Nahlah Ayed, the host of CBC Radio’s Ideas, is an award-winning veteran foreign news reporter who spent nearly a decade in the Middle East covering the region’s many conflicts, and later in London where she covered major stories from Russia’s annexation of Crimea, Europe’s refugee crisis; and the Brexit vote and its fallout. In 2012, her memoir, A Thousand Farewells: A Reporter’s Journey From Refugee Camp to the Arab Spring, was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award. Nahlah was born and raised (mostly) in Winnipeg, Canada.