After 15 years in Lansing, she moved to Washington, D.C., in 1950, having accepted a job monitoring and translating international news for the U.S. Department of Defense.[1][2] In 1954, she published a book of Arabic proverbs and songs she had translated into English, Alf mit̲l wa-mit̲l (A Thousand and One Arabic Proverbs), with a publisher in Beirut.[3][2][14][15] In this period she also wrote a popular collection of Lebanese-Syrian recipes, initially with a publisher in Washington, but later republished in Detroit, Beirut, and Sherbrooke.[2][14]