My name is Malak Kalmoni Chehab. As you may note, i am married, and have 3 wonderful adult children.
My identity is a mishmash of things, as i was born and raised in Ghana until the civil war there, i was 8 at the time. we moved to my parents’ native country of Lebanon, in the Middle East, for 3 years before the ongoing civil war there ousted us out to Toronto, Canada. that’s where i spent my teenage years and part of my universtiy education at York University. i didn’t complete my degree in mathematics, when i moved back to Lebanon to marry.
after my return to Lebanon, i had my 2 eldest children before feeling the need to complete my education. i was accepted at the University of Balamand, to study English Language and Literature, as a BA, while pregnant with my 3rd child. i completed that degree, and went on to get a Teaching Diploma and MA in Compartative English Literature. while working on my MA, i was teaching a variety of classes, from elementary, to complementary, to high school. i changed jobs while studying my MA, and was a coordinator for the school: preschool, elementary, as well as G7-G8. however, i was asked to take a teacher’s place, who was on maternity leave for 3 months, for High School students G10-G12. after that, i had my defense and started teaching on the college level.
2 years later, the war in Syria started affecting us in Lebanon, so we moved back to Toronto. although safety was no longer an issue, i had some health problems i had to overcome, before starting to use my words to express my pent up feelings. of course, now we are facing a global pandemic, and other social issues that require commentary. i hope that my writing will help others a look into other peoples’ perspectives.
What People Say
The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.
Walt Disney
Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.
Dr. Seuss
Poetry for Change 