Eid in Jenin

There's really a lot to report this holiday season. First off, last week was the Eid. Eid Al Adha to be specific and I got to spend one day of it in a village north of Jenin. Danielle and I visited a colleage of hers in his village, and of course, whenever you leave your house around here, you return with stories to tell.

First off, when we arrived we were greeted by everyone as per semi-usual: father, kids, brothers, mother -- the wives and sisters were in the next room, apparently laying low due to the presence of a not-quite-close-enough male family member. The unusual part was that they were sitting in what was slowly becoming a pretty dim room. I could just barely make out faces. By the time it got unequivocally dark, I was actually used to it and forgot about how weird it was to be sitting in the dark with a bunch of strangers, but then someone mentioned that the power was out, something that apparently happens quite frequently, and that they were hoping that any minute it would be restored. Meanwhile, the woman of the house (our host's mother) lit a small lamp of sorts and all began to make sense.

The sad stuff: The not-quite-close-enough family member was the husband of an absent sister. And the story that follows his family is as follows. He is one of those one-plus-something-million Palestinians living within Israel's semi-internationally accepted borders. He is from Umm Al Fahem and has Israeli citizenship and is pretty much free to travel anywhere except for those countries boycotting Israel (Syria, Lebanon, Iran.. maybe/probably more) and, due to one of many of Israel's laws that are designed to divide and conquer, Palestinian Authority areas. However, he said that since today was Eid, Israel relaxed that law in question and he was able to visit family on the other side of the Green Line. His wife, however, was not. She's not an Israeli citizen but rather a West Bank ID holder. Apparently, after some negotiation though the Israeli courts, she was permitted to live with her husband and kids in Israel despite her West Bank residency status, however, she can't go back and forth. So Eid Mubarak! She's stayed at home with a little one while dad took the other two kids to visit grandma and grandpa.

More sad stuff: It was kind of hard not to notice the photo-montaged poster that included a guy holding a pretty big gun, hung right up in the living room alongside more photos of the same guy, posing in your average family snapsot style settings. There was actually the same photo-montage in a sort of permanent light box display right outside the house's front gates. Unfortunately, it gets pretty easy to recognize a martyr poster and so it soon became apparent that this guy was the missing brother of our host. He was assassinated in his home by some Palestinians collaborating with Israeli intelligence. His wife went back to live her her parents along with their 25-day-old kid. According to our host, when collaborators don't have information to satisfy their bosses, they make up whatever will make them happy. My guess is that he also had the bad luck to belong to one of those many political parties that Israel just plain ol' won't tolerate, even if you are just a tile-worker, which he was. The symbol on the poster belonged to Islamic Jihad... and you thought Hamas was radical

Anyhow, there's more. One brother was there with his kids while his wife was locked away in prison, and then there's our host, who - when he's not visiting his extended family in Jenin - he's living in one of those liminal spaces between the wall and the Green Line. Two different kinds of IDs living in the same house means he pretty much has to stick to that liminal space unless he doesn't mind splitting with his wife.. and don't think the landlord doesn't know that. Depending on where they are, hard to define spaces fetch a pretty penny (or agora).

Meanwhile, Danielle and I were the center of attention. Talking all night in our mix of Arabic and English really did a lot for my vocabulary, but after a bunch of sweets that kept on coming, and what I calculated to be six hours of non-stop politics (and what Danielle thought was more like eight) I had an amazing headache. That night, we slept on the floor of their living room, and a few days later, I realized that I got to know this family in the same way you get to know characters in a movie. Each one has his story, which you get to know pretty intimately, but in the end, you're just watching them from the audience. For a reason I can't put my finger on, I feel guilty about this method of getting to know someone. Witnessing suffering as cultural exchange? Nonetheless everyone seemed thrilled to have us around, we were left feeling guilty that we didn't stay longer, Danielle's friend took care of our cab fare back to Ramallah, and I got a phone call just yesterday with a second invitation.

Again, sorry that there's not much humor to share today. It's these kinds of situations coupled with food poisoning, a crashed hard drive, the flu, a broken camera, a 1000 shekel fine (which I'll mention in the next post), an ultra-zionist spammer (which I may also mention, unless I can bring myself to forget it), and the accompanying nightmares are just a few of those pesky things that have been getting in the way of a good time these days. I think I might be back in the US pretty soon.

Eid Mubarak

Today was the day before Eid Al-Adha and all of Ramallah was out. How did I spend my evening? Reem and I checked out the Chinese restaurant on Rukab Street (yes... everything seems to be on Rukab Street) and then we headed home to fight, first with an LCD projector and then with a shifty laptop, in order to watch a movie that Said (the one who talks too fast, not the other one.. both are shway majnoon though) picked out in lieu of The Godfather. You might think that if The Godfather is out, you'd get Goodfellas or Scarface, but no, Said, never having been to the US and not as seasoned as many Western movie-goers, picked out Miami Vice. So I spent night before Eid eating Chinese food while listening to Dabke music, and watching bad American cinema while eating boycotted Israeli potato chips.

shway majnoon = a little crazy

ajnabiyye

For some reason I feel like the guy who found that American passport and I have an unshakable bond. We had the life of this old guy in our hands.. him more than me really... Anyhow, everywhere I go, I seem to have to pass by that shawarma place on Rukab Street and wave or make chit chat when sometimes, I'd rather it be a silent bond. So yesterday I'm walking home at night and I'm on the opposite site of the street of the shawarma place and I hear someone shout out, ajnabiyye... but before I could get a look, I heard some guy scold the other and say tafham arabi. I think it was the shawarma guy looking out for me, that really made my night.

glossary
ajnabiyye = foreigner (female)
tafham arabi = she understands Arabic

what's the point?

This question is one that comes up quite often. It feels like everyone around here is just running around making themselves crazy putting band-aids on what really needs some serious medical attention. So I guess I should just admit that I'm not really here to "help" and I'm still thinking about the best way to answer that question. If anyone in my position has figured out the answer, I'd really welcome your comments. Til then, you should know that I'm here for purely selfish reasons. I love being in Palestine.. ok not miye bil miye, but in general... I really do. Perhaps I'll count the ways in future posts since the absurd mix of positive energy, pessimism, suspicion, and general fun makes it hard to put it all down.

And not to be too touchy feely, but I'd like to end today's post with a few photos of some kiddies that I've met while I've been here.

glossary: miye bil miye = one hundred percent


A bit of a mural at Dheisheh. I accompanied Danielle there yesterday to help finish what Rosi -- who I kinda sorta know through my Arabic class -- started via Shiraa . Hi there Rosi.. incase you're reading this...




Amani and Hidayya (and a little one who I don't know) with the fancy audio recorder post-interview with Umm Walid in her family's "home" in Jalazone. Umm Walid spoke about life in Beit Nabala before '48.. part of an ongoing project whereby kids interview their elders about life way back when. Hopefully I'll get it together soon and post some excerpts.

Oh and before I go... just a few tidbits for the future.

I may be counted in the Palestinian Authority's census.
I met the grandmother of one of my 11th grade troublemakers on a bus.
If I don't say so myself, I'm getting good at making musaqqaʿa. I can't wait to make it for my American buddies back home.

when something is so wrong, it's hard to know where to begin

It's not just me, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone around here who thinks that Palestinians are going to get anything out of this Annapolis farce. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I'm opposed to "peace" ... I mean really. But when Israel takes it upon itself to deploy even more of its soldiers into the West Bank and close Palestinian cities because of -- in their words-- anticipated opposition to the peace conference, well, that should make you raise an eyebrow at the very least. So now that there's a peace summit a few continents away, thousands of Palestinians are finding themselves late for work. Doesn't it seem like an odd move to piss people off right around a peace conference? Meanwhile, Gaza residents are still getting killed off one by one, and those that remain get a few more days of electricity.. but that's a separate issue... And to forget about the "facts on the ground," as human rights violations tend to be called these days, the layers of how wrong this is is pretty obvious on a quasi-international level too... not that the UN has done anything good lately anyhow.

Anyhow, apologies for this post, I know you've come to expect notes from the everyday.. after all there's no shortage of political diatribes out there on this here interweb network. But since I'm home with a cold I don't have any actual experience to report today. Yesterday, however, I saw a wonderful yet painful documentary called 33 Days by Mai Masri at Al Kasabah.

the earthquake that shook Ramallah

Ramallah has been on edge lately due to the rumored coming of an earthquake. There were two last week (or maybe the week before), one of whick shook me in my bed just after midnight. So yesterday I headed over to work (the high school in Al-Tire where I'm teaching creative writing) and everyone is hanging around outside. One of my students runs up to me and jumping up and down, he tells me that an earthquake is coming. Is this kid putting me on? Can you really predict an earthquake? But the whole school is outside including the teachers, so I began to doubt everything I may or may not have learned in public school and I figure, I guess you can... My doubting sensibilities may be the cause for my eventual downfall, if I haven't already fallen, but that's another story. At least I learned a new word .. zilzal. So classes are eventually cancelled, and actually, this is the second cancellation out of the last four for this particular class. Number one was for the alleged "Independence Day" and the second was for the alleged zilzal. The latest rumor to accompany the rumored earthquake is that the whole ordeal was started by pay-by-minute Paltel & Jawwal, the Palestinian phone and cellphone companies. Nothing like an earthquake to get you reach out and touch someone.

In other news, Monday I recorded an interview with Said's mother about her life in Beit Nabala before 1948. Wednesday I took a nice walk up a mountain with a group of kids from Jalazone. And today I slept in cause I'm coming down with a cold. Till next time, I'll leave you with a song courtesy of Said's mom.

why am I still surprised?

I know that life here is made up of a whole lotta unfair shit... the stuff that war crime tribunals are made of...so why do I still get surprised when I hear yet another story? Today I was sitting in a sheesy coffee shop with a friend, reading a story she wrote about her chronic encounters with guys, young and old, who can't seem to avoid Israeli prisons no matter how much of an upstanding (non)citizen they try to be. In fact, it seems like the more upstanding one is, the more likely it is he'll get a knock at the door one evening. So as I'm reading her story, I see Mohammed, the roommate of a friend of mine come in. I said hey... thought you were going to Spain? I don't know the details but Mohammed was invited by some organization over there to give a speaking tour about the effects of the Wall. Turns out I was right, he should have been in Spain, but the Israelis wouldn't let him out of the "country"... or rather... over the bridge that connects the West Bank with Jordan. We all know that West Bankers aren't allowed to use the airport in Tel Aviv, so they use the next one a border-line away in Jordan. Or maybe not. He told me very matter-of-factly that he's required to have a meeting with an Israeli intelligence officer before he can leave, but when he showed up to his appointment, they just made him wait a couple hours before they said, come back later. Yeah. That's how it goes.

Closure: it's not only Israeli policy

Palestinians will impose closure on their own every now and then. Today Birzeit University closed. When I arrived all ready to pay my overdue library fines, I found a confused swarm of students around the closed front gate. I saw a long(ish)-lost acquaintance of mine named Ahmad (not the one who got his window smashed... another one) and he gave me the low-down. Apparently, some students affiliated with PFLP (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - a communist, secular party) gave some speeches on Saturday which offended some Fatah folks. Something happened, not quite sure what... but today students were pulling others out of classes and well... apparently it got bad. I heard beatings from one and stabbings from another but honestly, I have no idea who to believe. Meanwhile, I called my professor to confirm that class was indeed cancelled. It was. Then as I watched some guys jump the fence here and there, I talked a little politics with Ahmad (who's incidentally a Hamas supporter) and a friend of his, both of whom were upset over their wasted taxi-fare. Basically, the whole thing is sadly absurd. Ahmad's prediction is that all the shabab will be sharing hummus in the cafeteria tomorrow morning... provided the university re-opens... wataniya wahadi, I think is he how it put it. When I asked whether the culprits in this (the Fatah folks) would be expelled, he said "of course not" as did a new colleague of mine who teaches Arabic at a local high school here. Apparently, Fatah has, or can get, its fingers in anything and everything around here, including private predominantly-Christian universities, so unless someone dies, all will be forgiven, or rather, ignored.

wataniya wahadi = one nation

quick catch-up

Don't worry guys, it's all cool. So just a quick update:

Thursday was "Independence Day" in Palestine. Yes... you heard me, I don't get it either. I think the guy who smashed the window of Ahmad's SUV that evening might have also been upset over the premature celebrating.

It's starting to get cold here in Ramallah and the inside of our house is colder than outside, I'm scared for winter. And a shower that resembles a drooling camel isn't helping. Can I miss my American conveniences and be anti-America at the same time? I could really use a long American shower.

I met a guy who works at a shawarma place on Rukab St. who found an American passport on the street and asked me what should be done, like I'd know right? You'd think returning it to the US Consulate would be the best thing to do, but it's tough when you have to cross one of the largest checkpoints in the West Bank to get to there... something that's impossible without your passport... especially if you're Arab, which this guy was. So no thanks to the consulate, but rather to Ramallah's small-town-ness, though e-mails and word-of-mouth, we found the guy. It took 2 days.

I almost forgot

Ramallah, I hear, is the least occupied of all the occupied territories. So if all you do is shop around town and don't talk to anyone, it might be possible to forget what's going on. Last night, however, the series of reminders began. Coming back from visiting my Arabic professor with the rest of my classmates, we got stuck at Zataara for about 1/2 an hour. A fight broke out in the traffic complete with some scary punches, a big stick, and tens of people jumping out of their cars trying to break it up. Meanwhile, our driver (a relative of our teacher) is anwering his cellphone "ya habibi.... mabsut" all while people are close to being thrown on the hood of the Ford Transit. After the crowd disperses, he turns to me and asks me if I understood what just happened. He explains, they're fighting because of the Occupation. One car cut off the other in an attempt to be that much closer to the clogged up checkpoint... the soldiers at the checkpoint are the cause of the mess yet these poor guys are fighting each other.

Then today, I went to Jalazone and met some friends-of-a-friend and learned that everyone has multiple relatives in prison. I spoke (sort of) to a woman whose son is in one now and a man who served 7 years of a 20-something year sentence during the first Intifada. I also learned that two days ago, the Israelis entered the camp at 1:30 in the morning and took six more guys. And lastly, I met another woman who fled her village of Beit Nabala in 1948. And all this is being talked about over tea and cake....

overwhelmed

I know you come to expect good time when you come to read this blog, so I apologize for the seriousness of the last entry... but these things tend to come up quite a bit around here. So I won't give you too much to digest today.. I'll just leave you with a bit of something to listen to as I tried to teach a bunch of eager kids how to record field sounds around Jalazone today.

Memorial to Adnan Khalil

I wrote this letter to the editor of The Miami Herald last night in response to the article headlined: Two clerks killed in Pompano Beach store.

Jaweed Kaleem’s article from October 25, “Two clerks killed in Pompano Beach store,” reports a truly horrific event. I cannot even bring myself to imagine that I, or anyone I am close to, could ever die such an unexpected and violent death, and yet I knew Adnan Khalil, one of the victims of this double homicide. Though I grew up in South Florida, and I am currently visiting his country of origin, I never met Mr. Khalil face to face. Less than two weeks ago I wrote a letter on his behalf to the Consulate General of Jerusalem and the U.S. State Department through my volunteer work with the Right to Enter Campaign, a grassroots campaign based in the Palestinian city of Ramallah. Mr. Khalil is an American citizen of Palestinian descent. He was born in Palestine and his wife and three children currently live in a village near the West Bank city of Tulkarem. Mr. Khalil’s wife, Manal, is not an American citizen and so when they married close to ten years ago, Mr. Khalil applied for a residency permit under a family unification program in order to live legally in the country of his birth. Since 1998, Mr. Khalil had been living intermittently in the West Bank on Israeli tourist visas. His residency application had been pending at the mercy of Israeli authorities, who are the ones who determine who can or cannot live in the West Bank. The West Bank, however, is not Israel. It is a small territory roughly the size of Delaware, which is becoming a series of enclaves where Palestinians live in between the spaces occupied by soldiers and settlers-masked-as-civilians who are living here in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention with Israel’s military, legislative and financial support. I wrote the letter on behalf of Mr. Khalil requesting that the United States intervene with the Israeli authorities on humanitarian grounds to allow him to enter the West Bank to live with his wife and three children. Not only was he unable to exercise his rights that most of us take for granted – to live with one’s family in one’s birthplace – but during the past several years, Mr. Khalil’s life had become even more heartbreaking. He had been unable to fulfill his duty as husband to his wife who had been diagnosed with atrophy of the cerebellum and had become disabled to the point of full paralysis. Nor has he been able to be a present father to his three children who have been witnessing their mother’s health rapidly deteriorate over the past few years.

On October 21st, Mr. Khalil informed the Campaign that things were taking a turn for the better. The U.S. State Department contacted him and, without making any promises, they offered to intervene. We will never know whether Mr. Khalil would have ever been able to join his family in life, and now we are shifting our efforts to repatriate his remains so he may join them in death. Mr. Khalil never should have been in the Port Five Star Food Mart in Pompano Beach the morning of October 24th, he should have been at home with his family in Palestine. His death, and the death of Sabri Khaleq, whose story I don’t know, is unacceptable on so many levels. Unfortunately, I do not only feel like I know Mr. Khalil solely because of the letter I wrote for him. During the two short months that I have been living in Ramallah, I have met many people whose lives share the tragic traces of Mr. Khalil’s. I feel like I know him because I know many others like him. His story is the sad ending of one that Israeli authorities controlled from the beginning. I hope that we can understand the complexity of the lives of those who appear ever so briefly in the daily news, and take action when we see injustice occur.

When A Man's Gotta Go, A Man's Gotta Go

For all you newcomers, I just want to make it clear from the beginning, that the "man" is question, is not me. If you already know me, I guess that would be a bit obvious, but for those who don't, you should really know that despite my boyish name, I'm a woman... always was and always will be unless these vitamins that I just purchased today do something that the FDA (if Palestine had one) really wouldn't approve. This "man" is also not anything resembling what is commonly refered to as "The Man" but that one -- the one in green -- is in this story nonetheless.

So to quickly set the scene... I've been tagging along (freeloading) with the Riwaq crew on their various excursions around the West Bank to see art and architecture and the unavoidable backdrop to it all. This backdrop is where the story gets good today. So this evening's itinerary consisted of an exhibition of On Kawara at the Dar Al Kalima kindergarten (very weird indeed... conceptural art hung neatly above a blackboard and macaroni-art in a room filled with teeny tiny chairs) a "tour" of Bethlehem's Old City (didn't quite happen, but we did walk though it) and a reception at Dar Annadwa where we met the Director and a Lutheran minister named Mitri Raheb who was so inspiring that he almost convinced me to switch to the other side.

On the way back, I sat with a group of students from the brand new International Art Academy of Palestine that just opened up in Ramallah. I tried to get them to teach me the lyrics to Wen A Ramallah and got Reema's cheeks hurting with my knowledge of street Arabic as I called her habibti and her friend/colleage Mamoun zalamti.

Fun was in the air as we approached the Container checkpoint (also known as Wadi Nar) but sure enough this one soldier had to ruin it all for us. He stood outside the bus shouting the same three questions at the driver (in Hebrew) while the driver answered them (wrongly.. on purpose or not I don't really know) mixing Hebrew and Arabic. Bad vibes all around as this little guy kept yelling at our elder driver who I think was tired of hauling us around.. it was after 11pm at this point. Meanwhile, one Brit makes his way to the front of the bus, holding his passport like a shield across his chest, and the next thing I knew he was in front of the bus pissing two feet away from three soldiers in the middle of the checkpoint. Yes.. you heard me... this guy just started pissing in the middle of the checkpoint. I was in the front seat of the bus so I got a better view than most if you catch my drift. The students whom I was sitting with on the bus were speechless, the soliders were stunned, and I was like... hu majnun! Both the little soldier and the tired driver were now able to direct their annoyances/aggressions elsewhere and so the relieved Brit was detained and the bus was told to keep going. Commotion ensued... do we leave the Brit at the mercy of the checkpoint and its masters or wait... ok..we wait (I think only the driver wanted to leave him, as bus drivers all over the world tend to want to do). I picked up a mix of frustration and disbelief all around... more waiting (frustration) .. checkpoint as hamam? (disbelief). To complicate matters, our driver had all the Palestinian hawwiyyes from the guys on the second bus which was in front of us. And anyone who knows Palestinians know that they don't budge without their IDs so the driver of the bus in front is now out asking what's up.... To sum it up, the Brit was released after about 10 minutes and by this time, word got around and he was greeted back on to the bus as a local celebrity. Cheers all over! Who would have guessed that public urination could be so welcomed by artists, academics, intellectuals and boys and girls of all ages? Turns out, his move was not intended to be read as a form of political expression at all, hence the title of today's post.

Container / Wadi Nar



And now for your listening pleasure the song that got us through the night.

Glossary

zalamti - my man
habibti-my beloved/my honey/my baby
hu majnun - he is crazy
hamam - bathroom
hawwiye - ID card

more than just one.. or two

I know that you think that I'm in another world over here, but in fact, I'm in quite a few other worlds, and I'm not talking about Areas A, B or C. Forget the other side of the green line (or the wall) for now. Yesterday, I had the uncomfortable pleasure of visiting two worlds just about 15 minutes apart from each other. I had an afternoon coffee and a sickly sweet "juice" at Jalazone refugee camp after interviewing a man about his two sons in Israeli prisons, followed by a big banquet dinner in Al-Tireh celebrating the inauguration of the Second Riwaq Biennale. I don't have any pics of the banquet, but think of white linen tablecloths and more knives, forks and glasses than you really truly need. I'd ask "how did this happen?" but well you know... and if you don't, it's more than I can really get into right now. I'll try to think about an intelligent way to explain how this fancy shmancy restaurant came about, till then, check out this nice piece of info from the United Nations archive. It may have been a whole 59 years since that good-for-nothing passage of UN Resolution 194, but those three numbers are on the tips of everyone's tongues at Jalazone. Check out #11 and you'll see what the fuss is about.

don't let them win...

In all seriousness folks, there's some really great stuff going on here. Since I know that when people talk about all the great stuff going on in Palestine they are usually talking about non-violent resistance and olive oil, you may be suprised to learn that there's more than just unrecognized democracy and something to dip your khobs in. Oh... but when I say "you" I don't really know who I'm talking to.... so perhaps you wouldn't be surprised. Anyhow, yesterday, thanks to Riwaq, I saw stuff that was making me say anjad wallah all day long. While I'm not usually a fan of taking tours on air-conditioned buses (though this bus' a/c was broken), I'm willing to make exceptions for the right kind of people and we all know a good egg when we see one right? These guys are certainly good ones. They restore historic buildings all over the West Bank and not just for the sheesy museum go-ers either, since Palestine for some reason doesn't attract too many of those, but rather for the people! Yes, the people! Or as they say here... the balestinian beoble. Our guide and Riwaq co-director, Nazmi Al Ju'beh is the man at the microphone and architect Ruba Salim is to the left. Sorry.. I don't know who that is in the corner but he seemed to me "official" in some capacity.




side by side: old and new construcion in Bruqin (in village of Bruqin, Salfit District)


Bruqin Services Center


Salfit Community Center


Salfit Community Center




Thank you Riwaq for doing what you're doing. As I told Ruba during the tour, a job at Riwaq must be one of the few jobs in Palestine where you can actually see something getting better instead of getting worse.

Glossary:

khobs = pita bread
Anjad wallah! = really by god!

don't let the doctor get you down

The past is finally catching up to me. Thanks to this, I can do a little catch up while giving you the details of today (well.. last night to be more accurate). Remember when I asked you to remind me of that revoked invitiation to an Ifar (see below for Arabic-English glossary)? Well I don't need your reminder, I was reminded of this myself at 8:03pm when I saw that I had 5 missed calls and a new text message from Mr. Un-Inviter Himself or rather, Dr. Un-Inviter. To protect the guilty, let's change his name and call him Dr. Wasim. So backing up a few weeks... it was Week 1 of Ramadan and I finally decided to embark upon one of my many (mis)adventures which was to retrieve my transcript from the course I took last summer at Al Quds University a mere 16km from Ramallah... the trip takes about an hour but that's another story. I'll let the soldiers at Wadi Nar and the settlers at Ma'ale Adumim pipe-in with their comments below. Of course I don't believe in the concept of transcripts from Arabic classes, but I think that the Fulbright committee who requests that sort of thing does, so against all my priciples, I decided that passing two checkpoints in each direction is totally worth it to get the piece of probably-not-even-acid-free paper. Attempt Number One fails: the university closed eariler than I expected due to Ramadan. Attempt Number Two is where the story begins. The registrar's office is jam packed with people, wall-to-wall students crowded around 5 or so bank-teller style windows. I find out from another janib that this week is the last week of registration and it might be better to come back next week. Ok... I was on a mission and while it was not of the overdone militaristic kind, I was still determined. So I knock on an unmarked door and give an earful to the random unfortunate soul who answered it. I soon get paired with a student "volunteer" who takes me around to various offices and windows, settling the supposed 500+ Jordanian Dinar debt that one nice lady behind window number one said I would need to pay in order to get this piece of paper. Thanks but no thanks... two hours later, I get a piece of paper... not THE piece of paper... but one that will supposedly lead me to that golden waraq. I feel like I'm one step closer to victory but then I hear that I still need to return the next day. To make a long story shortish, I call the (ex) director of the Language and Literature Program and politely and pathetically insist that he send me some help to get this transcript. Thank you thank you... he sends me two (not one, but two) professors to help me navigate this maze that probably accompanies most universities that operate under the shadow of an inoperational government. Success! An hour later I have my official-ish document with that nice 70% mark (I know..I shouldn't brag about that, it was a suprise to me too. However yes, my Arabic sucked even worse last year than it does now if you can believe it) in addition to something I didn't come for: an invitation to attend an Iftar on Thursday with one those nice professors and a group of his students. Ok, so Thursday comes around and no invitation, no problem. A few days later, I get a text message, "Hi Toby, my wife is cooking Mansaf 4 ftoor, u r welcome at 5pm if u r interested, i am inviting some friends from my village and u can spend time with her, Dr. Wasim." Cool! I give him a call... count me in, excitement! At 4:06 I get another text, "Dear Toby, we'll make it on Thursday when I get my dad and mom, i am so sorry, u may not feel good with my ten guys my wife says, best Wasim." Ok, no problem I say. Thursday comes and goes. Ramandan is khallas, I (kinda) forget the whole ordeal. Now what does all this have to do with last night's five missed calls and one text message? All of you who know me well know that I don't get a whole lotta phone calls (hint hint) and so I try to answer every one in the event that fun and adventure is on the line. At the same time, the actual moment at hand always takes precedence over what might be lurking on the wire, so since I happened to be in the middle of a super-cool yet out-of-character Dabka lesson, I let the phone ring. What's the text message say you wonder? Well.. it's from the long lost ustaz. "Dear Toby, it is Dr. Wasim, please if my wife calls u say that i was sitting with u today at a cafe downtown, do me this favor please dear."

Sorry Dr. Wasim incase you're reading this... in general, I'd love to help. And don't get me wrong, I am ever so grateful for your help in getting me that transcript. Also, if you knew me well enough, you'd know that I have a soft spot for Palestinians and I'm always trying to help in my sloppy and usually ineffective way. If you want me to provide you with an alibi for the Israeli border police, army, navy, air force or shopping mall security.. Ahlan WaSahlan... but wives, that's outside my field of expertise (or interest). Kul Am W'Anta B'Kheir... and if there's a nice Arabic saying for "good luck with that wife-thing" I'd say that too. Banaat Ajnabiye.. beware! More on freaky men in future posts. I'll throw in a few posts on the nice ones too..... apologies to all you nice guys out there.. I've met you but the nice guys don't get the blog (as they say).

Glossary:
janib: foreigner
bannat ajnabiye: foreign girls
waraq: paper
khallas: finished
Iftar: the dinner-time meal that breaks the daytime fast during the month of Ramadan
ustaz: professor
eid: holiday
Dabka: Palestinian folklore dance
Kul Am W'Anta B'Kheir: something you say after Eid Ramadan, I think it's something like "I hope you and everyone will be well in this coming year" ...maybe
Ahlan WaSahlan : welcome

It could definitely be worse

Bear with me folks, I'm thinking to spend the next few posts chronicling the mundane day-to day... all the stuff you won't hear about in the daily, weekly or bi-weekly news regarding these parts of the world. However, at the same time, I feel obliged to add a little bit of catch-up, after all I've been here way too long to ignore the embarrassing fact that I've been in Palestine and have totally ignored my personal mission as a storyteller. So let's start with today, that's really the easiest. I woke up early, planning to add an hour to the beginning of my day so I can pay our overdue electric bill to the Jerusalem District Electricity Company, Ltd. Whether it actually takes an hour to pay an electricity bill is beyond my scope of knowledge, but I do know that the last time I tried to pay it, I took number 243 and sat down at the Bank of Palestine and waited about 10 minutes for the numbers to progress from 208 to 210. Apparently, though it's possible to pay bills at the bank, it's faster to pay them at the company office but that would mean getting a taxi to Birzeit (easy), getting off in front of the office (also easy) and waiting for another Birzeit taxi along the side of the road so I can get to class on time (hmmm). I've done that kind of waiting in the past, the kind where you just point to the road whenever you see a yellow minibus and hope it stops, but it's still a mystery to me how one goes about a routine in this manner. Taxis don't leave the taxi stand until they're full so unless someone gets off early (like someone headed to the electric company instead of the final destination) it's a crap shoot... as they say in my country. Anyhow, to put an end to this compelling story, I should just be straight and tell you that I convinced myself that today was an inauspicious day to pay the bill and I put it off. Instead, I decided to spend the extra time drinking my morning coffee (instant.. bleh) and then I headed off to school (Birzeit University) in the usual manner. Aside from the one time I got in the taxi with plenty of money, but got off mid-route when I couldn't find my wallet, only to discover along the side of the road that indeed, I was loaded, the almost daily commute has gone just fine. So moving on, my Arabic class is really taking a downward turn, I'm not sure how this happened because I was so optimistic at the beginning, but at some point several students in the class seemed less concerned with learning grammar basics or conversational techniques and kept requesting that the teacher translate words and phrases like "prostitute," "prostitution" and "I'm intoxicated." The teacher didn't seem to see this as a diversion of any sort and so the conversation went along and I accepted the fact that today wasn't meant for paying electric bills or learning Arabic. After class, I ate a cheese sandwich that made me feel queasy and headed to an office where (I thought) someone I knew worked. Turns out he's "khalas" with that job, and so no visit for me. So I headed to Jalazone, where I'm trying to begin (wow.. am I still just trying to begin?) an audio project there with some kiddies, and wallah, today I pointed to the side of the road and in less than 5 minutes, I got the taxi of my dreams, not one that took me straight into the camp, but close enough. I showed up all optimistic with my recorder and notebook, but turns out, today is not the best day for that either. I'm still not exactly sure why today wasn't a good day, but well.. so it goes. Inshallah Thursday we'll start to draft our questions and Sunday we'll interview a man who has two of his sons in an Israeli prison. The end-goal is to make an audio portrait of the camp, one person at a time. More updates on that as days progress. Meanwhile, I spent the afternoon at the Child Center trying to translate the functions of Mustafa's cellphone from English to Arabic, attempting to console Said, whose family situation really truly sucks, and battling for Mushira's attention as I pitch my next day's project plan.

As for catch-up, to be honest I feel a little worn out at this point, so let's revisit the past in the future ok? I'll just say this, it could be worse. Perhaps I'll give you some ideas as to how much worse it could be in future posts. Till then, I'll leave you with this photo I took at Huwwara.. a checkpoint that serves as the "entrance" to Nablus.

Returning to Ramallah

I really have no excuse. I had the purest of intentions to return to this blog as soon as I landed in Ramallah (don't misread this, Ramallah has no airport and the nearby one in Qalandia is "off limits" to put it gently), but somehow when I sat myself down at the computer, blogging took a back burner to other things like reading the news, fighting with Final Cut Studio, and general "googling". So since it's been about 6 weeks or so, it might be a little difficult to resume quite where I left off, but I'll give it a shot. Speaking of shots... today is the last day of Eid and so every boy and girl around these parts (well.. maybe not girls) seems to be playing, in a funny-yet-sad way, with ultra realistic Chinese-made gifts of choice. The fact that I know that the hundreds of automatic and semi-automatic weapons in the hands of so many walad and shabab are just plastic still makes me feel uncomfortable. But really, I hate to start off on a note like this so let me just remind everyone that it's the Israelis who have the real ones.

So just a briefing... I've started an Arabic class at Birzeit University, which is going shway shway as I should have expected. I've also been fumbling around in that recently-graduated kind of way, trying to figure out how to make the best of the fact that I'm back. And when I say "make the best of" that's where things get tricky. Whose best are we looking out for? Is this the question that all bloody liberals grapple with when they're out of their element? And don't even get me started for what good art or art-making is for... three years of grad school didn't really help me figure out the answer to that question. So rather than getting into deep thoughts, I'll just continue with the day-to-day. Aside from the class, I've also been going to the Jalazone refugee camp a few times a week where I volunteer at the "Nadi A-Tifl" or rather, the Child's Club. I'm trying to figure out how to start an audio recording project there but I've hit a few roadblocks (no, not those) which are a combination of me not knowing what I'm doing mixed with a language barrier and technical difficulties. But I'm optimistic, I think, and just last week I thought up a counter-plan for those days when recording doesn't seem possible. I wish I could say it was at least related to recording, but I don't think it is... more on that as the days move on. But if this project hasn't worked out so well for the kids just yet, in some ways, it's worked out great for me. I've befriended some good eggs at Jalazone, some of the staff at the Nadi, and I've been the recipient of food-aid that's way better than anything UNRWA has ever provided. During Ramandan, I've had four out of five Iftars at the camp (the fifth being in a restaurant so I don't think that counts) and after the first one, I learned a word that has been of great use at the other three (Sha'bana) which means "I'm full" combined with satisfied and maybe some more positive implications (I hope). I won't get into how awesome the food is, but remind me later to talk about the people I met sitting around the dinner table. Just some quick highlights... the plural of "curriculum" is "curriculua," as a high schooler informed me of this after misunderstanding the word "colloquial" which I used to translate the word "Amiyye," Said kicking me under the table after I said something I shouldn't have, and a man who has two kids in Israeli jails. I know none of this makes much sense now, but I'll try to flesh it out in a little while.

And just some notes for later:

My roommate's friend smoking a joint by our kitchen windown explaning to me the significance of the name (and his name) Khoury (priest)

Getting my transcript from Al Quds University at Abu Dis and a revoked Iftar invitation.

An odd walk I took with.. let's just call him Z.. and learning just a little bit more of many of those folks I met last year in Farkha.

I hope this is enough to keep you coming back for more, so tafadalu.. ok? More later.

I forgot to mention... I'm back

Incase anyone has noticed the year-long gap between the last two posts, my final year of grad school is to blame there. Rather than run the rat race to the tenure track job that many of my beloved classmates ran (and won... mabrouk!) I went the non-traditional route and decided on a bit of a career shift and skills gathering endeavor. Not sure exactly where that shift is going, somewhere between human rights work and cultural programming... but the first move took me back to Palestine to take another look at the options here and to get my Arabic up to speed. Since this place is the subject of my MFA thesis, which is sitting in boxes and rolled up in tubes in 4 locations across 2 states and another country, I'm also hoping to find it a well-lit home in the cultural center of Ramallah in the near future. So I'm in a bit of a prediciment here, sitting right now in.. ahem.. Tel Aviv.. couldn't be further than the right starting point. I'll be moving to either Ramallah or Birzeit pretty soon and starting the Arabic class. This one will do it, I can feel it. All those others got me started but this one, coupled with three months in Ramallah, is going to seal the deal.

borderline schizophrenia

I don't want to downplay the seriousness of mental illness, so I should be upfront here and say that aside from the medium-to-low level depression that everyone seems to suffer from these days, I have a clean bill of health upstairs. Nonetheless, if I may take some reckless liberties some medical terms that I honestly don't know much about, I'm on my way to being a full fledged victim of multiple personality disorder - two to be specific. But don't be mistaken, they are not symmetrical and I'm doing the best I can to embrace one and forget the other. When I visited a nice acquantaince, hopefully soon-to-be friend, at Birzeit University last week, I was dreading the question that I have already heard several times over the past few weeks. Where are you staying? A benign question to most, but not when the answer involves crossing an internationally contested border that only a select few venture over and through. In the morning I'm waking up in Tel Aviv in a nicely chilled apartment (24C to be specific) and by the afternoon I'm struggling for cellphone reception on Birzeit University's campus in the village of Birzeit and sweating through my modest clothing. I'm not a liar, so I try to evade the question... I say I'll probably be staying in Birzeit once my Arabic class begins. But no, the question is NOW. So I preface my answer with the word, "actually." I'm staying in Tel Aviv. I cannot think a CIA Factbook eqivalent for this dichotomy. It certainly doesn't exist in the USA. Maybe, perhaps somewhere along the Mexico/US border, times one milion, but I doubt it. So the reaction I get, the best one I could possibly receive.. It's far. Psychologically, he's right on, geographically, not really. Depending on the checkpoint situation, which at Qalandia, seems to be fairly consistent, it's about a 2 1/2 hour trip. From Birzeit: a service taxi to Ramallah - a bus to Jerusalem - a ten minute walk - a serivce taxi to Tel Aviv - another one to my temporary place of residence. That ten minute walk is where my transformation takes place, and if you have any question to which direction I enjoy more, on the way to the Ramallah bound bus, it's downhill, but to Tel Aviv, uphill. Anyhow, back to borders and mental instability... having 2 lives is really draining. I'm looking forward to picking just one. I'll send another post from Ramallah in a few weeks.