Email to friend Phillip 13/07/11
Hi Phillip,
How are you? This is just a short email to let you know that everything is good. I am living in the refugee camp with Mustafa and his family. He and his family, mother wife and baby daughter. Lots of young nephews and nieces come round all the time. I am sitting here at the internet. Above me is a plasma screen on which the others are watching a film on a satellite channel from Abu Dabi. It is getting late. I have been teaching here for about a week, trying to avoid the sun, sitting drinking thick Arabic coffee.
The only problem is that since the death of Juliano Mer Khamis, there have been some restrictions on our movement. We have to move around, especially in the camp, with our hosts or other locals. This has been a bit hard sometimes, especially as I like to wander around by myself sometimes. The camp (which is really a warren of small streets and concrete houses) is about a kilometre from the town, which is itself busy with markets, chaotic crowds.
How are you? This is just a short email to let you know that everything is good. I am living in the refugee camp with Mustafa and his family. He and his family, mother wife and baby daughter. Lots of young nephews and nieces come round all the time. I am sitting here at the internet. Above me is a plasma screen on which the others are watching a film on a satellite channel from Abu Dabi. It is getting late. I have been teaching here for about a week, trying to avoid the sun, sitting drinking thick Arabic coffee.
The only problem is that since the death of Juliano Mer Khamis, there have been some restrictions on our movement. We have to move around, especially in the camp, with our hosts or other locals. This has been a bit hard sometimes, especially as I like to wander around by myself sometimes. The camp (which is really a warren of small streets and concrete houses) is about a kilometre from the town, which is itself busy with markets, chaotic crowds.
I have started to write a blog, which is a bit slow because I don't have access to the internet all the time. Today has been a good day. Once or twice I have been a bit down. Having a bit of trouble with some of the other volunteers, who are much younger than me, and seem to resent me if I take any sort of a lead, but at the same time expect me to do so. Generally though everything is good and I am glad I am here. I will be in Jenin until 26th July, then go on to Abu Dis to catch up with my friends there for a day, and then spend two days in Jaffa to meet my cousin Peter (I am determined not to have our usual pointless argument this time) and his son Yaniv who I like very much.
Email to friend Monika 15/07/11:
Hi Monika,
I am having an interesting time. Relaxing though it is
not. I am in Palestine again this year, this time not in Abu Dis which
was a relative piece of cake compared to where I am now. Four other
volunteers (all much younger women) and I are volunteering in Jenin refugee
camp. We are all staying in the camp ('camp' doesn't mean tents by the
way as I thought when I first heard of it. It is a residential area of
crowded streets and concrete houses about one kilometre away from Jenin
city). We are staying with families all of whom are incredibly
hospitable. Palestinian hospitality is famous. My host Mustafa, is
a man of about 40 who lives with his mother and wife and a lovely eight year
old daughter, called Mais. When he was 16, during the first intifada, he
was shot in the back by an Israeli sniper, and lost the use of his legs.
He goes around in a wheelchair. He is amazingly cheerful generous man,
not bitter, not angry. We go around a lot. He is very skilled at
table tennis. He learnt quite a lot of English during the time he was in
physical rehab in Ramallah and Jerusalem. We talk in English and
Arabic. All the people in the camp are descendants of refugees mainly
from the Haifa area.
There is so much to say about all this. I am keeping a blog bit by bit when I have the opportunity. It is at www.jeninvolunteer.blogspot.com
The area is not entirely safe. I don't know whether you heard, but in April this year, an amazing man called Juliano Mer-Khamis, half-Jewish half-Palestinian Christian actor and director of the groundbreaking Freedom Theatre here in the camp, was shot dead 'by persons unknown' just five minutes from where I am living. Other things have happened in the camp and the town too, rumours abound (was it conservatives, fundamentalists hostile to foreigners or to liberal influences, or maybe the Israelis as lots of people are saying?) Anyway, we have to go around accompanied, which is a bit of a bind, as I like to wander around by myself sometimes. One problem for me about Palestinian life, is the constant sociability with very little break to be private, which I find quite stressful sometimes. Needless to say I have decided to be a little more closeted about being Jewish than I was in Abu Dis, though I think some people know, though in a very tactful way they are keeping quiet about it, and touchingly protecting me by keeping the information from getting into more hostile hands.
I am writing this from near another refugee camp called Al Farah, half way between Jenin and Nablus. I have been taken here by Marwan our main contact here, who works for the Palestinian authority. Here in the building where he works, there is a week long residential summer camp for children from all over the West Bank. All the boys and girls on it have lost at least one member of their family, fathers brothers etc, who were killed by the Israelis and are called Shahids (martyrs). It is beautiful, and I have been fighting back tears all morning. They do sport, English, art, music, write poetry. I have visited a class organised by a poet. The children have been writing letters to the souls of their dead loved ones and placing them in envelopes. Can you imagine? It breaks me up now to think about it.
There is so much to say about all this. I am keeping a blog bit by bit when I have the opportunity. It is at www.jeninvolunteer.blogspot.com
The area is not entirely safe. I don't know whether you heard, but in April this year, an amazing man called Juliano Mer-Khamis, half-Jewish half-Palestinian Christian actor and director of the groundbreaking Freedom Theatre here in the camp, was shot dead 'by persons unknown' just five minutes from where I am living. Other things have happened in the camp and the town too, rumours abound (was it conservatives, fundamentalists hostile to foreigners or to liberal influences, or maybe the Israelis as lots of people are saying?) Anyway, we have to go around accompanied, which is a bit of a bind, as I like to wander around by myself sometimes. One problem for me about Palestinian life, is the constant sociability with very little break to be private, which I find quite stressful sometimes. Needless to say I have decided to be a little more closeted about being Jewish than I was in Abu Dis, though I think some people know, though in a very tactful way they are keeping quiet about it, and touchingly protecting me by keeping the information from getting into more hostile hands.
I am writing this from near another refugee camp called Al Farah, half way between Jenin and Nablus. I have been taken here by Marwan our main contact here, who works for the Palestinian authority. Here in the building where he works, there is a week long residential summer camp for children from all over the West Bank. All the boys and girls on it have lost at least one member of their family, fathers brothers etc, who were killed by the Israelis and are called Shahids (martyrs). It is beautiful, and I have been fighting back tears all morning. They do sport, English, art, music, write poetry. I have visited a class organised by a poet. The children have been writing letters to the souls of their dead loved ones and placing them in envelopes. Can you imagine? It breaks me up now to think about it.
Another email to Phillip
19/07/11
Hi Phillip,
I am in the office of the Rehabilitation Centre in Jenin Camp. I am going to have a conversation class with some of the staff members in about half an hour. The centre does wonderful work with children and young people with cerebral palsy and other physical problems, some of which have been caused by accidents some by birth traumas. One of the staff members Walid makes surgical shoes, another Mahmoud makes prosthetic limbs. They have a room where they can help children with learning difficulties caused by brain damage, and they also train parents to look after their children. The centre is also a place where young student physiotherapists can do their practicals. There is a university outside Jenin called the Arab American University where they study. Funnily enough a lot of Israeli Palestinians study there. I was talking to one yesterday a very bright and friendly young woman from a village outside Haifa. (The border is only a few miles a way. A few days ago we all went to the house of one of our friends here Hisham who lives in another part of the camp up a steep hill. From there you can look out over the bleached countryside westwards up a range a hills, and there along the crest is the border with Israel. You can see it is Israel because from there you can see that it is heavily forested, and here the countryside is dry and yellow. 'They have more water', I say to Hisham. 'They have more of everything', he replies. Beyond the hills not very far away is the very different world of Haifa and the Mediterranean). The young woman has an Israeli passport, comes across a checkpoint every day to the university or here to do her practical. 'How do you see yourself?’ I ask her. 'Are you an Israeli Arab or a Palestinian?' 'I am a Palestinian', she replies. 'It is all the same to me. Other people where I come from will say something different'.
Today in the middle of a class, I was terrified by the sudden noise of a jet flying in low over the town. Sef told me about this, something that he had experienced when he was here. He saw a plane flying really low, heard a huge roar, he thought the plane was going to launch a missile. The noise comes suddenly out of nowhere, a huge roar. It happens once or twice a month. Israeli jets training. But they probably don't do it over Israel itself. Basically they don't give a shit, or they are doing it deliberately to intimidate and frighten, which it certainly does. The kids were very blasé about it, as is Mustafa when I mentioned it just now. But it must traumatise people over time. People must internalise the sudden shock. It must affect the kids there. Mustafa's daughter Mais, a lovely sensitive beautiful child of 8, cries easily, gets nervous and afraid, always has presentiments that things are going to happen to her dad, Mustafa says.
I have been having good conversations with Mustafa. Did I tell you about him? He is in a wheelchair, having been shot in the back when he was 16 during the first intifada in 1987. 'I actually met the soldier who shot me. It was a time when I went into Israel for treatment. I was introduced to the soldier. “Why did you shoot me?” I asked him. 'Because you were throwing stones', he answered, which I wasn't. Anyway, he never apologised, because if he had there would have been a black mark against him on his military record. When the soldier shot me, funnily enough I didn't feel any pain, but I suddenly lost my sight, although it came back later. I knew anyway that I would never walk again. They sent me for rehabilitation to a centre near Ramallah, where they taught me to use a wheelchair, to wash myself, to use the toilet. Then I came back here. There were doctors from Sweden there, who were very good. One man was a Jewish man from that country. He was called David like you. I called him Doctor David, and that is why I call you Doctor David'.
We play chess, ('Jatarange'), which I haven't done since I was a
uni, and I am still not very good. We also play a strange game called
Idris, which is like drafts but more interesting. Mustafa kept telling me
the rules as we went along. He is so generous that he keeps telling me
when I am about to make a mistake, what move I should be making, so I end up
winning or drawing.
I think the class is about to begin so
I will write more later.
Email to friend Alix 22/07/11:
Hi Alix,
Thank you for your invitation. I will be very pleased to be added to your professional network. I am not sure how it works, I will have to research it when I get back to London. At the moment I am sitting in an internet cafe in the refugee camp in Jenin Palestine. I have been volunteering here for the last few weeks, staying with a family, learning a lot, having some amazing and intense emotional experiences . It is so strange today. It is Friday, and at the moment you can here the mu'ezzin's call for midday prayers. Before I was in town with my host Mustafa. We passed a cd shop. Through one speaker the call to prayers was being broadcast. On the other you could hear some Arabic house music. I wish I had had a recorder to capture it. Mustafa says that putting together both kinds of music is haram (forbidden), but I thought it really does show something about this society, how complicated it is. You keep meeting contradictions at every turn. I went to some events in a cultural festival here earlier in the week. It was bloody amazing. One of the highpoints was a feminist comedy sketch involving two women, one older and more traditional one younger and trendier. It was quite difficult to follow but with the help of some others I got some of the gist. Apparently the two women represented Palestinians living in Israel (a more 'progressive' westernised but also a colonialist country). The older woman was at a hospital to get a nose job so that she could attract a husband. The younger woman, who was young and trendily dressed was embarrassed by her friend, was berating her for being backward and traditional. Some banter between the two followed. The culmination of the sketch was when the older woman told the younger, 'Here (in Israel) everyone is equal, women are equal to men but Palestinians will never be equal to Israelis'. Everybody in the audience roared with laughter of course. There is so much to write about here, I have only had sporadic access to the internet and anyway I have been so revved up that I have not been able to write so much in my blog as I have in previous years when I was in Abu Dis
some beautiful Arabic music, Lebanese I think, has just started up from somewhere, thick strings passionate love lyrics. I told one of my fellow volunteers yesterday, 'I am not in love, but in love with the idea of love' (from St. Augustine), which is a different thing. Something that has just occurred to me.
What I love about Palestinian / Arab culture, is the mixture of intense emotion with formality and gentility, it is mind-blowing sometimes. I am going to buy some cds of different kinds of music I love here, if I can get them past the fucking gestapo at Ben Gurion airport.
Thank you for your invitation. I will be very pleased to be added to your professional network. I am not sure how it works, I will have to research it when I get back to London. At the moment I am sitting in an internet cafe in the refugee camp in Jenin Palestine. I have been volunteering here for the last few weeks, staying with a family, learning a lot, having some amazing and intense emotional experiences . It is so strange today. It is Friday, and at the moment you can here the mu'ezzin's call for midday prayers. Before I was in town with my host Mustafa. We passed a cd shop. Through one speaker the call to prayers was being broadcast. On the other you could hear some Arabic house music. I wish I had had a recorder to capture it. Mustafa says that putting together both kinds of music is haram (forbidden), but I thought it really does show something about this society, how complicated it is. You keep meeting contradictions at every turn. I went to some events in a cultural festival here earlier in the week. It was bloody amazing. One of the highpoints was a feminist comedy sketch involving two women, one older and more traditional one younger and trendier. It was quite difficult to follow but with the help of some others I got some of the gist. Apparently the two women represented Palestinians living in Israel (a more 'progressive' westernised but also a colonialist country). The older woman was at a hospital to get a nose job so that she could attract a husband. The younger woman, who was young and trendily dressed was embarrassed by her friend, was berating her for being backward and traditional. Some banter between the two followed. The culmination of the sketch was when the older woman told the younger, 'Here (in Israel) everyone is equal, women are equal to men but Palestinians will never be equal to Israelis'. Everybody in the audience roared with laughter of course. There is so much to write about here, I have only had sporadic access to the internet and anyway I have been so revved up that I have not been able to write so much in my blog as I have in previous years when I was in Abu Dis
some beautiful Arabic music, Lebanese I think, has just started up from somewhere, thick strings passionate love lyrics. I told one of my fellow volunteers yesterday, 'I am not in love, but in love with the idea of love' (from St. Augustine), which is a different thing. Something that has just occurred to me.
What I love about Palestinian / Arab culture, is the mixture of intense emotion with formality and gentility, it is mind-blowing sometimes. I am going to buy some cds of different kinds of music I love here, if I can get them past the fucking gestapo at Ben Gurion airport.
