The Woman's Voice announces that it publishes in these pages only such news as its subjects themselves furnish to it; and if some should notice omissions touching certain sides of social activity, it is because The Woman's Voice does not wish to publish news not furnished to it by those concerned...
• Mr. Emile Bustani, one of the owners of the Contracting and Trading Company, has returned from a journey to England lasting more than two months, in the course of which he was in contact with the oil kings and with English men of politics and business. On this delightful journey he was accompanied by his estimable wife, Mrs. Laurice Bustani. Nor were her efforts without a noble patriotic aim — the more so as the two of them stand in the front rank of our zealous young people.
In a conversation with the editorial secretary, Mrs. Bustani expressed her intense admiration for the Englishwoman. Among what she said:
'There are things for which I have come to respect the Englishwoman. Chief among them is her fortitude in the face of rationing and the food shortage which still weighs upon the country; the Englishwoman accepts these with an open heart, and rarely did I hear one complain or grumble!
— The Englishwoman manages the affairs of her house without any shortcoming, and come evening there she is, perfectly groomed, ready to accompany her husband and to enjoy social life according to her own inclination.
— The practical life the
Englishwoman leads gives her breadth of knowledge and confidence in herself; in her general information she keeps pace with her brother man. The Lebanese woman, on the other hand, once she marries, lets her knowledge dwindle and contents herself with living within the compass of the house; her reading of books and magazines grows scant, and before long her husband has outstripped her by a long stretch...'
Mrs. Bustani believes that the Lebanese woman surpasses the Englishwoman in intelligence and quickness of mind, and is not her
inferior in culture; what she lacks is perseverance and steadiness in widening the horizon of her life.
• Woman in Lebanon still gives deprived childhood the fullest share of her activity. Among the most notable signs of this is the Child Welfare Society, housed in the Islamic Orphanage in Beirut.
This society was founded three years ago, and its first president was Mrs. Ihsan Rashid Beyhum. During the past month Mrs. Beyhum's presidency came to an end, and Mrs. Ni'mat Baydun Qaranful was elected to the post.
The aim of the Child Welfare Society, as appears from its name, is care for the child's health and attention to his person and his feeding. Children in straitened circumstances from the Horsh quarter frequent the center, where they receive medical examination from volunteer physicians and the price of their medicine is paid for them; parties are held for them, and clothing and foodstuffs are distributed to them at special seasons.
The truth is that this society of noble purpose, whose members number no more than forty ladies, has filled a great void in a district far from the heart of the capital —
where medical examination is now all but assured to every poor child.
In a conversation with the society's president, Mrs. Ni'mat Qaranful, she said: the number of children treated at the Child Welfare Society in 1949 reached twelve thousand children.
Mrs. Qaranful explained that these expenses are met from members' subscriptions, the proceeds of parties, and the donations of the charitable. She made special mention of Mrs. Faiza al-Solh, wife of His Excellency the Prime Minister, who constantly extends to the society her material and moral sympathy.
And Mrs. Qaranful, as president of this society, strives with all energy and activity to perform her duty in the fullest manner.
She works, besides all this, in a number of women's societies in Beirut, and believes in woman's competence and her worthiness to
obtain her political rights in full — without her house and her family suffering any neglect.
• The Society for the Protection of Lebanese Children, attached to the Lebanese Red Cross, invited the Beirut public to attend the ceremony opening its third house — on Hamra Street — held under the patronage of His Excellency Riad Bey al-Solh, the Prime Minister. The public warmly answered the invitation of this society, which continues to perform works for which it deserves praise, for the protection of childhood; every year,