Scenes from the Street

Some days ago I was passing along one of the streets of Beirut when, at one of its desolate turnings, my eye and ear were caught by a small boy pushing before him a white box from whose sides came the ringing of bells, while from the boy's throat, every now and then, burst loud, enticing cries, tempting the children to hurry over and buy his attractive frozen wares inside the white box.

My journalist's curiosity led me to watch the "ice-cream stick" vendor stealthily, without his noticing me. The distance between us had stretched and grown, and I was now safely beyond his suspicion... And how great was my astonishment when I saw him with my own eyes — believing himself far from any watchful gaze — open the box, reach for the little frozen pieces, lick them with his tongue one by one, and put them back in their places, having cooled his insides and satisfied his craving... Then he resumed his rounds amid the clamor of his bells and his cries, as though nothing had happened!

The image of that boy has stayed in my mind ever since that day — and his image afterward, handing out to the small children the ice-cream sticks, or "sticks," after he had licked them with his tongue.

I could not keep myself, after that, from passing these thoughts on to my readers, men and women alike. And what is the journalist's task if not fidelity in sharing people's joys and sorrows, and fidelity in responding, in recording his impressions, and in conveying them to whoever has eyes and ears?

And I asked myself afterward: how can the municipality pursue and check violations of this kind? And if that proves impossible, is it not more fitting for us — especially we mothers who watch over our children's health — to grasp the consequence of these dangers and fight them, and not give our little ones free rein to buy ices wherever they please and from whomever they please?!

I felt that my task, after seeing what I saw, was to warn mothers of the consequences of such things and of how gravely they threaten their children's health. And then, is it not one of our worst habits that our children drift through the streets after peddlers of every kind, squandering their piasters for a reason or for none, and growing up in extravagance — one of the plagues of this age? Is it not my task to alert my sisters the mothers to the need to curb this spending and to make up for it by ourselves supplying our children's wants of what they love — providing them with homemade ices, which surpass those others in cleanliness and in quantity? We shall thereby have brought our children back into the fold of the home, blocked the habit of spending and squandering, and kept far from them the harms that come of such doings.