To my dear friend Mu’min
(who is turning four years old this week)

Dear Mu'min,

By the time you’re old enough and well-practiced enough in English to read this I do not know if you will remember me. Your oldest brother brought me to visit you several times these past few weeks. You were shy at first, hiding behind the hallway corner, then burying your face in your brother’s shirt after he scooped you up and told you to say hello to me. Then a word or two. Then silence again.

The ice inevitably cracked, because, at the age of three years, eleven months, and some odd days, you were hopelessly curious and incurably talkative. You constantly asked your older brother to name things in English—sofa, curtains, cabinet, rug. You were timid at first, but soon you were testing me too, challenging me to speak the English words for every single thing in sight.

The second time I came to visit you did everything you could to distract me from conversation with your mother and older brothers. I tried to show off my Arabic writing for you, thinking it would surprise you. “No, no, no,” you said. “This is ‘b’”—it was a completely eligible scribble. Of course you hadn’t begun to learn reading and writing in school; nonetheless you still seemed pretty sure that you knew the Arabic alphabet better than I did.

You always loved to tell stories and had previously told me one about a man living in a cave atop a mountain (though the story was abruptly terminated when a funny TV show came on). The third visit I made, just a week ago, you immediately started a long narrative recreation of a battle with soldiers, tanks, guns, Jews, and Palestinians, complete with sound effects and dramatic pantomiming. I could hardly understand any of it, and your older brother laughingly told me while he translated that half of it was incomprehensible. ‘Children’s talk’ he said. You chattered unceasingly, leaping up on the couch to shoot from a higher angle, trolling across the carpet like a grumbling tank; I told your mother you were born to become a writer.

I wonder how many years have passed since then. You must be at least a teenager, or maybe twenty, as old as your oldest brother was when I first met him. I try to imagine what realizations first rattled that tenuous bubble of childlike innocence.

You were born into a difficult time. The Israeli army invaded the city shortly before your birth. Your mother must have nursed you while the twenty-four hour curfews were still in effect, while the streets were being turned to rubble and debris. Then for years thereafter, including up until now, the army checkpoints strangled the city. Consequently unemployment, poverty, and smoldering anger took their toll on people, effecting children the last and the most. Your mother told me, you saw a man shot in the head with your own eyes when you were two.

I had seen children, no more than three or four years older than you were when I wrote this, who worked six hours a day: some with tired eyes, sullen eyes, faces far too old for children’s faces. But you, Mu’min, back then, right now, were still the light of your family’s home: incurable talkativeness, runny nose, mischievous antics and all.

Perhaps matters have improved since then. I hope they did. If not, then what will we say to a whole generation of lost children? That peace was sued for in blood, sweat, and tears, but not enough to overcome indifference, selfishness, or shortsightedness? My friend, if we your elders, have failed you in the intervening time between my writing this letter and your reading it, forgive us. It is a difficult world we live in, without easy answer or repose. Do your best to live in it with self-respect, with principle and dignity. I have tried to do the same in my life thus far, but I do not know what anyone can do to change the madness of our times.

The legacies of today may make for a poor inheritance, and on your birthday of all days it behooves me to present you with something that will last you until the days when you come into your own. So because I can leave you nothing else, take then one simple gift: after all the years, over all the distance, a near-stranger from a far away country remembers and loves you, because long ago you smiled at him and called him friend. Take this simple thing with you, dear child, as you are propelled into the future, that uncertain but ever-beckoning horizon.

--Brian

Miscellaneous Factoids about My Life in Palestine

For the first time in my life since early childhood I have kept and used a wallet. I was so unfamiliar with the workings of a wallet that people had to show me how to use it properly.

I have worn two pairs of pants, one on top of the other, every day since my first night in Jerusalem, when it was so cold in my room (thin walls, built as an add-on to the roof, no heating anywhere) that I emptied my suitcase, piled the clothes on top of me in bed, and topped that all off with the suitcase itself.

I have lost at ping-pong to little children repeatedly. One of the community centers where I teach is the proud home of Nablus’ champion youth ping-pong team. I think they all wanted to play me because I’m Chinese (looking), but much to my surprise and their dismay, I did not pose much of a challenge. You laugh, but really, I’m not half bad and they’re all really really good.

Central heating is a myth. So are long hot showers. Never take either for granted ever again.

Our supply of gas ran out a week ago; there’s practically no gas in the city of Nablus and, some say, the whole West Bank. This means no hot water for bathing or washing, and using the stove conservatively. The last time I bathed was a week and a half ago; it’s fortunate that I wear so many layers of clothing. I did, however, douse my head in cold water and shampoo after my recent haircut.

For those of you who have been reading my blog (even a little), but have thus far been too shy to tell me, you are required to leave a comment HERE!

Life here is a cacophony: street vendors hawk their wares—fruits, vegetables, sweets, and bread; service drivers call their destinations—Balata camp, 'Askar camp, Huwwara checkpoint, Beit Iba checkpoint; the shouts of children at play fill the streets in the daytime; and the sharp reports of gunfire echo across the valley in the night. But the loudest in this storm of noise are the myriad voices demanding they be heard.
Here are a few which spoke most loudly to me. I have tried to preserve their uniqueness as best as memory allowed. The last one is my own.

Family
“One of my half brothers died before two years. Now I am ok. It was hard, but he made a decision, and I respect it now. We were both EMT’s in the Old City during the invasion in 2002. For ten days the things we saw were enough to drive some people crazy. You start thinking things like, ‘Why do I deserve to live when other people die. Why am I better than them.’ I think that is why my brother had to go fight. Me, no. But I understand why.”

Ruins
“Things are hard here. I am a security officer. How do you say… a captain, yes? I am a captain in the PLO security. But it has been nine months since they paid us. I am also fixing things, electrical things, appliances, as a second job. I was an electrical engineer when I studied in university. But there are no spare parts in the city. It is easier to buy it new from Israel than fix it in Palestine.
“There are the ruins of a Roman theatre in Nablus. How do you call it? An amphitheatre. Yes that’s right. A Roman amphitheatre in the hill by the old city. These people, the Romans, they were better than us. At least they made something. Even the slave who makes the stone chair—it is beautiful, with leaves on the side, shaped into stone. You cannot make something like this without putting yourself into it, even if you are not free, even if you are a slave. We are not slaves, but we do not make anything to leave behind.”

Children
“The children are angry. They are too young. They do not know anything but this violence. I worry for my children. What do you do when your three-year-old son tells you he wants a gun for his birthday? I do not want my child to be a martyr. They only want to play, but the guns and the violence keep them inside the house all the time.”

Pride or Dignity?
“Someday I will be at the checkpoints and a soldier will hit me, and there will be nothing else I can do but hit him back. Then the soldiers will beat me, and shoot me, and I will die. And that will be it. At least I will die fighting.”

Who We May Become
“I do not want to become a killer. I cannot stand blood on my hands. I do not want to blow myself up or something like this. But I know myself. If I get angry, if things go on like this forever, I will not be able to help myself. I cannot stand to have blood on my hands like that.”

Ajnabi fii Filisteen (A Foreigner in Palestine)

There are days here, days like today, when occasional gunfire erupts across the city landscape even in the daytime. A Palestinian militant was killed last night somewhere in the old city. He will be immortalized on yet another street-side plaque commemorating the Palestinian martyrs, until it too is shot down by Israeli bullets. Most of the martyr posters and plaques are decorated with doctored photographs of the fallen hero: a face lifted off some innocuous family album and pasted onto a body with a more militant or defiant pose.
There are days here, days like today, when you walk down into the valley’s center with vigilant eyes and ears, hoping to discern the exact location of the most recent gunshots. But days like this are rare. The real intrusion into peace of mind comes on the calmer days, days of balmy weather and mild mannered greetings from acquaintances on the street. On days like those, you hear something, a rattling or a loud pop. Then you realize it is the heavy pounding of a jack hammer, or the backfire of a decrepit taxi, or the mischief makings of idle children, but in that single instant, you froze. And when the moment passes, in embarrassed gratitude you thank fortune that your fragile little life went on, sound and whole.

I have begun taking some pictures of things around Nablus. So far I have three shots I like of a protest at one of the Israeli checkpoints, and seven shots of the former city hall, which was bombed out twice when the army invaded Nablus in 2002.

They're uploaded onto my facebook profile; they should also be available at http://blooabroad.shutterfly.com

There are people the world over whom, if you knew them, you would love them, and having loved them you would pay dearly to see their lives bettered.

That we may never meet them does not change anything.

Nablus

Let us start over from here, from Nablus.

Nablus is a city built on the shoulders of two hills. Its outlying districts ascend and fall with the slopes of Mount Gerzim and Mount Ebal, its downtown and old city center nestle in the narrow valley between them. At night the city lights rise into the sky and would melt into the stars were it not for the dark red lights of the Israeli outposts at the summits of each mountain.
Checkpoints control every exit and entrance to the city and its locale, and everyone has a story about them. In the brief week I have been here, I have befriended a host of Palestinians at the community centers where I teach English. Some speak of the daily inconveniences with resignation, many with anger, some try to interject humor. A friend of mine jokingly told me that at a checkpoint he once claimed to be French; none of the soldiers knew what to do with him because none spoke French.
At night the Israeli soldiers come into the city itself. By midnight, the witching hour, no one walks abroad in the streets downtown except the Israelis and Palestinian militants. Almost every night we hear gunfire from the confines of our apartment, a ten minute walk away. In the old city center you can see the telltale signs of these nightly visits: shot out street lights, bullet ridden signs, and every single residential door with a jagged gaping hole where its lock should be.
Despite all this, miraculously almost, the people here are the kindest I have ever met. Internationals are an unusual sight, and though we are subject to the occasional harrassment, most Palestinians who talk to us are kind, invite us in to talk with them, invite us in for tea at their shop, show us around their city, or simply ask us how we find Nablus and its people. Conditions are hard here. I've only just touched the surface of things myself, and so far I have conveyed only a sampling of that in this blog entry. But things go on, and things go on.
In one of my first classes, when I was done instructing, a friend of mine, the same who told the story about the checkpoint, wrote something up on the board.
It said: Life is a camera, so smile.
I am constantly in awe of how enduring the people I met are. Even in the midst of so many troubles, which I can only begin to comprehend, many still find a place where life yet shines its beautific smile upon them.

1/6/07
The Nitty Gritty Details

I love traveling. My heart, soul, and mind thrive on travel. However fate or the powers that be balanced a restless spirit with a body that demands stability. I am spectacularly gifted with asthma, respiratory allergies, lethal and myriad food allergies, and a propensity for hypothermia (because I’m skinny and don’t have enough body fat). The lungs have been ok, though they’ve come down with a slight cough. The stomach is constantly begging me for more food than my allergy paranoia will allow (so far one full meal; which was also a rip off price-wise). It doesn’t help that my checked luggage, with most of my clothes and toiletries, still has not arrived to me through Ben Gurion’s Lost and Found service, and it’s bloody cold, though I’ve managed to not come anywhere near the hypothermia stage thanks to the two pairs of pants and peacoat, which I wear at all times, including in bed where I have three layers of blankets. Here I’d like to insert a shout out to my Mom who insisted I take the peacoat.
Yesterday night I decided that the solution is simply to splurge and solve all these problems fast and effectively so I can get out to Nablus by tomorrow. Thus I purchased an international cell phone today (I got ripped off), and umbrella yesterday (I got ripped off), and will go to the New City section of Jerusalem where I am sure to have a better chance finding food I can talk myself into eating (which will be expensive, but I’m hoping prices will be standardized and thus everyone, not just me, will be getting ripped off). I tried arguing down the guy selling me the umbrella, but it was so tiresome that by the time I got to buying a cell phone today I just pretended not to speak much English and took whatever price they gave me. They seemed nice enough and I really didn’t feel like arguing. I just assume that because I am Asian (obvious tourist) I get charged 50-200% extra. It’s worth it if the luggage with all my toiletries arrives tonight.
On the plus side, I love the hostel I’m staying at. It’s the one place where they don’t try to rip me off—in fact all the prices at the restaurant below are printed out on a menu—and it only costs 25 sheikels per night to stay in a warm, though not heated, dormitory room.
On the newer plus side, I recently found a wonderful restaurant that won’t rip me off, and upon returning for a second meal I discovered this excellently equipped and very professional internet café. Now I just need my luggage…

1/6/07
A Letter to Matthew
(though obviously intended for all of you to read)


Today I visited the Holy Sepulchre, the site where Christ was entombed and then rose from the dead. Actually, over the past thirty-six hours I have inadvertently stumbled upon almost all the Stations of the Cross by following Spanish speaking tour groups. The path of the Stations of the Cross, the way Christ took when he bore his cross through Jerusalem to be crucified, Via Dolorosa, or Tareeq al-Aalaam, runs within a hundred feet of my hostel. Small shrines marked prominently in Roman Numerals according to the number of the Station of the Cross dot the entire way.
Of course I doubt anyone knows with absolute certainty that the path and the Stations are marked exactly where each thing happened. And when I eventually got to the Holy Sepulchre, there were no explanatory pamphlets or signs for any of the relics, shrines, altars, and display cases. I understood almost immediately that a small elaborate shrine with a quiet line of entreetants was the place of Christ’s entombment, and the rock in casing must have been a piece of the stone that closed the tomb and then was rolled aside when he arose from the dead. Still, those were just guesses reinforced by what I comprehended from a nearby Spanish-speaking tour guide. So I felt a little silly waiting in the long line of somber pilgrims, unsure what someone of uncertain beliefs like myself was doing here among devout Christians who traveled just to be here. Yet as I approached the entrance of that place, I was overcome with a strange awe and reverence. It felt a little bit like wanting to cry.
I’ve no easy answers, Matthew. No one really does. But as I left the Holy Sepulchre deep in thought, the following paragraph came to my mind. Excuse me if it is cloyingly aphoristic.

The intellect demands exactitude through questioning, but can never achieve certitude. The heart leaps to certitude but cannot provide precision or explanation. Somewhere in between, I think, is the human soul where faith of all kinds resides, be it religious or secular, neither or both.

1/4/07
40 Years in the Desert?

I’ve been sitting in what amounts to a glorified holding room in Ben Gurion Airport for the last four hours. It’s not all that bad. The chairs are upholstered with simple black pleather, the floor is marble tile, and we’re allowed to wander outside to the bathroom, hallways, and elsewhere, basically anywhere but past customs (because they’re holding our passports).
When I boarded my connecting Air Canada flight in Toronto the gate attendant checked my ID twice, then walked away with my passport and ticket to hurriedly confer with a colleague of his.
“Is there something wrong?” I asked when he returned.
“Ohh, no. Nothing’s wrong,” he answered with an oily smile.
“Enjoy your flight,” he continued, “I’m sure you will.”
I was naturally somewhat perturbed, and half expected to be assaulted by a team of overzealous aviation security officers on the jetway. Though why a disheveled Chinese kid boarding a plane to Tel Aviv warranted suspicion, I didn’t know.
It turns out what put me off about the gate attendance behavior was in fact unadulterated sycophancy. As soon as I boarded the plane, a cheerful stewardess (read: flight attendant) directed me to the last row of Air Canada’s elite executive super-duper first class section, and everyone began treating me like I was rich, important, or at the least related to someone rich and important. “Orange juice or champagne?” “Hot towellette?” “Box of Swiss Chocolates?” “What would you like for dinner? The Tenderloin steak? Very well.” Even when I was allergic to both possible main breakfast courses, the flight attendants kept pushing alternatives on me until I ended up with cold cereal and yogurt. And as luck would have it the first film was Little Miss Sunshine, which I adore, and which finished just in time for me to nap away most of the flight in my fully adjustable throne-sized chair that reclined a relaxing 150 degrees.
It occurred to me through a dreamy mid-flight haze that I could choose to believe in auspicious/inauspicious starts, in which case having the good fortune to be bumped up from coach to first class certainly boded well for my trip, or I could believe in karma, in which case somewhere down the line I was due to pay for this unlooked for luxury.
Many hours later, curled on a black pleather chair with my peacoat wrapped around my arms and a windbreaker laid over my legs above the marble tiled floor, in between answering questions about the nature of my visit to Israel (purely tourism) and the reasons for the Lebanese and Syrian stamps on my passport (visiting with a friend), I guessed that it must have been karma.
When, after finally being released, I was informed by the Lost and Found that my checked luggage had been left behind in Toronto and would only arrive the following day, I knew without a doubt that it had been karma.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Blog Post Script: Brian later arrived safely at his hostel as planned after hazarding public transportation to Jerusalem (which saved him loads of money but would have cost him a spell of being lost if not for a nice awkward scholarly guy named Amit), a taxi cab ride through Jerusalem to the Old City (which cost twice as much as the bus ride, but the taxi driver was fun to talk to), and a few dazed minutes wandering the claustrophobic streets of Old Jerusalem. He then woke up jetlagged at 5 in the morning to finish writing up his blog entry in third person.

Dear Friends,
From the outset I feel obliged to state the underlying moral premise for my trip to Palestine for two reasons: because some of you (but likely not many) may still be mystified as to my reasons for coming here, because said moral premise is one of two guiding principles for this foray into blogging (the other being to keep you all up to date with me). So let me say as best as I can that I believe if every human being knew intimately the lives of every other human being in the world we would dedicate our lives to the compassionate betterment of those less off than ourselves. And when I say ‘betterment’ I simply mean offering everyone a chance at living in peace, prosperity, and basic human rights, be they medical, political, legal, or otherwise.
It’s a nice idea—I know. Unfortunately it’s also impossible by myriad causes. So my journey here, I hope, is tantamount to the next best thing. Neither I nor anyone other human being will ever know the all intimate details of each life of the billions around the world, and in a foreign culture with a foreign language, which I speak haltingly at best, I’ll probably get to know a handful of people in the next four months and perhaps genuinely befriend fewer. Nonetheless it is my sincerest hope that this simple trip will suffice to prove to me for myself that I ought to dedicate my life to the compassionate betterment of those whose lot has been less than mine. In all honesty, this is sort of a chance to see if the ethical framework I’ve built up over years of closeted intellectual fermentation suits me, fits me as a person in the real world doing real things. Certainly I know I’m no saint. I am prey to everyday lassitude and indifference just like most people. But the people I really admire (and a few of you are among them) are the ones who work tirelessly, often in little and modest ways, for higher beliefs. So, the point is I’ve come to better know one little stratum of the people the world over, on whom I have based my fledgling yet fervent beliefs—it’s one thing to read and know of other people, another to meet, see, and speak with them.
Alright, having indulged in as much abstruse philosophizing as you can stomach, here then is a fairly amusing account of my trip to Israel. For your future reference, each blog entry will generally follow a particular tone until its completion. So later on when you all get bored of reading this blog, if one entry or another strikes you from the beginning as not your cup of tea, then feel free to skip it. I am naturally long-winded and I don’t want my verbage to be an unnecessary burden for those of you who are looking to read specific things from me.