I was born in Beirut in…(19)43. We lived with my cousin’s family. We lived in a house with five bedrooms. Above us, there was another house (apartment) with five or six rooms. But every room had one family in it. And in this way, there were many houses (apartments) with several rooms (sharing) one kitchen, and how did they live? They lived very well. Now, one…started at 10 o’clock for example, another at 9 o'clock. There was also only one bathroom. In the common area of the floor. When I was born, the first three-four years, maybe until I was nine years old, there was no refrigerator, no gas…no refrigerator, no gas…no washing machine, no dishwasher, no oven. How did they live? We were…my mother would sometimes ask us, me and my sisters, two kids before me, to knead the dough for the bread. And…then they would roll it at home, they would make the loaf, like pita. They would make a loaf and put it on big trays, like this table you saw. They put…if we said six seven scoops. Then, on a white sheet…(they put a bit of) flour and shake it again and again until […]. They would make bread twice a week. And sent it to the oven, the Arabic oven. They would designate every one, every plate, which family (it belonged to) and how many loaves. Many times, […] if we sent 40 loaves, 38 would return, or 37. As in, from every plate, the person running the community oven would take one or take two.

The school was…Alliance Israelite Universelle, which was…its centre was in Paris. There were teachers…for Hebrew, there were teachers from Israel. One…Mademoiselle Tawil, Mademoiselle Sofer…I don’t know if she was from Israel. And the principal (male), and the principal (female), Monsieur and Madame Silver…there was also Monsieur Pinto, Madame Pinto, two principals of Alliance. But…when…[…] at Alliance, Madame and Monsieur Penso passed away, may they rest in peace. Then they brought another principal…I don’t know where from, if he was from Paris or from another place, to teach French. The Alliance Israelite, I mean…it had Jewish students. There were a few non-Jewish students…the children of the Arabic language teachers. They would teach French, Arabic, Hebrew and reading and writing…I mean writing…even if the child was three years old. Normally four years old. There were people who would dare approach the principal (saying), “please, this child is smart. He’s smart, even if he isn’t four years old yet. Try him! Try him!” He entered (the school). Three years old! Soon, (they’ll be putting a child aged) two and a half years! But (at age) three years, we would read and write in three languages. In the sixth grade, I mean, middle school, English - they added English (classes). And classes…I learned at Alliance, but there was also…branches (streams). There were branches for girls for the middle school. In the sixth grade. Branches…they were called ecole populaire. And there was the director Madame Pichoto. (It was) only girls. But it wasn’t in the same building as Alliance. Alliance went up to the brevet, I mean middle school, and after the ecole populaire they would do middle school in Alliance. In the building. There was also…Talmud Torah. Talmud Torah…they taught more religion. But they also taught French, Arabic and Hebrew in a building close to the synagogue. And…also to middle school. Then they went to Alliance. Talmud Torah was only for boys. Ecole populare was only for girls, until sixth grade, and after they went to Alliance for brevet. Brevet…was like the baccalaureate…but three years earlier. The end of middle school…the end of middle school. After, in sixth grade, those who left school…there were people who left school when they were twelve years old. They paid money for Alliance but at Alliance they took (fees) according to the father’s income. There were people who stopped at sixth grade. At sixth grade there was a diploma called “certificate”. End of primary school. And why did they do this? Because even if they left school when they were twelve or thirteen years old, so they could then go to work…if one left (school), he would have something in his hand. He would have a certificate, diploma. He’d have a certificate in his hand (saying) that he was educated. He didn’t remain without knowledge. And that’s the good thing about Alliance Israelite. They had it in Iran, in Turkey, they were in Lebanon, in Syria, in Morocco, and Algeria…they all had the Alliance Israelite Schools.

As soon as they would finish the brevet - it was like this in Lebanon - as soon as they would finish the brevet, many would go to study stenography. Do you know what stenography is? They would go study stenography to work in…offices. Or they would go study a trade. This man (would study) hairdressing, and that one…(something else). Mainly, (they would become) merchants…I mean, (they would study) commerce. But commerce…accounting, they would study to be accountants and open a small store. And…later, but there was the merchant market. In the merchant market there were many Jewish merchants. And those merchants’ job was…children, in the their shops…either there would be sufficient work for the child until he got married […]…or he would study…would complete his studies…complete his studies at non-Jewish schools. There was the Protestant school for girls. The French Lycee for girls and boys. College de la Sagesse of the parish. And the Soeurs de la Besançon of the nuns. There was also a school for the Jews, whoever wanted to complete their studies would pay…pay […]. But the Beirut committee…the committee is the president of the community, the chief of the community…

There was the Wadi…a neighbourhood which was mostly Jewish. But there were Jews…a bit further. In neighbourhoods where Muslims lived, (for example) Sabra, there were no Jews there. 

The Jews had…the Wadi. And close to the sea too there were also residents. They were kind of clustered together. They weren’t very divided. Later…but in the heart of the Wadi, it wasn’t just Jews. There were Christians. There were Muslims. There were Alawites. Like in Hosh Ayass. The Hosh was very big. And there were several buildings. But the majority knew each other. But in Hosh Ayass there were also Kurds. Kurds…Muslims. I didn’t know that there were Kurdish Jews. Later, when we grew up, we learned and heard that there was (a thing called) Kurdistan and Jews there. Like the Kurds who were opposite us, their voices were always loud and they were continuously fighting. We had neighbours here, they were very kind hearted. But what (was the issue)? They were continuously fighting. They raised their voices. Once my cousin from America came to visit me. We were sitting on the balcony, doing preparations for my son’s wedding, and she said to me “do you hear her!? You didn’t change a thing.”. When they would be arguing in Beirut, in Hosh Ayass, a distance of…from here to […], about the distance of half a kilometre from our house, we would hear them arguing all the way in our house. They would…my father would circumcise their sons. When they wanted to scare the kids, they’d say to them “I’ll call the circumciser now! Listen to (obey) (my) word!”. There were also…in the Wadi…for who would we make coffee? For everybody who came! Whether it was the plumber, the plumber. Whether it was a tradesperson. If it were one of those people, it (bringing coffee) was a given. If it were, I mean, an unknown man - a cup of coffee was a must. Our neighbour was a seamstress. A Christian seamstress. She would sew bridal trousseaus. Later…

We would…on Passover we would bring only…I mean, we would drink milk only. But not…we wouldn’t do anything else. We would not eat fish. Why? Because they would catch fish using a piece of bread (as bait). We would not eat chicken because a month or week beforehand, I don’t know, they would have to stop giving it wheat. Hametz. Chickpeas…on Passover, we would roast. We would buy…seeds, and figs and seeds and pistachios and almonds and whatever you want. (We would buy it) raw and roast it at home. The salt and sugar, all that would be in the kosher method. How did they make matza? The rabbi would go to an oven…in an oven that he cooked bread in. He would go and make it kosher. Meaning he would activate it for no reason so that they would be able to bring the dough for matza. And they would make it there directly […]. They would make a big ball of dough like the saj (griddle) of the Druze. As they do on the saj it comes out soft, but in the oven the matza comes out hard so that there would be no fermentation. Over a period of 3-4 days, he would make matza only so that the whole community would be able to buy matza. Then there would roasting too. In order for them to roast the pistachio and almond and such, they would go to the seller and over a period of 2-3 days he wouldn’t do the […]. But there were many who wouldn’t buy from the…and make it. Why? When it wasn’t Passover, one day people my family knew heard that the owner of the shop (was saying) “bring me that shahmeh. Bring it to me!”. Even the pistachio and almond would be glistening (from the fat)! And what is a shahmeh? It’s a lump of grease. It was glistening, and ya habibe (sarcastic celebration) about the kashrut (the owner was disregarding the Jewish dietary laws). Ya habibe! Everything, everything we would make at home. We would make kaak, maamoul…there was no oven.

Most of the Jews in Beirut were of Damascene origin. The dialect…they exaggerate their speech. They sing a bit. From the speech, people would know…they would say to us, “what, are you from Damascus?”. It wasn’t similar to the Christian or Muslim dialect. They would know we were Jewish. When I was…studying at Lycee, the accounting Baccalaureate, the […]… The boys and girls would hear us talking. We would say “mu” (‘not’) and (they would say) “shu muu?” (what do you mean, ‘muu?’) (In Lebanon, the general word for ‘not’ is ‘mish’, while ‘muu’ is associated with Syria). “What is this?”. (We would say) “ma hek?”, but they would say “mā heyk?”. And we would say “muu”. So in Damascus, they would say it like this. So that they wouldn’t understand us, the non-Jews, we would insert some Hebrew words. When…someone would come, they would say to my mother “Gracia…shahor (‘black’ in Hebrew)”. As in, “make me coffee”. Or, there was no need for her to tell me. She would wink at me to make coffee. “Take out the atan (‘small boy’ in Hebrew)”. So that the young boy wouldn’t understand the family, they would say to us “look after the atan. The young boy. Take care of the atan.” But I want to tell you a cute story about the case of (the Hebrew word) shahor. Mshahar (Hebrew word with Arabic grammar). This word…they don’t know what it means, the Muslims. They don’t have this word. What does mshahar mean? Black. Boom. They wouldn’t say boom. They’d say atil. We would say “this is a boom”. Or in the presence of (others), “shaˁi this mshahar.” Shaˁi. Shaˁi means “look!”. “Look at this mshahar, what he’s doing!”. “Obi!”. “Obi!” means “look!”. “Obi at the non-Jew!”. That means ‘look at the non-Jew a bit!”. “Obi!”…means “look!”. I don’t know. That’s what we would say. “Shaˁi at this mshahar!”. Non-Jew…Christians…we would call ‘ˁarel’ (‘uncircumcised’ in Hebrew). I mean, when we were sitting in front of them, we didn’t want them to hear. We would be careful and say “this person is an ˁarel” or “this person is a goy”. Goy means ‘Muslim’ (in Hebrew, ‘goy’ means any non-Jew). I don’t know…(why it only means ‘Muslim’ in the Beiruti Jewish dialect). Be careful. ‘Be careful’ is…everyone knows it. They would prepare themselves before going out in the neighbourhood if they wanted to talk. “Take care, that’s a goy” (would be said) so that someone wouldn’t blurt out any words (that shouldn’t be said around non-Jews). My sister told me that in Brooklyn a boy was born in…I don’t know which family. A boy was born, and normally the father of the groom…his name is given to the child. They name the firstborn boy after the father of the child’s father. The boy was born, Jamil arrived…his (the grandfather’s) name was Jamil. (People said) “Wow, a boy was born! Let’s name him Jamil!”. Automatically, they name (the child) after the father’s father. But the married couple didn’t want to name him (Jamil). Oh! What happened? How can this be? How should they prepare the father (of the father of the newborn) that they wouldn’t give the (baby boy) his name? They spoke and so on, and worked out that they didn’t want to call their son Jamil. After the wedding, after the circumcision cermony, what did she (the mother) name him? Shahar. Shahar! (It sounds like) Mshahar! Couldn’t you find a different name!? You couldn’t find a different name? There’s no […] here. Because it’s close to the word shahor. Also the word…there was the Aleppine, sewwi sewwi. We…we weren’t Aleppine. We speak like Damascenes. But there were Aleppines. So a mixture was formed…an unbelievable sight. An Aleppine thing…the most of the mix was with French. That’s the difference between us and the Muslims. Meaning three languages from the age of three? A mixture. And now also, the Arabs here mix Hebrew and…together.

I forgot to tell you the issue of the last year of high school, I mean the baccalaureate, where Jewish students studied. Those who had money, would either (learn) at the lycée, college protestant and pay…the collage. They would pay however much they asked. And it was very expensive. At Alliance they would pay according to how much the family earned. To me, they said - after the brevet - what do you want? Do you want to work? My father could not pay for a place. It was very expensive. (People said) what? How could this be? It’s impossible. No way. Because I was the top in the class. “No way can you stop studying.” I didn’t say anything. Then, my aunt came, may she rest in peace, and said to me “Gracia, ask for a bursary. Ask for a bursary from the community. From the head of the Jewish community.” I asked for a bursary, and they said to me “okay”. I and a few others among my friends were given a bursary at the French lycée. As in, we didn’t pay tuition. We didn’t have to pay for the baccalaureate, which was three years. Why did they give it to us? Because we were smart. Good students. In the brevet, I came out as the top of all Lebanon. And the children of Alliance were known to be smart. It was known. The first year at the lycée, the teacher came and said, “I see that the best students aren’t from the lycée. They’re students from outside. Outside.” They were known. Why? Because the teachers of Alliance from their whole heart taught. From their whole heart. In the lycée they would say to us…there was an Arabic teacher too, a Christian, who said, “at the end of the month, I have money in my pocket. Whether you’ve learned anything or not makes no difference.” But there was Mr Khairallah, Mr El-Din, Arabic teachers. One Christian…no, two Christians. Muslims. They taught very, very well. And their children also learned at Alliance. They were very clever, too. And when…they saw this, after we finished the three years of the baccalaureate, they came to Alliance and suggested to us (the following): “if you want to study in Paris for a year, and come back a year later. You can take your certificate in pedagogy and you can become teachers with your diploma. And you’ll teach at Alliance.” But what (was the deal)? Food, drink and sleep…and pocket money. In Lebanon we would always mix Arabic and French. But you would have to teach for 5 years. If you stopped in the middle, you would pay. If you had three years remaining, you would pay three years. And you would take your card and…I taught for five years at Alliance. And there were 40 students at least per class. At Alliance there were girls…a girls class, a boys class…but after there were girls and boys. They couldn’t open a class for ten girls. They couldn’t open a class for 20 boys. They put them together mixed. The girls and boys mixed. Then we said to the principal, may he rest in peace, we said “okay. But how do you expect us…sometimes we’ve reached 42 students. How do you expect us to be able (to teach 42 students?)” He said “What would you do? If they tell me this is a Jewish boy, a Jew, we have to make him a place in the Jewish school. Can I tell him to go to the goyim? No, I can’t tell him (to go to the) goyim.” We would go quiet. And whatever Gd gave us, we taught.