Page 28 - IC Newsletter Summer 2010

Dear IC,
You ask for “Funny interesting stories from your years at IC.”
I read your newsletter regularly and enjoy it tremendously.
There are the touching stories, such as Ms. Sabra’s choir
boys, the achievement news describing an IC student who
climbed to the top of MT. Kilimanjaro and others who
achieved academic excellence. And then there are articles
that open amazing horizons for IC students especially
when officials fromYale University visited IC and offered
scholarships to potential students. So I decided to write back
about much humbler times, but no less important.
Your request reaches me 25 years after graduating
and plunges me into thought. The eighties were
not funny years, but it is through IC that
we became adults. As a parent in 2010,
I wonder now, how such a school
functioned under very scary times. Not
only did it open its doors everyday, it
gave us a world class education. The 25th
reunion of the class of 84’ last summer
brought forth successful doctors,
lawyers, business men and women and
the woman who would become a few
months after the reunion, the Finance
Minister of Lebanon.
Aside from education and in the midst
of war, IC offered extra curricular activities.
To this day, I feel that the club I joined during
those years has defined my personality. With
the Social Service Club, we collected clothes
for war refugees, fund raised for the needy,
hosted orphans at IC every Friday afternoon
to entertain them...the list is long and its effects
on me even longer. Through this club, we learned
cooperation, team work, leadership and most
importantly empathy. The friends I made in that club
are still my friends today and yes we are in touch.
IC was a wonderful place to be in the middle of
the chaotic and turbulent times of the eighties.
In retrospect, the teachers who arrived daily to
school (not an easy task those days)and the
administrators who ran the school
so admirably are nothing short
of heroes. Thank you IC.
Rula Haddad Norregaard ‘84
Dear IC,
IC, like Lebanon, isn’t just a school, it’s a state of mind - an
institution. I haven’t known a single human being who was
indifferent (Luke warm) to IC - Either you loved it, or not
so much, BUT you had strong feelings about it either way.
The overwhelming majority of us loved it, thought highly
of it, respected it, and are very “protective” of it and it’s
reputation - not to mention bragging that we were IC, and
being cocky about it -:)
What’s not to like: The grounds? Rock & Sage? the football
field, the auditorium, the sea,Bliss street, ACS, AUB, Hamra,
Hanna, Tarazi, Mehio,Marrouch, Shawqi, Socrates, Edison,
long hair, the girls who started becoming a way of life
from Brevet on, the fights, the arguments, the english
section vs the sectioniyye, selling our year-old books
in “the alley” just before the school year started,
the many many clubs that existed, or the endless
lunch hour especially for non-gharbiyyeh students
like me? - Mr. Schuller, Mr. Omar, Monsieur
Dumont, Mr. Hourani, Mr.Weaver, Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr…
And last but most: THE LEISURE CENTER - The
epicenter of social activity and endless fun and
spending our hard earned (aka given) quarters (Rib3
Lira) - Riz-Alla - Never thought we would think like
our parents when we were young and invincible
and knew everything!
Let’s also not forget how cool it was to be a fawdaji, a
smoker, a loud-mouth, an opiniated person,a political
activist, and an all-around gift to humanity…
Wazwaz-Shabbi7-Sammim-Wa7sh-Fa7l, and many
others I can’t recall anymore come to mind when
describing our lingo. We were IC, and therefore we
were more.
It wasn’t all fun and games and endless excitement on a
daily basis, but it sure “remembers” that way.
It was the American proposition of free speech, high
achievement, and democracy, in an exciting and hopeful
“Oasis” called Lebanon - America at that time was almost
everybody’s dream of what a Modern society was supposed
to be like.
Meen baddu yitsalla wa yitghazza?
I am happy and proud to have been an IC
student and will be an IC alumnus till the
end.
Chahine Saleeby ‘73
28 IC NEWSLETTER -SUMMER 2010