The 11 years of my elementary and secondary education at the English School for Boys were years of fascinating discoveries. My daily commute between Aley and Beirut was an opportunity for great learning. The traffic between Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and the Gulf, which I used to watch during these drives, was a subliminal induction into the pivotal role of Lebanon in regional business. The school itself enabled me to enlarge my humble circle of childhood friends to include acquaintances who, in later years, would become business contacts, clients and references who helped in the process of new business, media relations and support.
My entire elementary and secondary school years were vitalized by my deep dive into the Boy Scouts movement and membership of the Sea Scouts troop at the International College (IC). Scouting life was the facilitator of my first trip outside of Lebanon, when two Middle East Airlines (MEA) DC-3 aircraft were chartered to fly us to Cyprus, where we spent a whole week with the Boy Scouts of Cyprus on both the Greek and Turkish sides of the island. Beirut Seven Sea Scouts – as our troop was called within the Lebanese Boy Scouts Association – acquired a sailing boat that introduced me – the mountain boy – to the beautiful Mediterranean, which was azure blue and clean in those days. Then, together with two colleagues, we were selected to represent the Lebanese Boy Scouts Association at the 1st Arab Sea Scouts Jamboree in Abu Qir, just north of Alexandria on the Egyptian coast. Under the command of the Egyptian Navy, we boarded Al Mahroosa, the Egyptian royal yacht that sailed under the name HMS Aidafor many years during the reign of King Farouk. This royal yacht was converted into a supply ship after the 1952 revolution and became the facilitator of our open sea adventure. We sailed Al Mahroosa through the Suez Canal and toured all the lighthouses of the Red Sea, supplying them with drinking water and provisions.
On the way back to Alexandria we were given the job of scrubbing and repainting Al Mahroosa’s deck and exterior hull which, in keeping with our scout motto “Be Prepared” and the essentials of Scout Law, drilled into us the importance of maintaining the neat and clean appearance of our environment.
The sea was not the end of our journey of discovery. We hiked and camped all around Lebanon. We learned the Lebanese rural folklore from the villagers and elders. Even the surface of the Lebanese land – its fauna and flora – was insufficient to quench our thirst for discovery. We went into the caves and potholes of the Lebanese mountains and made Al Rweiss grotto in Aqoura our hang-out for countless weekends. The changing seasons and the colors and smells of Lebanon are a great inspiration that have left an everlasting influence on artists, poets, songwriters, and communicators.
The family wanted me to become a pharmacist, following in the footsteps of my two grandfathers, my father, and my uncle, so I had to leave the English School for Boys after graduating with a high school diploma in 1965 and return to Aley, where a new school that followed the Lebanese Baccalaureate system – a pre-requisite for entry to the School of Pharmacy at AUB – had just opened. The English School for Boys, where I had been for 15 years, offered a program ending with the First Baccalaureate, while at the Modern Sciences College in Aley, students were prepared to sit for the Second Baccalaureate exams.
This school in my hometown was another pleasant experience, bringing me together with students from the neighboring mountain cities and villages, which exposed me to the real diversity of Lebanon. At this early age, I came to realize the differences between the various socio-economic classes, as well as the country’s religious sects, which became helpful for me in future years when my work necessitated proper targeting.
The French section of the school had a very popular students’ club called La Collina, while in the English section, where I was enrolled, a new club was established under the name of The Pioneers Club. However, this club failed to attract members, which led the head of the English section to encourage me to run for the presidency of The Pioneers Club. Soon, I was leading a dynamic club management committee which set recruitment as one of its priorities and decided to launch an advertising campaign to attract fellow students to join. The back issues of my father’s Pharmacy International proved handy for this purpose. Soon, I started recycling the “He’s heard the call for Vidaylin” campaign, turning it into “He’s heard the call for The Pioneers Club”, which proved to be a traffic stopper in the school’s playground. Membership quickly soared, proving to Edmond Tohme, the headmaster, that his choice of club president had been the right one. More importantly, this experience made me realize that advertising really worked.