WASHINGTON: There is precision in the way the dozens of medical books are evenly placed on the bookshelves, and the diplomas ­ too many to count in the few minutes I have alone before our interview begins ­ line one wall in uniform correctness.
The desk is large and neat and located in one corner of the office; the chairs are comfortable, but firm. The overall effect is at once measured and restful: an impression that becomes more pronounced once Amin Barakat steps into the room.
A pediatrician and a clinical professor at the Georgetown University Medical Center, Barakat has been listed among the top-rated physicians in the US. He is also the author of two books on kidney disease in children, has published a countless number of papers and chapters in American and international medical journals and textbooks, and even had a medical condition named after him.
Yet ask the soft-spoken Barakat what he believes are the reasons behind his success and he does not hesitate to speak with warmth of the country he left behind in 1986 when civil war and fear for his family’s safety drove him away.
“I owe everything to Lebanon, to AUB, and to my community,” Barakat tells me. “It’s where I grew physically, emotionally, and professionally.”
Barakat graduated with an MD from the American University of Beirut in 1967 and subsequently went to the US for additional training at Johns Hopkins and at Georgetown University, where he specialized in pediatric nephrology (kidney disease in children).
He says the years 1977-86, when he was practicing and teaching at the AUB hospital, were very rewarding.
“I felt I was contributing because my specialty was really needed.” But everyone has a tolerance threshold, Barakat continues, and despite a fulfilling job, life in the midst of civil war eventually became “too difficult to survive.”
Barakat ­ along with his wife Amal and their three children ­ left his beloved Ras Beirut and took a position as associate professor in the department of pediatrics at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.
Three years later, the family moved to the Washington, DC, area, where they have remained ever since.
The US has been good to Barakat and he has been good to it in return.
“It’s very easy to feel that this is your country,” he says.
“People here respect you if you hold on to your ethnicity. So if you’re a good Lebanese, it’s a plus,” he explains.
“But you also have to be a good American.”
Barakat was recently awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honor by the National Coalition of Ethnic Organizations. The medal is given every year to a group of Americans who have made significant contributions to the country and to humanity in their field.
It is meant to honor those who live the American ideal while preserving the values of their particular culture and helping their community to participate in the life of their adopted country.
“I think of myself as a universal person,” Barakat maintains. “When I want to help as a doctor, humanity is my aim and national borders don’t matter.”
The inner boundaries, however, are found after that indistinct line which separates emotions from the intellect.
“When we come to the US,” says Barakat, “the mind works here, but the heart works in Lebanon.” He speaks for many of the new Lebanese immigrants whose determination to succeed as Americans seems to exist alongside an unending longing for home.
Besides serving on various AUB academic and medical committees since 1973, Barakat has held several positions with the university’s alumni association. He was a member of the association’s board and president of its medical chapter.
He was also a founder and member of the board for the university association’s Tennessee chapter.
Between 1993-95, he served as president of the AUB Alumni Association of North America, where he helped to raise millions of dollars to assist the university in its recovery.
“Americans, when they study at a university, feel indebted to the institution for the rest of their lives,” Barakat explains.
“We need to promote this idea among Lebanese graduates so our universities can go on to help others.”
Just over a year ago, Barakat set up the American Foundation for St. Georges Hospital in Beirut. The foundation raises funds to help the Achrafieh hospital develop higher-quality care for the needy.
It also supports the education, research, and post-graduate training of physicians and other healthcare professionals at the hospital.
“They needed our help so we gave it to them,” Barakat says matter-of-factly.
It’s the kind of help that many Lebanese-Americans would be more than prepared to provide, he continues. “It’s a way of paying back our debts to Lebanon. Lebanon should use those of us who are outside.”
Barakat says that he sometimes thinks of “going back” but does not know when that will be nor in what capacity.
Perhaps he will retire in Lebanon? “I would long to do that but, like many Lebanese, I am anchored here because of my children.”
And like many Lebanese-Americans, Barakat visits his home country on a regular basis to get together with the family he left behind, including his sister and his mother and father, both of whom have reached the the age of 90.
For the moment, Barakat says, he intends to continue doing what he likes to do best, that is helping children in his capacity as physician and involving himself in “extra-curricular” activities for the benefit of the country that shaped him.
A scientist and a humanitarian, Barakat says this to those who remained in Lebanon: “Don’t look at those of us who left as deserters.
“Lebanon is still in our hearts and we’re all ready to do anything we can.”