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Talk about paying it forward!! :nod:
Article Link
Former high school teacher serves up Thanksgiving dinner to anyone in need
By Ron Corbett, Sun Media
Reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act.
OTTAWA -- This is a Thanksgiving story. It starts at the Ottawa airport in 1970.
In that year, Ed Mahfouz arrived in our city, fresh from a flight from Lebanon. He was 18. Had roughly $10 in his pockets.
He also had a piece of paper in his pocket; the address of the family he would be staying with. Having no idea how to get there, he hailed a cab. Gave the driver the paper. Settled back to look at his new hometown, passing by the other side of the window.
Along the way, he talked to the cab driver. Told him he was coming to Ottawa to start a new life. Was going to go to school, if things worked out for him. Maybe become a teacher one day.
He managed to tell most of his life story by the time he got to his destination, and it was only then that he realized how far they had travelled. Only then that he panicked, thinking he might not have enough money for the fare.
Now maybe the driver, through some weird form of osmosis, knew this. Or maybe he did things like this regularly. Mahfouz has no way of knowing.
But it was strange what happened next, for as Mahfouz sat there in the back seat, wondering if the first thing he were going to do in Canada was rack up a bill he couldn’t pay, the driver turned to him and said:
“Hey, this one is on me. Good luck.”
If Ed Mahfouz saw that cab driver today, he could tell him it worked. That he studied hard and earned degrees from the University of Ottawa and the Universite de Montreal. Worked his way through both schools.
He became a high school teacher at J.S. Woodsworth (now retired.) He loved talking to students. ( Loves talking, when it comes right down to it. Just ask the cab driver.)
He got married along the way, raised a son, his life in Canada becoming everything he had imagined. He had many things to learn, of course, including holidays, the notion of Thanksgiving being something new for him.
“I came to love the holiday,” remembers Mahfouz. “It is a beautiful time of year, and such a beautiful sentiment. In this country, there should be no problem being thankful. I was certainly thankful.”
And so, in the spirit of the holiday, Ed Mahfouz came up one year with the idea of hosting a little Thanksgiving dinner. Maybe invite some of the men from the shelters. Maybe get the students involved.
He began making phone calls. Started talking.
Eighteen years later Mahfouz is still talking, still getting people to help with his Thanksgiving dinner. Yesterday, he served more than 1,000 meals from the school cafeteria at Sir Guy Carleton Secondary School.
First Student bus line ferries people to the dinner. They pick up at the shelters, and at the YM-YWCA, strip malls on Caldwell Ave. and Dumaurier Ave.
Independent Grocers donates food for the dinner. Ditto for Tannis, Costco and Produce Depot. Dollarama donates mitts and scarves. High school students organize food drives.
Keep in mind, this is not a Thanksgiving dinner organized by the Ottawa Mission, Dinners Unlimited, or any of the other worthwhile charities in town. This is a dinner organized by ONE MAN.
“Ed’s crazy food drive,” says Greg Scott, a teacher at Sir Guy Carleton. “It’s amazing how big it has become.”
Also amazing how many people it has helped. While the buses bring many people from the shelters, they probably bring more from the other pick-up sites. The disadvantaged, the unemployed, the hanging-on-and-holding-in-my-breath-so-long-now-my-chest-is-about-to-cave.
Elderly shut-ins, working families, cash-strapped university students, people recently arrived in town — they have all come to Ed Mahfouz’s Thanksgiving dinner. Not a bad legacy for one man, and yet when I mention this to him he is quick to correct me.
Then surprises me when, as I sit there expecting a rote comment about “a lot of people to thank,” he says instead:
“There’s someone else to thank.”
It was only later — when I had time to think about what he said next — that I came to realize how utterly perfect it was. How in keeping with the season. And how it is as good a definition of thankful — and the need for that sentiment to be passed along — as any you’re going to hear today:
“It’s not my legacy,” said Mahfouz. “It’s that cab driver’s.”
Article Link
Former high school teacher serves up Thanksgiving dinner to anyone in need
By Ron Corbett, Sun Media
Reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act.
OTTAWA -- This is a Thanksgiving story. It starts at the Ottawa airport in 1970.
In that year, Ed Mahfouz arrived in our city, fresh from a flight from Lebanon. He was 18. Had roughly $10 in his pockets.
He also had a piece of paper in his pocket; the address of the family he would be staying with. Having no idea how to get there, he hailed a cab. Gave the driver the paper. Settled back to look at his new hometown, passing by the other side of the window.
Along the way, he talked to the cab driver. Told him he was coming to Ottawa to start a new life. Was going to go to school, if things worked out for him. Maybe become a teacher one day.
He managed to tell most of his life story by the time he got to his destination, and it was only then that he realized how far they had travelled. Only then that he panicked, thinking he might not have enough money for the fare.
Now maybe the driver, through some weird form of osmosis, knew this. Or maybe he did things like this regularly. Mahfouz has no way of knowing.
But it was strange what happened next, for as Mahfouz sat there in the back seat, wondering if the first thing he were going to do in Canada was rack up a bill he couldn’t pay, the driver turned to him and said:
“Hey, this one is on me. Good luck.”
If Ed Mahfouz saw that cab driver today, he could tell him it worked. That he studied hard and earned degrees from the University of Ottawa and the Universite de Montreal. Worked his way through both schools.
He became a high school teacher at J.S. Woodsworth (now retired.) He loved talking to students. ( Loves talking, when it comes right down to it. Just ask the cab driver.)
He got married along the way, raised a son, his life in Canada becoming everything he had imagined. He had many things to learn, of course, including holidays, the notion of Thanksgiving being something new for him.
“I came to love the holiday,” remembers Mahfouz. “It is a beautiful time of year, and such a beautiful sentiment. In this country, there should be no problem being thankful. I was certainly thankful.”
And so, in the spirit of the holiday, Ed Mahfouz came up one year with the idea of hosting a little Thanksgiving dinner. Maybe invite some of the men from the shelters. Maybe get the students involved.
He began making phone calls. Started talking.
Eighteen years later Mahfouz is still talking, still getting people to help with his Thanksgiving dinner. Yesterday, he served more than 1,000 meals from the school cafeteria at Sir Guy Carleton Secondary School.
First Student bus line ferries people to the dinner. They pick up at the shelters, and at the YM-YWCA, strip malls on Caldwell Ave. and Dumaurier Ave.
Independent Grocers donates food for the dinner. Ditto for Tannis, Costco and Produce Depot. Dollarama donates mitts and scarves. High school students organize food drives.
Keep in mind, this is not a Thanksgiving dinner organized by the Ottawa Mission, Dinners Unlimited, or any of the other worthwhile charities in town. This is a dinner organized by ONE MAN.
“Ed’s crazy food drive,” says Greg Scott, a teacher at Sir Guy Carleton. “It’s amazing how big it has become.”
Also amazing how many people it has helped. While the buses bring many people from the shelters, they probably bring more from the other pick-up sites. The disadvantaged, the unemployed, the hanging-on-and-holding-in-my-breath-so-long-now-my-chest-is-about-to-cave.
Elderly shut-ins, working families, cash-strapped university students, people recently arrived in town — they have all come to Ed Mahfouz’s Thanksgiving dinner. Not a bad legacy for one man, and yet when I mention this to him he is quick to correct me.
Then surprises me when, as I sit there expecting a rote comment about “a lot of people to thank,” he says instead:
“There’s someone else to thank.”
It was only later — when I had time to think about what he said next — that I came to realize how utterly perfect it was. How in keeping with the season. And how it is as good a definition of thankful — and the need for that sentiment to be passed along — as any you’re going to hear today:
“It’s not my legacy,” said Mahfouz. “It’s that cab driver’s.”
