Thursday, November 15, 2012
For those of you watching the news and worrying...
Everything is fine here in Nablus. The West Bank and Gaza are separated by Israel and are run by two separate governments, which are treated and regarded separately by Israel and by the world at large. Life is here just going on as usual. In fact, irony of all ironies, today is actually Palestinian Independence Day (despite the obvious lack of an independent Palestinian state). And for those of you not watching the news, for whom this post makes no sense, read this.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Sponsor a Child
Looking for a way to help Palestine this holiday season? For just $50 per month, you can help Tomorrow's Youth Organization provide a child from impoverished areas in Nablus and surrounding refugee camps with quality education and healthy meals! Click on the link below to learn more: http://www.tomorrowsyouth.org/
Friday, November 9, 2012
"At night, when the sky is full of stars and the sea is still you get the wonderful sensation that you are floating in space." - Natalie Wood
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| The Dead Sea is the lowest point on earth, making this bar the lowest bar on earth. |
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| Covered head to toe in Dead Sea mud. |
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| Floating and reading the newspaper in the Dead Sea. Would have worked better if it wasn't so windy. |
Thursday, November 8, 2012
"You measure a democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists." -Abbie Hoffman
This was the second election night I've gotten to watch from the eyes of the Middle East.
Four years ago, tears were shed, all-night parties were held, horns were honking in the streets, and random people were approaching us in the streets yelling "MABROUK OBAMA" (Congratulations). The tone of this week's elections was considerably more subdued, though still overwhelmingly in favor of Obama. There were no tears of joy shed and nobody danced. People here have lost their sense of hope that Obama will make a chance in US policy toward Israel or Palestine, but there were offers of "mabrouk" within the center where I work, even accompanied in some cases with leftover Eid cookies. Four years ago, people around the world were full of hope. This year, we're all just looking for some stability and a little forward momentum.
Elections provided the opportunity to think back to election night in Tunisia four years ago, and look at how much my world has changed. Four years ago, I barely spoke a word of Arabic. I was in college with little idea of the career I wanted. Four years ago I was living under a dictatorship that fell in early 2011 to popular protests that swept across the region I have come to love. Four years ago, the only leaders the US had ever known had been overwhelmingly a group with whom I don't identify-- rich white men. Four years ago, I walked into my host family's house after an all-night party at the embassy watching the election results come in to be greeted with a giant hug from my host brother who said over and over "I never thought America would do it. I never thought they'd elect a black man", to which I couldn't help but agree, "I wasn't so sure we could either".
Today, white Americans are no longer the majority. The face of America is changing, and it's coming to look a lot more like the one I identify with and recognize as my America. It is overwhelmingly a little younger, a little darker in skin tone, a little bit more gay-friendly. This year, we elected our first Hindu senator in the state of Hawaii. The first gay senator in Wisconsin. This year we have the highest number of women elected to senate ever. And we still have a black (or at least non-white) president, and the first president to openly endorse gay marriage. Americans took to polls to legalize gay marriage in Maine and Maryland, and Minnesota became the first state to shoot down a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. We may even get a 51st state. Four years ago, I was hopeful about the direction my country was headed in, and I was met mostly with high unemployment rates and frustration.
Today, I'm still frustrated with my country and our policies on many issues, and experiencing this election year in Palestine has only thrown those frustrations into even sharper relief. But today I'm also proud of my country, because I think for the first time since I've been eligible to vote, I can say with certainty that despite everything, I am confident that my country is going in the right direction, even if much more slowly than I would like. Now if only we could get Michele Bachmann out of office...
Four years ago, tears were shed, all-night parties were held, horns were honking in the streets, and random people were approaching us in the streets yelling "MABROUK OBAMA" (Congratulations). The tone of this week's elections was considerably more subdued, though still overwhelmingly in favor of Obama. There were no tears of joy shed and nobody danced. People here have lost their sense of hope that Obama will make a chance in US policy toward Israel or Palestine, but there were offers of "mabrouk" within the center where I work, even accompanied in some cases with leftover Eid cookies. Four years ago, people around the world were full of hope. This year, we're all just looking for some stability and a little forward momentum.
Elections provided the opportunity to think back to election night in Tunisia four years ago, and look at how much my world has changed. Four years ago, I barely spoke a word of Arabic. I was in college with little idea of the career I wanted. Four years ago I was living under a dictatorship that fell in early 2011 to popular protests that swept across the region I have come to love. Four years ago, the only leaders the US had ever known had been overwhelmingly a group with whom I don't identify-- rich white men. Four years ago, I walked into my host family's house after an all-night party at the embassy watching the election results come in to be greeted with a giant hug from my host brother who said over and over "I never thought America would do it. I never thought they'd elect a black man", to which I couldn't help but agree, "I wasn't so sure we could either".
Today, white Americans are no longer the majority. The face of America is changing, and it's coming to look a lot more like the one I identify with and recognize as my America. It is overwhelmingly a little younger, a little darker in skin tone, a little bit more gay-friendly. This year, we elected our first Hindu senator in the state of Hawaii. The first gay senator in Wisconsin. This year we have the highest number of women elected to senate ever. And we still have a black (or at least non-white) president, and the first president to openly endorse gay marriage. Americans took to polls to legalize gay marriage in Maine and Maryland, and Minnesota became the first state to shoot down a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. We may even get a 51st state. Four years ago, I was hopeful about the direction my country was headed in, and I was met mostly with high unemployment rates and frustration.
Today, I'm still frustrated with my country and our policies on many issues, and experiencing this election year in Palestine has only thrown those frustrations into even sharper relief. But today I'm also proud of my country, because I think for the first time since I've been eligible to vote, I can say with certainty that despite everything, I am confident that my country is going in the right direction, even if much more slowly than I would like. Now if only we could get Michele Bachmann out of office...
Saturday, November 3, 2012
“You educate a man; you educate a man. You educate a woman; you educate a generation.” - Brigham Young
Women's rights in the Arab world consistently rank low as compared to the rest of the world. There are definite issues of harassment, of degradation, of abuse and of a general lack of equality here. And while these issues come across as systemic in the region, change is happening, however slowly, and should be recognized and appreciated when it does.
Sexism is not specifically Arab, Muslim or Eastern. Sexism is still widespread in the United States today, even by those we entrust to run our country. Comments about "legitimate rape" and "binders full of women" and remarks like "slut" and "prostitute" directed at a college student aiming to support access to birth control and using medical, not sexual, reasoning proves that these issues are still alive and well in our own communities, and make me cringe and feel a little extra vulnerable as a woman every time I hear them.
But as a woman who feels particularly drawn to the Middle East, I would be lying to say that sexism is not something I worry about as I pack my suitcase, or think of my future career. The Middle East does rank poorly as a place for women, as does much of sub-Saharan Africa or Eastern Asia. I hear catcalls every time I walk out the door. But despite the ample warnings that we got upon arrival here, Palestine is doing a lot better than Tunis, where women's rights in general are more advanced but on an individual level I felt more ill at ease. In Palestine, maybe because the grasp of English is less strong, you get a lot of awkward staring and "Hello, how are you? Where you from?" and a few inappropriate words in Arabic that they assume I don't understand but I do. But a glare or averting your eyes will generally be enough to put a stop to anything.
I've gotten and heard worse here, but nothing worse than I've gotten walking down the streets of Portland. Which, in many ways, is precisely my point. Being a woman, to some degree or another, means tolerating being objectified no matter where you are in the world. And we should encourage and support those who are strong enough and brave enough to take a stand against such abuse.
The video shown here was produced by students in a Feminist Theory class in the Language department of University of Jordan, where sexual abuse is closer to what it is in Tunis than what it is in Palestine. These girls gathered together and as a school project, wrote out common phrases called out to them while they walked around campus or their feelings associated with it.
And equally as important as the women who stood up and made this video is the response of the university administration, which, dishearteningly, was to demote the professor who taught the class from Dean of the Language Department because of fears that the video provides negative publicity about the university as a whole. As societies, the best we can do is stand up against harassment and encourage, not discourage, others to do the same. Change is happening-- this video is proof that women here and around the world expect better.
Sexism is not specifically Arab, Muslim or Eastern. Sexism is still widespread in the United States today, even by those we entrust to run our country. Comments about "legitimate rape" and "binders full of women" and remarks like "slut" and "prostitute" directed at a college student aiming to support access to birth control and using medical, not sexual, reasoning proves that these issues are still alive and well in our own communities, and make me cringe and feel a little extra vulnerable as a woman every time I hear them.
But as a woman who feels particularly drawn to the Middle East, I would be lying to say that sexism is not something I worry about as I pack my suitcase, or think of my future career. The Middle East does rank poorly as a place for women, as does much of sub-Saharan Africa or Eastern Asia. I hear catcalls every time I walk out the door. But despite the ample warnings that we got upon arrival here, Palestine is doing a lot better than Tunis, where women's rights in general are more advanced but on an individual level I felt more ill at ease. In Palestine, maybe because the grasp of English is less strong, you get a lot of awkward staring and "Hello, how are you? Where you from?" and a few inappropriate words in Arabic that they assume I don't understand but I do. But a glare or averting your eyes will generally be enough to put a stop to anything.
I've gotten and heard worse here, but nothing worse than I've gotten walking down the streets of Portland. Which, in many ways, is precisely my point. Being a woman, to some degree or another, means tolerating being objectified no matter where you are in the world. And we should encourage and support those who are strong enough and brave enough to take a stand against such abuse.
The video shown here was produced by students in a Feminist Theory class in the Language department of University of Jordan, where sexual abuse is closer to what it is in Tunis than what it is in Palestine. These girls gathered together and as a school project, wrote out common phrases called out to them while they walked around campus or their feelings associated with it.
And equally as important as the women who stood up and made this video is the response of the university administration, which, dishearteningly, was to demote the professor who taught the class from Dean of the Language Department because of fears that the video provides negative publicity about the university as a whole. As societies, the best we can do is stand up against harassment and encourage, not discourage, others to do the same. Change is happening-- this video is proof that women here and around the world expect better.
Friday, November 2, 2012
"A vacation is having nothing to do and all day to do it in." - Robert Orben
Eid break is wrapping up here, and it's hard to believe that I only have four weeks left before I'll be back in Portland. Life here feels so normal that it seems like I could stay so much longer. Monday starts my final rotation of kids, the oldest group (11-12 year olds), and then the last week is final evaluations and wrapping up administrative work.
This last week I spent traveling Israel proper, so I spent a day in Jerusalem, one in Tel Aviv and Jaffa and three in Haifa. The trip north was an adventure of public transit. We walked to the bus station in Nablus, caught a bus from Nablus to Ramallah, from there caught a bus from Ramallah to Callendia (the big checkpoint between the West Bank and Israel proper by way of Jerusalem), then we caught an Arab bus so that we could do the slightly easier drive through checkpoint, which was stopped and boarded by an Israeli soldier who checked everyone's ID's. Military service is mandatory for Israelis, so men serve three years just out of high school and women serve two years. What this essentially translates to on the ground is that a kid younger than me with a gun the size of his torso boarded our bus, had clearly never seen Americans on the Arab bus before, and had, by all evidence, never seen an American passport. We got through fine, but not without the kid flipping the passport open and closed, open again, back to the front page, back to our visa stamps, and then back to the front the passport again before essentially shrugging us through.
From the Arab bus station inside of Jerusalem, we walked to our hostel to drop off our bags, and went out to explore the city. We got to Jerusalem on Shabbat, so West Jerusalem was pretty much shut down for the Jewish holiday, but the Arab side still had plenty going on, and a few streets in West Jerusalem had some restaurants and bars open as well. We met up with a couple of girls we had met our previous trip to Jerusalem and went out to get dinner and chocolate fondue, all of which was delicious. Time and time again while there I was struck with the disconnect of the people sipping coffee in the sunshine in Jerusalem while not even an hour away, people in Nablus lived in camps and poverty with F-16's flying overhead. The next day we headed into the old city, where I got immediate looks of shock and surprise when I spoke to the vendors in Arabic, and even more so when I said I was living in Nablus. A lot of tourists come through Jerusalem, most of whom don't speak a word of Arabic, and many of whom don't speak any Hebrew either, so I could tell it was an interesting break from the usual. From there, we caught a bus up to Tel Aviv.
Our only night in Tel Aviv, our basic goal was to experience American life. We went to an American bar right near the embassy, where we watched football, ate nachos, drank beer and experienced a little taste of home. The next day we went to the beach, choosing one closer to Jaffa (an Arab community outside of Tel Aviv), and once again was struck by the differences. Here I saw girls in hijabs giddily playing in the water, enjoying the day with their families, playing with the dogs on the beach, and I couldn't help but think of Balata refugee camp. Most of the refugees in Balata originate from Jaffa, so as I looked at the families and the coast and the parks, I thought of the kids I teach and how this could have been their lives in a different world. It made me mourn for the lives they would never know they were missing, and also made me wonder how these particular Arab families got to stay in Jaffa, while so many were forced out of their homes. From there we wandered into the downtown area of Jaffa, where once again I was met with surprise when I asked the three men standing near the cash register if they were in line in Arabic. Tourist communities are always so interesting to me that way. From Jaffa, we headed back to Tel Aviv to the central train station, and caught a train up to Haifa.
The train to Haifa was cramped and uncomfortable and we spent the duration of the hour and a half long ride sitting on the train floor, but when we got there it was well worth the wait. Think of Haifa as Florida-- lots of retirees and young people and not much in between. We spent the bulk of our time in Haifa at the beach, where I (sort of) learned to paddle board, read a good book, and met some interesting people. One of the things particularly apparent to me on this trip is that sometimes a good geopolitical debate is worth it, while other times, you just don't want to get into it with the random beach bum why exactly you are living in Nablus, why being in Israel makes you feel more insecure than you ever feel in the West Bank, and why Israeli policies are shockingly racist and uneven despite their cries of democracy-- which means that a lot of conversations go like this:
Beach Bum: So what are you doing here?
Me: Vacation
Beach Bum: Where are you from?
Me: America
Beach Bum: How long have you been here?
Me: (choosing my words carefully) I've been in Israel for almost a week.
Beach Bum: And how long are you here for?
Me: Two more days
Beach Bum: And then you go back to America?
Me: (stalling a little, looking around for a change of subject) Not quite, I'm going a few more places before I leave. I have to go. (abruptly leaving)
Better yet, three American girls together, all from different places in the US but saying that they work together, as well as that they met here, left many people with confused looks on their faces. It wasn't our plan to lie ever, simply to divulge the least amount of truth necessary for conversation if it wasn't someone we felt the need to talk with longer than a few minutes.
In Haifa, we also went to the Bahai Gardens (the second holiest site for people of Bahai faith) and a beautiful sculpture garden on our last day in town, before taking a taxi back down into the West Bank and returning to reality in Nablus. It's good to be home though and have a couple of lazy days before work starts-- vacation can't last forever.
This last week I spent traveling Israel proper, so I spent a day in Jerusalem, one in Tel Aviv and Jaffa and three in Haifa. The trip north was an adventure of public transit. We walked to the bus station in Nablus, caught a bus from Nablus to Ramallah, from there caught a bus from Ramallah to Callendia (the big checkpoint between the West Bank and Israel proper by way of Jerusalem), then we caught an Arab bus so that we could do the slightly easier drive through checkpoint, which was stopped and boarded by an Israeli soldier who checked everyone's ID's. Military service is mandatory for Israelis, so men serve three years just out of high school and women serve two years. What this essentially translates to on the ground is that a kid younger than me with a gun the size of his torso boarded our bus, had clearly never seen Americans on the Arab bus before, and had, by all evidence, never seen an American passport. We got through fine, but not without the kid flipping the passport open and closed, open again, back to the front page, back to our visa stamps, and then back to the front the passport again before essentially shrugging us through.
From the Arab bus station inside of Jerusalem, we walked to our hostel to drop off our bags, and went out to explore the city. We got to Jerusalem on Shabbat, so West Jerusalem was pretty much shut down for the Jewish holiday, but the Arab side still had plenty going on, and a few streets in West Jerusalem had some restaurants and bars open as well. We met up with a couple of girls we had met our previous trip to Jerusalem and went out to get dinner and chocolate fondue, all of which was delicious. Time and time again while there I was struck with the disconnect of the people sipping coffee in the sunshine in Jerusalem while not even an hour away, people in Nablus lived in camps and poverty with F-16's flying overhead. The next day we headed into the old city, where I got immediate looks of shock and surprise when I spoke to the vendors in Arabic, and even more so when I said I was living in Nablus. A lot of tourists come through Jerusalem, most of whom don't speak a word of Arabic, and many of whom don't speak any Hebrew either, so I could tell it was an interesting break from the usual. From there, we caught a bus up to Tel Aviv.
Our only night in Tel Aviv, our basic goal was to experience American life. We went to an American bar right near the embassy, where we watched football, ate nachos, drank beer and experienced a little taste of home. The next day we went to the beach, choosing one closer to Jaffa (an Arab community outside of Tel Aviv), and once again was struck by the differences. Here I saw girls in hijabs giddily playing in the water, enjoying the day with their families, playing with the dogs on the beach, and I couldn't help but think of Balata refugee camp. Most of the refugees in Balata originate from Jaffa, so as I looked at the families and the coast and the parks, I thought of the kids I teach and how this could have been their lives in a different world. It made me mourn for the lives they would never know they were missing, and also made me wonder how these particular Arab families got to stay in Jaffa, while so many were forced out of their homes. From there we wandered into the downtown area of Jaffa, where once again I was met with surprise when I asked the three men standing near the cash register if they were in line in Arabic. Tourist communities are always so interesting to me that way. From Jaffa, we headed back to Tel Aviv to the central train station, and caught a train up to Haifa.
The train to Haifa was cramped and uncomfortable and we spent the duration of the hour and a half long ride sitting on the train floor, but when we got there it was well worth the wait. Think of Haifa as Florida-- lots of retirees and young people and not much in between. We spent the bulk of our time in Haifa at the beach, where I (sort of) learned to paddle board, read a good book, and met some interesting people. One of the things particularly apparent to me on this trip is that sometimes a good geopolitical debate is worth it, while other times, you just don't want to get into it with the random beach bum why exactly you are living in Nablus, why being in Israel makes you feel more insecure than you ever feel in the West Bank, and why Israeli policies are shockingly racist and uneven despite their cries of democracy-- which means that a lot of conversations go like this:
Beach Bum: So what are you doing here?
Me: Vacation
Beach Bum: Where are you from?
Me: America
Beach Bum: How long have you been here?
Me: (choosing my words carefully) I've been in Israel for almost a week.
Beach Bum: And how long are you here for?
Me: Two more days
Beach Bum: And then you go back to America?
Me: (stalling a little, looking around for a change of subject) Not quite, I'm going a few more places before I leave. I have to go. (abruptly leaving)
Better yet, three American girls together, all from different places in the US but saying that they work together, as well as that they met here, left many people with confused looks on their faces. It wasn't our plan to lie ever, simply to divulge the least amount of truth necessary for conversation if it wasn't someone we felt the need to talk with longer than a few minutes.
In Haifa, we also went to the Bahai Gardens (the second holiest site for people of Bahai faith) and a beautiful sculpture garden on our last day in town, before taking a taxi back down into the West Bank and returning to reality in Nablus. It's good to be home though and have a couple of lazy days before work starts-- vacation can't last forever.
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| A little taste of Portland in Jerusalem |
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| The beautiful Baha'i Gardens in Haifa, with the temple visible at the bottom |
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| One of many beautiful sculptures at the sculpture garden in Haifa |
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