OMAR MOUALLEM is an author, filmmaker, and educator. His latest book, Praying to the West, was named one of the Globe and Mail’s 100 best books of 2021. His documentary The Last Baron, about the unlikely link between a Canadian fast-food institution and the Lebanese civil war, was hailed as “one of the best Canadian food documentaries” by Air Canada’s enRoute magazine. Omar is also the “fake dean” of Pandemic University, a virtual school he founded in support of writers affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.