Sitting in Deficit

Between being sick and traveling, there has been little time for trumpeting this past month. I have an open invitation to jam at Dar Sansour (the Wi’am office) so I absconded upstairs and sunk my lips indulgently into a few familiar strains. My embouchure not entirely lost, I was just beginning to feel a little less sick when the scent of brewing zatta reached my nostrils. Zatta is known as thyme in English but I think that I will always call it zatta: the herb sees more action in this culture.

I went down-stairs and decided to sit while the tea finished brewing. As I did so, Zoughbi began to tell everyone in the room what a great guy I was and how important it was to be hospitable to me. I must have blushed terribly. I reassured everyone that they had been very hospitable to me and that it was really my pleasure to be there. Zoughbi went even further, saying that I was welcome to play outside, if I wanted, and no one would bother me.

As I sat down to drink my zatta, Zoughbi chimed-in again: “We are going to pay condolences; would you like to come with us?”

The answer was yes. I put my kafiah back on and joined Imad and Usama R. in Zoughbi’s car. We picked-up a school-teacher from Beit Sahour on our way to a nearby church. As we arrived, the abuna from the Greek Catholic congregation came walking up the street. We all shook hands and filed inside.

There, about two dozen older men stood as we entered. Zoughbi muttered the correct Arabic phrase and I tried my best to say it to each of them but I could tell I was not quite on-target. I took a seat next to Saliba and waited respectfully while they all conversed in Arabic. Only a few words popped in my ear: Eeran, ‘Ameerca, Isryal, Filisteen. Younger men were circulating the room with pots of coffee. I had to smile at the way older men accepted the tiny cup of coffee and then tried to offer it to the abuna, who wanted none of it. Personally, I had to use the restroom and Arabic coffee was going to exacerbate that like nothing else.

Another line of men entered, so that we all stood and shook hands with each other like opposing teams after a basketball game as our line left the church. I had made it without offending anyone and that was good enough for me, so I thought. We started the car and headed to the next church. “There are two funerals today.”

This time, I made sure to find the bathroom. While I was managing my fluid problem, I took a minute to think about what I was doing there. I knew nothing about the deceased. If I were capable of asking, I would not anyway. I had already been to one of these, I mused, so that I probably had all I needed to blather about paying condolences in my blog. From my normal, American perspective I was wasting time that I might have been using to... to... to...

I left the restroom with an intentionally different perspective: I was there. It reminded me of an important realization that flowered in the past month or so. In coming to terms with my relationship to my father, I also came to terms with the fact that sometimes even my attempts to be altruistic have oriented to my need to feel helpful rather than the needs of another. Praises on High, I managed to become more aware of that phenomenon and decided that there was value in ‘sitting in deficit’ with people while they are in the midst of struggle. Imagine how different the story of Job might be if his friends had continued sitting in silence with him rather than beginning their respective analyses.

We left the second round of condolences and proceeded to the basement, where (naam) a third funeral event was in progress. As I passed through the line, I tried to meet each eye and shake each hand with sincerity. It is hard to explain, perhaps. Facial expressions transcend some language barriers. I cannot take full credit: God blessed me with an expressive face. I let each of the older gentlemen see my emotions, how I felt to know that they had lost their friend. I can say honestly that something beautiful was there that was not at the first church, when I was worried about knowing what to do instead of wearing my compassion openly, even if there was nothing to do.

Back at the office, Zoughbi began again: “Really, you can play outside. My colleagues would like to enjoy your music without, uhh, so much repercussions inside here.”

I managed not to be very offended. At least I understood why Zoughbi had suddenly decided to talk about what a great guy John Daniel is – because he is a master at conflict resolution. Let me rephrase that: a master at Arab conflict resolution. In America, I could complain that he was being too indirect or feel betrayed by my co-workers because they did not feel comfortable confronting me. Yet, this is Palestine: everyone saves face. I choose to go outside; my co-workers are complicit in my playing somewhere on the grounds. Khalid remains outside of the equation. I know trumpets are loud but that is what I play. Halas.

...and the children win. The children always win. I went outside to a play-ground with half a dozen children and left a play-ground with two-dozen children. They came in twos and threes to the funny, loud noises. They had the most beautiful brown eyes and gaping smiles... I should tell you all about them sometime soon...

Sitting in Deficit

Between being sick and traveling, there has been little time for trumpeting this past month. I have an open invitation to jam at Dar Sansour (the Wi’am office) so I absconded upstairs and sunk my lips indulgently into a few familiar strains. My embouchure not entirely lost, I was just beginning to feel a little less sick when the scent of brewing zatta reached my nostrils. Zatta is known as thyme in English but I think that I will always call it zatta: the herb sees more action in this culture.

I went down-stairs and decided to sit while the tea finished brewing. As I did so, Zoughbi began to tell everyone in the room what a great guy I was and how important it was to be hospitable to me. I must have blushed terribly. I reassured everyone that they had been very hospitable to me and that it was really my pleasure to be there. Zoughbi went even further, saying that I was welcome to play outside, if I wanted, and no one would bother me.

As I sat down to drink my zatta, Zoughbi chimed-in again: “We are going to pay condolences; would you like to come with us?”

The answer was yes. I put my kafiah back on and joined Imad and Usama R. in Zoughbi’s car. We picked-up a school-teacher from Beit Sahour on our way to a nearby church. As we arrived, the abuna from the Greek Catholic congregation came walking up the street. We all shook hands and filed inside.

There, about two dozen older men stood as we entered. Zoughbi muttered the correct Arabic phrase and I tried my best to say it to each of them but I could tell I was not quite on-target. I took a seat next to Saliba and waited respectfully while they all conversed in Arabic. Only a few words popped in my ear: Eeran, ‘Ameerca, Isryal, Filisteen. Younger men were circulating the room with pots of coffee. I had to smile at the way older men accepted the tiny cup of coffee and then tried to offer it to the abuna, who wanted none of it. Personally, I had to use the restroom and Arabic coffee was going to exacerbate that like nothing else.

Another line of men entered, so that we all stood and shook hands with each other like opposing teams after a basketball game as our line left the church. I had made it without offending anyone and that was good enough for me, so I thought. We started the car and headed to the next church. “There are two funerals today.”

This time, I made sure to find the bathroom. While I was managing my fluid problem, I took a minute to think about what I was doing there. I knew nothing about the deceased. If I were capable of asking, I would not anyway. I had already been to one of these, I mused, so that I probably had all I needed to blather about paying condolences in my blog. From my normal, American perspective I was wasting time that I might have been using to... to... to...

I left the restroom with an intentionally different perspective: I was there. It reminded me of an important realization that flowered in the past month or so. In coming to terms with my relationship to my father, I also came to terms with the fact that sometimes even my attempts to be altruistic have oriented to my need to feel helpful rather than the needs of another. Praises on High, I managed to become more aware of that phenomenon and decided that there was value in ‘sitting in deficit’ with people while they are in the midst of struggle. Imagine how different the story of Job might be if his friends had continued sitting in silence with him rather than beginning their respective analyses.

We left the second round of condolences and proceeded to the basement, where (naam) a third funeral event was in progress. As I passed through the line, I tried to meet each eye and shake each hand with sincerity. It is hard to explain, perhaps. Facial expressions transcend some language barriers. I cannot take full credit: God blessed me with an expressive face. I let each of the older gentlemen see my emotions, how I felt to know that they had lost their friend. I can say honestly that something beautiful was there that was not at the first church, when I was worried about knowing what to do instead of wearing my compassion openly, even if there was nothing to do.

Back at the office, Zoughbi began again: “Really, you can play outside. My colleagues would like to enjoy your music without, uhh, so much repercussions inside here.”

I managed not to be very offended. At least I understood why Zoughbi had suddenly decided to talk about what a great guy John Daniel is – because he is a master at conflict resolution. Let me rephrase that: a master at Arab conflict resolution. In America, I could complain that he was being too indirect or feel betrayed by my co-workers because they did not feel comfortable confronting me. Yet, this is Palestine: everyone saves face. I choose to go outside; my co-workers are complicit in my playing somewhere on the grounds. Khalid remains outside of the equation. Trumpets are loud but that is what I play. Halas.

...and the children win. The children always win. I went outside to a play-ground with half a dozen children and left a play-ground with two-dozen children. They came in twos and threes to the funny, loud noises. They had the most beautiful brown eyes and gaping smiles... I should tell you all about them sometime soon...

Say Hello to Stockholm

A bad habit among bloggers is the “cathartic disclosure”, where the author throws every switch and loosens every valve, spewing a stream of raw emotion. On the other hand, there is a point where it is time to abandon the reflective tone and other contrivances and “keep it real”. I am trying to create a piece of the second kind but I welcome readers to hold me accountable if this entry starts leaning toward the former.

I reached that point two days ago. Whenever I am ill, I display a counter-intuitive surge in stubborn behavior. Some latent daemon in me takes the opportunity to start acting feisty; this time, I went ramrod over the UNESCO fiasco, which coincided with the pointless (and erroneous, in my opinion) re-affirmation of “In God We Trust” by congress. Like a genius (add sarcasm to taste) I made statements on Facebook:

“Hey US: keep your UNESCO funding because YOU ARE STILL IN DEBT FROM ALL YOUR WARS”

“Hey US: putting ‘In God We Trust’ on buildings and then perpetuating injustice makes you MORE evil, not less. Just fyi...”

Those were disclosures of the first kind. Later that evening, a church secretary from Michigan warned me to ‘beware of radicalization tactics’ and accused me of experiencing Stockholm syndrome. Luckily, I didn’t know what Stockholm syndrome was and continued ranting to Kara Crawford:

“America’s God is made of guns and money... they’re accomplices to oppression... “IDF”, psh: Illegal, Destructive FACISM ... if writing something repeatedly makes it true, I’m going to go to bed with a sharpie and write “I’M SEXY” all over my body instead of doing chin-ups...” etc.

Hauntingly, the words “Stockholm Syndrome” kept percolating into my thoughts. I worried that the nails were already in my activists' coffin, that I was a classic case of the mystery syndrome, doomed to be edified and shut-up about Palestine. Being responsible for my personal growth, I decided to face-the-music on Wikipedia:

In psychology, Stockholm Syndrome is a term used to describe a real paradoxical psychological phenomenon wherein hostages express empathy and have positive feelings towards their captors, sometimes to the point of defending them. These feelings are generally considered irrational in light of...

*nails popping from coffin*...son of a bitch: I’m here in solidarity with the hostages –and we have to TRY REALLY HARD to have positive feelings about the captors. Perhaps its the severe lack of a lack of abuse—savvy? Of course, what am I going to say to an old church secretary who either does not understand what Stockholm Syndrome is or is not educated enough to distinguish between the captors and the hostages in the West Bank? It did raise some funny (HAHAHA!) questions about the implications of explaining Occupation to someone whose paradigm is precisely backward. After being lectured to like a child, it was both tempting AND totally appropriate to return-fire with a similar lecture. Still, I was fatigued and decided that reaming-out a church secretary from a poor Grand Rapids neighborhood is not ending The Occupation. Posting this entry is not either but, frankly, I don’t care.

The real ‘Stockholm’ Syndrome is the reverse of what my mistaken friend supposed. Entire groups of Swedish sympathizers visit Wi’am on a regular basis. A couple weeks ago, Liam and I saw a Swedish choir sing at the Bethlehem Peace Center. The director was fond of making jokes about the US between sets and every single zinger hit home. I laughed heartily. The Palestinians on either side of me extended their hands to me:

من اميركا؟

ايوة، في ميشيجان.

اهلن و سهلن.

شكرن.

Note: I know my Arabic is remedial-level but I still enjoy confusing you with it.

So to review: Swedes support Palestinians and make-fun-of the US—how’s that for a Stockholm Syndrome?

The next day, I returned to the Wi’am office at Dar Sansour – which was restored thanks to funds from a cultural heritage organization in Sweden. I drank Arabic coffee with a made-in-Palestine scarf wrapped snugly around my neck and listened to Zoughbi Zoughbi talk to some Floridians. With stress and the changing weather, his talk took on a different timbre than usual. He still said things like

“I would never think of hurting an Israeli -- we are all part of the human family,” but he also used rhetoric like

“Israel is really stepping on our neck and choking us to death...”

Rays of hope: “Only the power of the oppressed can save them and their oppressors: we are trying to save Israel’s soul from itself...” but also shadow:

“The Israeli media is brewing troubles for us...” <--Naturally.

I commented to Imad, later, that I was angry with the US. He shrugged it off: “Don’t be angry, جون, it is garbage for your health. If you are angry at the USA you will find infinite anger. It’s no good...”

Palestinian scarves, tattoos, and whatever other symbols of solidarity aside, I am not held captive by Israel or the US. My captivity is a gift from whatever just colonized my respiratory system. I spend long periods laying in bed in semi-somnambulence, getting-up to drink mint-tea and cough things up. I’m fighting not against flesh and blood (or Zionism) but microbial forces of wickedness. There was a bright moment in the midst of sickness – an encounter that went well. That was it. Two days later, I am back into my bed and still many hours of patience and disciplined-understanding away from what my heart desires. That is normally fine with me: I would rather take months than rush and fail to build as I should. Still, I felt the full weight of separation this morning.

Earlier this week, at the height of a crabby morning, I told my mother that there was no way I was going to write her e-mail four to five times a week and that she should adjust. Subsequently, she unfriended me on Facebook. Thank God, she self-selected. My Father, I dropped myself and was glad to do so, not because I want to be estranged permanently from my parents but because I want to hear from them intermittently and in a positive way—social media highlights the problems that have been present for three decades. There is an entire book to be written about the dysfunctions of my nuclear family yet only one thing needs said: it’s gone. Hallelujah, that family is dead. I have my sister but that oppressive unit is gone forever. Better still, the YAM-family has embraced me. It is the other missionaries that I miss every day, longing for a time when I can fall into their arms again. Family is independent of blood-lines.

Yet, I cannot help feeling pain for the Zoughbi family. Tarek Zoughbi now has several bolts in his arm from an orthopedic surgery--check-points will forever be his bane. In spite of his US citizenship, Israel is using his Palestinian ID Card as an excuse to bar him from flying into Tel Aviv. The trip through Jordan is too expensive. Zoughbi will not see his oldest son at Christmas and probably not his daughter either. “She should stay with her brother so he is not alone...” said Abu-Tarek.

This morning it rained. Luca and Rafiq rounded-up some extra sweaters for me and I came back to the room and started drinking tea and thinking about all of these things and more. At risk of giving everyone an incomplete picture of this illness, I think I am going to end on that note: It rained. I was so cold I needed multiple sweaters. Everyone at Wi’am insisted that I get rested. Joy Prim issued a special prayer. I read the prayer, on Skype, and appreciated the thoughtful words she had spared for my low-point. Then it dawned on me that I am always boasting about the potency of Joy Prim prayers and now one has been laid upon me. Does that mean I have to believe things will rebound miraculously? If they do, doesn’t that mean I have other things I want Joy and the other YAMs praying for? *winks*

So, I’ll spare you all any more eye-strain. If you meet any Swedes in your travels, say hello to Stockholm for me. Ciao.

Walls:

Once upon a time, it was only a ring of rubble. A powerful foreign empire swept into the region, blowing Jerusalem's inhabitants into the East like dandelion fluff. Decades later, a new generation returned to the Holy mound and its city, in shambles and left vulnerable by gaping holes in its wall. According to the book of Nehemiah, a different kind of prophet came to Judea and drew the people together. In fifty-two days, it says, they were able to restore the wall and a sense of identity.

I drew a stone from upstate New York out of my bag and touched it against the wall in Jerusalem. I later learned that the Ottoman Turks built this incarnation of the wall in 1541 but the symbolism of the gesture was not lost. At one time, that little stone laid in a jar of water with 25 others like it. When I read Nehemiah, I am inspired by his unwillingness to be told that his goal is unreasonable, nor be intimidated by the self-interested people who are trying to prevent the refugees’ return. Wall’s function, by itself, may have been security but the function of building the wall was greater still: the refugees worked together and learned how to live together again. Nehemiah instituted reforms, evident in chapters 5, 9, 10, & 13. Within the parameters of the re-established Jerusalem, people were held accountable for their actions.

My readers are intelligent enough to know what walls can do. There doesn’t need to be a breakdown of the difference between a boundary, a buffer and a barrier. Anyone who reads this blog can smell the comparison coming, too. I stood by the Southwest corner of the Jerusalem Wall and looked over my shoulder. Across the valley was the concrete gerrymander. The cement serpent. At that moment, it looked most like a giant millipede quietly eating the decay it makes. Three days later, I looked at it from a different hill-top. From there, I could also see a Palestinian neighborhood completely enclosed by barbed-wire fence. The check-point there is walking-only, so that all of their Israeli-registered cars never go more than a kilometer. They carry their groceries and gasoline—everything—on foot. They are not Bedouin: all of them have to work jobs in Jerusalem to survive. In other words, if they want to keep their ID cards they must be indentured servants.

Walls can be good for your health. They prevent you from freezing in the winter, seeing your Dad naked or the organelles from leaving your cells. The Old City Wall has that cellular quality, with gates like pores and so many disparate, Holy apparatuses folded tightly into its cytoplasm. It defines an area and part of a community. The other wall reminds me of an amoeba. It severs communities by swallowing the arable land and leaving Palestinian villages behind or stretching itself around historic sites and leaving businesses stranded. Its route is no accident: it forms a tourniquet at the very point that Manger Street and Hebron road would converge, asphyxiating Bethlehem’s commerce. More than twenty years ago, the Jerusalem Municipality started offering property tax-breaks to Palestinians who moved past a certain point to the East. When the opportune moment arose, Israel built the wall just West of this building-boom and retracted the municipal limits: no more ID cards for them. “We are dealing with very intelligent people,” said our tour guide, Hammod, “there are people who sit in offices all day and think of ways to make Palestinians’ lives impossible.”

“Look over the wall and you will see people slaughtering each other,” joked Hammod. The other tourists flinched a moment before they realized: the wall bisected an East Jerusalem neighborhood. “Why here? The people on the other side are the same as on this side. There are more than 40,000 people who come to work in Israel illegally everyday. Israel has the best surveillance technology available, so they know. If this wall is for security, why would they let that happen?” The wall is hardly a source of security. One day, I passed through the check-point with relative ease, while the soldier in the booth yacked on her cell phone and apathetically waved me through. Two days later, the guards were performing monkey business with the electronic turn-styles; they would turn on the green light but not unlock the gate or unlock and relock the gate quickly. The little green light would flicker and another Palestinian would push against the gate, still locked. Clack. That day, the same guard just HAD to see my VISA stamp. Why? The wall is an intentional obstacle to anything that is not idiot tourists and cheap labor. As I hear Zoughbi say, repeatedly: “Israel wants to have cake and eat cake too.”

The politics of walls is not new. Walls are good for obscuring. They can create the needed illusion of danger when Israel wants to keep tourists funneled into the Nativity church, so they never get the chance to identify with Palestinians. The Zionist Christians can play pretend-promised-land and never feel the guts of what Jesus had to say, refusing to go beyond the walls. Some walls are not physical. Relenting in curiosity, I read about the Old City Wall on a Jewish History website. It advised visitors to “stay to the main thoroughfares in the Muslim Quarter,” as if it were dangerous or undesirable when, I know, the only quarter of the city that feels different is the Jewish one. On the other hand, the gerrymander makes it easy to forget how close Bethlehem, East Jerusalem and Ramallah are to each other; all of those Palestinians are kept far apart when they could be less than an hour away from united. “Some Jews are waiting for the Messiah, still; good luck to Him, here—I hope He has a permit to get through the checkpoint.”

Before we lapse into clichés about breaking down our ‘barriers’, consider the possibility of your home being breached. You build a new addition onto your house to accommodate more family. The court confiscates the key to the new addition, since it was built without a permit. One day, strange people show-up with said key and start to live in the new addition—with the intention of taking over your entire house and property if you ever leave. I bore witness to this situation. This is what I describe as parasitic Settler behavior. The problem is not walls but the intentions behind them. It would be impossible for me to imagine that the wall is for safety, even if they dress it up with a pretty facade whenever it passes through a Jewish neighborhood. Walls are for containment but containment is not always right. A significant point in the New Testament, for me, is when the temple curtain is reported to have torn from ceiling to floor, symbolically opening the Holy of Holies so that everyone could be sanctified.

The Holy of Holies was breached, violently, when the second temple was destroyed by Roman forces. Presently, it is re-sanctified under another faith—the same faith that built the current version of the wall. The temple mound is now home to a golden dome, built over a stone rising to meet Mohammad or a ruined temple alter, depending on how you look at it. Unfortunately, when I tried to visit I found that a new barrier had been erected. “It’s closed. Muslims only!” That would be one thing coming from a Muslim but is quite another coming from an Israeli Defense Force soldier, not a Muslim himself. If that smells like ‘fish’ to you, you are not alone. The closest I got to the dome was a photograph I took from the top of Al-Quds University. Fittingly, there is a line of barbed-wire partially obscuring its gleam.

Many promise that they will have a piece of the apartheid wall on their mantel someday, just as chips of the Berlin wall have scattered to all ends of the Earth. Other than a truck-sized section removed every few kilometers for farmers, I disagree. Any wall left inside the green-line when justice is served (and it will be) should remain as a monument—both to the hypocritical bigotry of Israel and the persistence of Palestine. Even now, the Wall is filling with artwork. The Palestinian Authority should be able to sell sections of the wall to artists who meet their criteria and I would like to see one-hundred percent of the proceeds go to education. I never want a Palestinian parent to buy a book again. Post-secondary, too: I want students from Scotland, Brazil, Taiwan (I don’t care) to compete for scholarships to come study in Palestine. While we are at it, I would like to see the tiles taken from the ‘garden’ portions of the wall and put-up around the courtyard at Bethlehem University, Al-Quds U., the international café in Ramallah, and other legitimate walls around the West Bank. As long as the snake is slain, make snake-skin boots.