Inshallah

One of the most frequently used, and most beloved words in Arabic is inshallah. In English it comes closest to “God willing,” but it carries more weight in Arabic I sense. It is used in many circumstances—if you tell a friend, “see you tomorrow for lunch!” the other puts his/her hand on heart and sighs, “inshallah.” If a civil engineer is presenting a proposal for how to find more water resources for a town, he or she would end the presentation with, “inshallah.” Whenever you have deep hopes, you beseech God for His richest blessings, that is “inshallah.” I like this word—I think it has gravitas.

So, the other night I met the King.

I am suppressing a giggle at the casual way/tone with which I just offered that declarative sentence!

The convocation was really breathtaking—enough glitter and glam in the background so that it felt special, but also very down-to-earth, a trait certainly reflective of this headmaster. All day the Communications Department had been busy with setting up a dais, and creating a lovely outdoor seating area for the event—flowers, chairs, lighting, working on a procession, all to officially open the school year.

The setting was on a patio in between the Dining Hall and Student Union, timed for 7:00 p.m. that exact moment when dusk glimmers on the uber-clear sky. His Majesty was to arrive a bit before 7:00, and greet the faculty in the Dining Hall. What to wear? While I wore the same outfit on the first day of classes I had chosen for the last 15 years, there really was no wardrobe precedent for chatting with royalty! I chose my grey suit and the shirt and tie I often have worn to the Harvard Club in New York for Hackley Alumni events. Feel free to draw any conclusions you like from that choice.

The faculty arrived to meet and greet, and minutes, really—literally five minutes before the motorcade is to arrive, I get a nosebleed! What??? In our family nosebleeds have occasionally happened at inopportune moments (just to show you how our family must prepare, on my sister’s beautiful Wedding Day, she made sure our cousin, the ENT guy, sat on an aisle nearby in case of any sanguinary disasters!) I rush to the bathroom, grab toilet paper and WILL the flow of blood to stop. (A colleague is trying to help, clucking, “it’s the dry heat I tell you!) I am not going to miss my chance to talk with the King!

I elbow my way back to the front—I had simply “casually” been in the front before, and about a minute later he arrives, and walks in. He greets each faculty member, ahaking hands and smiling the entire time, asking questions about how it is going, hoping that the experience has been good so far.

He makes me feel kinda tall! I am at least an inch taller, but he looks like such a nice man. He is wearing a grey suit, similar to mine, although I honestly think my tie is a little snazzier. After all, I tell myself, he has just flown in from a state visit to Libya. Maybe he didn’t have a chance to get out his Armani-Harvard-Club tie.

After this low-key chance to meet and greet His Majesty, the bagpipes begin signaling the procession. His Majesty leads the way, followed by the Board of Trustees and the faculty. The students are seated, and quiet, maybe awed in the same way I am. I swear I am not making this up, but the first tune the bagpipes play is “Yankee Doodle”! Oh my.

As His Majesty and the Headmaster sit on the dais, beyond them are about 14 flags, of the countries represented by the faculty and students. Here is the proof that this is an international gathering place!

The program is refreshingly simple, and very moving. The Headmaster greeted everyone with a short speech, followed by a teacher offering a poem in Arabic. No, I didn’t get many words, but there was such a lovely sonority and drama in the rendering of the poem, you just enjoyed the presentation. I did detect the word, inshallah, however.

The highlight of the program was a speech by a Deerfield Academy English teacher who is here for a year. After she greeted the bigwigs, she directed her remarks to the ones who matter the most—our students. “Years from now, you will tell your children about coming to this school. You will tell your children we hoped compassion and respect and patience would triumph… You will tell your children about this night.” At this moment, I apologize Doris Jackson and Anne Siviglia, I am forgetting the English rhetoric device when a speaker repeats a phrase for effect…it begins with ‘a’—anaphora? It also reminded me of one of my favorite theatrical moments, in the musical Ragtime, when Coalhouse Walker, Jr. senses his imminent death, and urges his followers to "Go out and tell our story, let it echo far and wide. Make them hear you."

Well, anyway, the speaker lovingly exhorted these rascally teen-agers that they will have the opportunity, and the responsibility to tell their children what this school means, and what it was like to sit there in that cool, sunset-glow, absorbing the promises of this school. I tried oh so nonchalantly to wipe away the tears that gathered—not only were her words so transcendent, so honest, so firm, but she was giving a great advertisement for history class! Of course I watched His Majesty as often as I could, imagining his thrill at seeing this long-held vision radiating in front of him.

A student group offered us a possible song for the school’s anthem—the Headmaster had written verse and set it to a Shubert piece. A small group played and sang the piece, and then the King offered some words about the importance of the elements of the school—the chance for academic rigor, sportsmanship, waitering in the Dining Hall, making friends of many backgrounds—all the elements he had treasured at his Deerfield experience 30 years ago.

After the program ended, the students met the King. He shook every hand. One little boy in my class, one of the nicest boys, who comes from a Bedouin family, gave the King his own official dress code school tie to wear—His Majesty immediately smiled, took off his own tie, and put the new regulation tie on. That boy looked positively thrilled. That moment ranks as one of the sweetest I can think of.

Of course there would be a reception, but for once, I put my gastronomic interests second. I stood on a step, and just watched the King greet everyone—every last student, every last worker who had rigged the electric stuff, the nurses, the kitchen help, thanking them all for their hard work at KA. How can you not be impressed? The man patiently works for world peace and Jordanian economic development by day, and on this night he basks in the glow of what this school might come to mean.

Inshallah.