I didn’t have many friends when I was very young. Maybe this is why I didn’t know that the song I sang in class that day was an unusual choice.
I must have been about 6 years old when the teacher asked me to stand in front of the whole class and sing. I sang a song that I knew well and that was called Bahai Kobo. My teacher became furious asking me to stop my nonsense and sing properly. Patiently I explained that it was not nonsense and that I was singing in Tagalog, a language spoken in the Philippines. The woman looked confused and simply asked me to go back to my seat. I was confused too, until now, I though everyone knew songs in Tagalog because it had always so naturally been part of my life.
For many years, I though everyone ate Pansit (a Filipino noodle-based dish) on their birthday because this is what we always had in my family. I also added salt to my fruits and I knew many songs in Tagalog (although I could only sing them phonetically without really understanding all the words).
Edna Aragao came to Lebanon in 1980. She was one of the first Filipino women to come to this war-thorn country to take care of little Arab children. She was part of my family for many years and I’m thankful that she shared with us some elements of her culture.
Migration is a very much a part of Lebanese history , whether it’s the Lebanese going abroad or people from other countries coming to Lebanon. This alone should help us be closer to other cultures in a positive spirit of humanity. But it doesn’t always work that way. Today, foreign workers from Asia and Africa are a common sight in Lebanon. They live with us, share our family secrets, they are part of the family. They are sometimes mistreated and suffering untold indignities.
