot break the people.