The year was 1984. I was a trainee at the Atkinson
Morley’s Hospital-St. Georges University in London. Having attained my fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons (FRCS)
degree in general surgery, I applied for the exam of the Royal College of
Surgeons Edinburgh for the degree of surgical neurology FRCS(Ed) SN.
اضافة اعلان
This was newly invented, prestigious exam and the only
one of its kind in the United Kingdom. We were 12 candidates going through the
rigorous scrutiny of top 10 examiners in the fields of neurosurgery, neurology,
radiology, pathology, and operative anatomy. At the end of a very long day, I
was the only survivor. My name was called, and I was asked to join the
examiners at the library for a drink. The other unsuccessful 11 candidates were asked to leave.
At the small ceremony with the examiners in the
library, I was told there would be, in a month’s time, a big ceremony in the
Royal College to receive my certification together with the other “ordinary”
general surgery FRCS candidates.
I flew my mother from Jordan (my father had died one
year earlier) to attend the big day. My mother bought a beautiful blue dress
and she was full of pride and joy as we were walking towards the Royal College
from a nearby hotel. As we walked I remembered that my mother likes, on big
occasions, to ululate (a long wavering high pitched vocal sound, produced by
rapid back and forth movement of the tongue) as an expression of happiness and
celebration. I politely told her it would be highly inappropriate to do so at
the Royal College. I added that “those awfully nice British people would not
understand this and may translate your ululation as a primitive act.” She
assured me she would never do anything that could remotely embarrass me.
Upon our arrival we were separated. She sat in the family
section with families of the “ordinary” FRCS general surgery candidates. I was
taken to a room where I was dressed in a special gown and a clerk with a big
royal cloak and a big royal pole in his hand opened a big door and announced my
arrival by knocking on the floor. I stood up on the stage facing the president
and members of the board of the Royal College, with my back towards the
audience in the expansive hall where everybody was seated.
I raised my right hand and swore, after the president,
the oath of the college. As I turned to face the audience, my mother’s ululation
filled the air of the Royal College, and all of Edinburgh. Those seconds as I was
turning on the stage felt like years, and I wished that the ground underneath
would open up and engulf me. To my surprise everybody; president and board,
candidates and their families, clerks and guards stood facing my mother in her
blue dress and triumphant smile with a five-minute standing ovation. For them
this was a proud mother expressing her joy over her son’s achievement. At the
hotel outside the Royal College, at the end of ceremony, everybody waited to
have a picture with my mother.
Later she told me “For my soul I would not have missed
this once in a life time chance.”
The moral of the story: Our mothers know better.
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