Sitting next to the BBC correspondent of the West Bank at an American comedy tour in Ramallah

“If I don’t laugh at all during the first segment of this show, please don’t think I’m humorless, I just don’t know what they are saying” said the nice british man sitting next to me at the Ramallah cultural center just as the stand up comedy show was about to start (about half an hour late) with lead comedian Amer Zahr.  I found this comment funny because I didn’t realize that parts of the show would be in Arabic , first of all, and that this dude was apologizing to me as if I of all people would be offended.  “don’t worry” I told him “I probably won’t  be getting any of the jokes either”.  That seemed to make him feel better.

That was a lie, I did get some of the jokes with my Arabic fusha/Palestinian and Egyptian ammiyah salad of scattered words and phrases  stuck in different compartments of my brain that I know or recognize.

The principal of my school and her husband graciously invited me to come along to this show, an American comedy tour called 1001 Laughs, and we had arrived before anyone else, and watched the theater fill up slowly (one of the other first people to arrive after us was Hannan Ashrawi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanan_Ashrawi)  and my ignorant self didn’t know who she was. 

Hanan Ashrawi is a Palestinian scholar and spokesperson.

"I think it's my own national identity, my own commitment to the Palestinian cause.

I feel that my personal life is essential because if you do not start with this concentric circles, if you do not love your family, you cannot be part of humanity.

My principal whispered in my ears to tell me a quick blurb on her which made me realize that I was going to be enjoying the show in the same theater as a very very important person (to say the least).    I was quite taken aback by surprise to see this cultural center, just as I had been when I had seen the French and German cultural center in Ramallah for the first time, and my first question for this place was , who funds it?? Supposedly the Japanese government (http://www.jerusalemites.org/jerusalem/cultural_dimensions/71.htm).

 It’s almost strange to be in a place called “The Ramallah Cultural Palace”, a state of the arts center with an impressive theater and stage, inside of a spick and span and pristine building.  A building like this definitely did not exist in my mental conception of Ramallah.  Granted my mental conception was pretty baseless minus the media (which is just violent images of gaza not really Ramallah), I’m still surprised when I find places like this, because no matter how much of a surreal bubble Ramallah is inside of Palestine, it’s still a city under occupation.

River Wyre

I happened to be sitting next to Wyre Davies, one of the bbc correspondents to the west bank (the only reason I remember his name is because he had to spell it out for me and told me his first name is the name of a river.  I’d never heard of that river before so that didn’t help me much, but I did remember the spelling because it’s a confusing pronunciation for only a 4 letter word).  Of course I had no idea who he 

was.  Like any international finding each other in the same vicinity, the only conversation starter is “so what brings you here in this part of the world?”.  No one just comes to Palestine for shits and giggles to really tour, like you’d tour backpacking through Europe or something; usually there’s some other purpose. That’s one thing that I was told even before coming here,  that those who are in Palestine are here for a reason.  He asked me and I told him that I was a teacher.  I teach 3^rd and 4^th grade at a catholic school in Ramallah.   This led him to tell me his dilemma of picking schools for his kids in Jerusalem.  That was the first thing that surprised me “this dude is here with his whole entire family??” he showed me an adorable picture of his three daughters, all under the age of 8 with his beautiful wife.  After a while  it was my turn to ask him, “ so what brings you here?’.   He fuddled with his response for a few seconds starting with “well I work for the bbc, I’m the correspondent here, but I’ve been here before for 6 months but now I’ve been stationed here for the next 3 years”.  Of course my first thought was “whoaaaaaaa.  You’re one of people on bbc where I check my news everyday that writes the freakin articles! No wayyyyy” but my response instead to him was a subtle “o, cool”. 

When the lead comedian finally started, it was strange to hear an American accent coming from the stage.  Minus my roommate, I don’t really hear American accents anymore.  So not knowing this person at all, there was still a strange connection of familiarity.  His comedy was great, and the whole place had a blast, laughing at the nuances of Palestinian culture, mannerisms, mispronunciations of English words, and the transition of age old golden authentic Arabic music soaked in sentiments of nostalgia to modern day commercialized crap Arabic music.  He left the stage after singing various songs and beautifully playing the Oud, and made his exit saying “I was born in America and I grew up in America.  But you better believe that my mother cooked Palestinian food every night and we listened to Palestinian music all the time.  I want you all to know that we might not live in Palestine but we have not forgotten Palestine”.  It was a remarkably genuine comment that made me reminisce of many of the Bangladeshi American events that I was a part of back in the states and how we would convey this very exact thought, that we haven’t forgotten where we come from.

“This is the kind of event that people outside need to hear about”, said wyre davies, ‘because hardly anyone would ever expect or think that there would be a traveling American comedy tour coming to palestine’. I couldn’t agree more. He was telling me about how journalism is just the art of being able to tell stories.  I haven’t really found a piece on this event anywhere, but here is a link to more info about Amer Zahr : http://www.1001laughs.com/zahr.htm

J enjoy the laughs  

Georgette

The first thing I noticed was that our lovely serene garden got a complete wax job.  It just looked naked. No weeds, no random plants, and shurbs scattered in between and around the white rose bush, the lemon trees or the almond trees.  instead the fresh dirt had been plowed and mulch was scattered about, and instead of a field of random greens of different sizes, it was a distinct garden of only what was supposed to be there, the trees, and the freshly dug up deep brown dirt.

The landlord had arrived. I hadn’t met her, I just knew her name was Georgette, and that  she was gone to the States for an eye surgery or something since the end of last year and had mysteriously made her return and I was too oblivious to notice when she actually came back, until I saw the garden.  

This 80 year old woman had quite the repertoire.  Firstly she’s 80 something years old and she’s spent those 80 years in Ramallah.  Ramallah is really not that big, which means everyone knows her and that she knows everyone. I remember hopping onto a random taxi one evening going to an evening class, and small talk with the cab driver about where I was from and where I was living led to the cabbie going “o georgette!! You live at her house? What a wonderful lady! She is very funny and sweet. Everyone knows her!”.  Somehow everyone knew georgette and no one uttered a bad word about her. She had been the principal of a high school here for years.

Then came the afternoon when we got a reeeeeeeally mean and hostile telephone call.  I picked up and heard a hoarse voice asking for M.  I handed over the phone to my roommate to see her face turn different colors of frustration ending in a phone slam with a finale of “bitch!!”.  “what kind of stupid people are you?? what kind of stupid people leaves the doors open? Why did you leave the doors open??”  Georgette screamed from the other end of the line, to which Maggie kept on replying : “we are IN the house.  No we are INN the house.  … WE ARE IN the house! We want ventilation” and then Georgette demanded that we pay rent right that second.  This was maggie’s 3^rd or 4^th direct or indirect interaction with her and each one got progressively more and more negative.  Supposedly in one of these interactions, Georgette had inquired about the ‘girl from north carolina’ because she had gone to school in north Carolina or something.

We hadn’t paid the rent yet, we hadn’t gone to see her after she came back, even though it felt like half the town had already  paid her a visit out of respect, so we were definitely accumulating negative points with Georgette. With teaching and tutoring, Maggie and I get home around 8 every night and by that time we are exhausted completely and after a couple of hours we go to sleep.  Somehow visiting Georgette upstairs never got scratched off the to do list.  Since I had never seen or met her, and both her and M were fuming, M handed over the rent and the small box of Hibiscus tea we brought for Georgette from Egypt to me, and I slowly made my way upstairs, nervous eager and scared to make peace with this lady whose house I’ve been living in since I got here.

This little old hunched over lady (completely blind in one eye) opened her giant doors and I walked in with a giant beaming (fake) smile greeting her with a gracious hello.  “Who are you?” she asked.  “O I’m Fahmida, Maggie’s roommate”.  “oh.  Well come in”.  2 seconds in her living room and she angrily handed over her remote control and asked me “do you know how to fix this STUPID thing?? Why is it so loud? I cant hear myself think!”.  Logically I thought maybe the remote control doesn’t work, so I was waking over to the tv to lower the volume and she goes “DON’T TOUCH THE TV!” “oop sorry sorry sorry, ahh lets ee the remote control, well here’s the volume, and here’s the down, and ohh yeah look ok is that better?”  she stared at the tv and then at me, and then she went “how did you do that?”

I was so scared. This four feet tall hunched over little old lady was emanating so much I was nervous about my ability to tame her anger or to have a nice friendly interaction.  “well sit down, but can you move that STUPID thing from the couch, I don’t even know what it is”.  I think stupid is her favorite word.  I was really impressed with her impeccable English though.  We sat down I gave her the tea and she goes ‘what is this??” I told her about the Egypt trip slowly softening her up into a casual conversation and suddenly she goes “whats your name again?”  “f”.  “oh ok.  Well who the hell is Samira?”  “..I have no idea who Samira is, but I’m fahmida”.  “well someone told me that you are samira.  But you’re not.  There is an F in your name not S”  “I know, yeah….yeah my name is f”. 

And then she asked me where I was from, I told her north Carolina, then her face slowly softened up a bit more and she told me that she spent some years there “in the middle ages” and went to college there, first at Guilford and then to UNC.

Unc!!! My 80 year old Palestinian landlord from Palestine is a tar heel alum from the freakin 50s! whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat.  I cant think of a better divine sign that I should definitely be working and living here J .  Two tarheels generations apart in the same house, lol what what what? Still boggles my mind.

And she sure did experience the north Carolinian terrain in the 50s.  she asked me if I was Catholic or Orthodox, and I told her that I was Muslim.  “O! Muslim??!”.  Then she goes “A muslim from north Carolina?? How did THAT happen??”  I guess some things have changed since her time J

The tarheel connection definitely definitely soothed and tamed her anger. I told her that I had to run but I’d definitely love to visit her whenever she is free.  “Im old and I live in this big house alone.  I’m always free, come whenever you want.  And bring Maggie too.  She seems like a nice girl”

I left her house thinking of that Leggo my Eggo waffle commercial of the old granny lady doing super speedy double flips to get her waffles.  I bet georgette could do that and kick people’s asses left and right.  She’s definitely a character, and I’m incredibly curious about her life.

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p.s. funny thing about real Madrid and Barcelona.  Based on this sports obsession, I gave a bonus question on one of the quizzes to my 4^th graders asking them to write 3 sentences about their favorite team.  I was very pleased with 2 of the responses. One came from abdul-rahman, this too- much-of- a- genius-for-his-own-good 9 year old kid who talks like a mini professor,  wrote : Teacher, I don’t’ know anything about Real Madrid.  I don’t know anything about Barcelona.  I don’t even know what sport this is.  I play computer games.

And one of my favorite students, Nadeem wrote : I don’t watch games. I sleep.  I love English.

My type of students J

Real Madrid vs. Barcelona

the thing with the kids that would drive me nuts sometimes is that in the middle of the lesson, as i would be talking in front of the class, i'd see pairs of boys with decks of those stupid stupid stupid pokemon cards, shuffling them, sifting through them or better yet, standing up, facing one another and high-fiving each other with them every 10 minutes.  i'd storm up to them to say "you know i can SEE you right?" and take their cards away, sometimes they'd hand it over with a sly smile and other times they'd plead and beg, realizing that the teacher caught them when they had their BEST deck in hand.  and this is how I, Ms. Fahmida, started collecting my own growing collection of those stupid stupid cards.  I might have close to 500 hundred now, and once in a while, to entertain ourselves, Maggie and I play around with them, in the teacher's room, after making sure that there are no students in sight.  I really thought that by the end of the year, my little cubby in the teacher's room would be a explosive vault of just cards.

but i realized in the recent past, almost with a bit of sadness, that it had been a while since i had confiscated any cards at all.  or bouncy balls.. or toy cars.. or rubber sticky rats (which are just gross looking) .. or prank toys.. or little circular disks that pop up when you press down on them, or other obnoxious man made creations that make trying to teach hyperactive youngens a living  nightmare.  

my most recent confiscation however was a Real Madrid poster being swooned over by a bunch of 4th grader girls.  they had a mini heart attack when i took that one away. 

students here NEED to know which team i support.  randomly in the middle of class, or recess, they shoot up their hands or run up to me  to ask "TEACHER! Real Madrid or Barcelona??" i had looked at them with a blank face the first several times they did this, especially when kids that i had never seen before would run up to me, so interested in knowing my affiliation, because i had no idea what they were even  talking about or what they were saying to me (anyone and everyone who knows me in the slightest can vouch for my sports retardation).  i asked my roommate about this, and she told me "just pick one, they won't leave you alone until you tell them which one is your team".  the obessions with these two teams is really amusing, especially because the affiliation seems so arbitrary, especially to a little first grader in palestine.  So of course, and i can shamelessly admit to the fact that i've never watched a match, so i dont feel any guilt or betrayal doing this, i claim real madrid around real madrid fans and barcelona around the other fans.  my homeroom class was distraught because one group was taunting the other saying that i was on their side, and the other side retaliated going NO SHE'S ON OUR SIDE! and then when both looked at me..well that was just awkard.  i tried to make them laugh by saying "hey kids I'm Real Barcelona!".  no one found it funny. 

during one of my tutoring sessions, i told my student about this, and the 15 year old appreciated the humor in the awkardness.  but then i got stuck in another sticky situation; somehow as we were all laughing about this, and by all i mean my 15 year old student, and her 12 year old sister ,the two brothers, 16 and 14 also chimed into the conversation, asking if i was real madrid or barcelona.  i took their side.  then they asked Israel or Palestine and then after that it was "Fatah or Hamas?" and then that was time to shut up.  

speaking of these rivalries, M and I had a fun time explaining the nature of college rivalries to Gabriella during our Egypt time, who just stared at us puzzled and intrigued.  Maggie told Gabriella that to me, F, the shades of the color blue hold extreme significance, which of course led me to explain to her the distinction between Carolina blue and Duke blue, and that they are very very different blues, that there is no confusing them, one is the good blue and the other is the bad blue.  Someone chimed in saying "like Israel, their flag comes in shades, and its Carolina blue" which of course drove me bonkers because the Israeli flag is DEFINITELY DUKE BLUE.  Is that weird that the duke blueness of the flag gives me strange satisfaction? its definitely defintely the bad blue. 

the end. 

(p.s. sorry to anyone that though the title of this post meant that i actually went to see a real match or that i know anything about football ;)

denied entry part II

At the end of the day, though Gabriella was deported, she is safe and sound and she is going back home.  She wasn’t tortured, she wasn’t physically hurt and she wasn’t abused.  What is jarring is not the fact that she was denied entry, but why she was denied entry.  We don’t know exactly why,  but clearly because in this part of the world she was flagged as a person, as an academic, whose presence was a threat.  Someone somewhere did not like either her opinions or involvements and she was flagged.  Someone knew that she was in Palestine, that she was pro Palestine, and quite presumably reported her to security before we even got there. They don’t shoot down internationals like they shoot down Palestinians, they simply send them back home and tell them to never come back again.

I went through a full spectrum of emotions coming back yesterday.  Egypt was a blast, and I certainly have to dedicate posts on just Egypt, but one crucial thing that I surprisingly did not anticipate feeling was feeling happy to be in a free country.  I met up with a good friend from undergrad now studying abroad at AUC and when she asked me how I liked cairo so far, my instant response was “well it feels great to be in a free country!!”.  What did I mean by that? I was taken back by my own response.  Coming back yesterday, I understood my own answer.  

My life here can be defined by movements along and across two kinds of lands : the occupied land and the occupier’s land, and I as a person am not free in any way to express myself freely in either of these spaces.  It’s tiptoeing around boundaries and lines, quite literally, that defines every move I make and every truth and lie that spills out of my mouth.  It’s an obsessive thing, because it has to be, and its engulfing.  Unfortunately.  Gabriella was the most careful out of all three of us, in terms of what she said in front of whom.  But clearly not careful enough.  Today in school after the principal of the school found out what happened, she told us as a reminder to be aware that there are spies in Ramallah and many of them are internationals themselves who come here, but with different agendas.  Not everyone is here for the same thing.  Some people do believe that Palestine as a land and Palestinians as a people should be wiped out, and internationals standing against that should be kicked out of here.

I was able to taxi hop in Cairo going from one corner of the city to the other, going from  suburban wealthy areas to narrow alley ways leading up to old mosques to cafes to bazaars, and taking a day trip to Alexandria, a 3 hour ride from Cairo, and coming back in time for dinner and bed the same day. I did all that without ever obsessing obsessively about having my passport in hand for soldiers to check, or worrying about checkpoints.  I go t to where I wanted to and needed to go, without having to worry about tear gases, shootings, demonstrations or clashes.

When the first set of settlements came to view sitting on the bus, I realized what I meant when I said, it feels great to be in a free country.  These settlements.  Settlers.  Settlers don’t exist in free countries. Sitting behind us on the bus was an AMERICAN couple talking about going to different areas of Israel, but having to pass through Palestinian villages, and saying that when they hit the Palestinian territories they’ll need to buy guns.  I have to admit how disgusted  I was to be sitting in an Israeli bus for the 7 hour ride from Eilat to Jerusalem, feeling like I was trapped by ignorance and arrogance, thinking that that ignorance and arrogance is the reason why my friend was stuck back at the border, in the middle of the Sinai, by herself, confused and crushed by what to do next and where to go next.

I couldn’t pull out of a chain of cycling thoughts spiraling in and out of two repeating thoughts of ‘what the hell am I doing here, why am I here??” to “why in the world should I not be here??” i couldn’t make up my mind if I feel disempowered being here again or if I feel more empowered then before, being lucky enough to come back to work and having a job that I absolutely love.  We came in through Qalandia.  That’s another thing.  Checkpoints certainly don’t exist in free countries. 

denied entry ( an excerpt from Spring Break)

We left in a rush after school last Wednesday, excited, pumped, and nervous.  For me it was just adrenaline shooting up and down, for many many reasons.  First of all, the last school bell marked the beginning of a much needed spring break.  I really think the teachers were much happier than the students to hear that bell ring.  The night before and the morning of, M and I had packed up all of our stuff, carefully packing each item, for our weeklong vacation to come to Egypt.  Yes it was to enjoy spring break, no doubt, but more importantly this was a visa run, as in our three month visa that we were using would expire and we needed to exit the country and hope and pray to be able to come back in again with another visa to make our stay and work here last for at least until the summer.  Under Israeli law, it is illegal for any international to stay in the occupied Palestinian territories for more than 48 hours.  Cleeeeeeearly..we’ve broken a few “rules”.

 I was experiencing adrenaline rushes, wiping out every trace of Palestine involvements for the last three months, every item that we packed up was scrutinized, our computers were completely wiped out, labels from shampoos and conditioners and chip bags and snack bags were peeled off and removed and most public things online we had to get rid of.  So this blog entitled “fahmida goes to Palestine” was down for a bit, for obvious reasons :)

It was the three of us leaving, M, myself and Gabriella ( Maggie’s friend).   Throughout the process of packing, knowing that a very probably ending to the vacation may be never seeing this house in Ramallah or being kicked out of here, I could not make up my mind if I was packing to leave leave or simply for an innocent vacation.  It was both.

Hailing a taxi in Ramallah to get to Jerusalem catch a 5 hour bus ride to the Taba border  we crossed over  with a sigh of relief after a full day of journeying with little to no problems from Israeli immigration and were greeted with a friendly “Welcome to Egypt” sign on the other side of the immigration building in the middle of nothingness in the Sinai Desert at 11pm at night.  Another extremely dodgy 9 hour bus with a sleep deprived bus driver across the Sinai followed,  leading us finally to our 12^th floor hostel room in downtown Cairo, where the three of us would stay together for the next 4 days.

The jostle of Cairo was captivating and I was exhilarated to be in the middle of a big boisterous city, wide eyed at the lineup of mannequins from top to bottom of display windows, the cabs, run down buildings, glorious mosques, bazaars and fully alert and awake at 2am in our room because of the sheer volume of the city; though I might have been trying to sleep, the city was certainly up and beating with a pulse. 

Gabriella and I spent a whole day together, gone to explore the pyramids at giza, to gape with wonder and dodge vendors trying to sell us camels and horses and dodge the heat of the sun. Up till then, Gabriella was just a friend of Maggies, and I knew this that and the other about her, but never really had the chance to actually get to know her.  She bounced around from being a girly girl to this genius academic professor from York (her actual profession) and I was intrigued by her perspectives.  It was fun spending so much time with her and laughing at silly things.  Giza followed by the pyramids at Sakkara then a fun girls night out at an Indian restaurant and followed by an even bigger treat to be swallowed within automated glass doors into a 8 story high City Stars Mall.  Our last 2 days together were spent by the beautiful Red Sea in Dahab.  Wow. Breathtaking. Gabriella and I had a blast smoking sheesha, which is not something I usually do, but it was a deal indeed to sit by the Red Sea, smoke amazing sheesha for about a dollar, hearing the beach and the sounds of the beach late into the night.  And of course, its during these outings that people you barely know start feeling like friends.  I learned more and more about Gabriella, her frustration with her extremely successful career as an academic and her choice to live in Palestine.  We were all talking about our lives and our plans, and where things go from here, and she kept on saying “my problem is that I really can’t imagine leaving Palestine.  I really can’t”.  We exchanged stories of our reaction to Jerusalem, and it felt so nice to speak to someone who feels as chaotic as I do, when I first experienced Jerusalem and when I go to Jerusalem.  She kept on saying that it breaks her heart every time to go to there, to see people not being allowed to pray or being denied basic rights in general.  Sitting down in a café looking out at the crystal waters of the Red Sea, you could see Saudi Arabia to your left.  “it breaks my heart to see and think about the fact that these people aren’t helping their own brothers and sisters”.   One thing was clear.  She really really loved Palestine, so much so that she wanted to stay for a long time, and doing that would actually jeopardize her career back in Europe. 

Last night, the three of us sat on our beds going over our stories and preparation for immigration early this morning.  All of us were set, we rehearsed questions, we rehearsed answers and a had a last magical night out in Dahab, by the sea, sitting with our 2^nd or 3^rd cup of Hibiscus tea. 

This morning, up at 5:30am, we all mechanically got ready, boarded the taxi and made our way across the Sinai again to get to the border.  The usual, I was taken aside apart from M and Gabriella to be questioned, and truly if anyone was to get screwed, it should and would have been me.  This time around, I was a Hindu Bengali American.  M got her passport back almost instantly, while Gabriella and I waited.  The three of us with our luggage sprawled out by us, standing in a nearly empty building just waited.  The wait turned into 3 hours, and we entertained ourselves with small talk and Gabriella and I got a huge thing of cappuccino to keep ourselves awake, talking about silly things, sprinkling in how we could go out to do certain things in Tel Aviv, and how lovely Tel Aviv is for certain things (there are microphones all over the buildings, and they pick up every bit of conversation, so it’s not that we had freedom to talk about whatever we wanted however we wanted, even that had to be strategized). After a long wait, I got my passport back, and I took it with a sigh of relief.  Now all we were waiting for was Gabriella’s. 

They took her in, questioned her, I couldn’t hear anything, but just watched her be taken into the room, and then asked to leave, then asked to sit for about 10 minutes and then taken back in again.  Finally she came out, looked at us and said “I’ll call you guys later on…they wont let me in”, took her bags and was forced to leave.

Stunned.  I was absolutely stunned.  Leaving with M and exiting out of the building with our luggage strapped to our back or hanging from our shoulders to face the sun and getting into the cab, I thought of weird things, like “but wait, we have your bus ticket to Jerusalem, we all got roundtrip tickets, what about your ticket” or “wait but you forgot your water bottle”.   I could not believe that second, or for the next 7 hours that three of us started this vacation and 2 of us came back. And that she was actually being deported.  Not in my wildest dreams did I think that the three of us would not come back, and not in my wildest dreams did I think that that would be my goodbye to Gabriella, someone that I was genuinely looking forward to spending more time with in Ramallah.

More to come soon…