“Were” does not refer to location as it is referring to the past tense of the subject in the sentence, but then again I am not an English teacher/professor.
In the age of typos and lackadaisical spelling, I could see how you would confuse “were” for “where. Even then the sentence doesn’t make sense if you replace “where” for “were” without adding an “are” into the sentence.
Errant spell check late at night...that is my excuse and I am sticking with it ;-)