1
25
7
-
https://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/files/original/2f4c8b962dc3da90b8cf54178893c08d.pdf
dcb4743d107b0b0f14b55e87c9f33219
PDF Text
Text
THE FAMILY TREE OF
FELIX KHOURY and NELLIE KHOURY A1!RAlWI
married Mileni (, sired one San .
Antonlou~ .
- - - -- - married MHat 6 sired 3 "OnS.
_ _ KaT .... married Husni (, sired one son ,
Elias,
1_______
~
3 daughters .
Elias Kaum .... nied IJnura ~ s ir ed
3 sons (, 3 daughters.
Snbeh ...,«Ie d Pouteen & sired 3 s on • .
-
-
Doumit who b"ca"" Father Francis
. anted Nekhl1 and siTed one SOn
6 daughterS .
[~~~~I------ N1emt811ah
~
~nd
.... rrled FaTaj
aired one
son , DOlI it (Felix) and on e daughtc< ,
Nukhl1 (Nellie) .. ho married Jam11
Abraham from ~a1tL
,,;;;;;;;f------- Doumi~ married
Mona ..... 11 fn>m Haiti
000 sired 3 sons 6 one daughter .
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Domit Family Papers
Description
An account of the resource
<h4>Biographical/Historical Note</h4>
<p>Moussa Domit was born May 24, 1932, in Mazraat al Toufah in Zgharta, Lebanon to Majed Moussa Domit and Jamili Yousef (Khoury) Jreige. His grandparents had spent time in Pennsylvania, and both his father, Majed and his aunt, Margaret Domit (called Aunt Peggy), were born in the United States. In 1953, Moussa immigrated to Columbus, Ohio, to complete his high school education. He then returned to Lebanon where he met Yvette Baini. Yvette was born in French Senegal, West Africa. Her parents returned to Lebanon when she was a child; she attended a French school in Tripoli.</p>
<p>Moussa Domit and Yvette Baini married on February 11, 1960, an the following year moved to Columbus so that Moussa could attend college. Moussa earned a BA in History of Art at Ohio State University in 1962 and an MA in Art History at Southern Connecticut State College in 1967. The became an American citizen the same year. During this period, the couple had four children, Maggie, Majed, Mark, and Matthew.</p>
<p>Domit conducted postgraduate work at Yale University before serving as Associate Director of the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., from 1968 to 1970, and as Curator at the National Gallery of Art from 1970 and 1972. In 1972, Moussa became Director of the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, a position he held until 1981. In this position, Domit developed the museum's collection, providing exhibit space for international and multicultural artists and historic art pieces. He led the campaign to move the museum away from its original location in downtown Raleigh to a new facility on Blue Ridge Road. In 1981, the Domit family left Raleigh for Memphis, where Moussa took a position as Director of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens before moving to the Appleton Art Museum in Ocala, Florida, in 1986. Towards the end of his life, Domit spent time in Lebanon, where he worked to restore his family’s summer home. Moussa Domit passed away in 2005.</p>
<h4>Scope/Content Note</h4>
<p>The Domit Family Papers contains documents and articles related to Moussa Domit's career in the art field, family photographs, and early letters from Domit's time in Columbus, Ohio. Additionally, the collection contains genealogical information through family trees and an oral history. The collection also includes a diary and an autobiographical narrative written by Maron Domit Barkett, a great-uncle of Moussa Domit.</p>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1905-circa 1986, undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Relation
A related resource
<a href="http://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/collections/show/23">Saleh Family Papers</a>
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Processed by Khayrallah Program staff. Collection Guide content contributed by Claire A. Kempa and updated by Allison Hall, 2023 November.
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese--United States
Language
A language of the resource
English
Arabic
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
KC 0022
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
This digital material is provided here for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
kc0022_010
Title
A name given to the resource
Family Tree of Felix Khoury and Nellie Khoury Abraham
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese--United States
Description
An account of the resource
The family tree of Nellie Khoury Abraham and Felix Khoury, drawn from Father Usef's History of the Village.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Image/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image
Family Trees
Lebanon
-
https://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/files/original/5abaa47daab64148f3222efdf86124ea.pdf
250743427451f2deb3d59c5dc7f55681
PDF Text
Text
��
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Domit Family Papers
Description
An account of the resource
<h4>Biographical/Historical Note</h4>
<p>Moussa Domit was born May 24, 1932, in Mazraat al Toufah in Zgharta, Lebanon to Majed Moussa Domit and Jamili Yousef (Khoury) Jreige. His grandparents had spent time in Pennsylvania, and both his father, Majed and his aunt, Margaret Domit (called Aunt Peggy), were born in the United States. In 1953, Moussa immigrated to Columbus, Ohio, to complete his high school education. He then returned to Lebanon where he met Yvette Baini. Yvette was born in French Senegal, West Africa. Her parents returned to Lebanon when she was a child; she attended a French school in Tripoli.</p>
<p>Moussa Domit and Yvette Baini married on February 11, 1960, an the following year moved to Columbus so that Moussa could attend college. Moussa earned a BA in History of Art at Ohio State University in 1962 and an MA in Art History at Southern Connecticut State College in 1967. The became an American citizen the same year. During this period, the couple had four children, Maggie, Majed, Mark, and Matthew.</p>
<p>Domit conducted postgraduate work at Yale University before serving as Associate Director of the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., from 1968 to 1970, and as Curator at the National Gallery of Art from 1970 and 1972. In 1972, Moussa became Director of the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, a position he held until 1981. In this position, Domit developed the museum's collection, providing exhibit space for international and multicultural artists and historic art pieces. He led the campaign to move the museum away from its original location in downtown Raleigh to a new facility on Blue Ridge Road. In 1981, the Domit family left Raleigh for Memphis, where Moussa took a position as Director of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens before moving to the Appleton Art Museum in Ocala, Florida, in 1986. Towards the end of his life, Domit spent time in Lebanon, where he worked to restore his family’s summer home. Moussa Domit passed away in 2005.</p>
<h4>Scope/Content Note</h4>
<p>The Domit Family Papers contains documents and articles related to Moussa Domit's career in the art field, family photographs, and early letters from Domit's time in Columbus, Ohio. Additionally, the collection contains genealogical information through family trees and an oral history. The collection also includes a diary and an autobiographical narrative written by Maron Domit Barkett, a great-uncle of Moussa Domit.</p>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1905-circa 1986, undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Relation
A related resource
<a href="http://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/collections/show/23">Saleh Family Papers</a>
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Processed by Khayrallah Program staff. Collection Guide content contributed by Claire A. Kempa and updated by Allison Hall, 2023 November.
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese--United States
Language
A language of the resource
English
Arabic
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
KC 0022
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
This digital material is provided here for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
kc0022_021
Title
A name given to the resource
13 Generations of Moussa Domit's Family Tree
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese--United States
Description
An account of the resource
Handwritten family tree detailing 13 generations of Moussa Domit's family lineage. Though undated, it was created after 1972.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Text/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
English
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Family Trees
Lebanon
-
https://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/files/original/472f356d4aa132c27c3c6e993d032753.pdf
47cbbcf31bf4b4a20e077ca8ffbed565
PDF Text
Text
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Domit Family Papers
Description
An account of the resource
<h4>Biographical/Historical Note</h4>
<p>Moussa Domit was born May 24, 1932, in Mazraat al Toufah in Zgharta, Lebanon to Majed Moussa Domit and Jamili Yousef (Khoury) Jreige. His grandparents had spent time in Pennsylvania, and both his father, Majed and his aunt, Margaret Domit (called Aunt Peggy), were born in the United States. In 1953, Moussa immigrated to Columbus, Ohio, to complete his high school education. He then returned to Lebanon where he met Yvette Baini. Yvette was born in French Senegal, West Africa. Her parents returned to Lebanon when she was a child; she attended a French school in Tripoli.</p>
<p>Moussa Domit and Yvette Baini married on February 11, 1960, an the following year moved to Columbus so that Moussa could attend college. Moussa earned a BA in History of Art at Ohio State University in 1962 and an MA in Art History at Southern Connecticut State College in 1967. The became an American citizen the same year. During this period, the couple had four children, Maggie, Majed, Mark, and Matthew.</p>
<p>Domit conducted postgraduate work at Yale University before serving as Associate Director of the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., from 1968 to 1970, and as Curator at the National Gallery of Art from 1970 and 1972. In 1972, Moussa became Director of the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, a position he held until 1981. In this position, Domit developed the museum's collection, providing exhibit space for international and multicultural artists and historic art pieces. He led the campaign to move the museum away from its original location in downtown Raleigh to a new facility on Blue Ridge Road. In 1981, the Domit family left Raleigh for Memphis, where Moussa took a position as Director of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens before moving to the Appleton Art Museum in Ocala, Florida, in 1986. Towards the end of his life, Domit spent time in Lebanon, where he worked to restore his family’s summer home. Moussa Domit passed away in 2005.</p>
<h4>Scope/Content Note</h4>
<p>The Domit Family Papers contains documents and articles related to Moussa Domit's career in the art field, family photographs, and early letters from Domit's time in Columbus, Ohio. Additionally, the collection contains genealogical information through family trees and an oral history. The collection also includes a diary and an autobiographical narrative written by Maron Domit Barkett, a great-uncle of Moussa Domit.</p>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1905-circa 1986, undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Relation
A related resource
<a href="http://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/collections/show/23">Saleh Family Papers</a>
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Processed by Khayrallah Program staff. Collection Guide content contributed by Claire A. Kempa and updated by Allison Hall, 2023 November.
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese--United States
Language
A language of the resource
English
Arabic
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
KC 0022
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
This digital material is provided here for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
kc0022_022
Title
A name given to the resource
Ghanim el Shur Family Tree
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese--United States
Description
An account of the resource
Handwritten family tree, likely made using information in Father Yousef's account.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Text/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
English
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Family Trees
Lebanon
-
https://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/files/original/b2172ce0a340e768900a70b4efca00e7.pdf
267fe9fdb008bf83a24486aee9a3dec2
PDF Text
Text
The following family history of Nellie Kh oury Abraham and Felix (Doumit)
Khoury is based on the village church records of births, baptisms, marriages
and deaths and some oral histo-ry, \Y'hich were compiled in 1934 by Father Yousef
(Kalem Cory's father), who was then the village priest.
According to these records and the information incorporated by Father
Yousef, the first to inhabit the little remote plateau in the mountains of
north Lebanon were Tannous Jreige (Anthony George) and h is wife, Sara .
are considered the fo unders of the village of Mazarat Taffah .
They
They both
came from the nearby and much older village of Egbeh; but their ancien t
ancestors were originally from the town of Jazeen in the south.
They nad
only one son whom they named Jreige, and he is the ancestoral father of the
Jreige family .
Aunt Faraj is a descendant of Tannous, as is Aunt Margaret.
The second family to occupy the fertile plateau was Ghanim el Shur and
his Wife, Mileni .
Ghanim was also from Egbeh and a friend of Tannous.
His
ancestors , however, came from the Land of Two Rivers, which is ?-Iesapotamia modern Iraq and Iran.
In the seventh century when the Arabs set out to conquer
the Middle East, the Christians then began to emigrate to distant places,
settling
predominantly in mountainous regions difficult to reach by the
waring Muslims .
Ghanim ' s reason for leaving Egbeh was the death of his little son .
is said that while he was chopping down a
mulberry tree, he accidentally
hit his son who died and Ghanim swore to l eave Egbeh permanently .
invited him to come down to Mozarat Taffah - meaning apple grove
Tannous
and
start a new life which Ghanim did and he named his second and only son
Antonious (after Tannous).
family.
It
He is the ancestoral father of the Karam
(All of this took place presumably in the fifteenth century, but
�/
2
I doubt it was that early counting the generations .
On the oth e r hand ,
Father Yousef may have skipped a century or two.)
The third founding father of the village was Antonious Shbat .
He is
known as the " fugitive " who came from the town of Aramoon in the south of
Lebanon.
(His ancestors , it is sa id - an d now his descendants claim -were
related to the old Gumya l family , one of whose sons is now president of
the country.)
Rufka
At any rate, Shbat married Tannous Jreige ' s granddaughter,
settled in the village and sired seven sons and three daughters .
He i s the ancestoral father of the Shbat family and several differen t
branches . (The
Barkets of Dover a nd Miami, the Thomases of OhlD
including Aunt Mary, the Ibraheen Maroonsand the As ias of Pennsylvania
are among his many descendants .)
And let ' s return to Ghanim el Shur .
His last name was originally
Shira r a, which in Syria c , the language of the Bible, means spark .
This
led to his being nic knamed el Shur, meaning in Arabic the troublemaker .
"But God only knows ," said Father Yousef.
His son Antonious married Marta from the central coast town of Batroon
and s ired three sons - Jreige, Munsour (Victor) and Karam (the gener ous
one) .
Jreige Ghanim married Hanni , the daughter of Barket Sarkis Shbat and
sired Ksunteen and Nihmi (Naimi) and three daughte r s - Dibi, Husni and Talia.
Ksunteen married Nafiye , a nd sired Amin and Saleem and two daughters Tamini (the precious) and Jamili (the beautiful).
Amin married Katoor ,
the daughter of Hannah Moussi and she died; then he married Sousan , the
daughter of Khoury Sumaan Jerges (George) and sired Michail and two
daughters - Afifi and Husn i.
Fouteen, and died at age
,(
Michail married Nahyi and sired one daughter,
23.~HiS
father , Amin and his mother as well as
�3
his daughter, Fouteen, al l died during the War (WWI) and the line ended.
Saleem, the brother of Amin, married Rsoula,
and
s~red
t~e .
daughter of Ibrahim Yakoob,
Khuzin and Saeed and two daughters - Nuzheh who married Moussi
Doumit Rizk (Aunt Peggy's grandmother) and Stausiya who died with her
mother during the war.
Khuzin married Maurineh, the daughter of Tannous
Moussa, and sired Aziz, Michail and two daughters - Lumia and Kalimi and
they all died with their father in the war.
Saeed married Budwiyai, the
daughter of Hannah Sarkis Barket and sired Jamil, Kalim, Salim and one
daughter, Milyia.
The three sons and their mother died in the war.
Milyia
survived the war and married Yousef el Khoury and had several children
including Michail who now lives in Buffalo and Amilia, who is married
to John Barket of Miami (Firjullah's mother).
Saeed Salem then emigrated
to America and married Afifi, the daughter of his Uncle Ksunteen, and sired
Jamil, Kalim and one daugher (all in New Kensington, PA).
Nihmi (Naimi),
Ksunteen's brother, married Suyeh, the daughter of Khoury Yousef, and
sired Jerges, Antonious and one daughter, Lila.
Antonious died single.
Jerges (George) married Hanni, the daughter of Yousef el Baini, and sired
Barbar, Michail, Hannah (Uncle
Fouteen, Fouli and Asmeh.
Joh~)
Yousef, Doumit and three daughters -
Barbar married Sultani, the daughter of Jerges
Barket, and sired Yousef and Elias and they both died small.
Then he
sired Ajani who married Sarkis Yousef Francis (Salwa's father) and Jinfiaf
who married Ibrahim Maroon.
Michail, Barbar's brother, married Moora from
the village Kahf el Mullool and sired Kublan, Shyban Naseem, Ukle and one
daughter, Yousefia (Josephine).
Hanneh (Uncle John), the brother of Barber
and Michail, married Hanni, the daughter of Jerges Sarkis Barket, and sired
Nihmi, Moussi Alek (Alex) and two daughters - Zahyai (Josephine) and Sulmeh
�4
and they all lived in America.
died single.
Yousef , the brother of Barbar and Hanneh ,
Their b rother, Doumit , married Barbara , the daughter of
Jerges Moussi Datvood (David) and died childless .
Munsoor , the second son of Antonious Ghanim el Shur , married
Kiramfrom the village of Busloueet and died childless .
Karam himself, the third son of
Antonious Ghanim el Shur .
married Husni, the daughter of Khour y Moussa from Egbeh and sired one son,
Elias and four daughters - Hanni, Alsowda (the black one) , Tousiyia and
Mariam.
Elias Karam married Untara , the daugh ter of Shediac Yousef Shbat
and sired Sabeh
Hanneh , Karam, Bachus and three daughters - Katour, Hileni
and Mileni who married Moussi Karkar from the village of Mizyara .
Sabeh, El ias Karam' first sao , married Fouteen, t he daughter of
Khoury Yousef Jerges , and sir ed Khalil, Doumit ,
a priest and was named Khoury Elias .
Kublan and he became
His son Khalil married Fouteen ,
the daughter of Jerges Anton i ous Roumanous , and sired Antonious, Assad
and four daughters - Nuzheh , Budra , Huweh (Eve) and Najeebi (Aunt Mary ' s
mother) .
His wife Fouteen died and I-e then married Katrine , the daughter
of Francis Azar, and sired one
died i n the war.
children .
SOD ,
Yousef , and then he and his wife
Assad married Ward i from Myzoyra and did not have
His brother Yousef ' s family is not recorded, but Yousef sired
several children who still live in the village .
Doumit, the broth er of Khali l , married Nukh l i (Nell ie) , the daughter
of Tedrous el Sisi from Kfirhowra .
He was ordained priest by Bishop Estfanious
in 1880 and was named Khory Francis and he sired one son , Niemtallah and
six daughters - Adleh who married Jerges Hanneh Barket ; Asmeh who married
Mansour Haoneh Zairook ; Fouteen who married Maroon Doumit Barket ; Zalfeh
�5
who married Doumit Moussa; Tarooze who married Elias Bachous; Bahiji who
married Zaidan Jerges Budwi .
Niemtullah married Faraj, the daughter of Wirdan Khoury Mikhail,
and he emigrated to the United States and sired one son, Deumit and
one daughter, Nukhli (Nellie) . Doumit (Felix) married Mona Asali from
Haiti and sired Victor, Eric, Paul and one daughter, Nellie.
Kublan, t h e brother of Khalil and Khoury Francis, married Amaleen ,
the daughter of Jerges Rizk Moussa and sired Elias and two daughters Fouteen and Fauli who married Shyban Munsour Karam .
Elias married Asmeh,
the daughter of Yausef Khalil Khoury and sired Kublan , Karam and seven
daughters - Haweh, Jinfiaf, Mary, Evelyn, Jouliete , etc .
(two born after
the records were written)
Hannah Elias Karam married Lila , the daughter of Naimi Jreige el Shur,
and sired Mansour, Doumit and two daughters - Najibi who married Wirdan el
Khoury (Aunt Faroj ' s mothe r) and Katrine .
Mansour married Mariam, the
daughter of Jerges Sarkis Barket, and sired Shyban, and then emigrated
to Brazil and had daughters there whose names are not recorded .
died in America.
Mansour
Shyban married Fou li, the daughter of Kublan Khoury,
and sired Hanneh, Mansour, Hanni and three daughters - Halimi , Damia,
Elan and Mary.
Doumit Hanneh, Mansour ' s brother, married Hileni, daughter
of Naseef Mikhail and sired two daughters - Sousan and Jami1i, and then he
and his wife emigrated to America and there sired Karam, Hanneh, Moussa
and three daughters - Lila, Mary and Susan.
His daughters, Sousan and
Jamili, died during the war .
Karam, the third son of Elias Karam , died single.
Bakhous, the fourth son of Elias, married Maurina, the daughter of
Roubi1 Khoury Moussa from Egbeh, and sired Diab, Elias, Sheker and two
�..
6
daughters - Latifi and Lamia who married Jerges Tannaus Saleh.
married Adleh,
Diab
the daughter of Yakoob Sabeh from Egbeh, and they
emigrated to America and had a family there.
Elias, his brother,
married Tarooze, the daughter of Khoury Francis , and sired one daughter,
Maheb.
Then he and his wife emigrated to America and had Sabeh, Yousef
and six daughters - Yghniseh , Virginia, Marcha, Latifi, Florence and
Gennie .
Shaker, brother of Diah and Elias, married Adele, the daughter of
Maroon Yousef Maroon, el Shidiac and did not have children .
This concludes the history of Ghanim el Shur family, from which
a family tree for Felix Khoury and Nellie Abraham can be drawn as on the
attached sheet.
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Domit Family Papers
Description
An account of the resource
<h4>Biographical/Historical Note</h4>
<p>Moussa Domit was born May 24, 1932, in Mazraat al Toufah in Zgharta, Lebanon to Majed Moussa Domit and Jamili Yousef (Khoury) Jreige. His grandparents had spent time in Pennsylvania, and both his father, Majed and his aunt, Margaret Domit (called Aunt Peggy), were born in the United States. In 1953, Moussa immigrated to Columbus, Ohio, to complete his high school education. He then returned to Lebanon where he met Yvette Baini. Yvette was born in French Senegal, West Africa. Her parents returned to Lebanon when she was a child; she attended a French school in Tripoli.</p>
<p>Moussa Domit and Yvette Baini married on February 11, 1960, an the following year moved to Columbus so that Moussa could attend college. Moussa earned a BA in History of Art at Ohio State University in 1962 and an MA in Art History at Southern Connecticut State College in 1967. The became an American citizen the same year. During this period, the couple had four children, Maggie, Majed, Mark, and Matthew.</p>
<p>Domit conducted postgraduate work at Yale University before serving as Associate Director of the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., from 1968 to 1970, and as Curator at the National Gallery of Art from 1970 and 1972. In 1972, Moussa became Director of the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, a position he held until 1981. In this position, Domit developed the museum's collection, providing exhibit space for international and multicultural artists and historic art pieces. He led the campaign to move the museum away from its original location in downtown Raleigh to a new facility on Blue Ridge Road. In 1981, the Domit family left Raleigh for Memphis, where Moussa took a position as Director of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens before moving to the Appleton Art Museum in Ocala, Florida, in 1986. Towards the end of his life, Domit spent time in Lebanon, where he worked to restore his family’s summer home. Moussa Domit passed away in 2005.</p>
<h4>Scope/Content Note</h4>
<p>The Domit Family Papers contains documents and articles related to Moussa Domit's career in the art field, family photographs, and early letters from Domit's time in Columbus, Ohio. Additionally, the collection contains genealogical information through family trees and an oral history. The collection also includes a diary and an autobiographical narrative written by Maron Domit Barkett, a great-uncle of Moussa Domit.</p>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1905-circa 1986, undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Relation
A related resource
<a href="http://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/collections/show/23">Saleh Family Papers</a>
Contributor
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Processed by Khayrallah Program staff. Collection Guide content contributed by Claire A. Kempa and updated by Allison Hall, 2023 November.
Subject
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Lebanese--United States
Language
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English
Arabic
Identifier
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KC 0022
Access Rights
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This digital material is provided here for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
kc0022_024
Title
A name given to the resource
"A Family Tree Taken From Father Usef's History of the Village"
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese--United States
Description
An account of the resource
A narrative family tree "based on the village church records of births, baptisms, marriages and deaths and some oral history, which were compiled in 1934 by Father Yousef (Kalem Cory's father)," priest of the village referred to in the document as "Mazarat Taffah" or "Mozarat Taffah" in northern Lebanon. Though the document is focused on the genealogy of the Ghanim el Shur family, it includes many asides for other important families in the village, and traces the marriages and births of many branches, including immigrants and their children.
The unknown contributor or compiler underlined throughout the document, and added a note at the bottom that reads: "At the start of WWI, the village population was 400. At its end it was 200, with one half dying from hunger."
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Father Yousef Khoury
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maggie Domit Bennett
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1934, undated
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Format
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Text/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
English
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
1930s
Family Trees
Lebanon
World War I
-
https://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/files/original/ac659660a3e2822eb39fac4a061d5813.pdf
e7a58ec3fb8e0cdc3d9f77651cfce011
PDF Text
Text
máximo kuri
THIS IS Y
Memories of a Family
Journey
�This is Y
THIS IS Y :
Memories of a Family Journey
Máximo Kuri
Vancouver 2019
1
�This is Y
For you, abuelita Margarita.
Thank you for telling me all about the X side of the equation, so that I do
not have to write the whole thing (right?).
Cover: The Gorge of the Kadisha. Steel engraving drawn by H. Fenn,
engraved by S. Bradshaw c. 1875
2
�This is Y
TABLE OF CONTENTS
About the Journey (Preface) ...................................... 4
Acknowledgement ..................................................... 7
Back to the Beginning (the trip)...................................8
Beirut ......................................................................... 21
Leaving The Mountain (to SA and Mexico) ................ 26
Violins and Tattoos in the Maronite Mass ...................36
Viva la Revolución (arrival in Mexico) ........................ 43
Mexican Dream (life in Mexico) ................................. 49
Leaving again (on leaving Mexico).............................. 62
Vancouver (arrival in Canada) .................................... 69
On the track ................................................................ 76
In the Hills of the Cedar Forest .................................... 78
Remembrances of Lebanon ......................................... 83
It has been too long (finding the family) ...................... 89
The Dwelling Place of Baal ........................................... 93
Genes and Things ........................................................ 104
Farewell ....................................................................... 111
Update – February 2023 – Homecoming .................... 113
Bibliography & Family Social Media Links ................... 118
3
�This is Y
About the Journey
“Are you certain that a man’s life begins with his birth?”
- Amin Maalouf – Ports of Call
I started writing this story after a family trip to Lebanon in late
2003. It was our first visit to the country where my paternal
grandparents and their ancestors were born. The visit produced
many revelations.
Every family has a history, of course, but not all family histories are
preserved. The link to the past is often broken within the span of a
generation or two. And, that is what had happened to this family,
for reasons that I will try to explain here.
Our clan has experienced emigration during the last four
consecutive generations. My paternal great-grandparents
emigrated to Africa, my grandparents to Latin America, and my
parents and I to Canada.
That is why I felt that it was important to salvage our recent
antecedents, although this is not a quest for identity.
As a member of humankind, I am well-aware that, ultimately, we
all share exactly the same origin. Nationality and race are irrelevant
concepts here, just useful elements in a game which can be fun to
play - if played in full awareness of the facts.
In that sense, I am what I am: a person born in Mexico, of Lebanese
and Mexican descent, who has lived most of his life in
Canada...simple!
4
�This is Y
This simple story, while unique, is not unusual, and is not intended
as a nostalgic idealization of a personal past. Still, some
sentimental, even cheesy passages are inescapable if a tale of a
family such as mine is to be told genuinely and openly.
This chronicle, while told from my family’s perspective, is,
primarily, a human story. The immigration phenomenon has always
been present around the world, but is now a preeminent issue,
with its infinite dose of great adventure, pain, and courage.
While working as an interpreter during hearings at the Refugee
Board of Canada in the early 1990’s, I heard amazing stories of
migrants from around the world, real odysseys beyond the most
imaginative fiction.
Regrettably, most of them will probably remain filed away, only to
fade into oblivion.
This narrative is, therefore, an attempt at preserving a fragment of
this human experience.
It has been written recognizing that memory, as a material process
involving the storage of information in brain cells, is always
selective. We recall and interpret experience based on our
conditioning. That is why no history can be remotely accurate, let
alone objective.
In addition, the ‘facts’ available in any inquiry may not be correct
to start with, so even the most faithful research may just
perpetuate an illusion, or, worse yet, a lie.
Therefore, it is perhaps wise not to become too attached to any
version of any ‘truth’ – or to any story. Each one of us is, after all,
the whole truth – a manifestation of all the past, the present, and
the future.
So, what is the aim here?
5
�This is Y
For me, it is to put the pieces of a puzzle together. A puzzle that can
never be put entirely together, and whose image may be
interpreted in many ways.
It is a labour of love, similar to a painting, or a carving: It attempts
to express something, but it can never do so completely.
The aim is to re-establish the bond with my ancestors, a sort of lifeline through time and space to communicate, share, reminisce, or
even to seek advice and support.
This story focuses on the paternal side of the family, on the ‘Y’
chromosome line – thus the title of this humble booklet.
That is because my mother’s lineage, the rich Mexican heritage of
the ‘X’ side of the genetic pool, is clear and present.
Having had the pleasure of a long and close relationship with my
maternal grandparents while growing up in my native Mexico, that
part of the family history has always been clear.
The other was not.
And, although this exercise may seem self-centred, the six
generations covered in this tale involve thousands of people. So, it
is not about me, the narrator, but about everybody else in the
story.
I tell my relative’s saga as I have heard it, lived it and understood it,
taking a glimpse into the extraordinary exploits of an “ordinary”
family.
It is also a search and a memoir, a message for my children and
their children, and a way to reach out to those who left us a long
time ago. They will live as long as we can remember.
Máximo Kuri, Vancouver, March 26, 2019.
6
�This is Y
Acknowledgement
Hard times reveal true friends: divorce, jail, illness or job loss, for sure.
But if you really want to challenge someone in this way, ask them to read
your family’s story.
My friends Ross Carter, Miguel Cramer, Paul Prinsloo, Raja Sabbagha,
and Ciaran Shields, did read several manuscripts of this attempt at
documenting my relatives’ passage through this world, providing
encouragement, a warm smile, and great suggestions.
And they did so enthusiastically (well, kind of) and gracefully. That
is true friendship.
Any inaccuracies or mistakes of any kind are obviously theirs
(especially yours, Ross), but I will take responsibility for them.
Family members made this a truly collaborative project. The
encouragement and information received from relatives in Lebanon,
Mexico, Canada, Venezuela, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand
was priceless, and I would like to thank Margi and Kevin Joseph in
particular for their help and support.
My siblings Mayela, Guillermo, and Victor were a great
inspiration; they provided amazing material by just being. Their
company during this adventure has been delightful.
Finally, Mamá and Papá; I could not have done it without you, and your
X and Y chromosomes.
Love,
Máximo Kuri
*Taking advantage of the social media platforms that are available, I have
added many links throughout the book. For those interested in family videos,
photo albums, and social updates, these resources may prove useful.
7
�Back to the Beginning
This is Y
October 2003
“Deep is your longing for the land of your memories and
the dwelling place of your greater desires.”
– Gibran Khalil Gibran, The Prophet
After more than 35 years of waiting, I am finally going back to the
land of my ancestors.
On the way to the airport in Vancouver, where I now live, the
stories I used to hear from my grandparents while growing up in
Mexico City come to mind. My grandmother Dalel and my
grandfather Hanna had emigrated there from Lebanon in 1922.
Hanna never returned to ‘el Bled’ (the Motherland), and never saw
his parents, or any of his siblings, again. For her part, Dalel travelled
only once to her country of birth, for a brief family visit, before she
died in 1969.
In our family this has happened with painful regularity – a member
of the clan decides to go his or her own way, disappearing for
decades, or never to be heard of again. I want to know why.
Hanna and Dalel used to talk often about life in their small
mountain village in Lebanon. They described picnics in the
countryside, where ice-cold rivers flow from the biblical snow of
the surrounding peaks.
They reminisced of the lush vegetation, the cool mountain breeze,
and the fruit…oh, the fruit! How many times did I hear the story
about watermelons, sweet as honey, being immersed in the
freezing waters of a stream until they cracked open, ready to
quench my grandparents’ summer thirst!
8
�This is Y
My grandfather used to tell me the stories about his youth in
Lebanon during his infrequent visits to our home. He would arrive
dressed impeccably, exuding a fantastic fragrance, a very subtle
mix of cologne and mastic that hit me pleasantly every time we
greeted with the customary 3 Lebanese kisses on the cheeks (leftright-left).
And he always brought a gift for us, usually Lebanese sweets, or
lokum (Turkish delight) artfully arranged in the unique blue box of
Hermes, a store in downtown Mexico City owned by ‘Mr. Mavridis,
the Greek’.
During those visits, Hanna used to tell me about his trips from the
village to the cities on the Lebanese coast, driving as a teenager a
Model T car along narrow dirt paths.
On those rare occasions when he came across another vehicle
travelling in the opposite direction, he had to pull to the side of the
path to let the other car pass.
I clearly remember him showing me his driver’s license, issued by
the French authorities when Lebanon was a protectorate after the
First World War.
He must have been in his seventies when he casually pulled it out
of his wallet that day in our family’s home in Mexico City, more than
half a century after having emigrated.
Despite the calamities and plagues that they endured during their
youth, including the Ottoman iron fist, the Great War, a locust
infestation, and a deadly famine, Hanna and Dalel always spoke of
Lebanon as a sacred land.
9
�This is Y
Yet, as so many of their contemporaries did, they were compelled
to leave, setting off a trend that would be followed by their
children, and grandchildren as well.
The stories that I remember are faint and vague; my grandmother
died when I was 8 years old, and my grandfather was estranged
from my father for a long time, so I could not see him as often as I
would have loved to, despite the fact that he died at age 86.
Like an absent father, the paternal origins have always been murky,
distant, intriguing; too much is now buried in family silence, time,
and distance.
The trip I am about to undertake with my parents and two of my
three siblings has been planned for years. We are about to come
full circle 80 years after Dalel and Hanna left their hometown.
We intend to look for the village and see if any relatives remain
there. It will not be easy: Other than Dalel’s trip in the 1960’s, there
has been no contact with any member of the family for almost a
century.
All we have to base our search on are blurry recollections of names
mentioned by my grandparents decades ago. My father did not
even learn to speak the Lebanese language, having preferred as a
child to immerse fully into Mexican culture.
Born in the Mexican capital in 1933, my father Victor grew up
during the height of nationalist fervour in Mexico, when oil was
being expropriated from foreign companies, and artists such as
Diego Rivera and Rufino Tamayo were unabashedly celebrating
Mexicanness. Spanish, Lebanese, Jewish and all other immigrants
were encouraged to assimilate quickly, and many preferred to keep
a low profile and blend into the local culture as soon as possible.
10
�This is Y
At age 16, for instance, my father was approached by a friend who
held a job with the electricity company in Mexico City. He offered
to recommend my father for a position there.
But, back then, most unions in Mexico did not accept among their
ranks people with ‘foreign’ surnames. Not able to join the
electricity company, my father then applied for a job as a packer in
a pharmaceutical lab.
When asked by the manager there what his name was, my father
said: “Victor Kuri”, pronouncing our family name in the Spanish
version of the original Lebanese “Khoury”, which in Arabic means
‘Priest’.
“Victor What”? snapped the manager.
“Kuri”, my father repeated timidly.
“From now on you are Victor García”, the interviewer declared. “I
will issue you an ID under García, and you can work here”.
My father agreed to work under his ‘Mexican’ identity during the
brief time he stayed at that company, Italmex, which, ironically,
was owned by Italian immigrants, before starting his own business.
Today, he still uses the nickname of ‘Victor Garcia’ when he wants
to surf the Internet anonymously.
Like our last name, my grandparents’ given names and that of their
eldest son, who was born ‘in transit’ in France, were changed on a
whim by Mexican immigration officials. Upon arrival, Hanna
became Juan, Dalel’s name was changed to Adela, and my future
uncle Mohsen was called Máximo.
Under those circumstances, my father refused to speak the
tongue of the old country at home, as so many immigrants’
11
�This is Y
children do, and preferred to adopt the language of the country
where he grew up.
In a photograph taken around 1937, my father appears as a child
dressed in full Charro (Mexican cowboy) gear, complete with the
traditional shawl known as ‘sarape’.
The image was taken at the Yazbek studio, ran by Edmundo Feres
Yazbek and his two uncles, Alfredo and Toufic, all of Lebanese
descent. It was one of the most important portrait studios in
Mexico City when it opened in the 1930s.
Edmundo photographed there many celebrities, including his own
brother, Mauricio, a movie actor whose stage name was Mauricio
Garcés.
After many years in operation in downtown Mexico City, the studio
finally closed in the late seventies.
My father, Victor, at age 4, dressed as a Charro (Mexican cowboy).
12
�This is Y
Trying to assimilate into Mexican society, my father was reluctant
to speak the Lebanese language, even at home.
But, the language was not all we lost. All links to the rest of the
family in Lebanon were also cut off for reasons that I am trying to
understand, and now even the name of my grandparents’ village is
obscure.
Just two weeks before the day of our departure to Lebanon, I asked
my father to tell me the exact name of the village. I wanted to look
it up in a map and plan the visit in our itinerary.
“I remember my mother used to talk of Sebil, or something like
that”, was his answer.
I special-ordered a detailed map of Lebanon from a travel agency
in Vancouver, and when I got it a few days later I scoured it. No
Sebil.
“It’s supposed to be in the north, close to Tripoli”, said my
concerned father, sheepishly.
“My parents used to go to Tripoli a lot, they talked about it being
the biggest city nearby”, he added.
After concentrating my efforts on that area of the map, I found a
small place called Sebhel. It is up in the mountains, and the road
leading up there looks small and sinuous. We are hoping that is the
right place.
What we will do when we get there, we do not know.
***
13
�This is Y
The trip from the American Continent to Lebanon, even 80
years later, is still long, and expensive. Despite the speed and
convenience of modern transportation, it will take us more than 26
hours to get from Vancouver to Lebanon, including a 12 hour stopover in Amsterdam.
Feeling impatient, I try to imagine what it must have been like for
Hanna and Dalel to sail, first from Lebanon to France, and then
across the Atlantic to Cuba, before finally reaching Veracruz in a
steamship, as youngsters, and speaking only ‘Mountain Lebanese’
Arabic.
Although they stayed in France for some months before leaving for
the Americas, the crossing from Saint Nazaire to Veracruz via
Havana must have lasted almost 2 months, under less than
comfortable conditions.
Travelling with a newborn just further complicated things for
Hanna and Dalel, who were only 21 and 18, respectively.
Heading East over that same Atlantic Ocean, I recall fragments of
conversations with my grandparents, and the times I spent at
Dalel’s apartment in Mexico City, building castles with my brothers
Victor and Guillermo using grandma’s canasta playing cards while
she cooked.
Sometimes my mother was there, helping Dalel in the kitchen,
learning how to prepare Lebanese village dishes such as the typical
lamb meat kibbeh, the traditional tabbouleh salad, or my father’s
favourite: mjadrah - rice with lentils and caramelized onions.
I enjoyed helping by turning the grinder lever while grandma
funneled in the mixture of ground lamb meat, burghul, salt, and all
the other ingredients of raw kibbeh.
14
�This is Y
My grandmother, Dalel.
I feel grateful that my parents are on this long-awaited trip, along
with my sister Mayela, seated next to me on the plane, and my
brother Guillermo, next to her, on the aisle seat.
Only my brother Victor is not here, having stayed behind for
business reasons. My parents, on the other side of the aisle, look
excited and expectant, on their way to another adventure together.
During the long flight I also have time to recall how, as a young boy
in Mexico, I used to visit the Lebanese embassy every few months
to ask for tourist maps, pamphlets and postal stamps.
I would then carefully, and lovingly, dissect them at home,
fantasizing about some day visiting the glorious Phoenician cities of
Byblos, Sidon, and Tyre.
Since those travel brochures were produced, much has happened
in Lebanon, including the brutal civil war that lasted from 1975 to
1990.
There has also been the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the 18-year
Israeli Invasion and occupation of Lebanon, the Syrian invasion and
29-year de facto occupation of the country, American and French
military interventions, the Gulf War, and the Iraq War - all
15
�This is Y
happening consecutively or simultaneously all these years,
preventing us from visiting the region before.
These events also kept me from fulfilling my childhood dream of
going to university in Lebanon.
But today, flying East, I look, incredulous, at the boarding pass that
I still hold tightly in my hand after several hours into the trip, and I
read it over, and over again: Amsterdam-Beirut.
***
16
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When the airplane starts its descent on the final leg of
our nocturnal flight, all I can see out the window is darkness.
I try, in vain, to distinguish the silhouette of the mountains in the
horizon, or to recognize any of the features that I have
painstakingly studied in my old maps.
I had always anticipated a spectacular view of the coastal
Lebanese capital on my first visit ever, but the approach from the
sea at night is all blackness.
Suddenly, just before landing, Beirut’s night skyline brightly
appears below. I see the Lighthouse, the areas of Rouche, Ramlet
el Bayda, the Marina, all of Ras Beirut, the Stadium. Everything
passes in quick succession, and, a few seconds later, we land.
I feel like crying – or, rather, as we say in Mexico to sound stronger,
I feel like water is going to come out of my eyes - but I sense my
sister next to me, and I hide my emotions; It is a family thing: as
typical immigrants, we have been taught, mostly subliminally, to be
strong, and never let our feelings be too obvious.
In fact, as an adult, this watery eyes issue had only happened to me
twice before: when my daughter and my son were born, and, on
those occasions, I could not restrain the floods…
Therefore, I overcome my joy, but keep my face glued to the
window, just in case, until the aircraft stops at the gate.
The airport is modern, brand new. It is hard to believe that there
has been so much destruction around here in the past few years.
It is hot, even though we landed past midnight, on October 21.
17
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We clear customs and meet our drivers from the hotel. Because
there are five of us travelling, we will take two taxis; both our
drivers’ names are Ali, and one of them is also a bellman at the
hotel.
We have reservations at the modest Mayflower in the Hamra
district of the city. I suggested that we stay at this hotel because it
had been the headquarters of many journalists during the
Lebanese civil war years.
The Mayflower is located in what used to be the epicentre of precivil war Beirut, a place where artists and intellectuals in quaint
coffeehouses and bookstores mingled with sophisticated socialites
shopping for the latest European fashions along Hamra Street’s
boutiques.
That was the ‘golden era’ of Lebanon, when other old clichés like
‘Switzerland of the Middle East’ and ‘Paris of the Orient’ were
coined.
But the good times did not last long. At the height of its boom,
Lebanon sank into a pit of chaos and violence that almost dissolved
it as a nation.
It was reading about Lebanon’s plight during the mid-1970’s that I
became addicted to newspapers, devouring any story written from
or about that country.
This passion would eventually lead me to pursue journalism.
And, from the civil war reports that I read on a daily basis, I became
familiar with the various neighbourhoods of Beirut and many
villages that were affected as well.
If a battle raged in Karantina, I would consult my tourist maps,
obtained from the embassy, and look for that sector to better
picture the story.
18
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“Ah! Karantina, in the port area, that’s why these militias are
fighting for control there…”, I would reason. If Damour was
attacked, I could immediately check where that village was located.
Soon, as I read the stories I could tell exactly where the incidents
were occurring around the country.
Then, at age 15, I decided to learn the Lebanese language, and
convinced my father to hire a teacher from Mexico City’s Lebanese
Club to teach me the dialect that he had lost.
And, in contrast with the music lessons and the bible studies that
my parents required me and my siblings to take, the Lebanese
course was a joy, and I became an uncharacteristically good
student of my dear professor Alejandro Basila.
Professor Basila himself was a descendant of Lebanese immigrants.
As opposed to the majority of the Lebanese in Mexico, who are
Maronite Christians, Basila was a Greek Orthodox.
I realized this many years later when, saying grace before dinner at
a Lebanese friend’s home in Vancouver, I noticed I was not
following the Lord’s prayer along with everyone else.
During dinner, I asked my friend to correct me, as I recited the
prayer to her. She laughed and said I prayed like a Greek Orthodox
(the second half of the prayer is slightly different compared to the
Maronite way).
That is when I understood why, 25 years before, while showing off
to my grandfather Hanna in Mexico by praying in Arabic before him,
he had a puzzled look in his face. I asked him if I was doing it the
right way, and he only said:
“Is that the way your teacher taught you?”.
“Yes”, I replied.
19
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“Then that’s the way you must pray”, he said, enigmatically.
During my university years in Canada in the early 1980’s, my most
enjoyable readings consisted of books about the Lebanese conflict
or the country’s history, prompting a friend to inquire if I was
pursuing a PhD in Lebanese studies, rather than majoring in
Economics, as I was meant to be doing.
But, after years of wishing to someday report from Beirut, I
became a journalist. At the time of this trip I am working for
Reforma, a Mexican national daily.
I convinced my editors to continue to pay my salary as their
Canadian correspondent while travelling in Lebanon with my
family, with the promise of filing some stories from here.
In a few hours it will be dawn in Beirut. We have two weeks to
recover our paternal past, or to finally accept that the beautiful,
blurry memories of our origins are all we have left of this place.
***
20
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Beirut
Descending into the basement of the Mayflower Hotel in the
morning, it is easy to imagine the international press corps taking
cover from the persistent bombardments while covering the many
recent Lebanese ‘events’, as the internecine armed conflicts are
referred to here.
The large room is now a pleasant restaurant, and we enjoy a
familiar breakfast consisting of pressed yoghurt, or labneh, three
different types of sliced cheese, white Lebanese bread, fresh
cucumbers, olives, tomatoes, and jasmine tea.
We are all delighted to be here, taking in every detail, but, the
familiarity of the food, and of the faces of the staff and the rest of
the guests, makes us feel strangely at home.
Waiting for our taxi after breakfast in the small lobby of the
Mayflower, I note a large portion of the pavement on the street
right by the hotel’s door. It looks like a big hole in the middle of the
road has been paved-over.
Above, in the building across the narrow, one-lane street, I see
pockmarks on the first-floor corner.
Ali, the bellman, explains that a bomb landed there during the war,
killing a hotel guest and two members of the family that lived in the
residential building.
When our taxi arrived, we asked our driver to show us around
Beirut. We wanted to see the capital before we embarked on our
trek to the mountains to search for our relatives and the family
village in the next few days.
The first stop, predictably, is the nearby site of the Pigeon Rocks, a
Beirut landmark. I take turns with my parents, my brother and my
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sister, posing for photos with those iconic formations rising from
the Mediterranean behind us. When I look at them from the
Corniche, I childishly think to myself: There is no doubt, we are in
Beirut!
After a drive around the city, among street merchants, heavy
traffic, horns and the sound of Lebanese pop music, we have lunch
at one of the trendy cafes in the newly-rebuilt central district of
Solidere.
The buildings here have been restored meticulously after they were
damaged in the civil war; the area is elegant and sophisticated, full
of life.
My mother, sister and father, drinking jellab at a Beirut terrace; and with
Guillermo at the Pigeon Rocks.
Over a light mezze of homus, green salad, and more labneh, we
fight the heat with delicious jellab, a syrupy iced drink made of
molasses, rose water and dates, served with pine nuts at the
bottom of the tall glass.
Refreshed, we take a cab to the district of Achrafieh, the
predominantly Christian area of the city.
I had seen this place in films; the neighbourhood is peppered with
beautiful mansions of sober stone facades and well-kept gardens
built during French colonial times.
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After a quick stop at the Sursock Building, which was featured in
one of my old pamphlets, we walk around and find more remnants
of the French presence here.
“Excuse me, is Saint Joseph’s University nearby?”, I ask in English,
addressing a man who appears to be the driver of a woman and her
two children.
He had just gotten out of the car and was waiting for his passengers
to enter one of the exclusive residential buildings along the road.
Before the man could answer, the woman approached us.
“I am sorry, I don’t speak Arabic very well”, I explained.
“Don’t worry, I don’t like speaking Arabic either”, she confided –
“Parlez-vous francais?” And proceeded to greet us and to give us
directions, in French.
Later, I kept thinking about this woman who does not like to speak
Arabic, in the middle of Beirut, and I began to understand that
there are, indeed, many worlds within this charming city.
In the evening, we return downtown to dine at the Grand Café, in
the business district of Solidere.
We miss my brother Victor, and I make a promise to myself to come
back one day with my children, Daniela and Alberto Mahrus.
Despite their absence, I feel grateful to be with the rest of my family
here, enjoying a fabulous Lebanese mezze on the terrace of this
beautiful restaurant, in the mild breeze of a late October evening.
Inevitably, I recall the music of Fairouz, the classic Lebanese singer,
and the romantic ballads from the album ‘An Evening in Beirut’,
produced in the early 70’s.
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My parents used to play the LP so often during my childhood, that
I still remember clearly the elegant cover depicting the Beirut bay
at night, with the city lights dotting the coastline.
I know that this is not how most Beirutis striving for a living here
see their city, although most certainly love it. But our reality is
different, this is a pilgrimage, and we are on a mission.
View a photo album of the Kuris’ 2003 Lebanon journey:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10218207152984898&type=3
***
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r.nuneedooi-t.0
B
Resurge
delosescombros
i;cwpl"E.flde.-e.
la eapit:a:I
liblDCNha N!Swplo de
losei;routbl'Ofipara
,lllH"f'a
L'OO\·ettirse en el Of!ll1to
eronom.ioo
y culluralde
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Happy to report from Beirut that the Lebanese capital is alive and well.
Article written at Wimpy’s Cafeteria on Hamra Street, Beirut, on October
31, 2003. Published by Reforma, November 30, 2003.
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Leaving the Mountain
“Who can ever tell because of what look, what word, what sneer a man
suddenly finds himself an outsider in the midst of his own people? So
that he feels this sudden, urgent need to go far away, or disappear…”
- Amin Maalouf, The Rock of Tanios
Hanna and Dalel left Lebanon out of a combination of
passion, pride, and a desire for a better life.
As children, they lived in the same hamlet, just a few houses away
from each other, during the final years of the Ottoman Empire.
When the Ottomans entered the First World War in late 1914, they
had already been masters of Lebanon for 400 years. Hanna was 13
then, and Dalel only 10 years old.
Jamal Pasha, head of the Ottoman Navy, and considered to be one
of the perpetrators of the Armenian genocide, was appointed
commander of Turkey’s 4th Brigade. In November of that same year,
Ottoman troops entered Lebanon and spread throughout the
country.
Frustrated at his defeat in the Suez Canal during the war in 1915,
Jamal Pasha ordered his ships to blockade the Eastern
Mediterranean.
My future grandfather Hanna, as many other young males in the
mountains, had to hide from time to time when Turkish troops
came to forcefully recruit villagers for military service.
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Dalel used to recount how the inhabitants of the mountains alerted
each other through whistles as the Turkish climbed the hills looking
for young men to recruit from village to village.
The young men would wait in the forest, hiding in groves and caves,
until the troops had left the area.
Many people were arrested, and, in 1916, twenty-five Lebanese
nationalist leaders were executed in Beirut’s Place des Cannons,
also known as Martyrs’ Square.
And then, Lebanon also suffered economically. The Ottomans
confiscated crops and cattle, especially in Christian areas, and
stopped grain from entering the country.
Dalel’s family, which was poorer than Hanna’s, suffered more. My
grandmother often recalled how, during the war, her parents were
once caught by a Turkish soldier carrying a bag of flour for the
family. The Turk decided to confiscate the food and tried to snatch
it away from her father.
When Dalel’s father refused, a struggle ensued, and the armed
soldier threatened to shoot. Desperate and afraid, Dalel’s mother
bit one of the soldier’s hands so hard that one of his fingers was
almost detached; in the melee, my great-grandparents ran for their
lives and survived the incident.
Dalel’s parents, Tanios Isaac Sam and Aniza Farah.
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This version of events was deeply embedded in Dalel’s mind.
Hanna fared better; his parents Bechara and Farieda, in addition to
their farming activities in the village, had been actively doing
business in South Africa since 1910.
Inspired by the success of some early migrants to the Transvaal and
to the Americas in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many
Lebanese travelled to those and other lands often, rather than
settling abroad permanently.
In South Africa, the Lebanese first tried their luck at mining precious
stones.
Bechara seems to have participated in mining in South Africa,
because his son Hanna used to tell stories in Mexico of how his
father witnessed mine workers being found out trying to smuggle
diamonds out of the mines.
The Lebanese in South Africa then concentrated on the sale of fresh
produce, and became peddlers of goods which were in demand in
remote farming communities.
At the time, South Africa was under British rule; the country’s
population had been divided into a race system consisting of 4
groups: whites, blacks, coloured, and Asian.
The Lebanese, which were often confused with Turks and Syrians
because they held Ottoman identity papers, fell into the official
category of “Native Races of Asia” – which in reality meant secondclass citizens.
Under the regime, only whites were allowed to own land.
The Lebanese finally got a chance to challenge the system of land
ownership in 1913, when a member of their community, Moses
Gandur, filed a lawsuit against the Witwatersrand Local Division.
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In the landmark case, Gandur’s lawyer, W.J. MacIntyre, challenged
the definition of “Native Races of Asia”, and had to persuade the
court that the “Syrians” (as the Lebanese were then identified),
were white.
One of the arguments emphasized the Lebanese Christian faith.
During the proceedings, MacIntyre asked the government lawyers
and the judges whether they believed that Christ was white.
They wholeheartedly agreed that Christ was indeed white;
therefore, the plaintiff’s lawyer, pointing at the Lebanese in
attendance, stated: “These people are Christ’s people, and still
speak his language”.
Case closed. Under Judgement 1913:23, the Lebanese were
officially considered white.
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Cover of the judgement, published by the Syrian (Lebanon) Christian Association.
At the time, people carried identification documents indicating
race, and anything other than white meant lower class. This forced
the Lebanese to look and act “perfect” (i.e., like part of the elite) so
as not to lose their position.
After Gandur’s successful challenge, the Lebanese in South Africa
would go on to win a few more legal battles to defend and
consolidate their “white” status in that society.
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One such battle was waged by Massoud Kalil, life President of the
Lebanese Christian Association of South Africa, who in 1950, along
with his wife Victoria, met with then-Prime Minister D.F. Malan.
Massoud and Victoria Kalil, originally from the village of Beit edDin, were the future grandparents of Kevin Joseph, husband of
Margaret Joseph (neé Khoury), one of Bechara Khoury’s
grandchildren in South Africa.
The purpose of the meeting with Malan, who established the
infamous system of apartheid, was to ensure that the Lebanese
would remain “white” under the revamped racial order.
Victoria’s fair complexion and blue eyes must have helped, because
they succeeded in their objective.
All these battles remained hushed while new generations of
Lebanese South Africans reaped the benefits of a discriminatory
system, unaware of the old struggles, until 2001, when a South
African magazine published the various judgements for the first
time.
But, back in 1920, things were different. There was growing
resentment towards economically successful foreigners, and ways
were found to curb their economic importance.
Bechara ran a produce establishment in South Africa, and also
quietly sold liquor on the side to interested parties, regardless of
their race. Unfortunately, a law prohibited the sale of Europeanmade liquor to “the Natives”.
Bechara was caught, and, on December 5, 1920, was deported back
to Lebanon on the SS Gloucester Castle out of Durban.
The ship had a service speed of only 13 knots. It’s creeping pace
earned her the nickname “Go Slowster Castle”.
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SS Gloucester Castle.
One can only imagine what Bechara’s mood was after the
forbidden alcohol sales mishap.
He had plenty of time to ponder the future during that slow, long
sailing back home through such ports of call as Lourenco Marques,
Beira, Dar-es-Salaam, Zanzibar, Mombasa, Aden, and Suez, from
where he probably continued by train on to Lebanon.
However, after allowing some time to put the incident in the past,
in 1928 Farieda started a process to be allowed back into South
Africa with the family.
Permission was soon granted to them on the grounds that the
family’s many properties there required being looked after.
Thus, the family eventually benefited from the change of policies
initiated in South Africa in 1913 regarding land ownership and the
racial status of the Lebanese in that country.
Bechara’s unexpected, early return to Lebanon because of the
deportation must have influenced his son Hanna’s decision to
emigrate separately.
Hanna was already a young man, with his own ideas and
aspirations. He was in love, and going to South Africa was not
possible at that time because of Bechara’s recent trouble there.
The family was relatively well-off, and during the years of hardship
in the Levant had had enough food to sustain the household.
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The situation in Lebanon then was such that, as a result of the
Ottomans’ actions during the First World War, prices soared, and
paper currency, which replaced gold, depreciated.
At the same time, locusts invaded Lebanon, and destroyed the
crops. Thousands of people died of famine and disease.
“The nights in Beirut were atrocious: You heard the whining and
screaming of starved people: ‘Ju3an, Ju3an’ (hungry, hungry),”
wrote the Turkish feminist author Halide Edib in her memoirs.
In 1917, Edward Nickoley, an employee with the Syrian Protestant
College, later the American University of Beirut, wrote in his diary:
“Starving people lying about everywhere; at any time children
moaning and weeping, women and children clawing over rubbish
piles and ravenously eating anything that they can find”.
“When the agonized cry of famishing people in the street becomes
too bitter to bear, people get up and close the windows tight in the
hope of shutting out the sound. Mere babies amuse themselves by
imitating the cries that they hear in the streets or at the doors.”
According to Red Cross estimates, from 1914 to 1918, almost a
quarter of the Lebanese population, or about 280,000 people,
perished as a result of those hardships.
The fact that Bechara and Farieda had been working abroad during
those years may have saved their children.
By the end of the war, Dalel and Hanna had experienced the end of
the Ottoman stranglehold on their country, and then lived through
a couple of years of French rule.
When Bechara was deported, in 1920, Hanna was 19, Dalel 16. They
had fallen in love with each other, decided to get married, and to
look for a new life together, perhaps abroad.
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But not without Hanna’s parents trying to prevent it. They had
plans of their own, including moving the family to South Africa for
good, where business opportunities looked brighter.
Bechara and Farieda had done well enough, but Lebanon’s future
and its status at the end of the First World War seemed uncertain.
They intended to move to Johannesburg as soon as possible, and
Hanna’s involvement with Dalel was an unwelcome complication.
This, especially in a culture where villagers often married first
cousins to preserve property within the family, was a thorny issue.
A look at Farieda’s picture is enough to understand Hanna’s
predicament. My great-grandmother had a temper of such renown
that it has survived two centuries.
In a photo taken shortly before leaving for South Africa in the late
1920’s, Farieda stands next to her husband Bechara, fiercely staring
at the camera.
Despite being almost comically shorter than my great- grandfather,
tiny Farieda dominates the scene.
“If you marry that girl, we will kill her”, Farieda warned her eldest
son, Hanna.
Bechara and Farieda Khoury.
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But my future grandfather was not easily dissuaded. He confided in
his beloved paternal grandmother, Khatoum: He would elope with
Dalel and go to Mexico, even if he had to do so empty-handed, as
so many others had done before.
He would not wait to go along with the rest of the family to
Johannesburg, not if they did not accept Dalel.
Only Khatoum knew of Hanna’s plan. Even her husband, my greatgreat grandfather Isaac, was unaware of it.
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In the only photo that we have of Isaac, the family’s patriarch is
wearing the traditional Ottoman seroual, the baggy pants of the
period, and matching shirt, jacket, and cap.
His simple but impeccable all-black outfit denotes the unassuming
pride of the Maronite farmer.
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Khatoum and Isaac had looked after Hannah and his siblings during
his parents’ absences while they worked in South Africa, and Hanna
and his grandmother had become quite close with one another.
She knew that Hanna was determined to leave with Dalel, and
could not bear the thought of her favourite grandson crossing to
the other end of the world with a teenage wife and no money.
So, Khatoum secretly handed Hanna a large sum of cash and gave
him her blessings.
Then, one day, without warning his parents, my future grandfather
Hanna took Dalel and sailed on a ship to France, never to return to
those mountains again.
Isaac Khoury.
***
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The following story is written by Catherine Khoury-Prinsloo. She is the granddaughter
of Wadih Khoury, one of Hanna’s brothers.
The essay recounts Catherine’s experiences at the Church of Our Lady of the
Cedars, in Woodmead, Johannesburg.
Violins & Tattoos in the Maronite Mass
by Catherine Khoury-Prinsloo
For my son Christiaan Prinsloo
No ways. It can’t be an actual fight, I told myself. Between
women! In church! I leaned over the choir balcony slightly to see
and hear better.
Perhaps they were just joking, playing around. Loud, after all, was
normal when everyone was filing out of mass. And plus – this was
the Maronite Leb Mass, so expect a few more decibels. But no –
this was a genuine, ugly barney.
Respect
The tall, elegant reader was saying something about it being
church – “Please, you can’t talk so loudly to each other. Have some
respect.” One of the other two older women replied loudly
“Respect! What about you respecting us and minding your own
business. Who do you think you are! This is not the first time
you’re starting trouble. Stay out of our business.”
I knew the other women. As well as I know many of the regular
people in mass. Playing the violin makes you so conspicuous, and
yet also amazingly, so invisible. You see so much. And you always
look out for your usual people in their usual places.
These two older women did speak loudly. The one was going a bit
deaf, I suspect. Over months I had seen them sit together, and
then for a period of several months sit on opposite sides of the
church, and just recently, sit together again. Don’t know more
than that. The one looked a bit drained. Fragmented information.
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Whenever I overheard bits of their conversation in the past it was
never momentous. Who visited whom, what this one said. Don’t
think what they said was the full story. Where they said it - and
why – maybe held the answers. Like putting treasured Smarties
into a silver box to magic them into Lindt chocolates.
I put my violin back into its velvet lined case, carefully locked it, and
got ready to leave. A last look around.
Love
My favourite elderly couple had just got up. They often stayed a bit
longer, to avoid the rush. Hand in hand they walked down the
aisle. He still wore a movie star moustache, she had pencilled-in
eyebrows. They always went up to communion together, and he
rested his hands on her shoulders sometimes. Once I saw him
carefully replace a dangling hair clip, tidying up her bun. She
smiled up at him, and I felt the biggest stab of jealousy and awe.
I see lots of gestures. At the sign of peace this middle aged man at
the back of the church gave his wife a quick hug, and then, when
she pushed him away a bit, he gave her a gentle tweak on her nose.
Curiously sexy and sweet. Can’t explain why. The weird semaphore
of long married couples.
The gay couple were back. They wore identical rings. They were
always so careful not to touch each other at all in mass, but when
the one had flu, the other one passed him his clean hanky and
picked up the newsletter he had dropped. I see the way they are
always deferential and a bit shy and hesitant, when the sign of
peace comes round. In case someone does not want to shake
hands with them.
Stereotypes
There’s no such hesitancy about the attractive 40 year old redhaired tattooed lady. She was smiling and as flamboyant as ever.
No wedding ring, just a half ring of Arabic writing ornamenting the
back of her neck. I could not resist. After one mass I ran
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downstairs and asked her what the writing meant – “It’s the names
of my children” she smiled. “Anthony and Bianca.” Quintessential
Lebanese. Stylish, out there, ostensibly rebellious but actually surprisingly traditional. A tattooed matriarch. Add that, if you can,
to any stereotypes.
Shepherds & their flock
And what about the priests? “Father Rafik is going to be extra
happy today,” the deacon said. “Not only is it the Festival in the
south, but very importantly Bayern Munich won their soccer league
match yesterday.” Warm chuckles and snorts of laughter. “Thank
you God,” Father Beshara added. “Otherwise my day was going to
be hell.” The laughter became a wave, reverberating around the
church.
When I win the Lotto, Father Rafik is going to Germany to watch a
match played by his heroes. I’ll organise that he meets the team,
and gets a souvenir signed by all the players. That’s for sure.
He was sneezing and wheezing in Mass last Sunday. He needs to
take it easier. Difficult though, looking after the likes of us.
We’re a troublesome, argumentative lot.
Contributions
But the man is a diplomatic treasure. A one-man peace mission. He
is forever mediating, forever trying to be appreciative of some
pretty dodgy contributions from the congregation.
Like the one Sunday when the sermon was about the 153 fish that
Jesus helped his disciples to catch. Father was explaining that it
meant that the good news was no longer just for the Jews, but also
for the Gentiles. That we also need to open our hearts and minds
to people who are different to us.
He tries really hard to make everyone feel welcome in the church.
There are a lot of new immigrants – not only Lebanese, but
Nigerian, Congolese – even someone from the Côte d’Ivoire the
other day.
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Anyway, after this mass about the 153 fish I hear this one very
earnest woman making her own contribution - so help me - trying
to add to the sermon, if you please.
She says to Father, “You know Father, I think that maybe it’s also
significant that 153 is also a prime number – you know - only
divisible by itself.”
Father smiles politely, and nods and heads off to another group of
people.
Lady – who taught you maths! Ask for your money back. But get
someone else to count it for you – please ! 153 is 51 x 3 – so no
coconut for the prime number idea. I guess Father figured it was
good that she was trying to contribute something – dodgy or not.
So he didn’t make her feel like a siyeel. He’s a good man.
The really great thing about our Lebanese priests is that they
constantly stress that they are not saints.
Saints and angels
They make mistakes. They have their own flaws. We all
remember the day the representative from Jews for Jesus came to
the mass. Father Rafik understandably wanted it to be perfect. We
needed to be cultured, dignified and organised. And also – don’t
mention the war.
Unfortunately, at one point in the mass the choir’s lead singer went
on singing a little too long, and kept Father waiting. He had
wanted to ensure enough time for his honoured guest’s speech.
Father lost it in a very small way. “Please, the people of the choir,
you must follow the priest please. He is in charge of the mass.”
A very public reprimand to the one who sings like an angel. The
one who left Lebanon recently, and still has that strong accent of
our Jidoos and Situs.
She makes you yearn, yearn for Jesus, and Mary, and goodness,
and that time when you were young, and ran in a golden field
laughing towards your parents. Her voice is a violin. Far better
than my own.
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Peace Initiatives
For a few weeks she did not come back.
The church was divided.
Somehow – behind the scenes – there was a peace initiative. And
when she came back, Father was even bigger in our eyes than
before, and the singer was cherished even more. Her first song
made us sigh. I saw all the eyes turn towards her, and then quickly
back to Father. All is well.
The Children and Families
Her baby was born recently. And comes with to mass. I play the
violin with extra care. It must also be a lullaby.
There was a pretty young girl – around five years old – she danced
in the aisle today, behind the grey haired lady with the piercing
blue eyes, slumped in her wheelchair. As soon as the music
stopped, the little girl returned to the pew. Her own heartfelt, feetfelt homage to God.
I love watching the toddler son of the famous racehorse trainer.
His dad commands a big stable with million rand horses - 400kg
power houses. Feature race champions. Durban July winners. But
the boss of the game at church is his small son. He leads his
slightly embarrassed dad on a merry chase from one side of the
church to the other. His dad always places second. And does his
best to look stern, and fails spectacularly.
The little girl is sweet and well behaved. She wears alice bands and
has small handbags that remind you of a nicer, old-fashioned time.
Her mom is tall and beautiful, and the family of four always sit in
the same area in the church. I check each time to make sure they
are there – a small but sturdy boat of family - that in some way
reassures you that all the rafts and rusty canoes can stay afloat
too.
The teenagers and the young adults in the church – so stylish. One
youngster had the back of his hair cut into a spider web pattern.
How cool is that ! And the young girls are so beautiful. The warm
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brown eyes – the hair – nobody has nicer hair than us. Sorry for
you everyone else.
Litmus Tests
“So how do you know you’ve just been to a Lebanese mass?” I
asked my second cousin recently. “Well,” she pondered. “We don’t
all rush off afterwards. Some of us stay to catch up on all the
gossip. And buy ghibbers bread. Because we don’t have enough
time to make our own anymore”.
“Or we were never wise enough to make the effort to learn how” I
grimaced. “All true, but also you will know that you are at the
Lebanese mass because I can guarantee that at least one woman
will be wearing an animal print blouse and possibly also skin-tight
animal print ski pants.
“At least one elderly lady will be wearing an old-fashioned lace veil
hearkening back to the days when women had to cover their hair
so as not to be a temptation. And there will definitely be tattoos.”
“One distant relative will say how much you or your son has
grown.”
Hanooshing the chickens
“During each mass you will witness at least one act of random
kindness - the mom in the pew behind picking up the book dropped
by the children in front of her. “
“A granny giving the children of the mom with her head in her
hands small toys to distract them.”
“A child sharing his biscuits or sweets with the child in the row
behind him.”
Something that makes you think of the word “Hanooshing”
comforting. Troos.
That makes you think of Jesus’ words of longing to hanoosh us. “I
wanted to hold you, Jerusalem, like a mother hen holds her
chickens snugly under her wing.”
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Thanksgiving
Thank you for what I have received at your altar. I hope to return to
you in peace. I do not know if I shall be able to return to you to offer
sacrifice again.
I leave you in peace.
Salaam, Salaam. Shalom. Peace be with you.
God willing, I’ll see you all again next Sunday. Is
mis saleeb.
Catherine Khoury-Prinsloo
June 2013
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Viva la Revolución
When Hanna and Dalel arrived in Veracruz in 1922, at the end of
the Mexican Revolution, their intention was to go on to Montreal,
where Dalel had relatives, but they never made it that far.
Prior to arriving in the Americas, they had spent a year in France,
where their eldest son Mohsen was born.
Once in Veracruz they met Domingo Kuri, a legendary Lebanese
pioneer in Mexico who owned El Arca de Noé (Noah’s Ark), a shop
in the port city.
Between 1920 and 1930, about 4,000 of his countrymen arrived in
Mexico. And he made it his duty to link most of the new arrivals
with people of the same towns already settled there.
Don Domingo, as he was known, was not related to my future
grandparents. He was born Abd el Adj, originally from Kartaba,
Lebanon. But when he arrived in Mexico in 1903 as an 18 year old,
he changed his name to Domingo Kuri.
He did so as part of a strategy to cultivate an identity that was more
acceptable in his adopted land. He often suggested to recent
immigrants to Mexico that they change their last names, preferably
to Kuri or Miguel, in order to fit in more easily.
In the case of Hanna and Dalel, they already had the “right”
surname, but heeded Don Domingo’s advice and adopted its
Hispanicised version: Kuri.
Our family name is common in Lebanon among Christians.
When the Sublime Porte decided to tighten administrative controls
in the empire, they required all citizens of Lebanon to assume a
surname for the first time.
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As in many other societies, people adopted the names of their
professions or their places of origin as their last names.
In the Maronite community, where married men can be ordained
as priests of the Church, the children of the prelates adopted the
name of Khoury (priest).
And, since in Lebanon there are priests in almost every Maronite
village, our last name is widely distributed around the country.
Upon meeting the newcomers at the pier as he usually did,
Domingo Kuri suggested that Hanna and Dalel travel to Real del
Monte, a mining town in central Mexico, where a couple from my
grandparents’ village had recently settled.
Following Domingo Kuri’s suggestion, they boarded a train for
Mexico City, from where they were to travel to Real del Monte.
The cars were packed with revolutionaries, wearing the distinctive
sombrero and cartridge belt that were made famous by Emiliano
Zapata, Pancho Villa, and their soldiers.
There were apparently some ‘bandidos’ too, because, before they
made it to Mexico City on their way to Real del Monte, my
grandparents had lost all the cash that Khatoum had given to Hanna
for the trip.
Left: The French ocean liner SS Flandre at Veracruz Harbour, early 1920’s.
Photograph by Manuel Bada. Right: Guillermo Kahlo, The Metlac bridge, Mexico
City-Veracruz R.R. Postcard published by J. G. Hatton, Mexico City.
***
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Real del Monte is a very picturesque village, nestled in the
mountains of the central Mexican state of Hidalgo.
But it was not a place with many opportunities for a young
immigrant couple in the early 20th century, so, with the help of the
Lebanese acquaintances referred by Domingo Kuri in Veracruz, my
grandparents soon moved on.
Many early Lebanese immigrants – often called “Turks” or “Arabs”
in those days - had dispersed into the Mexican interior, displacing
well-established French commercial houses there.
They had stayed in Mexico while other foreign merchant
communities left the country during the revolutionary years. This
allowed them to fill the vacuum in many profitable regional
markets.
In his superb chronicle of the Revolution, “Insurgent Mexico”, the
American journalist John Reed wrote:
“They say that there are few Jews in Mexico because they cannot stand
the competition of the Arabs”.
Reed also mentions some encounters he had with early Lebanese
immigrants during those chaotic times, just 5 or 6 years before
Hanna and Dalel’s arrival.
“El Cosmopolita is Chihuahua's fashionable gambling hell. It used to be
owned by Jacob La Touche (Jacobo Touche) —"The Turk"—a fat shambling
man, who came to Chihuahua barefooted with a dancing bear twenty-five
years ago, and became many times a millionaire”.
Also in the northern interior, Reed ran into another intrepid
Lebanese:
“A hostile Arab named Antonio Swayfeta (Chuayffet) happened to be
driving to Parral in a two-wheeled gig the next morning, and allowed me
to go with him as far as Las Nieves, where the General (Pancho Villa) lives.
By afternoon we had climbed out of the mountains to the great
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upland plain of Northern Durango, and were jogging down the mile-long
waves of yellow prairie, stretching away so far that the grazing cattle
dwindled into dots and finally disappeared at the base of the wrinkled
purple mountains that seemed close enough to hit with a thrown stone.
We passed only one human being all that day—a ragged old man astride
a burro, wrapped in a red-and-black checked serape, though without
trousers, and hugging the broken stock of a rifle”.
Apparently, this ‘hostile Arab’ eventually warmed up to Reed, and
led him safely through a two-day long, dangerous trek, until they
reached the village of Las Nieves, prompting Reed to report:
I knew that the price for such a journey as Antonio had carried me was at
least ten pesos, and he was an Arab to boot. But when I offered him money,
he threw his arms around me and burst into tears God bless
you, excellent Arab!”.
Sticking it out during those tough years would allow the Lebanese
to later emerge prosperous in the post-revolutionary period.
Hanna and Dalel followed the interior route first, perhaps under the
advice of other expatriates. In 1930, the young family was living in
Tolimán, another small, remote town, in the state of Querétaro.
But, by 1933, when my father Victor was born, they had arrived in
Mexico City.
They settled in the historic downtown area, the heart of the capital,
where immigrant ‘barrios’ used to be located.
They first lived in República del Salvador Street, surrounded by
other early immigrant arrivals who concentrated in multi-family
buildings often dating back to Spanish colonial times.
A couple of years later, Hanna and Dalel moved with their young
children to a building close by, at 125 República de Uruguay Street,
right across the street from the Cathedral of Our Lady of Balvanera.
The church, built in 1667, was given to the Maronite community by
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president Alvaro Obregón in 1921; it is the Cathedral of the
Maronite Catholic Eparchy of Our Lady of the Martyrs of Lebanon
in Mexico.
My father used to attend the dreaded catechism classes that were
imparted for children there. “The anise caramels they gave us at
the end of the sessions made it bearable”, he once told me.
The Kuris lived in a building owned by a French family who lived on
the main floor and operated a brandy distillery in the basement.
The home was near the city’s Zócalo, or main square.
Quintessential Mexico, where maimed lottery vendors, shoeshine
boys, balloon sellers and street organ players vied for some pesos
among the bustling fruit stands of the market of La Merced,
Mexico’s largest.
The Church of Balvanera and the home at República de Uruguay 125 (2023).
In the summers of the late 1960’s, during the elementary school
break, my father used to take me and my brothers to the garment
factory that he established after marrying my mother, some 35
years after Dalel and Hanna’s arrival.
At the factory, called Originales Guille in honour of my mother
Guillermina, my siblings and I spent the days drawing, making
figurines with bits of cloth, or playing hide-and-seek among the
dress racks.
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Originales Guille coat hangers still in use at the Kuri household(s) today.
From the factory’s windows on the 4th floor of the building, situated
on 20 de Noviembre Street, I could see the Mexican flag flying on a
pole at the centre of the main plaza, just a block and a half away.
At lunch time we used to walk with my father to Delmonico’s, his
favourite restaurant, huddled under the Tiffany stained-glass roof
of the fabled Hotel de la Ciudad de México.
“Who was that?”, I would ask my father after he had greeted
someone with a discreet nod along one of the cobblestonecovered sidewalks on our way to lunch.
“Oh, he’s the gentleman who owns the haberdasher’s shop on
Uruguay Street”, was the answer, and, a few steps later, “and that
was Mr. so-and-so, a friend of your grandfather’s”.
My father would acknowledge three or four other people in the
couple of blocks between Originales Guille and Delmonico’s.
This was his territory. He was raised here, surrounded by other
families who came from the same area of the old country, and from
other countries, in a surreal mixture of Mexican colour, the aromas
of fresh tortillas, ripe tropical fruits, chorizo, Chinese pastries, and
Turkish coffee.
***
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Mexican Dream
Mexico was a land of promise for immigrants and their
heirs, including my father, who left school early to start working.
He began by delivering photos taken by street photographers along
San Juan de Letrán Street, a busy thoroughfare in Mexico City.
But his mother soon objected, as the job required my father to find
the addresses of the photo subjects while riding his bicycle, often
through shady neighbourhoods, and chased by dogs.
My maternal grandparents, Margarita and Francisco, walking on San Juan de
Letrán Street in the 1950’s. Image captured by a street photographer.
It was the Golden Age of Mexican cinema, and a few years earlier,
in 1942, the film “El Baisano Jalil” (The Countryman Khalil) had been
released. It is the story of two families, one a successful Lebanese
immigrant family, and the other an impoverished but wellestablished local one.
The movie is based on a 1938 play by Adolfo Fernández
Bustamante, and became a classic in Mexico. In it, the Lebanese are
depicted as hard-working and compassionate textiles merchants
who, despite being well-liked, faced many social hurdles in the
country.
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A Lebanese in Mexico, poster promoting the film ‘El Baisano Jalil’. The caption
reads: “Jalil, a powerful man who overcomes everything through charm”.
An interesting element of the story is the fact that the Lebanese
characters in the movie, the Farads, are well-adapted, and
incredibly open to mixing with a Mexican family through marriage.
The roles of the charming Jalil, his adorable wife Suan, and their
steadfast son Salim were played by Mexican film icons Joaquín
Pardavé, Sara García, and Emilio Tuero, respectively.
Like the Farads of the movie, the Kuris persevered in postrevolutionary Mexico.
After the dicey street photos delivery stint, my father worked as a
courier on a scooter, but then decided to seek work in the United
States, as millions of Mexicans still do.
In 1950’s Chicago, he was employed by a family who made
fiberglass figures for businesses and amusement parks.
The figurines, once finished at the business’ workshop, had to be
transported in a pick-up truck to the amusement parks. My father
and a young black co-worker had to ride in the open back deck of
the truck – in the winter - giving a whole new meaning to the
nickname “the Windy City”.
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During his stay in Chicago, my father was also hired at Nabisco, the
foods giant. He worked in the production line of that company’s
plant, a 1,800,000-square-foot (170,000 m2) facility, and the largest
bakery in the world.
He was responsible for taking trays of baked products from the
production lines to the packing areas, and replacing those trays
with empty ones for the line workers.
Nabisco’s Chicago plant produces about 320 million pounds of
snack foods annually, so, there was a lot to move around, even back
then. My father’s work was lightened up by the many young Polish
immigrant women who flirted with him at the factory.
••
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........
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But the beautiful Polish girls could not prevent him from a serious
bout of homesickness, and, after almost 10 months in the USA, he
took a Greyhound bus back to Mexico.
Upon returning from Chicago, my father met my mother, who lived
in the neighbouring unit of the same building with her mother,
Margarita, a nurse by trade but also an outstanding painter and
seamstress; her stepfather, Francisco, my charismatic grandpa who
worked as a barber; and her older sister, Martha.
In the hope of marrying that girl next door, my father held jobs in
various small textiles operations in downtown Mexico City, which
were run by other Lebanese immigrants and their children.
Eventually, he managed to save enough money to buy a few Singer
machines, and started producing handkerchiefs for a factory.
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My father, Victor, working at a manual knitting machine in the joint venture
started by himself and some of his childhood friends in Mexico City. Chocolate,
pop, and cigarettes fueled the labour.
With the help of his future mother-in-law, my grandmother
Margarita, he began to make baby garments, but met fierce
competition from other manufacturers, until a store buyer
suggested they make women’s clothing.
My father Victor followed the advice, and the sales of his products
started to grow.
Within 5 years of their marriage in 1960, my parents were doing
well enough to start thinking about buying a house.
My parents’ wedding, December 10, 1960; Right: my father and his mother,
Dalel, at the wedding.
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They decided to have a family right away, and by 1966 they had
three boys and a girl running around the place.
During the first few years, our family lived in typical middle-class
neighbourhoods of Mexico City. First, in the Narvarte sector, where
I was born, in a house on Avenida de la Universidad, and later in the
Tecamachalco and Chimalistac districts.
Watch scenes of the Kuri family life in Mexico City from 1961 to 1966:
https://youtu.be/JjNiUfXKFRI
The clothing factory now had among its customers major retailers,
like El Puerto de Liverpool, and El Palacio de Hierro, two leading
department stores.
Then, in late 1969, we moved to a mansion in El Pedregal, located
in San Angel, one of the city`s wealthiest neighbourhoods.
My father always regretted not having been able to become an
architect, but now he could – at least partly – fulfill that dream. So,
over the following ten years we relocated often and lived in 3
different houses built by him, in the same neighbourhood.
And what houses! The residences included a private swimming
pool, tennis court, maids, cooks, a driver and a gardener.
Watch the Kuris having dinner at home in 1975:
https://youtu.be/VRIa2MlDhZg
While my mother insisted on continuing to manage the household
hands-on, she now had the luxury of hiring some help.
Petra Acevedo came to our home in 1964; she was one of the many
people who worked in our house over the years. Petra lived with us
and cared for my siblings and I for 16 years.
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As toddlers, she bathed us, put us to bed when my parents were
out at night, and often walked us back home from the
neighbourhood kindergarten. She also helped my mother with
cooking and all kinds of house chores.
Originally from the town of Los Reyes, Petra had a beautiful voice,
and used to sing “Recuerdos de Ypacaraí” (remembrances of
Ypacarai) every evening while washing the dishes.
While my mother excelled at Lebanese food and the more
laborious dishes, Petra’s meals were simple but delicious. Her
‘tacos Petra’ (beef tacos made with Mexican cream, green salsa and
cilantro), and her sweet coyotas (warm flour tortillas filled with
cajeta caramel sauce lightly baked on a pan) are still legendary
dishes that were in constant popular demand.
Another fondly-remembered helper is Buenaventura (‘Ventura’)
Ancona Kanul, a charismatic, pleasant Mayan handyman who loved
reading the adventures of the Mexican superhero Kalimán
whenever he took a rest from gardening or driving us around.
I can now confess to stealthily reading from my buddy Ventura’s
vast collection of that popular series, behind my mother’s back,
while riding with him in the car.
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April 1977 issue of Kaliman el Hombre Increíble.
Ventura, a native of a remote village in Yucatán and who had
learned Spanish through his own efforts, lived with us for 10 years;
he tried his best to teach me the Mayan language during our
commutes, took care of our house, garden, dogs, and even a
rooster pet that I had won at a supermarket raffle when the bird
was a chick. Ventura was always available and reliable.
Petra and Ventura’s surnames were different from ours, but our
lives were intimately intertwined beyond mere daily routines. Only
the extreme circumstance of emigration separated us later.
In addition to the privilege of outstanding house help, we attended
private schools, and had music, painting and tennis lessons at
home. We also joined an equestrian club, and, when my father
heard that there were some bullies at our school, he enrolled us in
Judo and Karate programs.
In 1970, at the age of 9, I was already an avid soccer fan, and the
World Cup was hosted by Mexico. I was lucky enough to watch,
with my father and some of his close friends, the final
championship game between Brazil and Italy in a private box at the
Azteca stadium.
We travelled often, especially to the United States, and in 1976 we
drove through Western Europe for 2 months in a van.
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Watch the Kuris’s daring crossing of the Champs Elysees together in the summer
of 1976: https://youtu.be/eA5FBoCDkcI
My father liked the good things in life, so we stayed at some of the
best 5-star hotels in Paris, London, and Lucerne. The dream of
those villagers willing to leave their millenary birthplaces for a
chance at prosperity abroad had been attained.
But there had been bumps along the way.
My grandfather Hanna had a wandering eye, and this had caused
some problems; my grandparents separated when my father was
12, and the end of the marriage had a profound effect on him.
Although he was deeply hurt by the separation, and the
relationship with Hanna was strained for many years, my father
always made sure that Hanna was well taken care of.
I recall visiting the garment factory as a child, and hearing one of
the delivery drivers report to my father that he had taken Hanna to
buy new clothes earlier that day. He then gave my father the
receipt for the purchases.
The driver also reported on Hanna’s health and general situation.
Hanna re-married and, already in his 60s, had a daughter and a son
(Amira and Juan Carlos) from his second wife, Marcy.
Hanna and his second wife, Marcy, with their daughter, Amira.
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Despite the huge age difference with Marcy, Hanna managed to
make the relationship work and was remarkably close to his
children, my father’s half-siblings, whom my father refused to meet
well into his seventies, becoming in the end quite close to them.
In that new relationship, Hanna was especially close to Amira, his
only daughter.
“He had a great mathematical mind”, Amira told me from her
home in Mexico during one of our regular long-distance
conversations.
“He liked to guess how many people were at a location, a
supermarket, restaurant, or whatever, and he’d automatically
calculate how many customers there were, how much they
consumed on average, and would come up with an estimate of
the business’ income”.
“When we walked, he’d count the blocks and point out what type
of businesses were missing in the area, what was needed; he’d
figure out whether a garage or a grocery store would do well
there, based on the neighbourhood’s density and all kinds of
other considerations”, Amira recalled.
And his hunter’s instincts were still intact, even after spending
most of his life in the concrete jungles of Mexico City.
When it rained, Hanna used to explain to his daughter that if the
raindrops were big, it would stop raining soon, but if there was a
drizzle, it would last a long time.
Hanna even predicted earthquakes based on the colour of the sky,
and was always aware of the weather.
“He was always a caring dad to me”, Amira told me, adding that
Hanna improvised a bedtime story every night of her childhood.
Hanna also cooked regularly for his children, making their
favourite dishes: Greek salad and laban (Lebanese-style yogurt).
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Almost 30 years after Hanna had passed away, Amira told me that
Hanna’s love has always been present in her life, and the memory
of that tenderness has given her the strength to make it through
the hardest moments in her life.
For my father, however, as a young boy, the split between Hanna
and Dalel had been tough.
When he started his own family, my father made every effort to
spare his children from those things that made him unhappy as a
child. So, he always saw our group as a tight-knit set, almost a clan.
He also encouraged us to practise competitive sports, just like he
did during his youth to make friends and find a heaven away from
his ‘broken’ home.
That is how he became a semi-professional basketball player,
having joined the Mexico City YMCA at an early age. At the ‘Y’ he
made his best friends, friendships that would last all his life.
This love of sport, and his conviction that it can be redeeming,
motivated my father to acquire a prestigious sports centre, located
in our neighbourhood of Jardines del Pedregal.
In 1972, along with a childhood friend, he purchased the Club
Familiar del Pedregal.
Valvoline’s No. 7 was a tough shooting guard.
The club had an indoor swimming and diving pool, three tennis
courts, squash facilities, and a gym. It operated a cafeteria, and
offered aerobics classes, dance lessons, and summer camps.
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Its Centro Acuático boasted one of Mexico’s best competitive
swimming teams and produced many national champions and
several Olympians.
The years I spent training there made my childhood a privileged and
beautiful experience, and life-long friendships were forged.
Watch the Centro Acuático team in action, c.1973:
https://youtu.be/8LjI8Olh7n4
My father, Victor (2nd from right) and some of his basketball teammates, ready to
board a flight to northern Mexico to participate in a tournament, 1950.
In his youth, my father had channeled his energy through
basketball at the YMCA, along with a tight-knit group of friends.
One of them was Raúl Lahud, also a descendant of Lebanese
immigrants raised in the same neighbourhood as my father’s.
Lahud, a self-made millionaire, made his fortune in the textiles
business, and was a silent partner in the sports club venture.
My father continued to run the garment factory, but the club was
his vocation. In contrast with Lahud and other shrewder
businessmen, my father used his money to fulfill dreams, instead
of multiplying wealth. A few years earlier he had opened an art
gallery in Mexico City’s Zona Rosa district.
Through the gallery, known as Kusak, my parents met many artists,
including Alejandro Jodorowsky, Silvia Pardo, Trinidad Osorio,
Francisco Toledo, and Yolanda Quijano, among others.
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The most notorious of them was Jodorowsky, the filmmaker best
known for directing such surreal cult movies as “El Topo”. He also
developed his own spiritual system, “psychomagic”, which is based
on alchemy, the tarot, Zen Buddhism, and shamanism.
Kusak showed some of Jodorowsky’s cartoons in the late 60’s,
when he started publishing a weekly comic strip called Fábulas
Pánicas (Panic Fables) – a take from the Panic Movement, an artistic
movement that he co-founded.
The strip was as wild and experimental as his films. It appeared in
the newspaper El Heraldo de México, and I was a huge fan.
Many of the acquaintances that my father made at Kusak would
spend the weekends at our house painting, sunbathing, and
socializing. The gallery lost money, but my father was happy.
At the same time, he continued to own the sports centre, in which
my mother Guillermina was actively involved as well. She worked
in administration at the club office, organizing the summer camps,
the yearly trips abroad, supervising the facilities’ maintenance and
dealing with member relations.
Kusak Art Gallery, Zona Rosa (Pink Zone), Mexico City; A Jodorowski comic; and
my father hosting an exhibit with a museum curator.
My father at a party in our home, dancing with Carmen Barreda, director of
Mexico City’s Museum of Modern Art; and with my mother in the 70’s.
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Many of the families who were part of this sporting and social
community became quite close, and my parents often acted as
mentors to many of the youngsters there.
During one of the annual house swimming tournaments held at the
club, one of the parents, Eduardo Cadaval – who would later
become president of the Mexican Swimming Federation – took the
microphone at the end of the 3-day meet, to address the three or
four hundred people in the stands.
Cadaval thanked my parents for their dedication, pointing out the
many successes the team had achieved during the previous years.
Suddenly, someone in the crowd yelled – ‘let’s hear a cheer for the
Kuris!”. The crowd, made mostly of swimmers, their parents and
relatives, all started chanting a typical Mexican sports cheer:
“Sikity-boom a-la Bim-Bom Baa, Sikity-Boom a-la Bim-Bom-Baa, A l- Beeo, a la-Ba-o, a la Bim-Bom-Baa, Los Kuri, Los Kuri, Ra, Ra, Raaa!”
The cafeteria at Centro Acuático del Pedregal (CAP).
Watch the In-House Tournament action at CAP, c.1973:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts4uTEnx6wk&feature=youtu.be
Standing next to my parents in front of all these people, showing
their genuine appreciation and friendship in such a way – with the
cheers thundering inside the closed space of the indoor pool - made
me feel teenage awkward, but also immensely proud of them. Life
was good, but Mexico had problems...
***
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Leaving again
During the same years of economic prosperity, corruption
in Mexico became rampant. Politicians mismanaged the country
and abused power with impunity, and my parents became worried
about the future.
Against the advice of most of their friends, my parents began to
ponder the idea of emigrating. First, they thought about moving the
family to Spain, but the political situation there was unstable at the
time.
They bought a property in Houston, a place my parents visited
often to attend fashion shows on business, but shortly afterwards
became disillusioned with the way that city was developing.
Watch the Kuris on their way to the airport in Mexico City and visiting Houston in
1977: https://youtu.be/9LTGiO4AlzA
We visited many Mexican cities in search of a refuge away from
Mexico City’s traffic, noise, pollution and increasingly violent
crimes.
My parents bought some land in the city of Querétaro, with the
idea of building a house there. But they soon sold it again after
learning that zoning regulations were not being followed, and that
a factory was going to be constructed nearby.
We travelled to the beautiful colonial city of Morelia, in central
Mexico, and visited that city’s university, as I was already in grade
12. But the school happened to be on strike, and the charged
political mood in the city put a damper on our desire to make it our
new home.
Another consideration was the northern city of Hermosillo, but
upon visiting it in the summer, we realized that we would probably
not be able to get used to the intense desert heat.
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So, during a trip to Vancouver in the Christmas of 1979, we fell in
love with that beautiful, young, exuberant Canadian metropolis.
After returning to Mexico, we had several ‘family meetings’ to
seriously discuss the possibility of leaving. My father often asked
the question: “Can we do something for Mexico if we stay?”.
I wanted to be a journalist, but in the late 1970’s that was not a
good option in Mexico. Journalists were often killed for reporting
the news, or for opting to do their job instead of accepting bribes.
The government controlled the media in many ways – newsprint,
for example, was monopolized by the government. Therefore, if a
given newspaper published information not acceptable to the
authorities, then they simply would not be able to get any
newsprint.
President Jose Lopez Portillo’s regime became so corrupt and
unpopular, that there were constant rumors about an imminent
coup d’état by the army.
One day in 1978, my parents came back home early after they were
not able to attend a concert at the Palacio de Bellas Artes, for which
they had tickets.
It turned out that the president and his entourage had decided to
be at the event, and filled up the hall with `guests` using the seats
for which people like my parents had already paid.
President José López Portillo, featured in Time magazine, October 8, 1979.
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This kind of arrogant and tyrannical behaviour occurred regularly
during a period when the president or his wife would systematically
order the random closure of key traffic arteries in the capital, so
that their motorcades could move at ease throughout the city,
causing total chaos and traffic delays for hours.
Police corruption had reached its peak; officers had to ‘buy’ from
their superiors the police cars and all the auto parts necessary to
maintain them, but in return had a license to abuse their authority
– having to provide the chiefs with a daily ‘fee’.
This resulted in constant harassment of citizens by the police, who
would take advantage of the slightest opportunity to prey on them.
All this on top of the political violence and complex historical issues
of inequality and social injustice that the country had suffered
since, at least, the colonial era.
The consequences were evident; One day, while driving to high
school in the morning with my brother Victor as my passenger in
our black Ford Galaxy, we were stuck in traffic next to a public
transit bus. I will never forget the looks of the dozens of people
jammed like sardines inside that bus, staring at us through the
windows…
In 1979, during my first job, I worked for three months as a
translator for the government organizing committee of the World
University Games. It was a great experience.
But, once the games ended, when I went to collect my paycheque
at the Ministry of Sport, I was informed that the budget for the
translators had vanished. I – and dozens of other people – would
not be paid.
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Then, after we had painfully come to the decision to emigrate, a
final letdown.
As an 18-year old, I was in the middle of completing my one-year
military service. I had drawn a ‘bola negra’, which meant I did not
have to perform any duties, but I had to be available to the army.
Therefore, I was not allowed to travel abroad without a special
permit.
I went to see a general at the National Palace in the main plaza, the
Mexican seat of government. The general was in charge of the
military service and he was the only one who could issue such a
permit to leave the country.
When I arrived for my appointment, I waited in the lobby, in awe
at the beautiful architecture and the murals of some of Mexico’s
greatest artists.
I admired and idealized the army, and believed that it was one of
the only trustworthy institutions in the country. On my mother’s
side of the family, I had relatives who were high-ranking officers,
and had always served the army proudly, almost devoutly.
A young sergeant came and told me he would take me to the
general’s office.
When we entered, the first thing I noticed were the porno
magazines on the general’s desk. He quickly took them and shoved
them into a drawer. He also put aside a bunch of peanuts he was
eating.
The general was in his mid-50’s. He asked me to sit down and tell
him why I wanted to see him. I told him I needed a travel permit.
He looked at me for a moment, and asked: “What does your dad do
for a living?”.
“He owns a women’s garments factory”, I said.
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“His office is actually two blocks from here”, I added.
“Listen”, said the general, “I have a girlfriend, she’s petite and darkskinned – do you think your dad has any nice yellow or red
dresses?”
“For sure!”, I replied, trying to sound enthusiastic.
“I will talk to my parents and get something nice for you. There is a
showroom there where you can choose the dresses”.
He took down my father’s business address and said he would go
there during the week.
The general then told the sergeant, who was standing straight
behind me, to make sure the necessary paperwork was prepared.
“Yes, Sir”, he replied, and then asked his boss, in a more informal
way:
“General, may I take some peanuts?”
“Oh, sure, take them all, I have eaten a lot already!” he said kindly,
and slightly amused.
The sergeant put the peanuts in the side pockets of his military
pants, and we left through a corridor that led to another office,
where a secretary would begin to process my travel permit – once
all the ‘requirements’ had been fulfilled.
Walking behind this soldier, in the symbolic heart of Mexico, with
his side pockets bulging with peanut shells, I could only – sadly –
think of Andre Breton’s words after his wife, Jacqueline Lamba, had
had an intimate love affair with Frida Kahlo during a trip to this
country: “Mexico is more surreal than surrealism itself”.
Looking back, I could see how my grandparents – or anyone - could
leave their homeland, a place they deeply loved, in the hope of
forging a new reality elsewhere, in the unknown.
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In the months prior to our move, we held informal farewell
gatherings with many friends and relatives, and people were
usually surprised, or curious about our plans.
But, I remember one particular talk that made an impression in my
mind, even at the immature age of 17: After a swim practice, one
of my CAP fellow-swimmers, Viridis, who is the same age I am,
pulled me aside and said: “Hey, Max, I hear that you and your family
are moving to Canada”.
“Yes”, I replied, “we are moving to Vancouver”.
“I am also emigrating soon with my family, we are going to Austria”,
she pointed out, in a solemn, sober sort of way. “It is important to
have a stable government backing you up, you know?“ She seemed
to know very well what she was talking about.
Viridis’ full name was Viridis Aloisa Marie-Eleonore Elisabeth
Marcus d’Aviano Caspara, or Archduchess Viridis of Austria, for
short. Her father was the last surviving child of the last Austrian
Emperor, Charles I. He was a toddler when Austria-Hungary
collapsed after its defeat in the First World War.
As a result, Viridis’ family was exiled, and lived in Switzerland, the
Portuguese island of Madeira, Belgium, and the United States,
before settling in Mexico, where Viridis was born. She eventually
married in Europe and now lives in France.
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That afternoon by the pool in Mexico City, through the tone in her
voice and the stern, yet innocent look in her eyes, I sensed the
seriousness of what laid ahead.
Ours were two vastly different families, with wildly different
reasons behind our immigrant backgrounds and destinies. We had
crossed paths serendipitously, and were again at a fork in the road.
This brief conversation, the last I had with Viridis, made me realize
that the emigration phenomenon does indeed take many, many
forms.
My family’s reasons for emigrating may seem frivolous compared
to the enormity of the challenges that millions of less-fortunate
people endure. But my parents were visionaries, they had seen the
writing on the wall, and decided to take early action.
Emigrating willingly and without financial pressures was not easy.
My parents left behind their relatives, good friendships, and a
material standard of living unimaginable just a generation before.
What is more difficult: Leaving your homeland because of war,
persecution or misery, or to leave behind a life of comfort and
wealth in exchange for social and moral ideals?
***
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Vancouver
Vancouver–
the sound of it is a wave,
breaking on the shores of the future,
Tune in . . .
- Alexander Stephen, 1929
Our application to emigrate to Canada was accepted, and
on June 15, 1980, we moved to Vancouver.
That day, we passed in transit through the United States. An
American immigration officer in Los Angeles checked our passports
before we boarded a connecting flight to Canada. When he saw
our documents, he looked intently at the family in front of him,
recognizing what it meant for us.
“You are emigrating today!” he murmured, bewildered, still looking
at each of us for a while before wishing us a good trip.
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When we arrived at our destination, Vancouver was still a frontier
town, isolated, almost a city-state.
Nature defines it. It is surrounded by a vast rainforest, mountain
ranges, and the Pacific Ocean.
The mighty Fraser runs through this seaport and gateway, as do
other mighty creatures such as squirrels, racoons, skunks, and
coyotes. The odd bear ventures into it from time to time. And, yes,
it is true: in its idyllic waters swim orcas, salmon and trout.
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Although open-minded and open-hearted, Vancouver dismisses
power and grandiosity, preferring to be left alone in Cascadian
Nirvana.
At times, it is strangely quiet…
As exciting as it was to move at 18 years of age under such
privileged circumstances, leaving my country was the hardest thing
I have ever done.
Mexico’s warmth, colour, ancient culture and diversity are unique.
I immediately missed my extended family and friends, but also the
mountains that surround my hometown of Mexico City, the finches
and towhees singing in the morning, the dogs barking in the
distance at sunset, and the beautiful ‘ahuehuete’ trees.
I longed for the familiar places, the plazas and the cafés where I
spent so many pleasant evenings with high school friends, my
neighbourhood, my language, and even the peculiar smell of
Mexico City’s smog.
Ten or fifteen years after leaving, those places and other memories
would flash through my mind at the oddest and least expected
moments; while driving in the streets of Vancouver, in the middle
of a class in college, or in dreams.
I missed playing chess with my friends at the coffee shop in Libreria
Gandhi, my favourite bookstore, going for ‘elotes’ – corn on the
cobb, covered with butter and chili powder - on Sundays in the old,
magical neighbourhood of Coyoacán, and the human eye contact
so commonly and easily made with every stranger around.
Nostalgia sweetened and muddled old memories of childhood trips
by Pullman train from Mexico City to my mother’s native
Guadalajara, on our way to her family’s hometown of Ixtlán del Río,
in the rugged mountainous interior of Nayarit state.
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The burro rides through the cobblestone-covered streets of the
town, the walks to the sugar mill, my uncle Emilio’s wood barrel ice
cream...
Riding with my brother Guillermo, and making ice cream with my siblings and
cousins at my uncle Emilio’s house in Ixtlán del Río, Nayarit.
Starting from scratch in Canada was difficult for the whole family.
To begin with, we were on our own, and knew little about even the
most basic peculiarities of the country.
A few months after we arrived, for example, during the first winter
in our new home, my brothers and I were trying to drive out of our
steep driveway after a snowfall.
Not having dealt with snow before, we were literally spinning our
wheels until our neighbour, who had been watching us from the
house across the street, came to our aid:
“Hey, kids, you don’t have winter tires”, the pleasant man told us.
“Winter tires?”, I replied. “What’s that?”
For five years after our move to Canada, my father, one of my
brothers, and I suffered from anxiety attacks. Mine became so
severe that I was forced to drop out of university after the third
year. I later learned that the problem was due to depression.
One year after our arrival, the Canadian economy collapsed. My
father had started building houses in Vancouver, just when interest
rates climbed to a record-setting 22 per cent…
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The great rewards were gaining the ability to stay detached, and to
always be ready for change. I am – always – home.
During the first years in Canada we started some viable businesses,
including Monte Cristo, a bakery/bistro operation with 3 locations.
The original one was on Robson Street, in downtown Vancouver.
Its Cajun chicken salad was a favorite of John Travolta’s, who would
often eat there while filming in the city.
Some nights, after performing at the nearby Orpheum Theatre,
what appeared to be the entire Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, all
dressed in black, would crash the place, causing havoc in the
kitchen.
After Monte Cristo was sold to a Kenyan immigrant family - who
made the operation grow and is still in business today - we started
importing Mexican pinewood furniture, blown glassware and silver
jewellery from Mexico for a retail operation called Mexico Arte.
Located in the Kitsilano neighborhood of Vancouver, it soon
became a favorite of the locals, especially at Christmas time.
The idea behind this business was, in part, to keep our links to
Mexico. And one of the most enjoyable aspects of it was the trips
to our country of birth, in order to buy merchandise for the store.
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When on such trips with my father, we used to drive through many
areas of the country, including some of the most beautiful and
culturally rich parts of Mexico, buying goods at craftsmen’s shops,
antique establishments, and markets.
My mother behind the counter at Mexico Arte.
The furniture home deliveries were another matter: the
adventures that I had with fellow workers trying to fit Haciendasize armoires into contemporary Vancouver houses and
apartments are the subject of another (thick) book.
Suffice it to say that many windows and doors were broken –
sometimes at the request of our customers – to squeak the pieces
through tight spaces.
The business was also eventually sold 15 years after opening.
These activities allowed us to work and integrate into Canadian
society. My siblings and I eventually married and pursued our
personal interests. In my case, journalism and translation.
My daughter, Daniela, at the helm of an Aquabus ferry on the waters of
Vancouver’s False Creek during her 2018 summer job; and my son Alberto
Mahrus, holding the British Columbia provincial high school soccer championship
trophy, won by his team in 2018. Centre: My children and I with their mother,
Begoña Balmori, in Vancouver, 2017.
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12:06
vancouver.moments
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Máximo Kuri’s Instagram account is mostly devoted to documenting life in
Vancouver - https://www.instagram.com/vancouver.moments/
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While there were never any regrets over our decision to emigrate
to the Terminal City, as Vancouver is known, the long learning
curve, coupled with the city’s high cost of living, meant that, from
a financial perspective, the move to our new home was a setback.
However, the goal behind our relocation was never financial gain.
We saw in Canada a democratic, multicultural society that
respected the rule of law, and in Vancouver we found a progressive
ecological and cultural oasis that appealed to our need for order.
Experientially we understood the true meaning of a trade-off, and
realized that the life of an immigrant is always a compromise.
In his 1929 poem, Vancouver, Alexander Maitland Stephen poses
the questions: Terminal…to what? Gateway…to where?
For us, Terminal…to a journey; Gateway…to other journeys.
My parents, White Rock, British Columbia (2015).
https://www.facebook.com/maximo.kuri/photos_albums
View photo albums of the Kuri-Balmori family dating back to 2008 in Maximo Kuri’s
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/maximo.kuri/photos_albums
***
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On the track
Having planned this trip as a birthday present of sorts for
myself, my family takes me for dinner to a Beirut culinary
institution: Istambuli, a restaurant specializing in Lebanese cuisine
where we dine during one of the most pleasant evenings of my life.
But I have to do some work. During the first few days of this 2- week
trip I write three stories for my newspaper. First, I visit Byblos, one
of the oldest cities on the planet.
It is only half an hour drive from Beirut. I look for Pepe Abed, a selfmade celebrity who lived in Mexico during his youth in the 1920’s,
and came back to his native Lebanon to establish resorts,
restaurants and bars that were patronized by the international jetset in the 1950’s and 1960’s.
In the late 60’s he opened ‘The Fishing Club’, a lounge housed in a
1,000-year-old structure built by the Crusaders right on the tiny
pier, from which Phoenician ships sailed when the Egyptian
Pyramids were new.
Visiting Tyre, Baalbek, and Byblos before starting to search for the family.
Despite the skill of their mariners, many of the vessels sank off the
Byblos coast, and Pepe Abed recovered hundreds of ancient
artifacts which he proudly displayed at ‘The Fishing Club’.
At his peak, he operated several businesses, including ‘Acapulco’, a
set of villas along one of Beirut’s most beautiful beaches.
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Known as ‘The Pirate of Byblos’, Abed, now 86 and frail, lost
everything during the civil war. Palestinian refugees invaded
‘Acapulco’, and his ship, “Así es la Vida” (‘That’s Life’) was sunk.
I reached Abed by phone, and he pleasantly answered questions in
perfect Spanish. His years of public relations yield wonderful
quotes, and I have enough material for a good story for Reforma.
Then, almost one week into the trip, we move our ‘base’ to Tripoli,
where I file a story about the legendary sweets that the Hallab
family has been making for generations.
We enjoy a seemingly endless variety of belewe (baklava), among
Muslim families breaking their fast in a late October evening of
Ramadan.
Inspired by the sight of vines everywhere, I report on the up-andcoming (but at least 5,000-year-old) Lebanese wine industry, its
wineries and acclaimed restaurants.
My editors are happy, and I can now concentrate on trying to find
my paternal past.
I spend a pleasant afternoon in the hotel lobby with my brother
Guillermo, sipping lemonade enhanced with rose water, wondering
if we will find any relatives tomorrow. Because tomorrow, we drive
up to the mountains.
On our way North, at Bab el Mina, Byblos.
***
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In the Hills of the Cedar Forest
“They stood at the edge of the Cedar Forest, marveling at the great
height of the trees. They could see, before them, a well-marked trail
beaten by Humbaba as he came and went.
Far off they saw the Cedar Mountain, sacred to Ishtar, where the gods
dwell, the slopes of it steep, and rich in cedars with their sharp fragrance
and pleasant shade”.
- The Epic of Gilgamesh (Stephen Mitchell translation)
The view of the vast, restless Mediterranean behind us was
spectacular, but we were not looking back.
Travelling along the cliffs of Lebanon’s Holy Valley, our thoughts
were set ahead, looking forward to seeing our family’s ancestral
home, a village we had only visited in our dreams.
On the mountain road, we come to a sharp curve, known as Koug
as Salib, or Curve of the Cross, and in the middle of it there is a sign:
’Sebhel’.
We had just climbed almost 700 metres in the last 20 minutes, from
the coastal city of Tripoli into the mountainous ‘Jurd’ region of the
country. It was time to look for the family village, the main purpose
of our trip.
Past Sebhel, the road follows the path of the Wadi Kadisha, where
hermits and saints have carved their rustic cathedrals on the rocky
walls of its canyon for centuries.
Even during the Ottoman Empire, the Maronites here were able to
maintain their independence and their Christian religion, fully
protected by the Sultan – a testament to the religious tolerance of
an otherwise unyielding invading force.
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We take the exit and immediately enter the village, driving slowly
downhill on a tight trail. The first person we see is a woman on our
right, washing clothes at the patio of her house, facing us behind a
small wall.
“Is there a family in town by the name of Khoury?”, asks Bayan al
Mohtar, our driver, through the car window.
The woman looks at Bayan and his passengers, their eyes fixed on
her in anxious anticipation. With a smile, she raises her eyebrows,
a gesture that in Lebanon means ‘no’.
After this brief encounter, Bayan, our Druze, middle-aged driver
and interpreter, starts moving our car forward again, among stone
houses with red roof tiles.
I mention that Bayan is Druze because, in Lebanon, a person’s first
allegiance is to their family clan, then to their village, and then to
their religious sect, which defines their identity.
It is somewhat ironic, then, that it is a Druze whom we depend on
to find our relatives in a Christian village. One hundred and fifty
years ago the Ottoman occupiers of Lebanon pitted the Druze and
the Christians against each other. In 1860 war broke out between
the two communities, affecting more than 150 towns.
My grandfather Hanna and my grandmother Dalel used to talk of
that conflict with bitterness against the Druze. As a Lebanese
proverb goes, “I am against my brother, my brother and I are
against my cousin; cousin, brother, and I are against the stranger”.
So, I hope that our taxi driver’s help will symbolically mend today
some old hard feelings.
It is mid-afternoon and the village seems uninhabited. The only
signs that we are not in a ghost town are the woman we just met,
and the flowerpots on almost every windowsill that we can see.
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There are clothes hanging on a line, a couple of cars stand parked
by the small seha or main square, next to the church.
I had read somewhere that, in many Lebanese villages, the local
churches have a bell which can be sounded at any time by visitors
upon arrival, and someone would come to greet them. I was
starting to consider the option.
A man is seated outside the telephone office, another building
made of massive slabs of limestone.
“Is there a family by the name of Khoury in town?”, our driver asks
again in Arabic.
Switching to French, Bayan tells me that the man says he does not
know anyone here by that name. That is strange, I think, because
our surname is so common in this region.
I begin to feel that it is going to be difficult to locate any of the
people we hope to find. Seated next to Bayan at the front of the
van, I cannot see my father’s expression, but I sense his skepticism,
and that of my mother and siblings in the back seat.
We travelled here to find the place where my father’s parents were
born almost exactly a hundred years before. None of us speaks
Arabic fluently; I have studied the language for 25 years but can
barely get by.
I found Sebhel in that detailed French map of Lebanon just weeks
before we embarked on this trip, based on my father’s vague
recollection of the name as he remembers his mother mentioning
it to him during his childhood in the early 1940’s.
That was more than sixty years ago.
As we quietly explore the town, I wonder if it was among these
pathways and small fields of tree fruits that Hanna and Dalel first
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met each other, having surely run up and down these hills in their
childhood and youth many times.
And it was not just puppy love – Hanna used to walk around Dalel’s
house brandishing a rifle, making sure everyone in town knew that
his engagement with Dalel was a serious matter.
“He marched around the house every day, like the guards do
around Buckingham Palace”, my father told me, chuckling.
When ‘off-duty’, Hanna liked standing at the edge of the ravines
that surrounded his hometown, and feel the fresh mountain air on
his bare skin.
“That wind in my village, so fresh it almost cuts you, makes you
strong”, he used to tell me.
These and other images of my grandparents’ lives here, before they
left forever, were fixed in my mind’s eye since childhood,
reinforced by the many years of waiting impatiently for a chance to
visit this place – if this, indeed, is the right place.
My grandmother Dalel’s Lebanese passport is the only record we
have that shows the location of her birth. It appears spelled as
“Sib.a’al”.
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We are hoping that the Sib’il my father remembers mentioned is
the same place as Sib.a’al on the passport, and the Sebhel on my
map, but spelled differently.
I was thinking all this when we noticed a young man and an older
fellow chatting by an ancient wall.
“I have some people from Canada here who are looking for their
relatives”, Bayan explains.
The younger of the two men is intrigued. He approaches our car
and takes a closer look.
“Their family name is Khoury”, Bayan emphasized.
Jumping into the van, the young man, who must be in his early
twenties, says he will take us to his uncle’s house. “He might be
able to assist you”, he murmurs, while giving directions to Bayan as
we negotiate the narrow, maze-like alleys of Sebhel.
***
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Remembrances of Lebanon
The 1920’s were not easy times in Mexico. Although the
Revolution, which started in 1910 and cost the lives of 1.5 million
Mexicans, officially ended in 1920, coup attempts and sporadic
uprisings continued for several years afterward.
These included the Cristero Wars from 1926 to 1929, a counterrevolutionary struggle. The movement was opposed to the
measures brought about by the Revolution against the Church.
After losing all their cash on the train from Veracruz, Hanna and
Dalel faced an uncertain future in a strange land. Unbeknownst to
them, they had just left the ravages of one war to enter a land still
convulsed by another conflict.
From their humble home on República del Salvador Street, my
future grandparents struggled to survive. First, Hanna started to
drive a taxi, and worked as a mechanic. His early experience with
cars in the steep and narrow paths of Mount Lebanon must have
helped.
Meanwhile, Dalel sold fabrics door to door on credit, a quite
common form of self-employment among the early Lebanese
immigrants to Latin America.
How Hanna managed to look after his fares effectively, without
speaking Spanish and being new to the city, is not clear.
But he did it. He also spent a long time playing poker with other
Lebanese, becoming such a good player that the game soon
became his main source of income.
Within 3 years of their arrival in Mexico, my grandparents had
added to the family two more boys: my uncles José and Alberto,
born in 1924 and 1925, respectively.
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About four years later, Hanna’s parents in South Africa reached out
via mail, offering to send Hanna and Dalel boat tickets so they could
join the rest of the Khourys – and the Shams, Dalel’s family - in
Johannesburg, where both families had settled.
Farieda promised Hanna everything was alright, and that Dalel was
now welcome as Hanna’s wife.
But it was too late. Hanna rejected the offer, choosing to continue
to struggle in ‘México bronco’ (rough Mexico) rather than accept
his parents’ help.
While Dalel and Hanna persevered in finding the promised dream
in the Americas, my father was born in 1933. Hanna worked odd
jobs, but kept benefiting from his skill at games of cards, which
often lasted one or two consecutive days and nights, fueled by
Lebanese snacks, the fruity tobacco of water pipes, and black
coffee.
These poker marathons usually took place at my grandparents’
house, or at the homes of their many Lebanese neighbours’.
The Barquet family had established a ‘casino’, patronized
exclusively by Lebanese immigrants, which became the unofficial
gathering place for the Lebanese community in the Mexican
capital.
Yapur Barquet and his wife, Eva, ran the establishment. One of their
daughters, Ventura, helped them in the kitchen, preparing a wide
variety of Lebanese dishes.
The Barquets also organized picnics in the Mexican countryside,
attended by many other Lebanese immigrant families. Those
gatherings were just like the outings in the Lebanese mountains,
where a lamb was slaughtered on the spot, and kibbeh was made
fresh by a stream.
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Ventura would later go on to write ‘La Cocina de Ventura: lecciones
de comida árabe’ (Ventura’s Kitchen: lessons in Arabic cooking),
first published in 1982.
The book was wildly successful beyond the Lebanese community in
Mexico, and by 2019 it had reached its 13th edition.
“I wrote it so our recipes wouldn’t be lost; an important part of our
culture is in our food”, Ventura has often explained. She also
starred in a television cooking program, ‘Vida Diaria’, broadcast by
the Televisa network.
‘La Cocina de Ventura’ set off a trend, inspiring the publication of
similar heritage cookbooks by other communities.
Dalel (resting her face on her hand) with my father as a baby and my uncle José,
next to him, at a picnic with the Barquet family in Río Frío, Mexico, c.1935.
Ventura Barquet, future author of a popular cookbook, is seated in the back row,
at left. Her siblings are Toya and Alberto (on Dalel’s right), Dora (standing), and
Adela (behind Dalel). The woman on Ventura’s left was a family friend.
My father and Ventura grew up together, and stayed in touch with
each other for the rest of their lives.
Not having met her myself, at my father’s insistence I called
Ventura from Canada one day in 2019, out of the blue, to say hello
and ask about her book and what she recalled of my grandparents.
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She immediately placed me, asked about my dad’s health – she
remembered he had suffered from knee problems – and said: “You
are Máximo… so your father named you after his brother”.
Ventura, in her mid-90s and totally lucid, added that she fondly
remembered my uncle Máximo, my father’s eldest brother, who
tragically died due to meningitis in 1946, at the age of 26.
The Barquets’ Casino Centro Libanés was at No. 52 on Correo
Mayor Street, and recently de-classified documents from the
Mexican Secret Service reveal that the site was under surveillance
in the 30s, reflecting the mistrust of foreigners at the time.
Many other communities were also under scrutiny, including the
Jews, but also German, Japanese, Italian, French, Turkish, and
Chinese nationals, among others.
The security archives quote an agent’s report: “The proprietor, who
is obviously Lebanese, has a liquor license issued by the City’s
government allowing the sale of wine and beer, and the centre is
comprised of approximately 125 members”.
The dossier continued: “All who attend are of Syrian-Lebanese
nationality, and pay a fee of 2 pesos per month; they visit the centre
regularly to play dominoes, backgammon, and pako (a Spanish card
game). There are 4 employees, 2 men and 2 women”.
The agent described the hall, indicating that there were
“approximately 20 small tables that the members use for gaming”,
adding that “they drink coffee at all times”.
No evidence of wrongdoing was reported. However, my father
remembers seeing at least four of the patrons bearing guns.
One of them was a certain Macluf, a fearsome fellow who hailed
from Zgharta, Lebanon. Rather than getting in trouble with the
security services, he eventually ended up being recruited by them.
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(Above left): The ‘casino’ operated by the Barquet family at the corner of
Venustiano Carranza and Correo Mayor streets in Mexico City; (Right): Dalel
(second from left) with friends aboard a ‘chalupa’ in the canals of Xochimilco.
During his childhood, my father used to walk past this old building
in his neighbourhood, and could often see Hanna at the balcony
smoking or having coffee with friends.
A couple of times a month, a musician from the old country played
the pear-shaped string instrument, known as Oud, at the Barquets’
home nearby, accompanied by 5 or 6 families who got together to
socialize and reminisce about the old days in Lebanon.
“Why are these grown men crying?”, my father would ask his
mother, Dalel, during these intense soirees.
“They are remembering their relatives, towns, songs, and
adventures when they were young”, my grandmother explained.
“I never saw men crying so much”, my father recalled years later.
“And it happened every time the Oud player came to play”.
Sometimes, when Hanna had won big at poker in the casino, on his
way home at dawn, he would walk by the Monte de Piedad
building, just off the Zócalo.
The institutional pawnshop was founded in 1774 to provide low
interest loans to the poor. Hanna would ask some of the people
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lined up outside of the building how much they needed to recover
their pawned goods, often jewellery with sentimental value, and
would give them the money on the spot.
But depending on Hanna’s income from poker meant that the
family had to live in disruptive feast or famine cycles.
My father suffered from this as a child, and resented the hardships
caused by gaming so much that he discouraged his children from
betting, and, to this day, I do not know how to play any card games.
My grandfather Hanna loved board games, especially “Tawle” – as
backgammon is known in the Middle East. And it was playing
backgammon with him that I learned how to count in Kurdish.
It is one of those things: A boy is born in a Lebanese mountain
village during the Ottoman empire, and learns to play ‘tawle’, a
favorite pastime of the occupiers in the Levant.
The Ottomans sent Kurds from Turkey to maintain order in Lebanon
and keep an eye on the Sultan’s domains. The boy learns to count
the numbers on the dice in what he thinks is “Turkish’, and decades
later, teaches these numbers to his grandson in Mexico.
“Yek, du, se, chjwar, penj, sheish...”. One, two, three, four, five,
six. The grandson later finds out that the numbers he learned are
not really ‘Turkish’, but Kurdish.
“Yek, du, se, chjwar, penj, sheish ..”, I teach my young son while
playing backgammon during a summer picnic in Vancouver, just to
keep the dice rolling.
***
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It has been too long
The fellow that we picked up at the town square directs Bayan, our
driver, to a house in the village.
He introduces us to a man in his late 60’s, and tells him that we are
looking for our relatives. The man, Boutros Sebaaleni, invites us
into his home and we sit in his living room.
Sebaaleni’s wife brings us coffee and Lebanese sweets while we tell
our story through Bayan. Sebaaleni, patiently listens to the story,
mostly told by my father.
“My parents were Hanna Khoury and his wife Dalel”, my father
explained; “they emigrated to Mexico, but the rest of their families
went to South Africa, we lost contact with everyone...”
After my father finishes, Sebaaleni calmly says: “I knew your
mother, and I know where your relatives live, I will take you to
them”.
Sebaaleni tells my father that he met my grandmother when she
visited Lebanon in the 1960’s, adding that he too has relatives in
South Africa and has visited the families there.
A few minutes later we are driven to a place nearby, right next to
the village square. Sebaaleni leads us up to an old stone house with
an orchard.
As we walk into the property, we meet an older couple in the
middle of making arak, the country’s wine-based, anise-infused
national drink, on a small patio.
The husband seems to be in the middle of the process, holding a
hose into a large vessel that contains the clear liquid, which in
Arabic means ‘sweat’.
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The man was heating a grape wine, and, as it perspired, the clear
liquid ran into a container, distilled.
I had enjoyed many glasses of arak with Lebanese dishes before,
but I had never seen it being made.
And this region is famous for its great Baladi (country-style) arak,
made only with Obeidi grapes, at a regulated 53 degrees of alcohol
– basically liquid fire.
Meanwhile, his wife greets us, and by then the news of our
presence in the village had spread, and we are surrounded by a
dozen people calling “Ahlan, Ahlan!”, a common greeting meaning
‘welcome, you are among family’.
Our forced and surprised host seems terribly busy with the glass
contraption, but looking at us intensely asks: “Why did you take so
long to come to Lebanon”?
Sebaaleni tells us that the couple are my father’s first cousin,
Francis Bakhos, and his wife, Georgette. Francis is the son of one of
my grandfather Hanna’s sisters, we are told.
We are seated in the lovely patio, which is covered by a trestle
enveloped in vines, from which full bunches of grapes hang.
Georgette brings us some pomegranates from the orchard, and we
eat them while Bayan frantically tries to summarize everything that
he has heard from my father and Sebaaleni before.
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Georgette and Francis – him with one eye on us and the other on
his distillation process - listen attentively, and then tell us that my
grandmother Dalel was there almost 42 years ago, and that she had
stayed with them in the house during that trip.
Then Georgette excuses herself, saying she is going inside the
house to look for some photographs. Francis’ eyes are still fixed on
us, as he tries to finish the batch of arak that he had started before
we arrived.
Observing Francis making arak, and admiring the grape vines on the
trestles, I recall that the French traveller Laurent d’Arvieux praised
the quality of this area’s wine during his visit here in 1660. In his
memoirs, he mentions that, according to local tradition, Noah
planted the first vines at the foot of these hills…
But, winemaking may have been discovered by a woman: In Sumer,
the keeper of the grapevine was the goddess Ama-Gestin; Isis
conceived Horus by eating grapes; in the Epic of Gilgamesh, Enkidu,
the wild man, tasted his first wine from a “temple woman”. And,
according to the Persians, wine was discovered by a woman looking
for poison.
While we wait for Georgette enjoying the pomegranates, we look
around in disbelief. Could this really be the house where our
relatives live? Have we found our long-lost family at last?
“I don’t think these are the right people”, my father says discreetly
in Spanish. “Their last name is not Khoury, but Bakhos. ”They are
confused”, he added, “it’s been too long”.
Then Georgette returns from the house, holding a photo. She hands
it to my father, saying “this is your father and his siblings, your
mother brought it when she came to visit from Mexico”.
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My father looks at the picture, shakes his head, and smiles widely,
but disagrees: “No, it isn’t”, he replies. “No, this is a picture of me
and my brothers!”
We were in the right place.
The photo that confirmed that we were in the right place: My father Victor
(seated) with his brothers Alberto, José, and Mohsen (Máximo).
Francis & Georgette Bakhos at the family house in Sebhel. | My father and
Georgette in Hanna’s bedroom at the family home, Sebhel.
***
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The Dwelling Place of Baal
“Lebanon has tears on her cheeks until you return…”
- Zajal poetry
Sebhel is an ancient Canaanite word meaning ‘the dwelling place of
Baal’, in honour of Baal, the Phoenician god of the land.
The name conveys important information, according to Elie
Wardini, author of the book ‘Lebanese Place-names’, because it is
much more than just a tag.
Wardini, who is a professor of Semitic languages at Stockholm
University, says that place-names are not merely means by which
humans locate themselves in the landscape, but rather “an
expression of how humans experience their environment”.
This explains why my grandparents, despite their difficulties here,
always referred to their village, its landscape, vegetation, fauna,
water sources and climate, with innate reverence.
Sebhel in the early 20th Century, and in the early 2000’s, looking West, towards
the Mediterranean.
According to local folklore, the village was established by the
Phoenicians fleeing Tyre during the reign of King Ithobaal, around
850 BC.
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I try to imagine what the town looked like when wolves and bears
roamed these hills. Even today, hyenas and wild boars occasionally
stray into the village, not to mention whip snakes.
The place has grown slowly over the centuries; based on local
records, in 1519 there were only 23 adult males living here. Now,
almost four thousand people are registered, but less than a third
actually live in the town. The rest have emigrated.
At first, it is hard to see why. This mythic area is blessed with
orchards and forests, and water is plentiful. In ancient times, divine
beings were believed to inhabit White Mount Lebanon.
Some even claim that the village of Ehden, less than 10 kilometres
uphill from here, is the original location of the Garden of Eden!
In any case, the fertile land has provided nourishment and
protection to those who have sought refuge in these mountains,
first the Canaanite polytheists, then the Maronites, for millennia.
Not far from Sebhel, in fact, are the cedar groves which, the
Scriptures assure us, were planted by God himself.
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Arak made by an extended family-owned distillery.
And then, there is the wine. When the Ottomans ruled this region,
drinking wine was not allowed, but, because of its outstanding
quality, an exception was made for the one made here.
Now, during the annual wine festival in the town, the posters
promoting the event proudly quote the famous edict: “All wine is
forbidden, except the wine from Sebhel”.
Wine that maketh glad the heart of man.
- Psalm 104:15
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Georgette Bakhos making wine in Sebhel, 2019.
We secured a couple of bottles of moscatel and arak, delicious, but
ephemeral.
Monsters have also lived here, though. The ogre Humbaba,
guardian of the Cedar Forest, was slain around here by Gilgamesh
and his friend Enkidu, according to the oldest story known to
mankind.
One of the oldest stories known to my family, however, has to do
with Hanna’s bravery and his love of hunting.
As the legend goes, at the age of sixteen, while hiking in the forest
around his village, Hanna found a wolf with its head stuck in a yshaped tree trunk, hungry and hurt, and desperate to free itself.
Hanna felt sorry for it, approached the snarling animal and, in a
fashion reminiscent of Gilgamesh, killed the terrifying creature by
stabbing it in the chest with a hunting knife.
There were many other stories of family prowess, mountain
villagers’ prowess.
Like the time when Hanna’s father, Bechara, hit a stubborn mule in
the head so hard that the poor brute – the mule, that is, as I often
have to explain to my horrified Canadian animal-loving friends - fell
dead on the ground.
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Hanna remembered Bechara’s impressive mustache in great detail,
down to the flashes of reddish hair that illuminated my greatgrandfather’s face in the sunlight.
SEBEEL
After eloping with Dalel, Hanna would never see his father again,
but the memory of that mustache would never fade.
GRAPE CLUSTERS FROM
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Staying up all night exchanging stories with friends by the fire,
singing, playing cards, and declaiming poetry, is a tradition that in
these mountains is known as Sahra.
Both men and women perform Zajal, which the UNESCO considers
part of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
They start the soiree with well-known songs, in which all
participate. A storyteller sings and recounts a story from Lebanese
folklore, then the participants start taking on the various roles of
the characters in the story, adding anecdotes, colour, and
exaggerations.
In the evenings, for instance, especially in the winter, people in the
village gather around a brazier placed in the centre of their living
rooms, drinking coffee and eating dried fruits with family and
friends.
Sebaali, a contemporary of my grandparents’, was a master of
Zajal, a form of Lebanese folk poetry declaimed or sung at social or
family gatherings, or in daily life.
While in Sebhel, we walk by the village square, past a small effigy
of Assad El-Sebaali, the celebrated local poet.
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What is life for, if not to share words from the heart with the proper
company, enjoying food and drink, at the right pace?
Zajal is also performed in more formal settings, like weddings and
christenings, in locations like the churchyard, the town hall, or
private homes.
On those occasions, Zajal becomes a duel, in which the poets
exchange barbs and try to outwit each other.
Members of the audience may also intervene, and at the end the
host often rewards the winners with gifts or money.
I said the matter is love
She said alas love!
I said there is a cure
She said there is none, my eyes
I said I am going to go mad and leave this land
She said there is no land without love
I said I will weep
She said in vain
I said I am going to go mad
She said ah mere words
I said I will vent my sorrows
She said mere words
I said I will moan
She said others have tried
I said where is the compassion?
She said it has been folded away
- Sabah & Wadih el Safi
Assad El-Sebaali wrote the lyrics to many of the sad, nostalgic songs
of Wadih El Safi, the legendary performer whose career spanned
over 75 years.
El Safi’s music and Sebaali’s words, carried through the sound of
the Oud strings, are a frail bond extending to the Lebanese
diaspora.
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The poet’s laments evoke the migrant’s intense longing for
Lebanon, and the regret felt here for those who never returned.
An evening of Zajal, by the late Lebanese cartoonist Pierre Sadek.
Boutros Sebaaleni, who first greeted us at his house, kindly offers
to show us where my grandmother Dalel grew up. We gladly follow
him to a beautiful building in a secluded part of the village.
A Lebanese Army sergeant now lives there with his family. He and
his mother answered the door when we stopped by. They greeted
us and explained that one of Dalel’s brothers came back from South
Africa many years ago and sold them the property.
The woman briefly went inside the home and brought back a
pyrographed cedar decoration and two stones. She then warmly
handed them to us as a gift.
My grandmother Dalel’s house in Sebhel.
This is where my grandmother Dalel was born in 1904. She grew
up here with her parents, 6 brothers, and 2 sisters. One of them,
Cecilia, died here before the entire family emigrated to South
Africa in the late 1920’s, after Dalel had gone to Mexico.
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The family settled in the Orange Grove neighbourhood of
Johannesburg, where the Lebanese community originally
concentrated, and many still live there today.
After Dalel’s mother, Aniza, died in South Africa, her father,
Tanios (Anthony) Isaac Sam, went back to Lebanon, re-married,
and had another child.
In the confusing Lebanese surname game, Dalel’s family in South
Africa used the Sam (or Sham) last name.
Sebhel’s ancient myths and wisdom were deeply ingrained in
Dalel, despite only having lived in the village until the age of 17.
Besides her expertise in the local kitchen recipes, she was also a
proven natural healer. And I benefited from her skills.
Just as she had done with my father when he was a baby, she
came to my rescue one day when, suddenly, not long after my
birth, I became downcast and despondent.
No one seemed to know what was wrong with me, but, to her, it
was a clear sign of the ‘evil eye’.
The phenomenon is believed to be caused when a jealous or
envious individual casts her “empty eye” upon a handsome and
healthy child (yours truly…).
Children are considered to be more susceptible to the effects,
which can range from headaches, gastric and skin conditions, and
stunted growth, to blindness, and even death.
The person responsible for the malady is usually not aware of the
harm caused by their “empty eye”.
Far from being merely a quaint superstition, in Lebanon the evil
eye is a folk belief that actually affects the way people perceive
reality and their place in it. And its treatment is an Art.
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Physicians are thought to be ignorant of the illnesses caused by it,
and their medicines are considered useless.
Therefore, as the dwellers of this area have done for thousands of
years, and following the practices learned from her ancestors, my
grandmother immediately took care of things herself:
I was placed in my crib while Dalel poured hot melted lead, known
as Sekbeh, into a vessel, which she then passed over my head.
The procedure to repel the evil eye, which can be transmitted by
a look, a touch, or expressions of envy or a “bad breath”, also
involved the use of incense, water and herbs.
In Lebanon, shops known as attars provide all the necessary
ingredients and devices to deal with these kinds of afflictions.
As if by magic, I immediately recovered. And, to prevent future
spells of that sort, a blue bead, symbol of the full moon – the
multiplier, the increaser – was permanently pinned over my
shoulder.
In view of the good results, my mother kept the amulet, and years
later it was attached to my own children’s garments when they
were born.
The soft blue color of the bead represents the moonlight, which
promotes growth and life.
This idea that the moon influences mother and child was shared
by ancient sages. Aristotle used to tell his students that the
course of diseases was impacted by the cycles of the moon.
And Galen maintained that babies born between the last and first
quarters of the moon were weaker and more prone to infections
than those born during the waxing phase and the full moon.
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The crescent has been used through the ages as a charm to bring
good fortune, healthy crops, and an abundance of livestock. And
it appears in the flags of many Middle Eastern nations as an
emblem of prosperity and power.
Here in Lebanon, the farmers watch for al-hilal (the waxing moon)
to sow and reap their crops, and the 11th day of the lunar month is
deemed the best to breed cattle.
Dalel’s keen intuition reflected her being in tune with nature. And
her Lebanese cooking proved to be another miracle cure...
When my brother Victor contracted hepatitis at age 6, she took
him under her wing for 2 months.
When I next saw him, he was as healthy as a horse, rosy-cheeked,
and had grown as tall as me, despite being a year younger.
Dalel visiting her brother Alec in South Africa in 1961; and in SA with an
unidentified child. Right: Alec before emigrating to South Africa from Lebanon.
Besides her ability as a healer, Dalel was also a reluctant diviner.
She was so adept at coffee reading (using Turkish coffee grounds
left at the bottom of the cup to interpret a person’s past and
future) that she constantly had to turn away people who came to
her apartment in Mexico City asking for readings.
Only 65 years after her birth, the affable, chain smoker Dalel (she
loved the unfiltered Mexican cigarettes Delicados) unexpectedly
passed away during a family trip to La Jolla, California.
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On that fateful voyage, she was travelling with my mother, my
siblings, and I. My father had stayed in Mexico, working.
The purpose of the trip was to visit Dalel’s third son, my uncle
Alberto, who had lived in the USA for many years.
The day before Dalel’s heart failed, we spent a memorable
afternoon with her at a beach in nearby San Diego, swimming in
the ocean and watching the mighty warships in the distance.
In the early evening, while gazing at the stars by the sea, a
favourite pastime of my mother’s, we saw a bright, fiery comet
cross the sky.
My uncle Alberto, the third of Hanna and Dalel’s four children, on his way to work
at a night club in Tucson, Arizona, where he was a Master of Ceremonies in the
sixties.
I was 8, and, as the eldest child, was often given assignments
during trips, which I enjoyed.
So, the next morning, my mother asked me to wake up grandma
and look at the time on her watch, which she usually left on her
night table.
I went to the adjacent room of the motel that we were staying at,
and found my grandmother, lifeless. “Grandma, grandma…”, I
said, knowing there would be no answer.
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I looked at the watch, it was 7:00AM. I paused and observed my
grandmother for a moment, then went back to my mother. I told
her “grandma doesn’t look good”, or something like that.
“Shhhh! she may hear you, it is early, that’s why she may not look
her best”, my mother said.
I knew exactly what had happened, and I also knew that when my
mother entered the room later, she would be upset.
About an hour later my mother started calling “Señora Dalel,
Señora Dalel, are you ready?” When there was no response, my
mother went to investigate, and soon came back, weeping.
This early, intimate encounter with death strongly influenced my
approach to life. To realize that one of the strongest people I had
ever known was gone, just like that, made me deeply aware of the
frail and precious nature of our existence.
I do not exaggerate when I say that, since that day, death has
always been on my mind.
And, thanks to that experience, I started living more intensely. It
was helpful to understand at an early age that death is an integral
part of life – and I doubt that there could have been a better way
for me to find this out, not as a concept, but in actuality.
The Day of the Dead celebrations in Mexico became meaningful
events for me. I laughed in the face of death – always there, by
our side - and happily enjoyed my yearly sugar skull, with my
name colourfully written across its forehead.
***
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Genes and Things
The relatives that we found still living in Sebhel were the
descendants of my grandfather Hanna’s only sibling who had
stayed in Lebanon – his sister Khatoum.
The other seven children emigrated with their parents to South
Africa in the late 1920’s, after Hanna and Dalel had gone to Mexico.
After the reunion with the family in Sebhel, our relatives provided
some contact information for those living abroad.
That is how we were able to reach my father’s first cousin, Baduy
Lahud, an endocrinologist living in Venezuela since 1949, when his
family emigrated there from Johannesburg.
We also got a hold of David Khoury, another first cousin of my
father’s, who is an accomplished artist in South Africa. Many of
his paintings depict the beautiful nature of that land.
And we located Catherine Khoury, granddaughter of Hanna’s
brother, Wadih. She lives in South Africa with her husband, Paul
Prinsloo, her son Christiaan, and her siblings Carol, Jenny, Cindy,
and Peter.
But most of the other information gathered was dated, and, after
the trip, the busy daily life routines and the distance made it
difficult to learn about the remainder of the family. Some years
passed.
Then, DNA came in handy. Very handy…
This happened after I figured that a search for one’s ancestors
would not be complete without the customary DNA test. And, if
genetics can provide an indication, our family had lived in Lebanon
for thousands of years, until Hanna and Dalel decided to leave.
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I discovered this after taking a test, thrilled by a story that I read
about DNA being used to track down the descendants of
Phoenician traders around the world.
This cutting-edge science was being applied with particular
emphasis in Lebanon by the biologist Pierre Zalloua.
The results indicated that the Canaanites, the Phoenicians, and the
present-day Lebanese are all the same people.
Zalloua is scientifically tempering the debate over Phoenicianism
– the idea that the Lebanese, and, in particular, the Maronites, are
the direct descendants of the Phoenicians.
Some sectors of Lebanese society have used this idea in an attempt
to distance themselves from Arab culture and traditions.
It is hard to resist the temptation to identify strongly with the
Phoenicians, I mean, Homer called them “skilled in all things”!
But Lebanese culture has been influenced by Greek, Roman,
Persian, Arab, and Ottoman cultures, to name a few. Still, the
Phoenician factor is there - and it covers all sects in Lebanon.
“Phoenicians’ Y-chromosome markers have been detected in
present-day Lebanese regardless of their current religion”, is all I
had to read in the news to get on the genetic bandwagon.
And this ‘Phoenician marker’ is present in almost 30% of the
Lebanese population, according to the studies.
Haplogroup J2 is believed to have originated in the Fertile Crescent
of the Middle East about 8,000 years ago, and its presence sharply
declines away from that region.
The lab tests returned showing that our patrilineal ancestry belongs
to haplogroup J2. This chromosome has been passed from father
to son for generations in a relatively small geographical area.
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YOU'Ance'!l~NA
who 'fOI.II~stora
Results reveal ~oolQue
storywe,e and Wherelhey came from.
Aesultsasot.
21 Mar202:3
DNA Results Summary for
MaximoKuri
-~
Ethnicity Estimate
• L.ewnt
! Northern l.Jmanon & Mount Lebanon
·• North Lebanon
• Spain
• Indigenous Americas-Mexico
, Eastern Jelisco, Agiuascel.ientes & Western
Guanajuato
45%
23%
17%
• Cyprus
• Basque
• Scotland
• Cameroon. Congo & Western Bantu Peoples
• Northern Africa
• lran/Pet"s.ia
5%
4%
3%
1%
1%
1%
One day, years after the trip to Sebhel, I received an email from the
DNA testing company saying that they had found a match among
their pool of almost 15 million members.
The match was a Peter Thomas, which puzzled me. I contacted
Peter, and got the following reply:
Wed., July 18, 2018
Hi Maximo
Really happy you contacted me. Firstly, my name is Peter Thomas, born 1944 in Sydney,
Australia where I still reside. I'm the 4th child of Joseph & Mary Thomas (mother's
maiden name is Lahood). Like you I've only recently done a DNA test with Ancestry.
Both my parents and their parents are from Sebhel […].
And so, more than a century after our grandparents left Lebanon,
Peter and I met, he in Australia, I in Canada…
Then, in January of 2019, I received another tantalizing notice of a
match from the DNA lab. The message indicated that it was most
likely a second cousin.
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I excitedly replied, and found a treasure trove: the match was one
of my father’s first cousins, Margaret Joseph (neé Sham), who was
born in Johannesburg – one of the children of my grandfather
Hanna’s siblings who had emigrated to South Africa in the 1920’s.
Margaret lives in Australia; I contacted her and we soon
reacquainted ourselves with each other.
The Khourys in Johannesburg, 1961.
Top row from left to right: Amira Khoury holding her youngest son Anthony. Amira’s
husband Simone Sham- his and Amira’s eldest daughter Antoinette. Next to her Tony’s
daughter Warda - her mom Matty- George Khoury (Hanna’s youngest brother); Sally
(Wadih Khoury’s wife) Bechus ( Francis’s brother), his daughter Freda, and wife Victoria
Khoury (Amira’s only sister in SA)
Middle Row: Amira’s children Patrick, Margaret, and Raymond. Tony Khoury (eldest
Khoury in SA) . Bechara (Hanna’s father), his son Wadih Khoury - his son Paul and his
daughter Brenda leaning on his lap.
Bottom row: Albert, David, Francis (Tony and Matty’s 3 boys); Rosie (Matty’s sister that
lived with them:) Eddie (Wadih son) .
My grandmother Dalel brought this photo to Mexico in 1961. She
had been visiting her own family in Johannesburg that year.
Watch Dalel visiting her siblings in SA in 1961: https://youtu.be/KiBj620Z2X0
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For many decades, when I occasionally looked at it, I wondered
what may have been the fate of all those relatives staring at the
viewer through time.
I assumed that the older among them had passed away, but there
were also many youngsters in the group. I did not even know their
names.
Fifty-seven years after that photo was taken – and 97 years after
my grandparents left Lebanon - the link with Margaret and her
siblings and descendants was re-established through DNA.
Margaret’s mother, Amira Khoury, was my grandfather Hanna’s
youngest sister.
She was a toddler when Hanna fell in love with Dalel and decided
to leave Lebanon – but Hanna always remembered her fondly, and
almost 50 years later in Mexico named his only daughter after her.
Through Margaret - wearing a white bow in the picture above - I
met her husband, Kevin, and got to know her siblings Antoinette,
Patrick, Raymond, and Anthony (who also appear in the photo).
I also learned that Margaret’s daughter, Simone, is a former figure
skater who represented South Africa in international competitions,
and her son, Michael, works for an Australian technology company.
Watch Simone Joseph representing SA at the 1999 Four Continents Figure Skating
Championships in Halifax, Canada:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkO-BVKHAcw
Soon after, thanks to her, I became familiar with the rest of the
Khourys, my family in both Johannesburg and Sydney, the
descendants of all of Hanna’s siblings whom he never saw again.
108
�This is Y
As of early 2019, Ancestry, the company I used to test my DNA the
year before, had found 840 matches for my sample alone, ranging
from 2nd to 5th and distant cousins. But do not worry, I will not have
time to document them all here…
There is one other person I was referred to this way, though, a 3rd
cousin whom I have been able to communicate with as well:
Theresa Greally, born and raised in New Zealand, where she lives.
Theresa’s ancestors, the Romanos, also hail from Sebhel, and
there are members of the original family still living in the village.
Although I have not been able to establish exactly the genetic
relationship to Theresa, the DNA results indicate that many of the
old inhabitants of Sebhel were blood relatives, further proof that
marriages between cousins were commonplace.
While the Lebanese of Mexico thrived in the textiles sector, and in
South Africa they concentrated on the sale of produce, in New
Zealand they focused on the hospitality business.
In all three places they were also hawkers, peddling their goods in
the hinterlands of those countries.
Theresa’s uncle, Amin Romanos, was one of them. He was a wellknown, hard-working and respected salesman in the Pongaroa
region of New Zealand.
Amin Romanos, a.k.a. George Salomon or “Gentleman George”, was a travelling
salesman in the Pongaroa area of New Zealand in the 1920s.
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�This is Y
And, since we are on the topic of genes…
They say that, in the Lebanese Christian villages during the
Ottoman empire, the priests were often given the prettiest girl to
marry, so that they would be content and not tempted to pursue
other men’s wives. The Khouriyya (priest’s wife) played an
important role in village affairs.
This interesting and noble custom may finally explain the Khourys’
good looks!
***
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�This is Y
Farewell
In Sebhel, we say long goodbyes to Francis, Georgette,
their children, and the rest of the family members who had
gathered around to join the conversation.
As we prepare to leave, slowly and reluctantly making our way out
of the garden of the ancestral house, my brother Guillermo and I
pick up some stones lying on the ground, as souvenirs.
Having arranged to come back in a few days for a formal meal, we
finally leave, still astonished.
Bayan drives us out of the village up the mountain road, towards
The Cedars of God, the small grove of millenary trees at the summit
of Mount Lebanon.
On the way, we drive past Ehden until we reach ‘La Luna’, an eatery
overlooking the Kadisha Valley. In a contemplative mood, we dine
sharing our impressions of this special day.
La Luna is a quiet place this evening, almost deserted; its owners,
who once lived in Venezuela, will soon be closing for the season as
winter approaches.
After supper, while the sun sets, I spend some time alone on a
terrace, enjoying the peaceful, deep silence.
Across the Gorge, the town of Hasroun clings to the cliffs.
Standing under the heavy branches of a huge cedar tree at the edge
of the canyon, I try to extend this beautiful moment.
I take a deep breath, and, feeling the autumn wind, I hear my
grandfather’s words: “... so fresh it almost cuts you…”
111
�To be continued.
Above: From father to son: Six generations - Isaac Khoury, his son Bechara, his grandson
Hanna, my father Victor, myself (Máximo), and my son Alberto.
112
�Update – February, 2023 - Homecoming
After the death of my brother Guillermo in Vancouver as a result of a
brain tumor in January of 2020, and following the health and travel
restrictions originating from the Covid 19 pandemic that started in
March of that year, my parents, Victor and Guillermina, decided to
return to Mexico.
They went back to their homeland in October of 2021, more than
forty-one years after emigrating to Canada. About eight months
later, my brother Victor and I followed. Soon after, trying to explain
the reasons behind these latest family developments, I wrote in my
social media pages the text that appears at the end of this chapter.
My children, Daniela (24) and Alberto Mahrus (soon to be 21), as well
as my late brother Guillermo’s daughters, Hana, Olivia, and Anabel,
remain in Canada.
Daniela, a graduate of the Tourism Management program at Capilano
University, is working in the tourism sector in Vancouver.
Meanwhile, her brother Mahrus is pursuing a Bachelor of Commerce
degree at the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) –
where he plays for the varsity soccer team – in the City of Prince
George.
My late brother Guillermo’s eldest daughter, Hana, is a freshman at
the University of BC (UBC), while her sisters are still in high school.
Finally, my little sister Maye and her husband Robert Van
Poederooyen, who reside in South Surrey, BC, are mulling over the
possibility of retiring in Spain in the next couple of years.
My children like to visit Mexico, and I am sure that my very talented
nieces will start to do so as well soon. We shall see what future
chapters they add to this book...
Since our repatriation, we have reconnected with family and friends,
and with our native culture.
The human connections have been particularly rewarding, having
had the privilege of spending quality time with relatives and old
friends in an atmosphere of total trust, and as though time had not
elapsed since childhood.
113
�Alex López, for example, whom I have known since grade 1 when we
attended the La Salle School in the Florida district of the Mexican
capital (but had not seen in more than 40 years) has been a true
Guardian Angel for our family since our return. He has taken care of
my parents as if they were his own, driving them around almost
daily, and helping them to settle before Victor and I arrived. We will
be forever grateful for his true friendship and kindness.
My high school buddy Javier Sánchez has gone out of his way to
make all of us feel welcome and adapted – we have already spent
many days catching up, celebrating family events at his beautiful
home, and at iconic places in Mexico City, such as our favourite
Mexican and Lebanese restaurants, the Racetrack, the Lienzo Charro
(Mexican Rodeo), the Azteca football stadium, and too many more to
list here. I have been humbled by the good-hearted and down-toearth support of this man.
Seeing Rogelio Loredo, my former water polo teammate at the
UNAM in the late 70’s and a very successful lawyer now, is always a
pleasure, refreshing, and fun – we laugh a lot together; Pedro
Gonzalez, a friend of many decades, has taken me on bicycle rides,
guiding me through his lifetime residential neighbourhoods of Roma
and Condesa, two of the most charming districts here. Pedro has
been sharing his considerable knowledge of this place with
enthusiasm and a real desire to ensure that I too enjoy this great city
as much as he does.
And then, there’s Arturo Xicoténcatl, our former swimming coach
and teacher. We met Arturo in 1971, when he started giving us
swimming lessons. He would later become the head coach of the
Centro Acuático Pedregal (CAP), but also our first communion
godfather, chess master, and family friend. Arturo is a celebrated
journalist in Mexico, who has also been inducted into the Mexican
Chess Hall of Fame. We have been regularly meeting with him for
breakfast, tortas, tacos, and coffee in various places to talk chess,
journalism, books, and life. We are privileged.
The list goes on, and it’d be impossible to list everyone and
everything that’s happened since our return. The family reunions
with my uncle Aubert and Aunt Marta (my mother’s sister); cousin
114
�Gaby and her daughters Michelle and Marie; the wonderful
escapades and esoteric conversations with my cousin Javier
Canchola, the visits to aunt Bertha’s home where her other sons,
Emilio and Marco Antonio, work making some of the best
hamburgers I have ever had....
During the almost year and a half that my parents have been back in
Mexico, some of their best friends have passed away. On the bright
side, they have been able to be with them at the end of this part of
the journey.
My brother Victor, on his part, has had the chance to spend more
time with his daughter, Sofia, and his stepdaughter Alexia. I am sure
that for him that has been the best part of this new adventure.
I have been having some Vancouver flashbacks occasionally. That
beautiful city will always be on my mind and in my heart, but, at the
moment, all that is in the past.
Mexico has been transformed in the last 43 years, and is still
undergoing major transformations socially, culturally, politically,
physically, and economically. These are exciting times, and I look
forward to making my tiny contributions to this magnificent process.
The weather is amazing, the energy sublime.
In any case, this story is still in the making, that’s for sure.
______
September 27, 2022 (Posted by Maximo Kuri on Facebook):
I have recently relocated back from Canada to Mexico. The reasons are
many, and not easy to explain, but, since many friends have asked what
motivated this move, here it goes:
When I was still a teenager, my parents made a decision to leave our
homeland in search for a brighter future. So, in June of 1980, we moved
from our native Mexico City to beautiful Vancouver.
Almost 43 years later, I am back in the Mexican capital, where I was born.
The initial decision to move to Canada took many years. My parents – true
115
�visionaries - could then see the writing on the wall. The rampant corruption
in Mexican life, violent crimes committed with impunity, the systemic
shortcomings in education, the environmental pollution, a failing democracy,
and the absence of the rule of law...
And time, unfortunately, proved my parents right: the country’s problems
worsened after we left, reaching levels that far exceeded their worst
predictions.
During the 1980’s and 1990’s we found in Canada what we were looking for
– freedom, security, quality of life, a good place to raise a family. As a
group, and individually, we were welcomed in that fantastic land, where we
were able to evolve personally, socially, professionally.
I have nothing but praise for Canada, where I was able to raise my two
children in peace and enjoying high standards of living – in terms of
education, health, rights and freedoms.
But circumstances change (no matter how hard one tries to avoid clichés,
some things are just so).
I changed: When we left Mexico I was 18, I am now 60!
We changed: Having raised my daughter and son at the beginning of the
Century, they are now independent adults, navigating the complexities of
this human age, travelling the world on their own, and exploring career
options in challenging and interesting times.
The world changed: Economic rollercoasters, war after war, globalization,
the Internet, 9/11, the Covid-19 pandemic....all this and more has deeply
transformed the planet that we live in.
Canada changed: Like the proverbial boiling frog that is slowly being boiled
alive, things in Canada (and in other Western nations such as Australia, the
USA, the UK, and New Zealand) have been heating up and morphing –
gradually over time but drastically when compared to what the situation
was back in the day when we emigrated there.
This issue is complex, and many may disagree. But, having lived there
continuously all these years, I have noticed and experienced such changes.
9/11 brought about new laws and measures that deeply eroded rights and
116
�freedoms in Canada (and other places); the Maple Leaf, which in the past
was associated with peacekeeping and neutrality, became just another
insignia of a group destroying places and making enemies all over the world;
Canada’s international image has suffered, a lot.
Economic and immigration policies undertaken in the past 20 years or so
have created vast economic gaps among the population, which did not exist
before.
Social programs have been steadily decimated or eliminated over the years.
And Canadian provincial and federal governments of all stripes have become
more and more authoritarian, often using heavy-handed measures to deal
with dissent, including the freezing of bank accounts, the seizure of assets,
and censorship. Other domestic problems like high taxes, the ultra-high cost
of living, the broken healthcare system, etc. are also troubling.
I am not a nationalist, but an Internationalist, yet I do love Canada, and its
wonderful people. It is still a great country, of course, but not quite the one
it was 43 years ago.
And...Mexico changed: Perhaps not as fast and deeply as those who love it
would like, but the changes in Mexico in the past 5 decades are remarkable.
There are still many, many serious problems here, too many to enumerate
here. However, the last 3 administrations have been led by presidents from
3 different political parties (something that not even Canada can boast
about).
The security situation, while still bad in many areas, has greatly improved.
My hometown of Mexico City, which I had not visited in 15 years, is
unrecognizable to me: The motor vehicle traffic in the city of 25 million
people flows astonishingly well, public transit in the main areas of the city is
first class (I have been using it) – and affordable; its streets are clean; the
vegetation is green and dense, and the parks are many and well-maintained.
People are friendly, helpful, and kind (in just a few weeks I have had many
wonderful experiences and witnessed first-hand the kindness of strangers).
There is a sense of freedom, of laissez faire in the air. Big Brother here
seems to be a much nicer, friendlier, good-natured type of guy.
The country has not been involved in wars, invasions, sanctions, or blockades
of any kind, and therefore its passport is one of the most welcome
117
�worldwide. Of course, the weather, the food, the colour and culture that
have always characterized Mexico are also alive and well.
Finally, it seems like I am not alone. More Canadians, Americans, and
Europeans are leaving their country today than at any other time in recent
history.
Of course, this topic is subjective, relative, and personal – people from places
like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, China (and Mexico, among others) are still
flocking to the USA and Canada, looking for better opportunities.
So, the future has indeed been brighter, and it keeps getting brighter and
brighter. Who knows what it holds? As a digital nomad, I am embracing
these exceptional times and look forward to getting to see more of this
beautiful globe of ours. All I know is that today I am very grateful to have a
chance to enjoy precious moments with family and (old and new) friends.
Cheers!
Homecoming on IG: https://www.instagram.com/maximus_antonius1/
118
�This is Y
Bibliography and Family Social Media Links:
Camila Pastor, The Mexican Mahjar: Transnational Maronites, Jews,
and Arabs under the French Mandate, December 6, 2017
Antoine Khoury Harb, The Maronites, History and Constants –
January 1, 2001
Amin Maalouf and Catherine Temerson, Origins: A Memoir, May 13,
2008
Amin Maalouf and Barbara Bray, In the Name of Identity: Violence
and the Need to Belong, Mar 1, 2012
Amin Maalouf, The Rock of Tanios, Sep 1, 1995
Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation: Lebanon at War, Oct 25, 2001
Colin Thubron, The Hills of Adonis: A Journey in Lebanon, Aug 1,
1990
Sandra Mackey, Lebanon: A House Divided, Sep 1, 2015
Jean Said Makdisi , Beirut Fragments, A War Memoir,
1990 Persea Books
Lebanon Lebanon, Edited by Ana Wilson, 2006 Saqi Books
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet, Published by Alfred A. Knopf, 1923
Ventura Barquet de Siad, La Cocina de Ventura, January 1, 1992
Carlos Martinez Assad, Memoria de Líbano,
Océano; 1st edition (February 1, 2015)
119
�This is Y
Martha Diaz De Kuri; Lourdes MacLuf, De Líbano a México, Crónica
de un Pueblo Emigrante, January 1, 1999
Elie Wardini, Lebanese Place-Names (Mount Lebanon and North
Lebanon) A Typology of Regional Variation and Continuity, Dec 31
2002
John Reed, Insurgent Mexico, International Publishers, 1969
Gilgamesh – A New English Version (2004),
Translated by Stephen Mitchell | Free Press
Laurent dÁrvieux , Mémoires du chevalier d'Arvieux ...: contenant ses
voyages à Constantinople, dans l'Asie, la Syrie, la Palestine, l'Egypte,
& le Barbarie ... recüeillis de ses mémoires originaux, & mis en ordre
avee des réfléxions. Par Jean Baptiste Labat, Volume 2
Edited by Jean Baptiste Labat, Published by C.J.B. Delespine, 1735
The University of Michigan, Digitized 30 Nov 2005
Elizabeth Saleh, Trade-marking Tradition: An Ethnographic Study of
the Lebanese Wine Industry, Thesis submitted in fulfilment of
requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in
Anthropology Goldsmiths, University of London.
Guita G. Hourani , The Struggle of the Christian Lebanese for Land
Ownership in South Africa
https://wlcui.com/2013/10/26/the-history-of-the-south-africanlebanese-the-struggle-of-the-christian-lebanese-for-landownership-in-south-africa/
Guita Hourani, Interview with Myriam Sfeir, Migration and work at
the Lebanese Emigration Research Center (LERC)
http://www.alraidajournal.com/index.php/ALRJ/article/view/20
8/207
Kevin Smullin Brown, The Lebanese of Mexico, Identifications in
Aspects of Literature and Literary Culture, School of Oriental and
African Studies, University of London MA, Philosophy, University
College London, University of Londonon (1880-Present): “P and
120
�This is Y
Eliane Fersan, Syrio-Lebanese Migration (1880-Present): Push and
Pull Factors, , April 19, 2010
https://www.mei.edu/publications/syro-lebanese-migration1880-present-push-and-pull-factors
Cecile Yazbek, The Chasm of Assimilation: My mother’s New Zealand
cousins, September, 2016
https://lebanesestudies.news.chass.ncsu.edu/2016/09/07/thechasm-of-assimilation-my-mothers-new-zealand-cousins/
Lebanese Migration (1880-Present): “Push” and “Pull” Factors
Delia Salazar Anaya y Gabriela Pulido Llano (coords.), De agentes,
rumores e informes confidenciales. La inteligencia política y los
extranjeros (1910-1951), México, INAH, 2015.
Carlos Martinez Assad, 1945: Relaciones México-Líbano y los inmigrantes
libaneses, El Universal, https://confabulario.eluniversal.com.mx/1945relaciones-mexico-libano-y-los-inmigrantes-libaneses/
Quinn Hargitai, The Strange Power of the Evil Eye, BBC, 19th
February 2018 https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20180216the-strange-power-of-the-evil-eye
The Evil Eye, A Casebook, Edited by Alan Dundes, The University of
Winsconsin Press, 1981, 1992.
Alixa Naff, Belief in the Evil Eye among the Christian Syrian-Lebanese
in America, The Journal of American Folklore
Vol. 78, No. 307 (Jan. - Mar., 1965), pp. 46-51 (6 pages)
Published By: American Folklore Society
https://doi.org/10.2307/538102
https://www.jstor.org/stable/538102
121
�This is Y
List of family social media and online links:
- Kuri Family Tree (Ancestry)
https://www.ancestry.ca/family-tree/tree/3129110/family?cfpid=-1771980299
- North Carolina State University
Moise E. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
(Repository of the Kuri Family Archives)
https://lebanesestudies.ncsu.edu/
- Máximo Kuri’s Facebook account
https://www.facebook.com/maximo.kuri
- Máximo Kuri’s Facebook - Lebanon Trip (2003) Photo Album (Public)
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10218207152984898&type=3
- Máximo Kuri’s Instagram Account @maximus_antonius1
https://www.instagram.com/maximus_antonius1/
- Máximo Kuri’s Instagram Account @vancouver.moments
https://www.instagram.com/vancouver.moments/
- Kuri Family YouTube Channel
(Includes digitized family films dating back to 1961)
https://www.youtube.com/user/turchiman
- Victor Kuri Isaac’s Facebook Account
https://www.facebook.com/victor.kuri.167
- Simone Joseph competitive figure skating video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkO-BVKHAcw
- Centre for Lebanese Studies
https://lebanesestudies.com/
- Lebanese Emigration Research Center (LERC)
https://www.ndu.edu.lb/lerc/
122
�This is Y
123
�This is Y
�This is Y
�This is Y
�This is Y
�This is Y
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Kuri Family Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
Photographs
Business
Photography--Mexico--Exhibitions
Portraits
Description
An account of the resource
<h4>Biographical/Historical note</h4>
<p>Maximo Kuri is the son of Victor and <span>Guillermina Kur</span>i. Maximo's paternal grandparents, Dalel and Hanna, immigrated from Lebanon to Mexico in and adapted the family name "Khoury" to "Kuri." Following a family trip to Lebanon in 2003, Maximo began to research his paternal family history. </p>
<p>During the 1970s, the family traveled within Mexico for the children’s swim meets. The kids swam for Centro Acuático del Pedregal (Pedregal Aquatic Center, also referred to as CAP), located in the neighborhood Jardines del Pedregal in Mexico City. In 1976, they spent two months traveling in Western Europe.</p>
<h4>Scope/Content note</h4>
<p>The Kuri Family Collection includes a written family history, "This is Y," compiled by Maximo Kuri in 2019, focused on his paternal Lebanese side and their immigration to Mexico and South Africa. The collection also holds multiple photographs of the Kuri family, most of Maximo's father Victor Kuri, and documents that relate to the Khoury family's life in Lebanon.</p>
<p>A series of film reels and tapes are included in this collection, but are not available online. <span>Please email kcldsarchive@ncsu.edu for all research requests or questions concerning this collection.</span></p>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maximo Kuri
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1920-2019
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Processed by Laura Lethers, Sarah Bernstein, and Allison Hall, 2023. Collection Guide created by Sarah Bernstein with contributions by Allison Hall, 2023 October.
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Language
A language of the resource
English
Spanish
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
KC 0055
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Digital material in this collection is provided here for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law.
Physical material in this collection is also available to researchers. For questions or to access a collection, please contact us at kcldsarchive@ncsu.edu. Please give at least 48 hours for responses to any inquiries regarding the materials.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Maximo Kuri
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
kc0055_021
Title
A name given to the resource
This is Y by Maximo Kuri, 2019
Description
An account of the resource
A family history written by Maximo Kuri focused on his father's side that documents his family's life in, and leading up to leaving, Lebanon and the life of the Khourys in South Africa, in Mexico, and in Canada.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2019
Subject
The topic of the resource
Biography
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Text/pdf
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Maximo Kuri
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
The donor retains full ownership of any copyright and rights currently controlled. Nonexclusive right to authorize uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. Usage of the materials for these purposes must be fully credited with the source. The user assumes full responsibility for any use of the materials.
Biographies
Family Trees
Lebanese Civil War
-
https://lebanesestudies.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/files/original/ceae94f716f5a99354e834af017f5c80.jpg
92f61a297ae422f4c9411e7b50feb119
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
El-Khouri Family
Description
An account of the resource
These materials were provided by Marsha El-Khouri Shiver and primarily relate to the life of her father, Joseph Maroun El-Khouri, and his family in Lebanon and in the United States. <br />
<h5>Biography</h5>
Joseph Maroun El-Khouri was born in 1924 in Kour, Batroun, Lebanon and Mariam Thomee Yazbek El-Khouri, one of seven children. His father, Reverend Joseph Michael Maroun El-Khouri was a Maronite priest, and at least one sibling, Sister Victorine El-Khouri, followed his example and joined religious orders. <br /><br />Joseph served as an intelligence agent and interpreter for Great Britain during World War II. In 1949, Joseph travelled to Minneapolis, Minnesota to help settle an uncle’s estate. Initially Joseph had no intention of immigrating permanently to the United States, but soon after he arrived he met and fell in love with Rose Isaac while visiting relatives who lived in the large Lebanese community located in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Rose was the daughter of Thanios (Thomas) Isaac and Moura (Nora) Lawandos Isaac, who immigrated to the United States in 1912 and 1914, respectively, and were married in 1917. Thanios Isaac supported his wife and five children by working various laboring jobs, including for the railroad and a local wiremill. Thanios Isaac passed away in 1939. <br /><br />Joseph and Rose married in Rose’s hometown in 1950, and moved to Minneapolis where they operated a grocery store until 1953. Joseph was naturalized in 1954 with the help of his friend Vice President Hubert Humphrey, at the time a Minnesota senator. In 1955, Joseph and Rose moved to Andrews, North Carolina, to be closer to Rose’s sister Bessie Isaac Jabaley, who was living near her husband’s family in Copper Hill, TN. The Jabaley’s helped the growing El-Khouri family establish themselves in their new home by making Joseph the manager of their department store, Jabaley’s, which Joseph purchased and renamed to Khouri’s in 1965. The store remained open until 1989. <br /><br />Joseph quickly established himself as a prominent civic leader in North Carolina. He served on a number of boards and service organizations including: the Andrews Lion Club, Western Carolina University Board of Visitors, Cherokee County United Way, the Andrews Chamber of Commerce, and the Daniel Boone Council of Boy Scouts. Joseph was a devoted Democrat, even serving, with his eldest son George, as an elected delegate to the 1988 Democratic National Convention in Atlanta. In addition to these civic and political accomplishments, Joseph and Rose were pillars of the Catholic community in North Carolina, holding the town’s first Catholic masses in their own home, and donating the land upon which the Holy Redeemer Catholic Church was built in Andrews, North Carolina. <br /><br />Joseph and Rose had seven children: George Maron El-Khouri, Theresa El-Khouri Martin, Mariam El-Khouri Gerber, Marsha El-Khouri Shiver, Barbara El-Khouri, Catherine El-Khouri, and Anthony El-Khouri. Joseph passed away on July 22, 2012; at the time of collection acquisition (2012), Rose El-Khouri was still living. Since his passing, Joseph El-Khouri’s contributions to North Carolina have been recognized locally, and his legacy has been carried forth by his children and grandchildren.<br />
<h5>Scope and Content</h5>
The collection consists of photographs, letters, documents, and articles relating to the life of Joseph Maroun El-Khouri, his wife Rose Isaac El-Khouri, and his children. The material details Joseph's career and community contributions as well as providing insight into multiple generations of Lebanese-American family life.<br /><br />The collection also contains photographs and letters relating to Joseph El-Khouri’s relatives in Lebanon, as well as materials from Rose Isaac El-Khouri’s family in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Unknown
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Marsha El-Khouri Shiver
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
circa 1910-2012
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
Donor retains full ownership of any and all copyright currently controlled in agreement with Khayrallah Center. Nonexclusive right to authorize all uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA)
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image
Text
Subject
The topic of the resource
Immigrants--Lebanese--United States
Language
A language of the resource
English
Arabic
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Marsha El-Khouri Shiver
Collection description written by Claire A. Kempa
Access Rights
Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies.
Parts of this collection are restricted to the public. Contact the center for more information.
Document
A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text.
Original Format
If the image is of an object, state the type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Paper
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
El-Khouri Family Tree
Subject
The topic of the resource
Family trees
Description
An account of the resource
A hand-drawn family tree of Marsha El-Khouri and her two children, based on genealogy from Lebanon.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Unknown
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Marsha El-Khouri Shiver
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
Unknown
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
Donor retains full ownership of any and all copyright currently controlled in agreement with Khayrallah Center. Nonexclusive right to authorize all uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA).
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Text/jpg
Language
A language of the resource
English
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
2015 04-28
Claude Shiver
El-Khouri
Family Trees
Isaac
Joseph Maroun El-Khouri
Marsha El-Khouri Shiver
Michael Joseph Shiver
Rose Isaac El-Khouri
Shiver
Thomas Isaac Shiver
Yazbek
-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Mack Family
Description
An account of the resource
These materials were provided by Mitchell Mack and relate to the history of the Mack family in Mooresville, North Carolina.<br /><br />
<h5>Biography</h5>
Hanna Makhoul Fakhoury was born in Roum, Lebanon and—on the encouragement of a friend who had settled in Marion, South Carolina—emigrated to the United States in 1903, leaving behind his wife, Naceem, and their children Charles, Nora, Side (Sahid), Lucille, Sophia, and Bahia. As he passed through Ellis Island, the clerk anglicized “Hanna” to “John” and shortened “Makhoul” to “Mack,” completely disregarding the man’s surname of “Fakhoury.” While some of Hanna’s descendants regret the loss of their family name, with its obvious Lebanese heritage, their ancestor accepted his new moniker and pursued his new life in America as John Mack. Unable to speak any English, John arrived by mistake in Marion, North Carolina; aided by a kind station master, he was directed to F.A. Jacobs of Charlotte, North Carolina, a Lebanese American who helped Mack. John Mack purchased merchandise and began selling items door-to-door in North Carolina. <br /><br />In 1905, John Mack decided to return to Lebanon to visit his family and help them move back to the United States with him. However, Naceem was unsure about moving to a new country, and John returned only with his two oldest children, Nora and Charles, in 1908. A year later seventeen-year-old Side, the second son, decided to join his father and travelled with two friends to the country. Unfortunately, John and Naceem’s hopes to reunite were never fulfilled, for Naceem passed away suddenly in 1912, after which John retrieved the rest of his children.<br /><br />After an early attempt to open a store in Charlotte failed due to a fire, the family opened John Mack & Sons in Mooresville, North Carolina, on December 24, 1912. While the children of John Mack grew and took on greater responsibility in the department store, John Mack himself continued his work as a travelling salesman. With Side, Nora, and—as she grew up—the youngest child Bahia all helping to run John Mack & Son, Charles, the eldest, pursued his own business enterprises. After opening a shoe store, Charles found success in a Confectionary store, providing candies, peanut brittle, and sweet ingredients at wholesale to other companies. At first Charles ran this shop with John Ikall, who married one of the Mack daughters, Lucille; after Joe left to open a restaurant, Charles continued to successfully run the business on his own. <br /><br />Side Mack married Joe’s sister, Tabitha (Tabetta) Ikall Mack. The couple had four children together: Edward, Madeline, Margaret, and Side Mitchell. Side, taught himself to speak flawless English, became a well-respected member of Mooresville. In addition to leading and supporting local Boy Scouts, Side Mack served as a volunteer fireman and a member of the Masons for over fifty years; John Mack & Son sponsored the Mooresville Recreation Department’s athletic teams, further developing Mooresville’s community spirit. Side Mack passed away at age 79 in 1971, a beloved member of Mooresville’s community. <br /><br />Side and Tabitha’s children built upon their successes and carried forth their values. Of their four children, the eldest daughter and youngest son carried on the tradition of running John Mack & Son. Madeline, the eldest daughter, was a talented artist and designer who left her education at Maryland’s Institute of Art and Design to help her family during the Great Depression; after the outbreak of World War II called her brothers to serve in the military, Madeline assumed a prominent managerial role in the business, helping her father to sustain it throughout the depression and World War II. Mitchell, the youngest son, attended college after his military service; though he had planned to pursue a graduate degree at Harvard Business School, he decided to return to Mooresville and start a family with his spouse Delores Corey Mack, after his brother, Edward, chose to pursue a career elsewhere. Mitchell, himself a lifelong Scout and recipient of the Silver Beaver Award in 1962, ran the store’s scouting department and the menswear, while Madeline managed womenswear, advertising, and merchandising. The store remained open and thriving until 1993, when the siblings decided to close the business in order to retire. Madeline passed away on March 31, 2006.<br /><br />
<h5>Scope and Content</h5>
This collection contains photographs, articles, photographs of family artifacts, and interviews related to the history of John Mack & Sons as well as the Mack family, particularly Side Mack and his children.
Subject
The topic of the resource
Lebanese-Americans--United States
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Mitchell Mack
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1920-2014
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
Donor retains full ownership of any and all copyright currently controlled in agreement with Khayrallah Center. Nonexclusive right to authorize all uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA).
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Mitchell Mack
Collection description written by Claire A. Kempa
Moving Image
A series of visual representations that, when shown in succession, impart an impression of motion.
Duration
Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.)
44 minutes 57 seconds
Player
html for embedded player to stream video content
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/O6Rpz_OzEho?si=9HbGSgAOqo2lHzVh" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The Mack Family History and a Pictorial Family Tree
Description
An account of the resource
This video was donated by the Mack family. It was first created in 2007 and updated in 2009. It contains a history and pictorial family tree of the Mack family, and was created for use at family reunions and celebrations.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2009
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Mitchell Mack
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
Donor retains full ownership of any and all copyright currently controlled in agreement with Khayrallah Center. Nonexclusive right to authorize all uses of these materials for non-commercial research, scholarly, or other educational purposes are granted to Khayrallah Center pursuant to Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA).
Subject
The topic of the resource
Family trees
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Unknown
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image
2000's
Family Trees
Mack