Meet the Mothers of the Future

How does the young girl live in our country today?
On what foundations are her personality and her judgment built?
What are her opinions on life? On learning? On marriage?
On politics? On religion? Etc....

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Georgette Bassoul entered the arena of life when she was still sixteen years old. She completed her elementary studies at the Lazarist school in Beirut, then studied English for a year at the American School for Girls, and also trained at typewriting. After that she worked as an employee of the Iraq Petroleum Company in Beirut, drawing a monthly salary of 192 Lebanese liras. Her pay then rose until it reached 260 liras.

When the company's offices moved to Tripoli, Georgette was given the choice between resigning and moving to work there, and she chose to keep working. So she moved to Tripoli and lodged in a nuns' convent, spending the weekend in Beirut. Even so, she felt a strange loneliness at being far from her family, and she preferred to resign and return to Beirut before five months had passed since her move.

Meanwhile the Tapline company was receiving the applications for work that poured in upon it, so Georgette sent in an application and received the letter of acceptance after two months had gone by, during which she learned to type on the Arabic typewriter.

Two years have now passed since she joined the Tapline company as an employee specializing in typing on the Arabic typewriter, and today she draws 320 Lebanese liras a month.

I asked Georgette whether her passage from school life to independent work had required an effort to adapt herself, known as she is for her quiet, shy nature. She answered that she was uncomfortable at first, for what a distance lies between the merry life of school and a job that demands bending eight hours a day over the typewriter. She would tremble and blush if one of the clerks, of whom there were many scattered about the office, spoke to her. But with the passage of time Georgette grew used to her work and came to feel that she profits from it in various ways, which she enumerated to me, saying: "I feel that the benefits of my work are not confined to drawing a salary each month. Relying on myself has made me feel ease and stability, because I am not a burden on anyone else for my living — indeed I contribute to the family's expenses. And do not forget that work outside the home enables a girl to become acquainted with different kinds of people, which strengthens her personality and softens her temper."

Georgette is the third member of a family made up of three girls, a mother, and a father who formerly worked in the dyeing trade but was struck by an illness that has kept him from work for fifteen years.

Each of the sisters contributes a share toward providing the household's needs. The eldest works as a typist at the Bank of Syria and Lebanon, and the second works at the same bank.

Georgette is thrifty in buying what she needs. She does not dispose of her salary as she pleases, but gives the whole sum to her mother, and her personal monthly spending does not exceed twenty liras, which she lays out on a few extras and on the price of a cinema ticket. As for her clothes, her mother is the one responsible for choosing what she needs; and since she spends the greater part of her time at work, she keeps to simple clothes made up of several skirts and colored wool sweaters. Her clothes for formal occasions consist of a wool dress, a suit and a broadcloth coat, and a pretty hat, in addition to various accessories. She has a passion for beautiful clothes, but contents herself with the simple among them, according to a limited budget.

I asked her how she spends her free time, and she complained that her life runs on a single rhythm. She goes to her office on Hamra Street at eight in the morning and stays until noon. Since her house is near the office, she takes her midday meal at home, then returns quickly to continue her work from one o'clock until five in the afternoon, after which she goes back home to rest for an hour. Her two sisters will have returned from their work as well, and the three talk together while Georgette knits herself a wool sweater. Then she takes up a French women's magazine and reads the chief news of fashion and household management, or goes to the market with her companion. The whole family gathers around the supper table, and she usually takes to her bed at half past eight in the evening.

As for Sunday, which is her holiday, she goes to church to attend morning Mass, then returns home with her friends, and they gather around the radio to listen to the Arabic section of the listeners' request program on the Radio Beirut station. She spends the afternoon either going to the cinema or exchanging visits with family and friends.

I asked Georgette whether the young man in our country knows how to behave with a girl who works outside the home, and she assured me that the young men she works with at the company show her every respect. She drew my attention to the fact that the girl herself has an influence on how a man behaves toward her: if she knows how to keep her dignity, he shows her every regard and treats her as a colleague in the office.

Georgette refuses to go out with the young men of her acquaintance, because her milieu is still traditional and considers a girl's going out with a young man a defect in her upbringing. She then mentioned to me that she dances only at rare family parties. And though her mother allows her to attend such occasions, she refrains from telling her father, for he is never lenient in this respect.

Her family shows open-mindedness in allowing her to choose the man of her future, and she told me the following: "If a young man asks to make my acquaintance, or to call on me, I invite him to our house, where I can come to know him closely in a clean family atmosphere, instead of going out with him in secret."

But Georgette has not yet chosen the one she loves. She requires of the man of her future that he possess a measure of intelligence and culture, and that he have the magnetic charm of the well-known actor Tyrone Power. She prefers that he have an independent profession by which he can support the household without making her prop it up by working outside the home. And since she holds fast to the duties of her religion, she makes it a condition that he be of the Maronite rite. Nor did she hide from me her attachment to the teachings of the Church, her monthly communion and confession, besides her daily stop at church on her way to work.

When I asked her about her interest in the country's affairs and its politics, she shook her head, saying: "I do not understand, and take no interest whatever in, the events and developments of any kind that happen in the country. I never read the newspapers, Arabic or foreign. My reading is confined to French magazines and storybooks." And though she reads Arabic well, she attributed her not reading in it to her having been accustomed since childhood at school to reading in French only.

And though she is inclined to practice sports, especially basketball, her working hours do not allow her to do so. She contents herself with listening to Western song and music of all kinds.

Georgette looks upon those around her with contentment and confidence. Her first friend is her mother, to whom she confides everything that happens to her. She spends merry, happy hours with her two sisters, and likewise with some of her colleagues at work, going out with them on excursions and outings. Here she showed me her inclination to travel to Europe and America, though she prefers to settle down and live in Beirut.

When I asked her about her plans for the future, she hesitated in answering; then her face reddened and she said: "Here I am, staying at my work until I marry; then I shall stay in my house and manage its affairs and my children's affairs, as is incumbent upon every mother who wants to contribute to offering a sound generation to the future."