Yacoub shoulders family responsibility at young age
‘School of Life’ helped shape people’s characters
This is the fourth in a series of articles on Dr Yacoub Yousef Al Ghunaim, a writer, a scholar and former minister of education.
Special to the Arab Times acoub spent three happy years at the Muthanna, after which he was supposed to continue his education at the Qebliya School.
Unlike Al Muthanna, where every student was happy to attend, the policy at Al Qebliya was very intimidating.
In those days teenagers were conservative, hence having to go to school with their head uncovered was shameful to them, but the school regulation did not allow students to wear a ketra (the traditional headscarf), they were also not allowed to go to school on bicycle, even if they were living quite far from the school.
However, what annoyed students most of all were the extra curriculum activities they had to practice during holidays and weekends.
The new scholastic year of 1949-50 was approaching; Yacoub was faced with the dilemma whether to attend Al Qebliya or enroll at the Institute of Islamic Studies, for which he felt an attraction ever since his uncle, Mohammed Al Jerah, an erudite in the scientific interpretation of Islam, introduced him to the subject.
Almost daily Yacoub was passing in front of the Institute on his way to his uncle, Ibrahim; one day he saw a crowd of people at the door, some were young, but most of them were older men.
When he heard that it was the day of
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enrolling he decided to enter.
After he enrolled he discovered that the curriculum was quite tough and more demanding than that at the Qebliya; besides the usual subjects — English language, mathematics, and science in general, he had to deepen his study on grammar, on etymology, on rhetoric and on religious science. He needed more time to do his homework and there were other commitments he had to attend, one of them was his father’s shop he had to attend during his absence.
His only free time was after the sunset prayer because it was too dark to attend the shop, so he could study without interference with the flickering light of a kerosene lamp.
It was an immense relief when in the fall of 1953, the thermal energy complex at Shwaikh began producing water and electricity in quantity.
Though the initial supply of water and electricity was barely sufficient to the people in town, it transformed their life almost overnight.
It was like a miracle, every activity became more pleasant and enjoyable.
Drinking water had never tasted so good, while the electricity lighting the home and the town felt like living in another world. Things that could not be done in the past, became part of city life, every activity was extended into the night.
The water-electricity complex began with three small steam turbines running three AC generators of 750 kw each, superheated
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steam from three boilers channeled into two flows -one to feed the steam turbine, the other to heat seawater in the distillation plant.
The water produced was piped into two reservoirs of a three million gallons capacity, to which at first was added some brackish water to replace lost minerals. In the fall of 1953 chlorine was added (two parts per million).
The School of Life is the toughest and the most severe; it shapes people’s characters spurring to develop those potentials that make them more resourceful and alert to a passing chance enhancing their success in life.
In the frugal days in Kuwait the elder son was expected to shoulder the responsibility as head of the family in his father’s absence.
Yacoub was only ten years old when his father decided to leave on pilgrimage to Makkah, being the elder of his two brothers; he had to take the responsibility till his father was back.
On the eve of the departure with Al Dedham organizing party, Yacoub was watching his father with growing sadness as he was packing for his long journey ahead, which by camel caravan was expected to last more than two months.
Among the things necessary for the journey were heavy clothing to withstand the chilly night in the desert, and a Moharram, consisting of two large pieces of white cloth every male pilgrim must wear during his pilgrimage.
On the day of departure at dawn, Yacoub accompanied his father to the meeting place along with relatives and friends. At the time of their arrival the place was already full of people and trucks.
All the bags and suitcases of the pilgrims had been loaded in the afternoon of the day before for an early start in the cool of the morning.
Soon the convoy was leaving town. Emotions ran high as relatives and friends parted company with a last goodbye. Everyone, those who stayed behind and those who were leaving had tears in their eyes.
In that moment Yacoub was suddenly assailed by an overpowering need to cry, to let go to the emotion he had been struggling to hold back in his father’s presence.
He was already missing him as the convoy began moving out of town. A great sadness, a mixture of apprehension and worry took possession of him; though he was amidst a crowd of people, he felt alone, as lonely as a molecule of water in the immensity of the sea.
Quietly he followed the line of trucks moving out of town, leaving behind a cloud of rising dust as it took to the desert road.
In the meantime on the eastern horizon the first streaks of golden lights were lifting the dark drapery of the night.
The first glimmers of sunlight, capriciously reflecting their hues in the vast expanse of the morning sky, were casting golden patches on the earth below.
By the time all nature was bathed in the full glory of the rising sun, the convoy had become a distant dot barely visible, which soon disappeared in a cloud of dust, turned to gold in the brilliant sunshine.
By then the crowd around Yacoub had dispersed through the narrow streets of town, which by then had come to life teeming with an orchestration of sounds greeting the new day.
He was still staring at the cloud of dust coming to nothing, when the firm hand of his uncle on his shoulder startled him to reality.
The pilgrimage to Makkah in the old days was fraught with many dangers and hardships, for this reason and because the journey lasted so long, the departure and the arrival of pilgrims was a great social occasion.
At the time the father of Yacoub left in pilgrimage, the first part of the journey from Kuwait to Al Hagar, on the Saudi border, was by trucks; from hence to Medinah and to Makkah the journey was by camel caravan.
Only the strong religious atmosphere, the companionship, the faith in their pious duty and their expectations made bearable the hardships the pilgrims had to endure.
To be continued