“And you miss her, of course,” another girl teased him.
“I miss her very much. Please let us help each other find our loved ones. Thousands of us are in the same boat.”
The crowd began to depart with a glee on their faces. Yousif’s romantic appeal seemed to have drained the tension out of them. But the one thing Yousif did not anticipate was the unlikely sight of the lady in the blue dress approaching him.
“If I were younger I’d wish you and I were in the same boat,” she whispered in his ear, smiling.
The glint in her eyes revealed a charm he would not have expected.
Several good things emerged out of the principal’s meeting two days later with the advisory committee. Yousif was among the few faculty who had been asked to attend. Ustaz Sa’adeh not only convinced four men and three women that the opening of the school was in the best interest of their children, but that ultimately it was in the best national interest as well.
“The decision to return home belongs to none of us,” he said. “It’s in the hands of governments and we all know how slow that can be. While waiting for the ministry of education to triple or quadruple the number of schools needed to accommodate the influx of refugees and the country’s natural growth, it would be a shame to let the children suffer more than they’re suffering already.”
From Yousif’s point of view, common sense reigned and quiet filled the room.
“Right now,” the principal added, “we should concentrate on what we can do and not on what we wish would happen. The minute we realize that returning home is imminent—or is an option—I’ll be the first to strike the tent, so to speak, and head back to Ardallah. Until then we should do what we can to educate our children. Wasting a mind is a crime.”
Yousif observed that the committee members were much nicer in private than they had been in public. Around the shoddy rectangular table in the faculty lounge, they listened and spoke as one family. Yes, they agreed, there was no need to let children miss school. The only thing that troubled them was giving the enemy the impression that they were willing “to settle” outside Palestine. As the principal spoke, the men nodded and the women tightened their lips or folded their arms.
“Personally, I’d like to apologize to you,” a thin woman in her forties said, removing her glasses and dabbing her eyes with a lacy handkerchief. “Instead of trying to find out what was on your mind, we rushed here as if we were storming the Bastille.”
“These are dark days,” the principal answered. “I understand your anxiety.”
Tariq Ayyash, the greasy little man with the oversized jacket, fidgeted in his seat. Everyone turned to look at him. Yousif was offended by the sight of black crud under Tariq’s fingernails.
“With all due respect,” Tariq said, “I still think opening the school at this time is unwise. It’s bound to upset whatever secret negotiations that might be going on. If I were a Zionist in Tel Aviv I’d be dancing in the street. I’d be thinking the Palestinians are already making adjustments to live outside their homeland.”
“They’re not that naïve,” a lady said, with a pale smile.
“It’s possible,” Tariq defended himself.
“That’s a good point,” Yousif argued. “But what if the hypothetical negotiations you speak of drag on for years? As I’m sure they would. What then?”
Tariq was not convinced. “Okay,” he said, gesturing to quiet the rising chatter. “What if someone else starts a big farm to teach families how to cultivate the land and grow crops to make a living while waiting. And what if someone else starts a vocational school to train men in some kind of trade? How would the enemy read or misread our intentions?”
Ustaz Sa’adeh decided to close the discussion. “Tariq has raised legitimate questions. However, each of us must do what he or she is qualified to do. We do what we know best. If I were a prime minister of long standing and privy to the high drama being played behind the scenes, I might think otherwise. Right now I’m primarily an educator and you are proud and responsible parents. In these capacities I feel it’s our collective duty to take our children off the streets to make sure that they continue learning. They need to know more than just how to read and write. Or to do math. Or to know basic history. Above all, they need to know how to think for themselves so that they can cope with the enormity of our catastrophe.”
“Amen,” Yousif said.
The rest solemnly nodded their heads or expelled a deep sigh. A robust man with a shock of white hair pulled out a pack of cigarettes but, seeing the disapproval in others’ eyes, quickly put it back in his pocket.
Questions began to fly. “What about books? What about a budget to run the school? What about a school for girls, not just for boys? What about . . .?”
“That’s where you can be of great help,” Ustaz Sa’adeh told them, flashing a forced smile. “We’ll discuss that in our next meeting.”
As a student, Yousif had often waited for the teachers to come to class and talk about politics. Now he was a teacher, meeting with the other teachers in the makeshift lounge and participating in their discussions. At the moment, however, his mind was on his first session with his seventh-grade students. There were twelve and he was ready to meet them. If only Salwa could see him now, he thought, as he opened the door to the classroom.
He started the session by introducing himself and giving them a brief summary of his background. Then he went around the room asking each one of them to do the same. One by one, they mentioned their place of birth and gave some information about themselves. All the while he was jotting down notes by which to remember them.
When they were through, he looked pleased and told them so.
“Now for our first assignment,” he said. “When you go home, I’d like for you to write an essay about yourselves. Simply expand on what you have just told us.”
One student in the back row raised his hand. “How long?”
Yousif told them to write as much as they could and to bring it in a week from that day. “As we go along,” he added, “we’ll take a good look at what you have written. Each paper will be considered a first draft. Then we’ll start the rewriting process. Or what some refer to as revision. We will enlarge on some points, and delete others. By the end of the term each of you will have six or seven segments on the same theme: yourselves.”
“Wow!!” many said.
“Is this a composition class?” one student wanted to know.
“Yes it is,” Yousif told him. “As you can see we don’t have textbooks yet. So reading will have to wait. For the time being, we’re going to concentrate on writing. Actually we have no choice.”
Most students seemed agreeable. Except one.
“We can read newspapers. They don’t cost much.”
“A good idea,” Yousif agreed. “We’ll try it. I might even bring some magazines and pass
