Our Women in the Service of Summering

And Broummana was the journey's end... Upon this verdant spot my choice fell for spending my summer vacation — here, where the hills embrace one another to the far horizon, and where the green pines embrace, in the most splendid greenness of health and life! And where the air is mild and temperate, neither compelling the wearing of wools nor leaving bodies drenched with sweat...

This opportunity allowed me to enter a number of hotels, and before long a phenomenon caught my eye, one almost common to most of the hotel managements here: the activity of woman, and her taking of the reins of affairs... It seemed to me that this phenomenon deserved attention, especially as we are in a country that depends, more than on anything else, for the revival of its economy on the resources of summering!.. And I said: here are doors of livelihood thrown wide open before woman, and she can distinguish herself in them and win a certain victory — for the field is her field, the subject is the subject of her specialty, and she has only to seize the opportunity!

Long ago the summering countries, such as Switzerland, recognized woman's capability in the management of hotels, and paved the way for women in most of these tasks... Even in Lebanon we see that the small hotels that meet with patronage and popularity owe the credit for it to woman.... This woman may be hidden away in a kitchen, but she is, in any case, a watchful eye that secures comfort for her guests and meets their requests with open-heartedness! Otherwise, what is the secret of the summer guests' attachment to a particular hotel, to which they return every summer and for which they will accept no substitute?! Is not the philosophy of success the meeting of these small requests without fuss? Is not the management of hotels an art in its own right, requiring at bottom specialization, and taste, and forbearance?!

From Broummana itself I wanted to bring two models to illustrate what I mean: two small hotels whose success, and the summer guests' attachment to them, go back to woman's skill and her good management.

The first hotel is the Hotel Rossli, standing on a solitary knoll among the pine trees. Its owner was originally a Swiss man who sent his eldest daughter to Switzerland to specialize in home economics and hotel management, and her lot fell to a young Lebanese man. After her marriage, Mrs. Hilda Jureidini took over the management of the hotel in its entirety, and showed outstanding ability in preparing the kinds of dishes she had learned at school. She is the skilled cook on the day the cook is absent; she is the prompter and planner who draws up the menus and keeps the accounts; and it is she who personally oversees everything, distributing the work and going about among the guests to make certain of their comfort and their satisfaction with everything....

I spoke with Mrs. Hilda Jureidini and admired the good spirit with which she is adorned. She declared to me that the success of hotels goes back, in large part, to the guests' satisfaction with the food and the cleanliness, and to the securing of working hands. She explained to me, with a touch of pride, that the work in the hotel is divided among the members of the family, each according to his capacity. When I asked her how this was done, she answered: "I am responsible, apart from the general management, for the terwiqa (or breakfast), which I see to alone, while the girls are busy with the cleaning and tidying. My younger sister 'Gisèle' helps me in the work, my mother is responsible for the washing and ironing, and my father serves at table! Yes — he does not disdain even to wait on the guests, and he has accustomed us from childhood to be like him; and this gesture has pleased all our guests..."

There is one phenomenon that calls for admiration: Mrs. Hilda, in addition to her constant work and her great responsibility, is the mother of two little children, whose claims upon her she fulfills in full...

As for the second hotel in Broummana that earned my admiration for its management, it is Villa Fraiha. Here the atmosphere is purely that of a family; everyone forms one group bound together by intimacy, and the credit for this goes, of course, to the good management with which the work of the hotel is carried out — and the inquirer soon realizes that the source of this success is the wife of the hotel's owner, Mrs. Salma Fraiha, for she is perpetual motion from morning till evening. She is the first to rise early in the morning, and the last to take to her bed at night! And in her veins there is health enough to carry her on her feet the whole day long!!

Mrs. Fraiha is the mainspring of all movement and the thinking head of the hotel; nothing is done without her knowledge. And it is a lovely thing to watch her giving directions — even with her eyes and her eyebrows she gives directions and orders!! She is always ready to meet every request, and apologizes with the greatest courtesy if a request proves scarce and impossible...

At the home economics school in Sidon her eldest daughter Mona took her training; despite her young age, she is her mother's right hand and her first assistant. Mona's aunt, Miss Wadia Fraiha, attends to the washing, while the hotel's accounts are supervised by Shawqi, the eldest son...

The guests of the Fraiha hotel, thanks to the efforts of its owners and their vigilance over everyone's comfort, will accept no substitute for this hotel. The atmosphere is that of a family, as I have said, and in this atmosphere precious friendships are founded which have their effect — not among the grown-ups only, but among the little ones too, for the number of children in this hotel rivals its like in the other hotels, owing to the good treatment, and to the meeting of the children's requests in particular.

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Everything in life has a philosophy, and the philosophy of hotels is gentleness, taste, and forbearance — qualities more abundant in woman than in man. Our women need specialization, and acquaintance with the value of this work and with the good that can be reaped in its field, for ourselves and for our country...