Mr. Yazbek’s Gift

As I reach new mileposts in life -new school, new job, new country, marriage, children- I often shed the superflous clutter of my previous existence. Not everything, of course. Photographs are preciously preserved as are other sentimental momentos of the past. The oldest such momento, surviving numerous life-changing events, sits in the drawer of my nightstand. It is a little green notebook with frayed and discolored pages, containing in the careful and deliberate handwriting of a thirteen year old, sayings and verses of poems in Arabic.

The thirteen year old was me, long ago. My Arabic teacher at the French Catholic school I attended in Lebanon, was Mr. Yazbek. He had the habit of peppering his lessons with sayings and verses from famous and not so famous poets. There was a little Ibn el-Rumi, a little Jibran, something from al-Buhtary and even a few of Mr. Yazbek's own poems. I would quickly jot down what he said in class and later collected them carefully in my green notebook, neatly divided under catogories like "greed", "courage" or "virtue". None of these sayings or verses were part of the curriculum and so I did not have to memorize them for an exam. I am not sure what compelled me to compile these sayings except the sense the Mr. Yazbek was different than other teachers.

Perhaps it was the way he unexpectedly tossed out his little gems, with a flourish and conviction that was absent when he taught us the standard lessons. For Mr. Yazbek, the Arabic language was not just a tool of the trade, it was a passion that he tried to impart to his students. His literary knowledge of Arabic was broad. Once a week, when most of the boys in the school attended mass, Mr. Yazbek, a Christian, would bring together the handful of Muslim boys in my class and teach us verses from the Quran. That Mr. Yazbek took the time to do that for us warms my heart to this day. To some, what he did may seem incongruous; to me it makes perfect sense. Mr. Yazbek has definitely earned his place in my imaginary Levantine dreamhouse where tolerance and respect reign supreme.

Mr. Yazbek was my last Arabic teacher. We left Lebanon that year prematurely ending my secondary school education in Arabic. I would never be exposed to literary Arabic beyond the tantalizing snippets that Mr. Yazbek introduced me to. It is something I regret and makes me feel somehow lacking especially that my father, a prolific writer, has an excellent command of the language; and who doesn't want to measure up to their father?

And so I continue to hold on tightly to the little green notebook, Mr. Yazbek’s gift. On the one hand the notebook reminds me of Mr. Yazbek's passion but also my inadequacy when it comes to Arabic. On the other hand, armed with this thin tome of sayings, I also feel that I still have my foot (more like my toe) in the door of Arabic literature... After all, I can still quote verses from Ibn el-Rumi:

كم من منزل في الارض يألفه ألفتى ـــ و حنينه أبدا لأؤل منزل

نقل فؤادك حيث شئت في ألهوى ـــ ما ألحب ألأ للحبيب ألأول

أبن ألرومي