In this episode, I speak with Louis Blin, former French ambassador and expert on the Middle East, about the deep historical ties between Europe and the Arab world.

We unpack how figures like Napoleon Bonaparte were influenced by the East, and how centuries of cultural exchange shaped everything from food to language to political thought.

The conversation also dives into how colonial history reshaped perceptions of the Middle East, and why those narratives still affect how we see identity and modernity today.

This episode invites you to rethink where cultures begin and end, and whether those boundaries ever truly existed.