religion - part II

I was asked to substitute a 5th grade religion class one day as I sat down for my break.  They needed a teacher to cover the class and sitting in the teacher's room, I suddenly was the most suitable person to go cover.  "what do i teach them??" I asked, and the response I got was "I don't know, you're Muslim"
So I headed down and the entire classroom was a hectic chaos and they all seemed to quiet down for a bit wondering what I was doing there when I walked in.  I started the class slowly, first asking them what they were learning, and as I was asking them I was stopped by a student who suddenly shouted out "Are you Muslim or Christian??" and when I told them I was Muslim, I kid you not, there were gasps. and then a brief silence, and THEN students shouting out random things like "SAY SURAH FATIHA!!"  or "do you hate Israel??" and then transitioning into a melody of "say Surah Fatiha, say Surah Fatiha, say Surah Fatiha" or they'd point to their books, and ask "can you read this?? READ THIS!"

The sound of the bell ringing to mark the end of that class period was magic and bliss to my ears.  I came out, again appalled at how even at that age, there is a NEED for everyone to know which box every individual around them belongs to, a religious box is absolutely necessary. And I clearly do not fit into that box.

The most intense and emotional of these experiences actually happened less than 48 hours ago.  I'm still shaken by it.  Fadi's death has naturally made me think about faith, my relationship with God, and the fragility and value of life.  My mind was flooded with these thoughts and going to the service at the Church to see Fadi's mom and pay our respects to her and Fadi, I couldn't control my tears (even though I'm not a person to really cry, it's almost unheard of to have seen me cry if you don't belong to my immediate family).  We were greeted by Fadi's uncles on our way in and on our way out they were the ones showing us out.

Small conversation with them turned into something else.  One of Fadi's uncles started on a tangent of how astonishing it is if you really dig up the history of Islam and Muslims, and he kept on repeating "you will be astonished as to what you find.  you will be astonished".  Still wiping away tears, I was intrigued and puzzled as to where in the world this was going.  his tone turned more and more sour and he made the remark "Muslims claim that they worship 1 god.  But that is not true.  They worship 2 gods".  23 years of being Muslim, this was flashing news to me, so I asked him "which 2 gods do they worship?"  He looked at me and he said "They worship "Allah" and they worship the man Mohammad".  I hadn't said anything to his strange, crude, and disrespectful remarks, but to that statement I couldn't keep quiet.  Being inside of a church, at a service for someone that had passed away, I wasn't in the emotional state to even have the energy to feel outraged.  I simply told him "That's not true, Mohammad is a Prophet, not a god'. he looked at me for a brief second puzzled by why I would say that, and Maggie intervened to say "She's Muslim".  and there it was.  Both of the uncles who were there subtly making remarks about how stupid Islam was, immediately ganged up on me.  For a brief period of time both of them were asking awful things simultaneously, one asking "Who WAS Mohammed? why do you love him? Why is a he prophet?" and the other one asking "Why do you call him Mohammed? do you know what that means? that means the most praised, why do you praise Mohammed? why is HE the most praised and not Lord?"

I was in shock.  I just could not believe it.  But it didn't stop, they kept on going and going, saying awful things, each of which felt like a stab at the heart.  "Why do you read the Quran in Arabic? Do you understand Arabic?" to "do you know that Arabic translated into anything else doesnt mean the same thing anymore? Do you know that 90 percent of everything written in the Quran was stolen from us and the book of the Jews?"

there were many things that I could have said (for instance asking about the authenticity of the Bible, or asking the simple question of if the title of "most praised" bothers him, how does believing that God had a "son" not bother him), but all i could think was "I am here for your dead nephew, is this really the right time and place to be telling me how awful you think my religion is"
The cherry on top, was one of the uncles looking me in the eye to tell me "if you really want to know the truth, you must know Jesus Christ"
Being mindful that this was a service, that i was in a church, and that I couldnt take them anymore AND knowing that they wouldn't stop, I literally (and it was probably rude) walked away from them saying "I am here for your nephew Fadi, and I really need to go".

Suddenly there was an onpour of tears that came gushing out feeling so stripped and isolated from any spiritual comfort.  M needed to go inside the bigger church and I followed her inside, now crying inside of the church.  On our way out, Fadi's uncle was driving out.  He reversed his car seeing me, rolled down his window, and apologized.  I told him that it was fine, and that he was forgiven.  My roommate, being in such an awfully sticky position, replied, "well at least he apologized".
at least he apologized?? no he probably apologized because he's sorry that I haven't been saved by Jesus Christ.

I am just utterly shocked that truly, truly  people are blind and incapable of seeing each other as human beings sometimes.  I know that Fadi's uncles are loonies and nutcases, just like the thousands of crazy loonies and nutcases that exist in Islam or any other religion.  I don't see this encounter as something I would hold against Christianity, it would be foolish and dumb of me to think that way.  And I am not naive enough to think that that kind of insensitivity, hatred, and blindness doesnt exist  in the minds of people of my own faith.  What disturbs me most is to really see, feel and face the extent of hatred that exists, solely religious hatred.

When I walk in Jerusalem, and I see orthodox Jewish men and women dressed head to toe, fully garbed, I think to myself, how are you ANY different from really conservative Muslims? Seriously, you're just wearing a different style of clothes.  But the mental cage of thinking that you are the rightly chosen rightly guided all else are hell bound, is exactly the same. Seriously, crazy religious people, they just have different religions, but they are all the same people, almost like a reflection of each other.

Nothing like a nutcase to get you thinking.

The following images is to make you laugh if you think it's as funny as I think it is.  People are really silly if they see more differences than similarities.  These slight, sliiiiiiight differences somehow make it absolutely ok to hate one another, and fight like animals, killing each other over stupid things.  Honestly sometimes I wonder, as humans we pride ourselves in having the size of the brain that we have, our mind, and our conscience, and that we are above primitive animals.
Yet, if you think about it, there's no breed of primitive animals that brutally kill their own kind, their own species, unless needed for absolute survival.  But we humans, albeit having a conscience not only participate in brutality that animals would never think of doing to their own species, but more often than not we sit silently to condone it.

Here's the kick...this violence is at its worst with very little hope for ever attaining co-existence and peace in a piece of land called the "Holy Land"

                                    display 1.1 : muslim woman wearing a headscarf

         

                                     display 1.2 : a jewish woman wearing a headscarf

Display 2.1 : Orthodox Jewish men

Display 2.2 : Muslim Man

Display "important to notice".1 - Christian child praying

Display "important to notice".2 - muslim children praying

Display "important to notice".3  : jewish child praying

It's not that I think about only these 3 religions at conflict and that I feel only these 3 are the most important.  But in the context of where I am right now and what I'm seeing, these 3 are at it (although the Christians are more neutral than anything else, comparatively, in the whole scheme of things here)

religion - part I

when i was preparing to come to palestine, i sought out advice from friends and friends of friends who had been here before to get as precise of a picture as possible in terms of what i should anticipate when i'm questioned by the IDF at the border.  they all unanimously told me that telling them that i was Muslim would be a bad idea.  especially since my passport clearly says that I'm from Bangladesh.  given the circumstances, i needed to have a story, and being Muslim, even having heard of a Palestine, being socially aware in any way, being nothing but an Israeli loving dumb American tourist couldn't be a part of it.  I was even told to not bring a copy of the Quran, nor a prayer rug or any other symbolic item.

Naturally, I had to contemplate about this, a lot.  Practicality versus morality.  To say the least the mental tug of war was extremely difficult for me.

I made up my mind.  I needed to get into Palestine.  There couldn't be anything more pointless than telling IDF the truth, I'd get sent back to the US, back to square 1, and what good would that do? I wouldn't be able to do anything.  I wanted to be in Palestine, I wanted to work here, I wanted to be socially active for something that I believed in, and I did not want to let it slip from my hands because of political bullshit.  I prayed a lot, and I hope that at the end of the day God forgives me for the lies, and sees my intention inshAllah.

So it began.  I was Christian, as were my parents, I was going to Israel, I didn't even know what the Palestinian territories were and I loved Israel.  Did I mention that I love Israel? Because I really love Israel.

After 3 and a half hours of waiting, being interrogated, sitting around, being interrogated again, waiting, we got in.  Thankfully, they didn't check my suitcase that did have my prayer rug and my copy of the Qur'an in it.

Working in a Catholic school, my company has been predominantly Christian, although there are many Muslim teachers and Muslim students.  It's very hard to tell who's who though.  The way that others found out that I actually wasn't Christian, was when they'd invite me over for dinner and wine, and I'd have to reply with "sure! I'd love to come over.  but I don't drink wine".  They'd look at me in surprise and ask "why not???"  and I'd have to say with a chuckle "Because I'm Muslim."      ... "oh!":: awkward transition:: "well we'll have Sprite instead!"

As wonderful as it's been to be embraced without any judgement (though I'm definitely considered Bangladeshi at school and not American because I'm brown, and Maggie is definitely the American teacher) for the past couple of months I've felt like an outsider in my community and stuck in a strange limbo of neither belonging here nor there.  I'm so used to having a Muslim community around me that is receptive, and I'm so used to be able to go to the Mosque to pray that suddenly being stripped from that IN a Muslim country has caused mental discomfort and strife.

Earlier this year, before the Israeli govt took the Palestinian side of the Ibrahimi mosque, M and I had gone to Hebron to see it.  At the checkpoint, we were let through under the pretext of both of us being Christian.  When I went inside the mosque, a friendly looking man approached us offering to show us around, anticipating that I was Muslim, and when I told him that I wasn't (not wanting to change the story from what I told the guards), he basically treated us like shit the entire time we were there.  It was jarring for him to treat us the way he did thinking that I was something that I was not, and it was jarring to think that his treatment would be so different had he known that I was really Muslim.

Are people really incapable of seeing each other as human beings?

Rest in Peace Fadi, you will be remembered always

it never quite makes sense anytime death gets so close to you in proximity.  i've never been one to be able to deal with death well and this time around isn't any kind of an exception. i'm really appreciative of friends who have sent messages, it really does mean a lot.

the student that passed away had a disorder that made his body age a lot faster than his actual age (unbelievably, extremely extremely rare disease), so at age 14 he looked like a hunched over, slow and weak 10 year old, needing assistance with nearly everything he did. not only were his motor skills declining, but his eye sight as well. he was nearly blind.  so at age 14, his body was actually 70 years old.

his mother is a co-worker, and his brother is a student of mine in the 3rd grade.  his mother had invited me over to their house a little while after i had arrived, an invitation and an afternoon that i won't forget.  his brother Jack, is one of the brightest students that i have. they had prepared a really special lunch (that must have taken hours to prepare) and they welcomed me into their home with affectionate hospitality.  after enjoying the delicious lunch, the kids brought out their photo albums and showed me all their family pictures, some of which made Jack and his siblings giggle and others that left them embarrassed.

Fadi came out of his room, and I thought "o that's Jack's brother! they look alike! that totally makes sense".  Looking through the family photos i had been wondering who it was next to Jack that looked just like Jack, and as I looked at Fadi, I thought, oh my gosh it's him. but why does he look so different now?  I was uncertain of what his condition was and completely aware that its not appropriate to ask his mom.  I spent the entire afternoon after lunch playing with the kids, Jack played his Oud for me and his sister played the violin.  I was trying to make Fadi laugh so we were playing around with this giant beach ball and then after that we played board games for hours.

Rest in Peace Fadi

Inna Lillahi Wa Inna Ilayhi Rajiun

At school Fadi was always tended by his mother, constantly.  she preferred that he be at home, but he reeally wanted to be in school, and he was in school up until last week.   he was tenderly taken care of by the other students as well, they weren't their usual crazy selves around him (which says a lot).

no mother should ever have to see their child die.  i can't imagine any other kind of pain that is worse.

being far away from home, of course this makes me think of my own family.  it makes me realize the mortality of everyone around me and myself, how fragile life can be, and how little time we have to do as much good as possible.

mourning the death of a student...

inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi rajiun..

friday afternoons and green almonds

every day after school i'd walk home and stop at the grocery store on the way to buy at least one pomegranate.  pomegranates always make me think of my childhood in iran and i re-discovered how i loved them so much and after discovering how awesome it felt to pick one up from a freshly delivered stack at the market, pay so little for it, and come home to sit in our garden, slice it in half, flip the skin backwards to have the seeds fall out like loose teeth (weird analogy i know), sprinkle a little bit of sugar and lemon juice over it, i made this lovely activity a relaxing a routine.

until one day when i went to the store and there were no more pomegranates.  i circled the store about 3 times thinking maybe it was in some new location or something, but no no, there were absolutely no pomegranates.  i felt so cheated and i came home complaining to maggie and being like where in the world did the pomegranates in ramallah go? and she goes, o they're probably out for the season, there'll be giant fresh strawberries soon.

seasons! so used to plastic cellophane wrapped tightly over disposable trays filled with pre-picked amount of fruit in the produce section of chain stores, i completely forgot that in the natural order of things, FRUITS come in SEASONS!  and the pomegranate season sadly is gone :(

however.  there's new things to look forward to.  like the green almonds that have freshly grown into different sizes in our garden.  a month ago, the tree was bare, naked from leaves but dressed in cute miniature white flowers.  the tree shed itself from the flowers and then flourished into a green explosion and now there's these fuzzy coated green fruits, almonds, that have grown that you can pick and pop in your mouth.  they're chewy, tart, with a slightly bitter aftertaste sometimes. somehow they're a familiar taste.


friday afternoons are always pleasant, especially on a day like this with the sun beating down.  and the sun beating down is good for 2 reasons.  one is that it's the perfect day to do laundry, clothes hung outside will actually dry before you go to bed.  and 2 because the sun makes me extremely happy.  on friday afternoons i love hearing the sound outside, which is usually filled with clinks and clanks of the neighbors and the city.  stores, schools and offices are pretty much closed, so everyone is home, taking care of the chores that need to be tended too.  as i hang out my wet clothes to dry, i see my neighbor doing the same, and she gives me a smile and a nod of acknowledgement.

after that i can sit outside on the small dining table that we've shifted outside, skim through a book, and pluck off the green almonds, enjoy the sun and think about nothing.

...except for all the grading that i have to do before school because turns out all of the grades needed to be turned in on thursday, another memo i didnt get because it was posted in arabic in the teacher's room.

"this wall, does this limit the foundation of the human mind?"

one of the first things that i remember hitting me like a ton of bricks was a comment that a co-worker made maybe on my 3rd day of work.  we were just sitting in the teacher's room, and i was asking her if the students are rowdy and wild in all of their classes, or if it's just something that i have to break into because i'm a new teacher.  she said something really interesting. she told me to think of palestine as an entity :  really broken, really chaotic, with scattered pieces that are constantly pulled at and torn.  that's how every kid is inside.  she replied with a chuckle saying that, yes its not just your class, the kids are pretty bad in all of their classes. they feel trapped, they feel stuck, and they feel the need to lash out and school is sometimes their only getaway.

i think that was a defining point when i started to really look at the context of where i was and what i was doing differently, trying to conceive the bigger picture and putting effort into not regarding every day as going in and out of classrooms to deal with a bunch of 8 and 9 year olds. That was the first stepping stone and it kept on building after that.  i might have mentioned this before but my first month of teaching was dealing with a lot of pissed off parents.  and as trying as it was to sit and listen to an hour of angry arabic after an exhausting day at school and then spend another hour translating everything and trying to convey my concerns in english, it was through those interactions that i began to get glimpses of my students' families.  one concerned mom came who i later found out was blind in one eye because she had been shot in the face by an israeli sniper. i learned that my 'bad' classes were really bad because there were about 10 to 15 students with extreme learning disabilities and the special ed teacher in the school only had one simplified diagnosis for all of them (without ever really interacting with them).

coming back from tel aviv and jerusalem on the bus to cross over the checkpoint to get into ramallah, i started noticing how the road gets narrower and narrower, more and more broken.  at first i couldnt figure out why my eyes were bouncing around like ping pong balls walking around tel aviv and jerusalem.  its because every building didn't look the same! there were skyscrapers! there's no sky scrapers in ramallah and every building here looks the same, the same color, the same layout, just maybe different sizes. there were highways! like american highways! there were STREET SIGNS! there are no street signs in ramallah; everyone knows where everything is through landmarks.  so if you ever asked for my address, i live on the way to Tira (a well known neighborhood) and across from  Pizza Express, and that's as precise of an address i could give you. for friends and family that have wanted to send care packages, lol, i've had to tell them that i dont really have an address.  The cafes, boutiques, shops, stores, skyscrapers, slowly shrink and degrade as you make your way over to Palestine into smaller shops, open bazaars, lots of small mini marts.  you start seeing more of the terrain, because highways have not been built over it.

you start seeing the wall.  THE wall.

and even though i've seen the graffitti on the wall a lot of times, i noticed a new spray painted message from the window of my bus.  it said "this wall, does this limit the foundation of the human mind?"

thinking about how my american passport actually allows me to cross over from one side to the other, and most people here are trapped, thousands are having or had their homes demolished, and thinking about how mind fuckingly strange it is to go from a first world country and then end up in a third world country 8 miles down the road, that question lingered in my mind for a long time.  and then i think about my students, whom i love so much, and the underlying reasons behind why they are struggling...is because the trapped feeling, the occupation, the Intifada that ended a few years back (curfews where people could not leave their house literally for months or they'd got shot or run down by tanks), left the kids intellectually crippled.  the parents as well.  not my sentiments.  i dont think i'm in any position to say this, my american self tells me that i wont ever understand because i didnt grow up here and inshAllah I'll be able to leave this place when I want (an option that the majority of the people here dont have)  but the principal of my school would sit me down to talk to me about this, to explain what i'm dealing with.  'the kids dont know how to think, the teachers are not challenging them, the parents are thankful that their kids are alive, so they let their kids get away with everything, for the parents its ok for the kids to get into 'little' fights or 'play a little'.  'we have to fix the education' she says.  and i think thats what gives me so much internal strength.  knowing that without education there's nothing.

so yeah..the wall, every slab of it, is limiting the foundation of the human mind.

Conversations with a "lost boy" from Sudan

i remember when i first heard about gabriel.  "is it ok if my friend gabriel comes and stays with us? he's homeless right now". my rommate asked me and all i could think was ‘sure as long he stays in your room and not mine’. 

every day for 2 weeks there'd be a call from gabriel and he'd say that he's coming to ramallah to stay with us becuase he was just kicked out of his apartment in Jerusalem.  Obviously i was very curious about this person who just never showed up even though he was homeless.  the situation seemed urgent enough and i sort of just dismissed him as a really wishy washy person.  

"i figured you wouldn't mind him staying with us or that you wouldnt mind giving him a place to stay knowing that he was a child soldier, a slave, his entire family was murdered and is currently a refugee right now with no legal status".  this is how i started to know more and more about gabriel through M, who told me about her epxerience workign with the sudanese refugee community in israel where she would go every weekend to visit and volunteer.  She’d teach them English in small crammed rooms or help them with general things, like life advice.

as silly as this sounds, learning about him through maggie, he just became a character in my head, almost like a mythical creature, like some friend of my roommate that i would never acually get to meet .  A friend of my roommate who had a history that I couldn’t really fathom and  more unbelievable was the fact that  a person with a story like his is someone that my roommate knew so closely.

i learned that gabriel comes from an extremely important family and he is known in the southern sudanese community very well, and known because he comes from an extremely important political family  who were all killed.  I was told that it’s kind of like if Chelsea Clinton ever became an orphan.  Well thats who Gabriel is.  

my curiousity kept on building and building.  supposedly he could never keep a job, and he'd keep on getting kick out of his house.  i couldnt draw a mental picture of this person.  on one hand i had this image of a really sullen, serious, hard stricken person who carries with him a life long saga of trauma, on another hand I thought maybe he's like emmanuel jal an inspiration upon first encounter (in whatever form that may be),  or was he just some dude that was a  total flake? 

M and i needed to go to jerusalem.  gabriel gave us his place to stay.  ironic huh? maggie's constant mantra of "gabriel you need to get a job and keep it" had done some good and a month and a half later he was working 14 hour days, had a place to stay and was giving the two of US a place to stay.  

he welcomed us into his one room studio home.  a really really small place, but just enough space for one person.  i didnt mind at all, especially since it was so warm inside and i was concerned that maybe we’d have to freeze the night. it was just a bed in the room, and along the sides of the wall neatly lined up were his fridge, his stove and a sink and an oven.  inside his small bathroom he had his washer and dryer and his shower.  

what surprised me most about meeting him finally was his general demeanor of kindness and warmth.  It’s a kind of kindness that’s very rare. My interaction with him wasn’t long, only an hour or so after we got to his place.  Then he left to spend the night elsewhere and gave us his home and returned when we were awake at 6:30am the next morning.

Through  short conversations with him I learned about his disdain that so many people dismiss what is happening in southern Sudan, preoccupied with Darfur (which struck a chord, since UNC is all over Darfur awareness, how did southern sudan never come up?). I learned about his disdain about Egypt and learned about him getting arrested in Egypt 7 times.  Talking about these officers is when he said “I really think there are no good people in the world”.  He talked about Sudanese refugees just getting shot by the Egyptian officers after they’d been cleared to get into Israel as refugees.  He tells me that over 2,000 had been shot like this, among which were his friends.

There was an air of awe inspiring jaw dropping amazement after Emmanuel Jal had come to UNC last year and had done his show in Memorial Hall.  Everyone that was in that giant hall was captivated and speechless after hearing Emmanuel Jal speak and after hearing him sing.  His rawness and candid account of just his life was something that I don’t think any of us had ever seen.

When I mention this to Gabriel, he says “O Emmanuel! I just talked to him a few weeks ago, he’s doing well” Gabriel is doing his own thing, speaking in different churches, to different audiences, telling his story because he thinks that the story must be heard.  On his shelf I saw a stack of dvds with his face on it.  he made his own documentary about his experience and his story.

“but people just forget”.  “when you talk to them they gave you their full attention and they give you sympathy, and as soon as you walk away, they forget”

what's our responsibility about these awful awful things happening in the world? sometimes i wonder if we just take these pieces of news as entertainment. 

gabriel's story struck me because i realized how easy it is for everyone to separate themselves from problems that's not theirs.  child soldiering, slavery, war, displacement, living under an occupation..if your life has never been infiltrated by any of these things it's easy for the mind and the brain to separate it as something that happens to other people.  Why would you ever want to make it a part of yours in any  way shape or form if you didn’t have to? It’s nice for it to be left alone as  a thought provoking story, or a piece of news to watch, a lecture to attend or a show to enjoy. I’m not really sure what we do after that.  What can we do after that?

  

having a conversation, being in his home, or seeing him as a person, i realized how “ordinary” of a person he was with such an extra ordinary and unbelievable life.  It cracked me up when the only way he described Israeli girls at the clubs was by saying “oh my God, they are CRAZY! The cuter they are, the CRAZIER they are” and him explaining how dating them is so difficult because they cause the break up and then the get crazier after you break up.

He’s been in Israel for 3 years and his stay here is temporary.  he says he's understanding the Israeli mentality,  i can't figure out if he really loves where he is or if he doesnt, he seems to carry a lot of love for the place but then he talks about never looking the corner store shop ownerin the face when he is paying for his things.  "i want him to ask me one day why i dont look at him in the face and why i turn away when i pay for my things" he told me, “it's just the way that they look at you.  i stood in line but 15, 20 people went in front of me because the shop owner just ignored that I was standing there”.

He kept on saying that at 27 he was really old and that he needs to get married.  It may be a non chalant comment to make for a young person but it hits on a lot of issues.  For a refugee, there isn’t a sight of a place where he can feel ‘settled’ and there’s a bigger question of who he should and can marry.  He kept on saying “ I really want to get married but I’m not in Sudan”

Before coming here, I had worked with incoming refugee mothers in the Raleigh/Durham area.  I’m not in any way trying to clump refugees of different backgrounds and circumstances into one box, but the little interaction that I’ve had with them makes me reflect on so much about things that I can’t separate from mentally that feeds into my sense of stability and foundation as a person..like having parents, my family, knowing that there is security where I live and that I can pursue a higher education,  and I can inshAllah one day have a family of my own and practice my religion and raise my kids, and even though there is uncertaintly and moments of instability, these foundations are still grounded.  And how I think of these things as a bare minimum for a good life. But  then after experiences like this I realize to some people these are unrealistic luxuries. 

from ramallah to jerusalem to tel aviv and back in one day

There were just so many cute little cafes and boutiques lining the street! Every block was lined up with restaurants and cafes, and the weather being as nice as it was, people were sitting outside, enjoying their meals, sandwiches, coffees or snacks, reading something, tending to their kids or company and just chilling.  It surprised me to see women wearing shorts, tanktops and summer skirts.  Neither in Jerusalem nor in Ramallah (of course) would I ever see that. But I guess I was in tel aviv so things were a bit different.

M and i got to tel aviv after a series of buses.  We woke up Sunday morning and headed towards the bus stop around 7am to catch the bus from Gabriel’s house to the central bus station.  The central bus station in tel aviv was so freakin confusing to navigate. I hear it’s the biggest bus station in the world.  Our destination was the Egyptian embassy and to figure out how to get there or which bus to take at least, we went up to the information desk lady who told us that our bus would be across the street next to a cellphone place. 

Not entirely sure of when to get off of the bus, we realized we got to our  destination in tel aviv when we saw the side of the building with paintings of Egyptian mummies on it. 

The first sleaze bag that I’ve encountered as well as the first gyp that I’ve encountered so far  : the guy behind the window at the embassy.

The process wasn’t long but I am currently dealing with passport separation anxiety as I wont be seeing that little booklet until next week.

We strolled through the city knowing that we had the day to ourselves! And we were already in the city, the weather was gorgeous, so it was perfect to take advantage of the opportunity. We just walked in every which random direction just exploring the city, window shopping (which was fun until you realized that you don’t have money to spend on cute dresses).  When we’d get hungry we’d sit at a café to pull out a book, or a journal or just to chat a bit.  It was a fantastic afternoon and because I haven’t really gone anywhere in the past month, being so freakin broke and being  penniless (shekel less I should say rather), this weekend was definitely a treat.  And it was also M’s one year anniversary of being here in the holy land. 

We celebrated with sushi (which felt heavenly) and nice little sweet treats.  Seeing the beach was also beautiful, seeing the coasts of the Mediterranean, which runs alongside tel aviv. It was peaceful. 

We took another bus to get to Jaffa.  An old fort from the Ottoman empire turned into a walking museum it felt like with the fort still in tact.  Shops were built inside the fort  and walking around, there was no clearly lain out path,  which made it so amazingly cool.  I’ve definitely coined it as one of the coolest places I’ve seen.  Jaffa, noted.  

Knowing that getting back home would be a time consuming ordeal, we started our trek back around 5pm. And I think we got home around 9:30pm.  This is without having to worry about checkpoints, because you don’t  get stopped when you are coming back to Ramallah.  Tel aviv is only 37 miles away from Ramallah.   

picture day and a feast

one of the best things about working in a foreign country in a foreign school where you don't speak the language is always being in a for a surprise when you show up to work.

like today.  no wonder everyone looked so freakin nice today.  i missed the memo on the teacher's bulletin board that said it was picture day.  since all of the memos to the teachers are always written in arabic.

the school days here go from Monday to Wednesday then you get Friday off (the Muslims are happy) and then you go to school on Saturday and then you have Sunday off (the Christians are  happy).   Because of this abrupt break,  in the beginning I remember feeling so happy that the week was shortened and I'd get Friday off.   ...but then came the dreadful Saturday morning when I'd have to peel myself off of bed to show up to work.  I never know if getting Friday and Sunday off, but having to work Saturday is really like a "3 day weekend" (sort of) or if it's really no weekend at all.  Either way, Saturdays are rough for me because I'm still adjusting to consider it a regular 8-3 work day.

so on this rough saturday morning like every morning i was running late to work and i showed up to see everyone looking extra spiffy and nice.  i kind of dismissed it as maybe everyone's having a fabulous saturday morning? lol and then i was notified during my break that i should go see the photographer.  things made more sense then.

afterwards, as i was preparing the homework for the week, a student came upstairs looking for me and called me out of the room to tell me stuff that i was not understanding.  she kept on pointing outside and i realized maybe she's trying to tell me that I have break duty today? I'm supposed to stand outside during the kid's break and make sure that things are relatively in order.  I always forget when my duty days are.  So i followed her out.  but then she ended up taking me to the auditorium (before today i had no idea that we even had one) and i saw rows of long tables, with students literally feasting on a really lovely luncheon. rolls of bread and trays of freshly cut tomatoes and cucumbers, with hummus plates on the side as well as falafel plates on the side.  "what's this??" i asked, but she didnt say anything, she just told me to eat.

wont' ever complain about free food. it was delicious.  M and i were there, and she cleverly figured out that maybe this is a special lunch organized by the religion class.  Ustadh Ziyad, the Muslim religion teacher and Sister ( I can't remember her name) organized this apparently.  Usually when the kids have their religion class, they separate into their respective religions and go to their classes, the Muslims in one class and the Christians in another.  I guess this lovely arrangement was made to have the kids eat together, and I heard later on that both teachers had prayed together before starting the meal.

always nice to have a little spurts of surprises sprinkle your day to make it more interesting :)
predictability is so overrated.

finally blogging, i promise i'll get better

anger is a huge problem at school.  it's perpetual, its habitual and it permeates each and every classroom, corridor and building at our school ; students struggle to escape from its bind not knowing how to handle their anger and teachers struggle day in and day out, exhausting themselves mentally and physically, not knowing how to handle the students.  every day is the same. i dont know how many times a day i hear "teacher he hit me!" "but he hit me" "he hit me!" "teacher she hit me!" ..or my favorite (except not really) "TEACHER HE KILL ME!".  i never know if i should stop the fight first or explain first that the word is not "kill" but "hurt", "no basil, he didnt KILL you, say that he "hurt" you!"  "oh ok.  but teacher he KILL me!".   those two words  (hit and kill) seem to be the only two expressions they know to use when you ask them why in the world they are pounding someone else.. either its because they were 'hit' first or better yet because someone 'kill' them.

seeing when i wrote on this blog last is making me realize that it's been almost two complete months that I've been in ramallah.  i am clearly way way behind on this blog and i couldn't recap every significant/insignificant thing that has happened that's made this experience so far what it is.  it almost feels entirely too overwhelming if i try to recap more than the last 8 hours actually.

every day has been an adventure, as cliche as that sounds.  when i got here i had absolutely no idea what i was getting into, i had never taught before, i've never been to this part of the world before, i didnt even know the name of the school where i'd be working, who i'd be teaching, or who i was really working with.  if i sit to think about every other kind of "leadership" experience i've had or any other job that i've had, the idea of an 'orientation', or a guide or a manual or a training program seems ludicrously luxurious.  i'd been wanting to come to ramallah for so long that up until 24 hours before boarding the plane, my biggest concern was simply getting here.  i remember at jfk when i finally was walking over to my gate at 10pm, half paying attention half not because i was on the phone, i saw someone that was looking at me with the same curiosity that i was looking at them with  .."do i know you?"  and then she was like "o hey!".  lol it was my one and only contact and my bridge to coming here : M.  the last time i had seen her was 3 years ago on franklin street working at kidzu museum.  and now i was about to board the same flight with her to fly to Jordan.  weird how life works.  would have never thought the last time i was signing in for my volunteering shift at kidzu to clean up the mess in the museum that i'd be living with the front receptionist lady 3 years later. in palestine.

sitting across from her in the plane, i remember thinking "fuck".  "now that i am actually on the plane going to my destination i have to actually think about why I'm going there. about my job"  i thought to myself "wow i have like 27 hours to figure out this teaching thing!".  one of the first things that M told me that i was so puzzled by was "ok so your first day is on the 9th, two days from now, so we can figure out how to do the first day.  between rania and i (rania is the principal) we feel that we can prepare you".  she has teosl experience and i've been teaching for 14 years, we can prepare you.  all i had in response was a nervous laughter, hoping and praying that she was right.

it was surreal to pull up to our apartment the first night, surreal to go to school the first day to face my classes and surreal to come out of the first week alive.   M kept on reassuring me that the first month of teaching is always the hardest, and boy o boy was it tough.  this is the point when i lose words as to how to start describing the events day in day out.  i got my schedule and every day i rotate between 4A and 4B, 3A and 3B.  i quickly learned their personalities.  i put a little note next to the boxes on my schedule that said "hell" next to 4A and 3B.   I had wondered why M and every other teacher that I had spoken to reiterated that you really really have to show a mean face the first day, you just have to be a downright hardass, and i was even told to just glare, and warned not to smile.  my naive mind at that time had thought "aw but they are like 8! why would i not smile! they are SO cute!".

hell no.

i understood.  i understood why you can't smile.  i dont think i smiled in any of my classes for the first month.  every day, i struggled, frustrated and exhausted not knowing how the hell i'm supposed to teach ANYTHING if i am just breaking up fights, physically dragging kids to the principal's office, or yelling at kids to get down from windows, to stop walking on the desks, to stop throwing their pencils, sharpeners, erasers, hats and scarves at each other, or to simply to stop shouting at the top of their lungs, or to stop squeaking, or beating their desks or each other.  my voice was gone almost every day after school and i felt as if my voice was always drowned out by the commotion.  i was told almost with a chuckle when i was coming up with classroom rules, that i shouldnt touch the topic of 'respect' because it's not something that the kids will comprehend.  I didnt know what that was supposed to mean, what do you mean they dont understand this concept?  i quickly realized that yes..it's not something they  get.  after a couple of weeks i remember thinking, wait why am i accepting that respect is not understood?? shouldn't we do something to change that? after all we were brought in as international hires to help make and implement many many changes in the school.  ... maybe we can start here .with respect.

how do you explain 'respect' to 3rd and 4th graders who have never practiced it, at least not with their teachers? there's fear from the teachers that beat them yes, but respecting each other is not something that they do, nor is respecting the adults in their lives.

2 months later, i almost can't believe how attached i feel to the school and the students.  yes they drive me crazy, some of the crazies at school (non students) and the students who at times i think are rotten to the core, make me so angry sometimes,  but i can't believe how much i love them.  i'm learning more from them then they will ever learn from me.

 i wish i could get to know each and every one of my students individually. when i started, the classroom felt like a giant blob, and each day was a battle.  it's taken some time to figure out each kid, and i think thats what i was doing the first month, just learning about each kid.  how there's kids in my class that are close to fluent in english to others in the same section of the same grade that don't know the alphabet.

it's been a process to try to assess their actual capabilities and knowledge rather than look at them like numbers (on paper they are all A students, even the ones that dont know how to spell "me"). parents in the beginnign were just downright pissed off not understanding how i was teaching or why their kid was getting into trouble.  and i was an easy scapegoat for some to blame all of their problems on.  that was fun.


2 days ago a student actually bit me when i was trying to break up a vicious fight.  a couple of days before that a student had stabbed another student with his pencil.  like i said before, anger is an issue. a huge issue at the school.

M struck an interesting chord today saying that 'wait the kids have no idea how else to express themselves" they get angry and all they know is violence.  they fight viciously about the silliest of things, but they will fight nontheless because doing nothing simply means 'defeat'.  the kid that bit me, his punishment has been to sit out of recess for a week.  i've been sitting with him one on one to talk to him about his behavior in class, why it's bad and what he should do,etc but today he sat with maggie and a lightbulb went off in his head when maggie said "there's other things you can do when you get mad".

talking with the social worker at school, some of the other teachers and the principal, maybe this is something that we can actually put an initiative towards.  teaching kids that its OK to be angry but not ok to be violent.  baby steps towards something.  talking to kids about handling their emotions might not work magic overnight, but if it stops a couple of fights a day..that's still something.

i'm almost thinking i'm happy that this kid bit me, it drove a couple of teachers to pay more attention to this anger problem.