After blogging about Israel, and finding it to be an amazing outlet I decided to continue..
Right now I am going to be writing about current experiences and thoughts, but when I return to the States I will be going through my journals from my time in Central America and Northern California.
For informative reasons and because I searched this before I left, to get to the west bank is not hard, from where ever you are, get to Jerusalem, take the light rail to the Damascus Gate, maps at the Light rail station show where the Arabic busses are and then get in line for the correct bus, everything with be in Hebrew, Arabic and English until you get to your next destination.
Today I began my day in the free state of Israel in a bed in Rohovot, and I am now sitting on the balcony of a building in Nablus, a city of the occupied West Bank, or as those here call it, Palestine. I will be working with a program called Project Hope, here is Nablus until Ramadan begins and I return to the States.
I was nervous coming here, after the way the Israeli's that I had been around had reacted and talked about the West Bank and Gaza. As I walked from the train stop to the Damascus Gate bus station, I got more nervous. I sat next to a girl at the gate for a bus labeled Direct to Ramallah.
The view of Nablus from the Porch, a sense of peace is setting in as I eat falafel, and chat with the girls.
When the bus arrived I had not expected it but everyone rushed to get on. I was flustered I grabbed my massive bag and got in line. As two young women and a girl elbowed their way in front of me I got mad, I was pissed, heated, excuse me you think because I have this massive bag holding me back that you can shove your way in front of me then when I got on the driver said I needed to put the bag in the back I handed him a 50 shekel bill and put the bag in the back, when getting back on the Bus I realized in the time it took to put my bag in back all the seats had been taken, and I still had my small backpack purse and lunch. The driver only gave me 16 shekel back, which I knew was not the right amount and I just got massively ripped off but I was just happy to be on a bus to Ramallah.
As I stood, or more like stumbled, hate grew inside of me for those girls. I began thinking things like, Jessie, they don't have the opportunity or privlege you have, just leave it and that justification just made me more disgusted with myself. The bus ride for a good 30 minutes was horrible, I was stumbling back and forth, my arms getting tired of holding my body in place, and I kept thinking their are so many men on this bus that do not have any bags, and I saw them men getting up for other girls but they wouldn't get up for me, they must just not like me. They saw me and they made a judgement and that is it, this assumption was me making judgement on them, my mind can be really nasty mean sometimes.
Then I looked down at a women who was sitting in a seat I had been holding onto, she looked up at me and slowly in her beautiful broken english, "Why do the men sit while you stand, it is shameful, I am embarrassed" and my heart sank into my chest a bit deeper. These people do not hate me, I am way to in my head, and I have been with Israeli's for a hot minute. This women just pulled me back up to the surface.
Porch from the room I am sleeping in in Nablus
The bus did not make it all the way to the bus station, construction in Ramallah made that not possible, so for my 34 shekel bus ride I got to walk the last 5 blocks to the bus station in Ramallah. As I worked through my mind ways to justify the money that I spent on that ride and not asking for the rest of my change (when I get ripped off because I am in another country and I am flustered it really makes me made at myself and the people who rip me off, but mostly just myself) I found the station. Turns out busses are not running today, which is shitty. I found a shared taxi for 16 Shekel to take me to Nablus, which I was just fine with, I got to sit and it was half the price of that fucking bus.
On the bus in from Ramallah I hadn't even realized when I entered the West Bank, but in this Taxi, I noticed the security check point, with young Soldiers hanging the Israeli flag on their little booths, and stopping to ask for the ID cards of everyone in the Van, when I handed up my passport the drier quickly handed it back and did not give it to the guard, I wonder why.
As we approached Nablus I noticed the signs were not written in three languages anymore, everything was in Arabic. I got anxious about getting off at the right stop, so I uncomfortably asked the drive to drop me off at the hospital that the Project Hope organizers had recommended. The man next to me said it with his Palestinian accent, and the driver understood, when I got out, the man sitting next to me asked where I was going and I said Yasmeen Hotel next to the hospital. He then continued to ask me if I knew how to get their, he gave me brief directions and then said, "Can I just walk you there?"
At the beginning of this journey I was being shoved out of line by two bitchy young women who apparently just lacked manners. Now A man is offering to go out of his way to walk me to the Hotel that I will meet the program people for Project Hope at, I know it is human nature to assume and categorize but I really wish I could transcend that ti a certain extent. We walked and talked about our schooling and our jobs and why his English was so good. When I got to the Hotel they called Tawfiq, Tawfiq is a boss (figuratively and maybe literally as well) , he tried to charge me 5 shekels for carrying my bag and then he drove me around in a car his younger brothers pimped out with tinted windows and weird jenk add-ons all over the car, not to mention its a manual. Makes me think of the 'riced out' cars in Chicago.
He showed me his photography, he talked about how tomorrow he takes his final test for his Masters, and how his mom wants him to get married, yet he feels he cannot commit to anything because he might move to the US or Canada on a scholarship to get his PhD. He talked about working for an organic company in Mikwakee but turned down the job because they began brewing organic beer, and he talked about the fact that he works with Project Hope because his family came here in 1948 as refugees and how he wish someone would have helped him as a child with his education. This guy is charming and hilarious. When I asked him where he was from, he said Hiafa, and his family came here in 1948, his grandfather told him that he should always say Haifa and that he should tell his children that also, because maybe one day they will be able to return.
I really love this old place, the door from the porch to the room
I un-packed and ate lunch with 3 of the girls I will be living with, we talked on the balcony that overlooks the city from this old apartment building that I have already fallen in love with. I feel more at peace than I have through out this entire Journey, I am going to be here for at least 15 days, I have unpacked, eaten and I'll shower soon, maybe. I am reading "The Iron Cage" its about Palestine's inability to achieve statehood, I am immersed, and everything in this house in labeled with its arabic word, I have a feeling this will not be the only time in my life that I come to this house.
To all that have been following my journey, I made it! Thank you for any support or good vibes you have sent my way. They are much appreciated.
-Jliv
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