Like any child, Josephine loved to be told stories. When she was younger, we used to tell her stories in Arabic. In Arabic, we have the formal written language, and the informal spoken language. To make it simpler for our children to understand, we would take an Arabic book and tell them the stories in the spoken language. By the time Josephine was four years old, she had memorized all of the Arabic storybooks that we had in the house.
About this time, Haifa’s uncle, Ummo Emile, came from Lebanon to visit us. He and his wife spent a week with us. Ummo Emile was a very strict school principal. It was uncommon to see a smile on his face, or to see him play with children. Ummo Emile was also a poet and he wrote many books.
As children and teenagers, Haifa and her sisters felt intimidated at the very thought of Ummo Emile. Whenever they would see him at a family gathering, they would have to recite their school lessons, and could never relate to him as an uncle.
Now an adult, Haifa still felt the need to sit and speak carefully in the presence of Ummo Emile.
Ummo Emile spoke the formal written language.
One night, he sat with Gibran and Josephine to read them a story. He began to read the story in the written language. Josephine interrupted him, “Ummo Emile,” she said with a hint of frustration, “You are reading the story wrong.” Haifa gasped in the background.
“What do you mean, child?” Ummo Emile responded. “You are reading it wrong. That’s not how you read it,” Josephine insisted. Ummo Emile simply proceeded to continue reading the story.
Josephine interrupted him again. “No, Ummo Emile, that is not how you read the story! You are reading it wrong.” It was a tense moment. Haifa was now in shock. Ummo Emile looked at Josephine. Josephine took the book from him and said sweetly, “Here, Ummo, let me show you how to read the story.” Having memorized the story, she went through the whole book and “read” the story in the spoken Arabic language.
Ummo Emile did not seem to mind. He was amused and even managed to smile.
At another time during the visit, Ummo Emile asked Josephine to spell her last name. She proceeded to tell him, “N-I-C-H-O-L-A-S”. He said, “No, actually, you spell it N-E-C-K-L-A-C-E, Necklace.” Josephine shook her head, and responded, “Ummo Emile, that is not right. A necklace is something that you wear around your neck. My last name is ‘Nicholas’, not ‘Necklace’.” After a couple minutes of going back and forth, Josephine finally said, “Ummo Emile, what’s the matter with you? You can’t read, and now you can’t spell either!”
