Mrs. Nabiha al-Najjar, Wife of Our Ambassador in Moscow, on Her Travels

On her journey to Australia, Burma, India, and elsewhere...

On the dancing flying carpet the imagination of our forefathers, and our forefathers' forefathers, used to soar... to accompany Ibn Battuta and the teller of the Thousand and One Nights to the far edges of the East and its strange and wondrous distances.

Today, however, that yearning imagination no longer holds those reins stretched out across distances and lands. We live in an age in which the inventing mind has satisfied the appetite of that limited imagination — it is the energetic front-runner in bringing its creations into being.

Do you know where our ambassador in Moscow, Mr. Abdullah al-Najjar, and his wife spent their diplomatic leave? In my saying 'God rest Ibn Battuta' lies part of the answer!

They made a series of visits to Australia, then to the islands of Malaya and the Philippines, then to Thailand, Burma, India, and Pakistan. And today, in Lebanon, Mrs. Najjar talks to me about the journey of the recent past.

What astonished our lady in Australia, after an absence lasting eighteen years, was an immense building activity creeping swiftly through every corner of that continent, borne on the shoulders of men and women alike. And no wonder — the country brims with wealth that never runs dry; and so everything there is on the increase, so much so that the population, which was 7 million twenty years ago, has now become about 11 million.

In Melbourne the two visitors attended most of the Olympic festivities, and the opening ceremony was of the utmost splendor and order. The conversation turned to our consul there, Mr. Youssef Shadid, and his lady wife... they are, to put it briefly, the central jewel in the necklace of our Lebanese community.

In young Indonesia our ambassador and his lady wife met with such warmth of welcome from the government as left in their hearts a treasured keepsake from a country that bears us Arabs every affection. And talk of the Indonesians' sympathy for the Arab renaissance, as Mrs. Najjar says, is truly delightful — and it runs long.

Bandung, meeting place of the Asian and African nations, was the travelers' first place of pilgrimage, and what arrested her there was the natural beauty that generously clothes its plateaus and slopes. Hail to a country whose beauty is tended by the gentleness of its people and their fine hospitality!

From Indonesia the two travelers moved on to Burma... where the Buddhist temples rise on high...

In one of the squares stands a Buddhist temple whose loftiness challenges the Eiffel Tower; it is the greatest temple in the world. The height of its dome alone is three hundred feet... God be praised... And that dome is coated every three years with blazing gold. Around it stand small private temples built by the wealthy families of that day, and to them the people make pilgrimage every day, barefoot... humble and reverent.

Where, one wonders, do such temples multiply and flourish? I agree with Mrs. Najjar on this point... It is where poverty prevails and people groan under its weight, where deprivation and misery make their nest, that the domes of the temples rise high, and the deprived take refuge in them, as though they were palms of supplication lifted toward heaven in search of consolation.

And in the island of Bali is magic, magic entire; the Westerners see it as an Oriental pearl dancing in the sea... The dancing of the people of Bali needs no introduction; old and young alike excel at it. And the religion of Bali — for whoever cares to know — is a mixture of Buddhism, Hinduism, Shintoism, and the original pagan Balinese faith.

In Bangkok (Siam), too, many towering temples spread abroad, glorying in the brilliance of their colors... and there too is the sumptuous royal palace... A visit there, in our lady's phrase, does justice to all these marvels... So come along... let us be off!...

And India... we do not forget it; there the stay was long, and so the telling of it runs long.

It is the land of magic made serene by its ancient roots, the land of mystic beauty... The beauty of India, as our lady described it, is unique in its character — a character that shakes off every speck of dust intruding upon its pulsing, steadfast ideality.

There our ambassador met his friend and former colleague in Moscow, Dr. Radhakrishnan, who today holds the office of Vice-President of the Republic.

And in New Delhi there was a meeting with the President of the Republic and with the leader Nehru... gentle... kindly... Many before me have said that such gentleness and such kindness are the offspring of a ripe, benign strength...

Mr. Najjar and his wife were invited to the President's reception, and the guests numbered more than four thousand, amid the crowning colors of the sari, calling out... laughing... Yes... the sari remains, and will remain, modest in its wrapping, sweet in its draping, delicate in its elegant flow... and this is something the women of India — and others besides — know well!

And woman in India, says our lady interlocutor, is a moving member of the state. Her culture pleases you, as does her forward drive in the fields of construction, building, and services — a drive guarded by sobriety and watched over by a balanced, wakeful national spirit. In India there is a hospitable atmosphere in which tourist and visitor find ease, and it is enough for us what its people show of understanding for our Arab causes and the ebb and flow bound up with them...

And in India we find a great loyalty to leaders... On Gandhi's grave bouquets of flowers lie always in stillness, and rings of the faithful surround it... the disciples... and how many they are, tending the memory of the Master.

We hear of the wonders of the world... Wait — the seventh of them is in India, at Agra on the bank of the river Jumna, where the Taj Mahal stands: a marvel in its beauty, a marvel in its endurance, a marvel in the moral of its tale... the tale of an astounding love. Three things Arjumand Mumtaz Mahal said to her husband, the Emperor Shah Jahan, before her death... She said: 'Care for my children and watch over them... do not marry after me, my beloved... make of my tomb a crown of beauty and a wonder among the wonders of the world...' Yes indeed! Arjumand asked of her husband all that could be asked... And in any case... look for the woman behind every legend of beauty!

How narrow is the breast of these pages! And so the writer must always resort to abridgment — and abridgment, in my book at least, is unjust... I ought to have set down everything Mrs. Najjar told me. Suffice it that she planted in my soul an insistent longing to travel toward the East; and here I am in my turn trying to stir in the readers a longing to travel to the far reaches of our Asia — have I succeeded?!