ihath

She: So.....are you thinking about marriage?
He: No, not at all. I am penniless, drifting through life, without future. I can't go back to my country and I have no idea where my life is taking me. How can I possibly think about marriage?
She:So.....do you at least love me?
He: No, I have dedicated myself towards the political struggle in my country. There is no room for love in my life.

This very romantic exchange happened between my parents when they first met.

Promising start for a love story, eh?....... It only gets better.

When I was a little girl, I would soemtimes ask my mom
ihath: Mom?......how did you marry dad?
Mom: When I met your father, I chased after him and he tried to run away. I ran and ran and ran. He kept on running and running and running trying to get as far away from me as possible. The faster he ran the faster I ran, until finally he dropped to the ground in exhaustion. He couldn't run anymore he was too tired. I jumped on top of him while he was lying on the ground breathless, struggling to take his breath. I shook him violently "Are you going to marry me or what?" gasping for air he replied "Ok, ok, ok. I will marry you......I can't run anymore"..... and that is how me and your dad got married.

When I became older my mom told me the more detailed version of that story.

Sasha, was a young woman of 22 years, living in the city of Liberec north of Czechoslovakia and was engaged to be married to a young man from her home town. Working as a clerk in a bank, she happened to meet a wealthy German man who drove in a fancy Mercedes.....which was a rare sight in the socialist country. The wealthy German man took a liking to Sasha and started showing up at the bank for made-up reasons all the time.

One day, Sasha was going on a date to see a movie with her fiance, at the end of the date the fiance walked her home and tried to plant a kiss on her lips before parting, she pushed him away and ran into the house. Her father, Joseph, saw the kafuffle taking place at the door steps.

Joseph: Sashenko?....... Do you not like it when he touches you?
Sasha: No.....Yuck!......I can't stand it.
Joseph: So....how will you live with him once you are married?
Sasha: I guess will have to get used to him touching me once we get married.
Joseph: Since you are not getting married for reasons of the heart, why not get married for reasons of the head. Since you are about to marry a man you don't love, then why not marry a man you don't love that has money. Why don't you marry the German that chases after you all the time.
Sasha: Ha?.......I didn't think about that.

So Sash went on a vacation to a lake side resort. Her plan was to use that time to think and decide about which man she will spend the rest of her life with. Her curent fiance, who is nice, or the older German man with the fancy car.

And there she saw an Iraqi man sitting under a tree by the side of the lake reading a book. While all his Arab friends were ogling the young women in bathing suits and flirting with anything wearing a skirt; this young man seemed serious and was completly engrossed in his reading. Sasha was so drawn to this man that she took his picture from a distance without his knowledge that very first time she saw. She has cherished and kept that picture till today. All her efforts to meet this man and talk with him were met with a lukewarm reception. Still, upon returning from her vacation she broke off her engagement without giving a specific reason and would keep going back to meet with this young man that she saw at the lake side resort. Once the young man made his intentions clear - he had no intention to get married and he was not in love, Sasha was heart broken.

On her way home, she went to church and kneeled in front of the statue of virgin Mary. She paryed and prayed and prayed that the holy mother of Jesus would grant her wish and let her have the heart of the man she was madly in love with.

"Holy mother of the lord, I have come to church every Sunday for the last several years despite the fact that I live in a socialist coutry where going to church on a regular basis is heavily frowned upon. I have attended mass time and again with the handfull of 80 and 90 year old ladies who are the only people still coming to church in these times, never doubting you once. I have knelt here and prayed at your feet many many times. Will you not grant me this one wish this one time? Will you please place love and tenderness in that man's heart towards me." In tears, my mother looked up upon the statue of virgin Mary and swears to god that she saw the head of the statue nod in agreement, as if telling her that her wish would be granted.


ihath: Mom?......Didn't you think that it was odd to ask virgin Mary to grant you a husband that wasn't Christian. Don't you think that the virgin Mary would rather you married a Christian man?
Sasha: When you are in love you don't think about such partical matters.
ihath: Mom?......wasn't that humiliating...you being in love with a man that didn't have the same feelings?
Sasha: Offcourse it was humiliating. I was heart broken. Each time I would see him I would tell myself that I would never ever come see him again. But then I would tell myself I will go see him one more time, just one more that time and it will be the last time. But then I would go see him agian and again. I couldn't help myself....I was drawn to him by powers beyond my control.
ihath: But, what did you see in him? he is not even handsome.
Sasha: To me he seemed like the most beautiful man on earth.
ihath: That will never happen to me. I will never allow myself to fall in love. It seems terrible.
Sasha: One day, when you meet the right guy you will have no choice......you will see.....when the time comes I will remind you.


And she did remind me of this conversation when I met my husband.

ihath: Dad?....so why did you marry my mom?
Dad: I was touched by her sincerity. I told her I was penniless, I told her that I couldn't even go back to my country, I told her everything and she kept coming back to see me. I was flattered that somebody was in love with me, no woman has ever been in love with me before.
ihath: Didn't you have a sweetheart back in Iraq?
Dad: No, offcourse not. There were no women in University back in those days. There was maybe one woman in my whole class and she was ugly.
ihat: But, wasn't there a neighbours daughter or a young woman you met on the street that caught your eye?
Dad: My generation ..... we were different. We were serious and dedicated group of yound people, not like young people these days. We didn't have time for love and other such nonsense. The revolution was our love.
ihath: So how did you change your mind? what made you finally decide to marry my mom?
Dad: Well! I started thinking, here is this young woman who really really loves me. I am in my thirties. I can't go back to Iraq to get my mom to find me a bride the old fashioned way. So I thought why not? It's not like everyday some woman falls in love with me. Plus it was about time I started a family.
ihath: So did you fall in love with her eventually?
Dad:Yes, your mom kinda grew on me after a while.


On their wedding day, my dad didn't know enough Czech to be able to understand the service at his own wedding. He worried he wouldn't know when to say yes when asked "the question" because he wouldn't understant the question. And so he agreed with my mom that they would hold hands and when it came time for him to say - ano (yes in Czech) my mom would squeeze his hand and he would know it was time to say ano.

Judge: Do you take this woman to be your wife for the rest of your life?
Sasha: (hand squeeze)
Dad: ANO!

The other day my daughter asked me

daugther: Mom? ..... how did you marry dad?
ihath: Well!.....when I met your dad he gave me a lecture about the state of the universe. The things he said made perfect sense and explained many things that I was wondering about. I was so impressed with how smart he was and how wise he was that I decided to give him a gift in appreciation. I thought I would give him a book, but he had many books and I was worried I would give him the wrong book and he would think I was stupid. Your dad has high intellect and I was worried that I would give him a present that would expose my ignorance. Then I thought I would give him a CD, but you know your dad, he has no appreciation of music. So after a long and agonizing thinking, I decided that I should give him something that he needed and not something that he would necessarly like. Being the super logical man that he is, I thought he needed a wife that would drive him a little crazy. I went to him and told him that I offer him myself in marriage as a token of appreciation. He looked me over, walked around me to take a good look from all sides and finally smiled. He told me that he liked the gift and that it was the best present ever.

One day I will tell her the full versioned story.

“You have been neglecting your English writing for sake of your Arabic Writing. You are just churning out one article after the other on your Arabic blog and producing nothing but weak posts on the English side, that is when you write anything at all. Now writing in Arabic is swell but you should not allow that to effect your English writing. You have developed your own style and voice in English, you Arabic writing is improving over time but it is still not all there, it is not up to same level as your English writing. Anyway!......most internet readers speak English so you reach a wider audience that way” – said my father over the weekend. He was berating me for neglecting my English blog.

This is the same man who years ago told me that if I mixed English words into Arabic while I spoke to him that he would rather I didn’t speak to him at all.

I told my dad that I received critical comments from a young man named Mohammed from Egypt and that after a long email back and forth that he convinced me to write in Arabic. I explained all the reasons that I felt writing in Arabic mattered. How we need to engage in a dialog among ourselves and not just with the west. How as a result of me living in Canada it gives me the freedom of saying whatever I like without fear of prosecution. How there are thousands and thousands of Iranian bloggers and most of them write in Persian. How it make me feel jealous to see Iranians being so proud of their own language, while we Arabs blog mostly in English.

“With all respect to this Mohammed….I am not saying don’t write in Arabic…..I am telling you not to stop writing in English”---was my dad’s final answer.

I am 35 years old and I am still trying to impress my dad…..I wonder what that says about me?

Alright, dadio! this one is for you.
…..

The men where crying like little babies, hitting themselves with grieve, they looked distorted, confused, completely defeated. You could feel the distress in the air

The year was 1967, and my father was in the Czech republic taking a language class as part of his graduate studies. He was studying along with a group of other Arab students. When Egyptian president Jamal Abed Al Nasser announced the loss of the Six Days War to Israel, the Egyptian students became so grieve stricken that my father worried they would have nervous break downs. The other Arab students were also depressed but the Egyptian young men took it the hardest. That moment is frozen in my dad’s memory because he has described it to me many times. The moment of defeat, the loss of a dream.

But, it was the era of broken dreams, and loss of the six days war was only one of many.

My dad in his youth had many sweet dreams.

The son of a wealthy merchant in city of Al-Shamiya, south of Iraq, he dreamed of a new Iraq, a better Iraq, an Iraq that was completely different from the Iraq he grew up in. He dreamed of an Iraq were everybody would be equal and have the same rights. He dreamed of an Iraq were nobody went hungry and nobody was poor. He dreamed of an Iraq free of British occupation and free of the client regime left behind by them. He dreamed of a country where everybody could express themselves freely and without fear for their life. Dreams of pride, victory, Arab nationalism, Arab unity, progress, modernity and better life. Dreams of rebuilding the whole country.

And so…….he joined the Iraqi Communist Party against the expressed wishes of his father. The communist party was going to achieve all these dreams.

Did you ever notice how all the leaders of communism come from a privileged backgrounds? Carl Marx, Lenin, Fidel Castro yet they claim to be fighting for the rights of poor and hard working. My theory is that all these overeducated, privileged young men became communists in order to rebel against their fathers. … just a silly theory….don’t take me too seriously.

When the forces of darkness reined in Iraq and those that objected got killed, arrest orders were issued for my father. Hiding in the apartment of a friend, the police came to arrest him anyway, somebody must have spotted him and informed on him. As he was being arrested, he remembered comrades that were arrested like him only to show up dead with holes and burn marks few weeks later.

“I have no idea where the courage or the idea came from, but I decided to give it a try” – my dad told me. While he was being driven in a jeep to his dark fate, he decided to try to b.s. his way out of it.
“Do you know who I am?” – He told the arresting officers.
“You are making a huge mistake, I am a high officer in the army, all of you are in big trouble as soon as this mishap is cleared up, I will have all of you arrested and punished”- he belted at them in confidence.
The arresting officers looked worried, somehow this display of haughtiness was convincing, they decided to let him go and come back after verifying that they had the right man. My dad was long gone when they came back the second time.

After that he went hiding in the basement of an abandoned house, his first brush with death convinced him he should never be seen in public and so he never left the room for months, eating nothing but canned food the whole time. Going out to buy fresh fruits and vegetable seemed too risky. Till this day my dad can’t stand canned sardines because it was his main stable for months during that period.

Later he arranged for a fake passport and used it to get out of the country. He simply walked in confidence into the airport hoping he wouldn't be discovered. “I was shitting in my pants, knowing that if I am discovered I would be dead, but pretending to be walking in all confidence”, my dad told me about his unusual exit of his country.

And so the son of the wealthy merchant would arrive in Kuwait penniless, without papers, without ID, without a way to prove his education, the one who wanted to defend the poor and the hard working would soon join them. It was the first time in his life that he would experience hunger and poverty but not for long. Soon the party would arrange for him to study in the Czech republic.

In the Czech republic he would experience an even bigger heart break. Seeing the corruption rampant in the socialist country, he soon started to doubt his ideals. He wasn’t sure anymore if this was something that was worth risking his life over. It all seemed very different in his dreams than the actual application he witnessed. "But some are more equal than others" didn't have the same ring to it.

Here he was, depressed, away from his county, exiled from a country that wants to kill him, his beliefs shaken, no longer sure what he believed in, all his sweet dreams broken, drifting through life, nearly broke, no job, doing a degree he didn’t care about, Life seemed very very dark indeed.

And so………….He got married and had two kids.

In my childhood, I was discouraged from having dreams about rebuilding countries.

Such dreams can be a serious risk to your life.
--------

Sweet dreams are made of this
Who am I to disagree?
Travel the world and the seven seas
Everybody's looking for something
Some of them want to use you
Some of them want to get used by you
Some of them want to abuse you
Some of them want to be abused

Sweet dreams are made of this
Who am I to disagree?
Travel the world and the seven seas
Everybody's looking for something
Some of them want to use you
Some of them want to get used by you
Some of them want to abuse you
Some of them want to be abused

I wanna use you and abuse you
I wanna know what's inside you(Whispering)

Hold your head up, movin' on
Keep your head up, movin' on
Hold your head up, movin' on
Keep your head up, movin' on
Hold your head up, movin' on
Keep your head up, movin' on
Movin' on!

What makes a good preacher?

Effective Christian preachers have a compelling vision of Jesus Christ which
they communicate forcefully to their listeners to lead them to view their
circumstances differently and to respond with strengthened faith and commitment.
(Zuck, R. B. (1996, c1994). A biblical theology of the New Testament (Page
370). Chicago: Moody Press)

I believe that to be a good definition of what a good preacher is. The same definition can adopted for a preacher in any other religion or other ideology. Notice that the definition of a good preacher doesn’t include strength of one’s own faith.
Now lets analyze it a bit. First the preacher must have a “compelling vision”. The preacher must be able to verbalize and communicate a crystal clear vision that the listener is able to imagine in his own head. He must be able to talk about some idealistic world or some perfect place and describe it to you in such detail that you start believing that such a place does exist. Once that is done you are hooked, you will do anything to follow him into that perfect place. For example, you have to say” I can make you become thin, I can make you become happy, I can make you find comfort, I can make you feel good, I will take you to a beautiful place. You can’t just talk about happiness or comfort or whatever else it is you are selling you have to describe it in detail, what does it look like? how does it feel? what does it smell like? Once I am in that state how will I be different, will people perceive me differently? Will I look different? Will I be more successful?. You need describe that person so that I can even imagine what they will have for breakfast for the next 10 years.

Second, “communicate forcefully” the preacher must be a good communicator, he must be able to communicate not only clearly but in a forceful manner. It’s not good enough that the preacher communicate in clear language, he/she communicate is a manner that can’t be ignored. He must be entertaining, his words must be gripping, he must be charismatic, when he talks you just want to listen and can’t ignore him, very few people know how to communicate is such a seductive manner. For example, you can use one liners which are radical yet memorable so that they will stick in a person’s head for a long time. “Jesus love you”, “Islam is the solution” it doesn’t matter what that means it sounds good and once you hear it a few times it sticks in your head and the next thing you know everybody is repeating it like a mantra. Humor is a good communication tool, if you can get people to laugh then you have them, it is hard to ignore somebody once they gave you a good laugh.

Finally, he must relate to the personal circumstances of the listener. It is not enough that a preacher paints a beautiful picture of the ultimate goal. Most people will say, yes but I am flawed, perhaps some other people can reach to that idealistic place, but I can’t. A good preachers will address your own particular short comings, he will say I can see that you have sinned, I can see that you have suffered, I can see that you have been through tough time, I can see that you have failed before and that is ok. What that does is help the listener actually believe that even they can achieve the required goal. For example, you must be able to sense what the person is looking for and then promise that you will give it to them. This person wants to lose wait, another is having marriage problems and feels completely overwhelmed by it, this person is afraid of social gatherings, another is looking for lasting love. To each person you need to say I will give that which your heart desires. To each person you must deliver a customized message that speaks to their individual yearnings. You might think, but hey! isn’t that manipulative and perhaps a little dishonest. Well yes it is, and quit frankly it only works on feeble minded people, objective and self confident people are not swayed by such techniques. The good news is that majority of people are the feeble minded category and only a minority are the objective kind. Most people allow their feelings to sway them.
Most people will say that they hate being preached to, I believe that what they mean is that they hate being preached to by bad preachers who don’t follow the basic rules of conduct of preaching and give other preachers a bad name.

You my friend are a bad preacher. You simply suck at it. You don’t communicate a compelling vision at all, you keep telling me about how I going to go to hell, well what is so compelling about that? You communicate in the most boring, tedious and obnoxious manner that even a believer will defect after listening to you. I am willing to bet that even your own mother can’t stand your sermons. Finally you are not even attempting to relate to my personal circumstance. Heck! you don’t even know anything about me nor are you willing to take the time to find out.

Please do everybody a favor, either you quit preaching or take the time to do it right. Like most things in life, preaching is a skill that can be taught and with practice you can actually become good at it.