many lessons for me today. patience

the occupation hits so many so hard, and affects peoples' lives in every way. and there are struggles within that are compounded by the occupation. class struggle in this place cant really be talked about. the palestinians are oppressed. period. every one of them. but there are layers of oppression that go deeper. these layers seem very difficult to address in US society and culture, impossible to imagine here. i had a taste of different worlds here so far, between doctors and labor organizers and international NGO folks. the doctors all had their sweet taste of privilege in their mouths, which i have a natural aversion to. but its more complicated that that. they feel like they deserve more because of their fantastic status. they have wealth, and they have power. but of course, this is a relative power, and wealth, because it is limited by the apartheid wall that the israelis have built. but a power nonetheless and it is perhaps the occupation and oppression upon them that make them cling to their status even more dearly. so its a strange mix of feelings for me. they dont wait in lines, they get frustrated when someone is in the way of their car, they expect their secretaries and assistants to wait on their every beck and call. they dont experience the daily hazards and implications of the occupation in the same way as do 90% of their "countrymen". and at the end of the day it seems so sad because they cant go 9 miles from ramallah to jerusalem just like every other palestinian with a west bank card.

so i got a little tired of being introduced to doctors as "this is mateo, he has come to talk about chinese medicine, and he himself was a detainee by the israeli army and was psychologically tortured." this sentence ends with a hearty chuckle in the room by the doctors, and i am not sure how to respond. what he says is true. and in saying so i remember standing naked in front of 5 soldiers and being told that i would be killed before i left. this was not funny to me. so maybe there is humor in that it seems so bizarre that i fall into the same category that their patients fall into, an uncommon situation. these men have never been arrested or experienced the torture that their patients have. and granted my experience in prison pales in comparison to that of so many thousands of palestinians, but it doesnt change the fact. i doubt that these men laugh when their patients tell them of their torture. so what is it that makes them laugh? in a moment i resent them for their laughter, their superior doctorly laughter, and then i remember that they have lived under occupation their entire lives. and of course they cling to the little grace, respect, and privilege they can get in their lives.

and in the afternoon i go to the office of the palestine general federation of trade unions with abdelrahim, and sit and listen and talk politics with the secretary. a different experience, very much so, but also so similar. oppression everywhere. except the analysis of broader struggle to end oppression doesnt end with the occupation for the labor guy, it ends with the end of capitalism. but he says the palestinian society cant begin to think about these things until the occupation is over. he says they need to take responsibility - clean up their streets, stop throwing trash on the ground, stop putting chemicals on their foods, take responsibility. but its so difficult when the occupation pits one against the other. he said to me "i like life, the israeli likes life. but he makes it dark above. when its dark skies, above ground below ground, whats the difference?" he tells me about his village, 1200 years old, now has a settlement from 15 years ago that takes the local water for their fountains, swimming pools, gardens, grass and his village only has drinking water one day a week. 2 men from his village were killed by a settler recently when they were going home from work in a factory. they were waiting in the car after work to pick up their friend, a settler came out and asked what they were doing, he told the guy, and the settler left and came back 2 minutes later with a machine gun and murdered the two at point blank range. no punishment for the settler, he was never "found".

i leave the trade union office, and on the way out they show me the new door that was put in six months ago from after the soldiers came in and destroyed their computers and shot up the place, for the second time in a year.

having lunch with abed he tells me about a visit to the US, on a speaker's tour. his phone goes off every 22 seconds, and someone always needs something from him. he admits that the only real way for him to rest is to leave, and this is a privilege that few get and abed himself feels a little guilty about having. but the speakers tours are not all good for him, they are exhausting, and the organizers often pack the events so closely and so full that he is even more tired than in the west bank, just because they need to save money on a day of transportation or lodging for him. and then a man in ohio whom he was staying with was supposed to be responsible for a piece of luggage he left in the airport. the suitcase was full of gifts for people, t-shirts, doves of peace embroidered, many things. and the man never returned him the suitcase. he never mentioned it to anyone, he is so humble and gentle. he didnt want to make anyone feel stressed. he let it go, and told me if that man wants to steal t-shirts, let him. i am not sure what i would do if i saw this man on the street, but many unpleasant things cross my mind. i cant imagine someone treating my friend abed, one of the best people i have met in my life, such a dear man, in such a disrespectful way.

i walk back to joe's house, a man who works as a policy advisor for an ngo in ramallah. he makes more money than the average palestinian and lives in a nice house in the old city of ramallah. a really nice guy, wonderfully hospitable. yet another layer in this world.

i meet back with doctor sehwail, the general director of the treatment and rehabilitation center for victims of torture, and he has me wait for two hours in his office to speak to me for fifteen minutes. then i get lost looking for the bus station becaus it is now dark and i am alone with my bags, speak no arabic, in a culture that is still very unfamiliar to me, and alone. yes, these are the moments that i wonder why i come back. holding my bags, walking in circles, lost, not understanding a fraction of what goes on around me. but then it feels so good to see people smile when they get acupuncture, and that the training was a huge success. programs are to initiate in 4 cities within the month, and one of the trainees said to me when i left "you might be surprised, i think that the next time you come back everyone in the center will be walking around with seeds in their ears!" i like that daydream. anyway, because of this i miss a bus and end up waiting for two hours to go to jerusalem, where i wait 4 hours in line at a checkpoint to go 9 miles. i remember the story that the secretary told me at the pgftu who said every day he waits in line at a checkpoint, sometimes with 20, 30, 40 cars long, for hours, and then a settler car pulls past everybody, and in 12 seconds he is through and on his way. doctor sehwail doesnt notice that i had to wait two hours for him, he is used to it. he doesnt know where the buses are that take me to jerusalem, because he has a big fat SUV. and also because he hasnt been allowed to go to jerusalem for 10 years. its so complex that my mind begins to spin. i dont know where to begin. and i am not even getting into the israeli side of things.

all these lessons to me have to do with patience and perspective. its always good to try to step one more step back. there is good all around as well, and i apologize that tonight i am writing about my frustrations and not sharing explicitly the beauty in this. but its there, and i am feeling this simultaneously, which makes things feel even more strange.

so at the end of another long day i sit and type in a hostel in jerusalem, with my friend hisham. tomorrow i will finish the journey that i started today to tel aviv to retrieve the package that i sent three weeks ago filled with supplies and materials to support the training that i just finished participating in. such is life, here, i suppose. so this is a long ramble, and for someone who isnt a writer i seem to be doing a lot of it. this is pretty much everything that i have thought about today, welcome to the inside of my head.