exhaustion.

Sometimes you do things, impulsive things usually, and no matter how important they seem to you, it doesn't matter because it's not enough, it's never enough. Sometimes you let go of things, material things, and think that what you're going to pursue is more important than that but then you wake up months later and you're right back where you were initially, with the same faces and places surrounding you, you're left wondering if letting go of that thing, as material as it was, was right.

I've been awake for over 12 hours and it's 14h. I'm the type of person that thinks of 98 things at once...too many thoughts for her own good. I'm that person that runs on 4-5 hours of sleep and has more energy than a five year old. No matter how much I try to rest, my body still can't manage to stay still and I wonder if I am going to spend the rest of my life feeling this anxious. I'm convinced that when I die, I'll still be thinking and waiting and oh how I hate waiting! It's not because I am naturally impatient, it's the fact that I really have no idea what I am waiting for.

There is a Chinese proverb that says the three hardest things in life are loving someone who doesn't love you back, waiting for someone who never comes and not being able to sleep when you are so tired. I might be facing a mix of all three, or maybe just one, I may never know, but instead, I'll continue to wait, and not out of choice.

It takes two.

My suitcase is on the floor. The clothes are still inside, unpacked, except for a few things. Maybe I should unpack, I feel like I've been recycling clothes. My bookcase is still empty, save for the books and magazines I actually unpacked. But things are still up in the air, which is why I've kept everything as is. Toronto makes me unproductive, or maybe it's the fact that my desk is covered with papers and doesn't feel like my space. May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December, January - that's how long I've been living out of suitcases and never have I unpacked them. Boarding passes from Beirut, Bilbao, Barcelona, Amman, Orlando, Chicago, Frankfurt, Toronto, Winnipeg and Ottawa peek out of the pages of my journal. My body has forgotten the concept of time, and my phone is tired of changing time zones and sim cards. I even stopped asking if the tap water was safe and just took my chances.

It's hard to believe that it's already 2011. The length of my hair is a sign of how much time has passed since the last time I was in my own house, sitting and relaxing on my couch. 2010, in comparison to 2009, was a much better year for me, I've accomplished a lot throughout the year, although sometimes I feel like I haven't. Despite the cloud of uncertainty that continues to hover over my head, the entire journey was necessary for my mental and physical health, it was an experience I may never have again. I had the opportunity to teach for the first time, to visit more cities in a day than I could ever imagine, to interact and meet some of the most fantastic people, explore and document societies and cultures and eat copious amounts of good food. What was the biggest lesson learned? That I need to pack lighter.
I have so much I want to write, but I can't seem to piece the sentences together.

Two years of maintaining this blog today, and although I haven't posted as much as I should have (I've even forgotten to post about my adventures with the bedouins in Wadi Rum and at the Red Sea) here's to another year of yuppie activism. I hope you'll still be reading.

Fix your accent.

The small cup is suddenly a medium, and the weather is almost always in the double digits, even if it feels cold. These are the signs of being in America. I'm currently in Florida, on a family vacation. Normally, I would never take a trip with my mother, my two bratty little sisters, my aunt, her granddaughter, my nephew, my other aunt and her two sons, but since being in Canada (specifically Winnipeg) was making my hands feel like sand paper that's never getting softer even after constant use, I decided to get some sun. A part of me secretly wanted to visit Disney and Universal Studios again, it has been 13 years since my last visit and I adore rides.

Florida really is a swamp. The water tastes like it's straight out of the sewer. I attempt to keep my mouth completely closed when showering because I am constantly gagging.

Everywhere you go in Orlando, there are numerous restaurants and stores with wood as opposed to glass for windows. Closed up, probably due to the recession. West Palm Beach does not look as affected - its restaurants and shoppes are packed. But the senior citizens definitely overpower the amount of youth and so do the Lexuses and Mercedes.

*Photos taken in West Palm Beach

no option for extension

It's hard to imagine that today marks five years since she felt that feeling. Five years and everything since has been temporary. Her memory recalls the day vividly - even the clothes she wore, the accessory she had on her backpack, and the way she wandered around aimlessly, confused and unable to understand why she had done what she had done, but she knew it had to be done. She wonders if she's the only one who remembers this date, but it doesn't matter because here she is, five years later, still looking for that feeling, that feeling of permanency.

Until then

She loves to put us down. All of us, not just me. "I won't tell you what people said about you, because I'm ashamed to tell you and hurt your feelings." I know deep down it isn't people, but it's her thoughts of me, what she thinks of me. I sense it in her voice, in her mannerisms. This is the reason why I feel like a television screen in the background when I speak to her, a program on mute, an image. I go to sleep hoping that in the morning what I saw, heard and felt was not true, but who am I kidding? I click next and next and next, I listen to conversation after conversation after conversation, all praising the most important people in one's life, and I wish, one day, I could participate. Until then, I keep pretending.

Oops...belated Ramadan Kareem

How can I forget to wish everyone a Ramadan Kareem. Sorry for being two weeks late, but internet is really slow around here.

Cities of immigrants and oranges

Tel Aviv from Jaffa

This is Tel-Aviv.

Ironic?

The shurut from Haifa takes 40NIS and drops you off in a grimy neighborhood. This is Tel-Aviv and not only does it feel strange but everything feels out of place. The name should've been the indication. If this isn't an identity crisis, then I don't know what constitutes one. I guess they are right when they say it's the South of France, many people look like they've inspired Donatella Versace's Eurotrash looks. The divide between the rich and the poor is like any other North American city, and looking at Tel-Aviv's skyline makes you feel as if you're somewhere in Mexico in the 70s, the hotels give it away.

Jaffa from Tel Aviv

Jaffa's clocktower. This makes roundabout #3 I illegally and dangerously cross to get a photo.

I wasn't really interested in spending time here anyway and 70s architecture or numerous Bauhaus style homes from the 30s wasn't going to make me stay either. I was more interested in taking a short walk to Jaffa, the Bride of the Sea, the city whose beauty is renowned, a city long inhabited and the city that smells of oranges. I also have a thing for walled cities, which explains my love for Jerusalem.

Unfortunately, Jaffa's walls were dismantled to ease traffic in the 20th century. Her old inhabitants were also dismantled, and must now live with the fact that all their old homes, previously inhabited by Arabs, now house galleries, museums and shops. The Arab population in Jaffa is evident, but due to Tel-Aviv's proximity, the population is more balanced than other old cities. Jaffa's old city doesn't quite feel like Haifa's old market, or Akka's old city. The narrow alleys are cleaner. Some homes are renovated and trees provide shading. Rarely do you find Arabs roaming the streets of Tel-Aviv, but in Jaffa you do, however, most of the shops selling "Falafel, Israel's National Snack" postcards are run by Israelis and flooded with fanny pack wearing Americans.

Jaffa port

The Arab Hebrew theatre

Cannons from the Ottoman era

Ajami café

It isn't hard to imagine how beautiful Jaffa once was and the peaceful harmony that resonated from it. I would live here because it's warm, its coast is blue and its cobblestones are old. I would live here, if it weren't for the obvious obstacles I face.

Sadness consumes me when I walk through the old city and I know if I stay any longer I'd sit still, constantly waiting for the smell of oranges that won't come to fill my nostrils.

Mahmoud Darwish poem on someone's balcony

Hanging rock

Conversations with tourists

In Haifa, we met a couple from Austria. I'm 100% sure they thought I was a spy.

"A long time ago, this guy from Germany decided to go to Albania and pretend he was the King of Albania. His reign lasted three months!" she says.

"That's crazy! I wish I could do that, claim royalty somewhere, but nowadays it's impossible," I say.

"How did they not know he was not the King of Albania? And why did it take three months?" my friend asks.

"Because back then, there was no google. You had to take a ship, wait for it to arrive to Alexandria, let them check the references in the old library, realize he really isn't the King of Albania, send a ship back to Albania and inform the court," I respond.

Nablus

This city is conservative, and I don't care much for tradition. Tradition and religion are not the same, but many people think they are. After a few days in the remote village where my family comes from, packed with too much tradition and over zealous fallaheen, and almost losing our minds, we departed for Nablus where we were put straight to work. I'm volunteering at the university in the public relations department that organizes this fantastic summer camp for international and local youth. I adore the hospitality here, minus the stares that I constantly get and the jaws dropping when I respond in a perfectly constructed Arab sentence to "welcome! welcome!" mistaking me for a foreigner. You don't find people like this [hospitable] where I live [Canada].

This used to be a building, demolished by the IDF during the intifada. There is word they are making a playground...

With an assigned student guide that I refer to as an absolute gem, we visited the Old City of Nablus, a haven of pregnant stray cats, demolished buildings (thank Israel's countless invasions on Nablus during the second intifada) and construction. They are fixing the water pipes, or modernizing the West Bank, whatever you want, which is supposedly "hope" for the Palestinians because rules and regulations represent progress. How about focusing your energies on other things that will drive proper change as opposed to having police officers roam the streets (as if the occupation isn't enough) giving out tickets like North American police officers on New Year's Eve, and creating new laws that resemble the unnecessary implementation of rules in the West? This discussion will continue as I continue touring the various cities.

The remains of an old Turkish bath

A tour in Balata refugee camp, the most populated refugee camp in the West Bank, meant a dance with sadness. Overcrowded is an understatement - this is beyond the suburbs, your house is basically in the other, and the things like secrets, privacy, sunlight and proper air circulation do not exist here.

The first floor is what replaced the tents 8 years after the creation of the refugee camp. These would house an entire family. Once the family grew, they would build another room on top of the first room.

Narrow alleys of Balata refugee camp

We climb an old camel brown Opel, owned by a 70-year old man originally from Yazoor, a city near Jaffa. He was eight when the Nakba happened. The window is a workout to bring down, and the heat makes me put in the extra effort to get it down. We arrive in a part of Nablus where the air is cooler, and he recounts his story, and how he was displaced, like 750,000 other Palestinians in 1948. His story is different than other testimonials I've witnessed: not only does he have the key to his house, but he has over 100 deeds to land he owns, some from the British Mandate, others from the Ottomon Empire. The documents also include marriage certificates and old receipts. He owns dunams and dunams of land - and if we calculate the old Palestinian gineh ($4 dollars is approximately 1 gineh), he's wealthy.










Ottoman era

Right of Return - resolution 194