Ladies and Gentlemen:
It would have been a lot nicer to talk to you, smile at you, and answer your questions face to face, but the insidious Corona conspired to make that impossible! Thus, I am grateful for the opportunity given to me by June Coxon, to address you here.
I was born in the British Colony of Aden, Yemen, to an educated family with two medical doctors and four Ph.Ds. And yet, most of my siblings can recite the Quran by heart, and pray five times a day, preferably in the mosque, whereby they expect greater rewards in paradise.
But, as you will see from my abbreviated CV below, I also had the wonderful opportunity to live and therefore to closely interact with people of so many different cultures, languages, customs and, above all, religions. I travelled in the ME, India, China, Japan, Thailand, Australia, New Zealand, the West Indies, and extensively in Europe. I studied medicine in the UK, USA and Canada.
Here, I had the wonderful opportunity to create and broadcast my own radio show, Dialogue With Diversity, which I supported financially, and which won the prestigious annual award of CEMA (Canadian Ethnic Media Association) two years in a row, only the second time that ever happened! The program was broadcast from downtown Ottawa on CHIN radio for five years.
It was a weekly interview of two or three people, always gender balanced, from different countries and cultures. It started with Nepal and Italy and covered 50 different nationalities, cultures, religions and sexual orientation …. wherever “diversity” occurred. It was so easy to realize that all those different ethnicities and religions were as nice, and kind and honorable and friendly and proud and Canadian as each other. I was invited to their “national days” and got to know them more.
I had previously come up with Potlucks 4 Peace (P4P), a dialogue between a gathering of a group of Arabs and Jews. Since my retirement from the practice of medicine, I have weekly met, for coffee, with this bunch of elderly, (like me!) Arab men and occasionally women. They come from different countries, and backgrounds: Christian, Muslim or secular. It goes without saying that the conversation turns into a debate about the chaotic state of the Arab world. There is total agreement that things need to change, but there is no agreement on how. Yet we continue to be friends and to talk!
Those conversations were rich enough for me to put into my latest, and final, book Democracy, Deity and Death which is what I was planning to discuss with you. It is a provocative dialogue about life and death and religion and politics, among four Arabs, three men and one woman: a Lebanese Christian homosexual man, a Yemeni Muslim imam born in Wales, a secular Egyptian professor of biology, and a secular Egyptian female manager of a London bank.
Excerpt from the Book:
“What do you think about moving to Britain?” Abdul-Raheem asked his wife, Fatima.
“It is up to you. You’re the man of this family,” she responded.
“Yes, I know, but I am asking you because you’ll face a completely different society there which you may not like – or might even hate.”
“Well, you were born there, and you grew up there, and you’re a good man, so it can’t be all that bad, I suppose.”
“No, it isn’t bad, but you’ll feel the difference more than anyone else in the family. I was born there, as you said, and the children will soon fit in. They’re innocent and open minded, and they’ll absorb the culture is around them. But do you want this for your children?”
“Do you?”
“I think it will be good for their education and their future. But they may lose their religion in the process, which I’d hate to see. Western society is falling apart because it has abandoned its religion, and with that, its moral values.”
“In what way?”
“Well, your son might tell you to mind your own business when you advise him on something. Or he might not greet you when he comes into a room. Or he might disobey you and leave the house when you tell him not to.”
“They do that already!”
“And your daughters will do the same, if you stop them from going out to meet their boyfriends.”
“You’re their father; it’s your job to stop them before they bring shame and scandal upon our family.”
“Over there, neither the mother nor the father can do that. The children could take us to court for forcible confinement.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s what the lawyers call it when the parents physically prevent the child from going out. But if you are prepared to accept laws like these, we can go. My passport is still valid, and I can get passports for all of you. But you have to be part of this decision.”
“You know best. I’ll follow whatever you decide.”
“Isn’t it funny? The world accuses Muslim men of oppressing their wives. Yet when I ask you to make the decision, you kick the ball back to me!”
Fatima laughed. “There’s just one thing I want to know; can you take a second wife – a white woman – in Cardiff?”
“Not unless we’re divorced first.”
“In that case, let’s go!”
Abdul-Raheem could not stop laughing. He knew very well that he could have made the decision all by himself. With the green light from Fatima, however, he was able to move more freely and with enthusiasm.
The book is available for $15 from: Perfect Books (613) 231-6468; Books on Beechwood (613) 742-5030; or qghanem2@gmail.com. Under the circumstances, you could also get a copy from the Publishers, (or Amazon):
https://www.austinmacauley.com/search/content/Democracy%20Deity%20Death%20type%3Abook
Mystery Novels in English by the Author:
2011 – Final Flight From Sanaa
2012 – Two Boys From Aden College
2014 – Forbidden Love In The Land Of Sheba
2019 – Democracy Deity And Death
Book Co-Authored by the Author:
2012 – (co-authored) My Arab Spring
Books Written in Arabic by the Author:
2014 – Arabic/English poetry: From Left to Right
2017 – Smashwords e-book Hiwar Bidoon Khisam
2019 – Let Us Chase Him to Tunis
2019 – Intiqam Al-Khadimah
2019 – Aakher Tayirah min Sanaa
2019 – Al-Hob Al-Muharram
Awards:
2009 and 2010 – The Canadian Ethnic Media Award (CEMA), Radio Category – for “Five Races in a Family of Four”, and “Three Women Friends: Jewish, Christian and Muslim.”
2010 – Ottawa Community Immigrant Services Organization (OCISO) Media Leadership Award
2010 -The United Way Community Builder Award (Plaque at Ottawa City Hall)
2010 – Dream Keepers Citation for Outstanding Leadership
2011 – Arab Ambassador’s Award
2012 – Yemeni Canadian Community Award
2012 -Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal for Community Activism
2013 -The Arab Canadian University Graduates Association award for poets and authors
2013 – Arab Ambassadors Award for Volunteering
2014 -Top 25 Immigrants to Canada Medal
2014 – Order of Ottawa Medal
2015 – RBC Top 25 Canadian Immigrant Award
Editor’s Note: Qais Ghanem wrote his first book in 2011 after being encouraged by a friend in London, England to do so. He says “To my amazement it was part of the material used in a successful thesis at a university in India three years ago.
Sent Apr. 22, 2020