Safe? Sometimes.

Deserted Hebron marketplace

One of the most often-asked questions about our trip to the Middle East was:

Did you feel safe?

And yes, I felt safe. For the most part. Jordan is very safe - Amman is safer than some American cities. Most of Israel proper is pretty safe - just not around Gaza. And I felt fairly safe in the West Bank.

The only place it got a little wild was the day we visited Hebron.

Hebron is known to many as being probably the tensest place in the land. It's the site of one of the most ideologically motivated Israeli settlements. There are estimated to be about 1,200 Israeli soldiers protecting the 400ish settlers. There are over 100,000 Palestinians living in close range.

The Palestinians used to see Hebron as a market town. There was a thriving industry in shopping and marketing - the marketplace was huge, lively and profitable. When the settlers came, they built high-rise apartment buildings right next to the market, and began using their high windows as an opportunity to make life miserable for the people below. They threw bottles and stones, and poured hot oil and urine down on the Palestinians. Palestinians fought back, and erected tarps and nets as overhangs, to catch all the debris, but eventually they gave up. The market today is now completely deserted, and Hebron Palestinians suffer from unemployment and poverty in the once-busy town.

(*Not all settlers are so badly-behaved, although one might question the legality of even the nicest settler's right to the land. But the settlers in Hebron have a lot to answer for)

On the day we visited Hebron, about 50 yards in front of our van, we saw a few men throwing stones at Israeli soldiers who were perched on the roof of a nearby building, overlooking the proceedings. The soldiers dropped tear gas on the crowded square. All the mayhem that you can imagine ensued. Luckily we were down wind from the gas, and were still able to go forward, albeit tensely. A little while later, as we were leaving, we saw several soldiers dragging a crying Palestinian child toward a police van, his mother running after him and beating her fists on the soldier's back. We also saw a Palestinian family whose water reservoir, their only source of clean water, had been riddled with bullet holes four days prior to our visit by an Israeli soldier at point blank range. He knew exactly what he was doing.

Heavy, heavy things.

Small traveling delights

I always know I've ventured outside of the sterilized Western world when I am greeted at the airport with a lungful of foreign air - air pungent with cigarette smoke and mingled with the aromas of cooking food. I love that smell. It means adventure and new thrills await.

I love that feeling of walking through those glass airport doors, having no idea what the air outside will feel like and no context to anticipate it. Will it be hot? Windy? Humid? Rainy? No matter what it is, after the hours of breathing recycled air on the plane, anything feels freeing and exotic.

I love how when I arrive in a new place at night, like we did in Jordan that first night, and travel to the hotel in the velvety dark, throwing open the window curtains in the bright light of morning becomes an adventure, a childishly delightful reveal that our eyes drink in thirstily.

I love how the first eating experience in a foreign culture is a grand adventure in good humor and daring, and I love the feeling I get when I try something entirely new with a grin and gritted teeth and end up liking it - a lot. I even love when I get a mouthful of something odd and unpalatable, because we can tell the story later and giggle over the memory.

I love speaking those first hesitating syllables in a new language, always trying to learn a few words just to be polite, and wishing my mouth formed the sounds easier. I love the absence of eavesdropping, where a person having a loud conversation on their cell phone isn't bothersome because the words are a lilting flow of nonsense to my ears.

Most of all, I love that feeling of connectedness and the commonality of the human experience. Jordanian women coo over baby clothes. Israeli women decorate their homes. Palestinians pick up children from preschool and marvel over their crayon artwork.

We're all the same, really.

Deep down.

No matter where we are.

Wow

You know how sometimes, at the end of a two-week trip, you sort of can't wait to get home? You start thinking about your bed, and your couch, and comfort food, and all the things you aren't experiencing while traveling?

This was not one of those trips.

I felt like I needed another week. Another month. Another year.

It was, in a word, marvelous.

Here was our rough itinerary:

Arrive, spend few days in Amman, Jordan, seeing friends.

Travel to the West Bank (Bethlehem), stopping at sites along the way.

Spend two days exploring the north of Israel - visit Sea of Galilee, Capernaum, and Nazareth.

Back to Bethlehem, attend conference on finding peaceful, nonviolent ways forward for Israelis and Palestinians.

Check out Jerusalem.

Back to Amman.

More time with friends.

Over and out.

Every single piece of the trip was wonderful and has its own sweet memories.

Of course, I have lots more to tell you.

But work calls.

So I will leave you with this:

a link to pictures!

Pictures coming...

Back.

I have so much to tell you!

(Starting tomorrow)

Busy Bee.

I have been a very lazy blogger lately.

Here are my excuses:

Leaving for a two-week trip tomorrow morning:
(packing, cleaning, shopping for neccesities, stopping the mail, staying late at work to finish up projects)

LSAT on June 7:
(feverish studying before we take a two-week hiatus - although we have three books on informal and formal logic that are on the airplane reading list, so we're not getting completely away. Schedule goes:

Work 8-4 [no time for a lunch break; eat at my desk], get home, change out of work clothes, and study 4:30-9:00 with a half hour break for dinner. Saturday and Sunday sleep in, study 10-5, try to pack/prepare for trip (see above)/have a good time.)

Now tell me, when would YOU blog?

T- minus how many days? (someone do the math)

Leaving for the Middle East on Saturday morning.

Reuniting with good friends, experiencing new parts of the world, and hoping to capture it all on my camera.

I'm VERY excited!

P.S.

Isn't this flower

simply lovely?

I think I would like a dress

made out of this flower.

Breaking News

The Mister and I are taking the LSAT.

(in preparation for a possible law school run)

Test is June 7th.

Major big deal.

Pray for me?

P.S. Despite all the jokes, I am not doing this to channel her: