Flying Back with Rumi

Bar on Emirates A380 

Rumi lover Wesam

Emirates has a wonderful stand up bar on its A380 fleet. They serve all kinds of drinks and snacks. You also meet fellow travelers. We met a very interesting Jordanian chemist: Wesam. He works as the mid-east representative of the American company doing scientific research and was flying to America to attend a conference. 

We quickly established his wife was from a formerly rich Syrian family from Aleppo, Syria. Her sister still lives there and is now supported by the extended family outside Syria. He says she isn’t in danger. Our conversation shifted through the usual subjects newly acquainted strangers touch when they are from different cultures if you perceive they are open to conversation. Religion, politics, recent travels, wherever the conversation leads. I mentioned we had come from the Jaipur Literary Festival. Wesam was unfamiliar with the literary festival. I briefly mentioned there are panels on all sorts of topics. I mentioned a few of them including the poet Rumi.

Our entire conversation changed with my incidental mention of the great Persian poet Rumi.  Wesam then related a long, very emotional and personal story about how Rumi saved his marriage and rekindled the love of his wife. This is the kind of intimacy that can only happen at 40,000 feet on an airplane, where some instantaneous connection is made between folks.

A word about Rumi. He wrote about 400 years ago in Persian. His poetry is beloved still today especially by the people of the Mid-east. Poetry was and is a staple of Arab culture. Cathy and I have heard much poetry by Rumi, both spoken and set to music. Although it is usually performed in Urdu, the most expressive of languages, we can usually appreciate the sentiments without understanding the words.

Our new friend Wesam related to us about the decline of his marriage; culminating by his wife finally saying she no longer loved him. He was devastated. She mentioned in passing she had read a book that changed her life. The book was entitled The Forty Rules of Love: A Novel of Rumi by Elif Shafak

It was a recent novel by a female Turkish-English writer, about Rumi and how his poetry and the rules for life derived from the poems affected the lives of the characters in the book. Wesam was excited and passionate as related this story to us. He decided to read the book himself and purchased a copy in Arabic. He realized from the story how he was treating his wife in a way that made her feel neglected. He vowed to himself to change. Her birthday was approaching, and he decided if he could learn to play “Happy Birthday” for her on a ukulele he would win her back. Ah how the male mind works. Wasam secretly took lessons on the ukulele for 21 straight days. On the day of her birthday he surprised her with the ukulele and his rendition of “Happy Birthday”. It didn’t work, he stated, she still didn’t love him. The ukulele gambit was not an utter failure, she did however give him points for trying.

He realized it wasn’t a specific action that could repair the relationship, but he had to fundamentally change the way he treated her. He spent the next year slowly changing his relationship with her. He says he has regained her love through his actions motivated by this book (and a viewing of Clint Eastwood’s Bridges of Madison County” - ah the power of cinema)!  He and his wife recently returned from a vacation / pilgrimage to Turkey, where they spent 3 days in the city where Rumi was born and is buried. They sat on the ground in circles of Rumi poetry lovers where sages read the poetry and discussed its meaning. I wonder if he will be going to Santa Barbara to see the still alive Clint Eastwood.

We have arrived back at our house, all is well.