Office Tour!

A little tour we did of the office :)

Aya

Aya is a 22-year old Palestinian university grad who took advantage of an entrepreneurship opportunity offered at Tomorrow's Youth Organization in Nablus in the West Bank. Her organic sheep farm is considered to be a great success and example for the program, called FWEN (Fostering Women's Entrepreneurship), founded by both TYO and Cherie Blair's international women's org.

The "Truth" About the West Bank

So I've been offline for a bit, but this really got me fired up today:

I've never heard/seen such bullshit in my life. This guy says nothing about the fact that, even if there wasn't a nation called "Palestine" legally recognized before 1948, there were still PEOPLE LIVING THERE who in no way deserved to have their homes destroyed because some foreign government decided the Jewish people needed that land more than those already living there. For hundreds of years. Oh, and even if "the presence and construction of Israeli settlements in the West Bank should not be considered illegal," the insistence by the Israeli government that all Israeli settlers should carry guns so they can harass and shoot Palestinians whenever they feel like it should be.

I Have No Profound Words

I have no profound words. Just sadness. Sadness that I'm leaving this place before the work (in my mind, at least) is finished. But we could stay here another year and still be finding new stories to tell every day; I'm still learning new things every minute; I still don't understand the culture here--why the people are so generous and welcoming and why everything is so different from what I know.

So many of the people we've met would give you the shirt off their backs--even if you were already wearing one--even if it was the only thing they owned. And this is different from American culture, as much as we'd like to deny it. But that's not to say I've enjoyed everything about the culture here--there's still definitely a very patriarchal slant (almost machismo-like) that is very frustrating for someone with feminist leanings such as myself. But for other things, like generosity towards strangers and the value of a very close-knit family, I admire these viewpoints and wish I had more time to explore them.

It has been so interesting and so enriching to interact with people whose view of the world so differs from my own. It's important, as a student of the world, I think, to see and hear out as many view points as you can; if we didn't all see the world from so many different viewpoints--so many different angles--the world wouldn't be round, it'd be flat.

So I'm taking in views of the world as I can get them, one at a time, and saving the profound words for someone who's seen far more viewpoints than I.

Nablus After Curfew

Leaving tomorrow has us all nostalgic-like, thinking back to our first few days in Nablus. Remember when that crazy thing happened? No? Oh, yeah, that's right, you weren't there. Allow me--er, Andrea (and her guest, Amy)--to clue you in.

Music in Balata

A simple video I took yesterday when our translator, Kate and I took a trip to Balata camp--the largest camp in the city of Nablus, home to both the largest number of people (20,000 in one square kilometer) and the worst conditions. We met up with a friend of our translator's who helped show us around the camp. We met an art instructor from the local university and he offered to play us some traditional Arabic music. Our translator told us his friend was a very good singer and we begged him to sing along. He obliged and the result, I think, is quite magical ;)

Unlikely Medicine

I'm a bit of a klutz. It's a fact. It doesn't matter where in the world I am or the length of the trip--you can always count on me to need some sort of medical attention: in Kenya it was a sprained wrist; in Costa Rica it was intestinal parasites. And while those specific instances have rather dramatic stories to go along with serious diagnoses, it appears my laughable Palestinian incident--tripping over a street curb--will also have an incredible story.

On our way to the bank on Thursday, I stepped off the curb and rolled my ankle and fell hard onto the pavement, ripping a hole in my knee about the size of an egg. Luckily, this all happened in front of the juice shop so I was able to sit down. Our friend Iman was working and he was so sweet--he brought me ice for my knee and gave us strawberry banana smoothies (I think it's safe to say that if this same event had occurred in front of a Starbucks in the US, I would have been lucky to even get a band aid). Normally, it's haram (culturally unacceptable) for a woman to show anything above mid-calf in public, but it seemed more important at the time to get my knee cleaned and banadaged there on the street corner in the open than respect cultural norms. We fixed it up and I hobbled back to the Center.

We left that night to go to Ramallah and Jerusalem for the weekend and travel didn't go so well for my knee--it was oozing and swelling a lot and band aids either stuck too well as to be painful or fell off quickly. I had trouble sleeping the first night because of the stinging. But when we go to Jerusalem, we stopped to have tea in a market stall with a six-fingered Beduoin farmer named Zayid. While telling us about his father who had owned the stall before him and his vegetable farm, Zayid noticed my poorly-treated knee.

"What is your problem?" he asked me.

I told him I had fallen the day before and he ushered me over to his desk, where he procured a tupperware of homemade antibiotic cream and a white bandage. He carefully peeled the band aids off my knee and spread the new ointment on there* and then wrapped my knee in the bandage. For the first time since the day before, it wasn't throbbing or stinging.

I thanked him extensively and promised to return the next day (I hoped to find something to buy from his shop). Myself and the team walked up, down, and around the Mount of Olives and Jerusalem that night and I slept like a baby on the roof of the hostel, all without being bothered by my knee. The next day though, Zayid did not return to his stall in time for us to visit him again so I hope I get another chance to visit Jerusalem before we leave to attempt to repay yet another generosity bestowed on me in this amazing place.

-Jackie

66% of photos by Andrea Patiño

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*Students of the World in no way encourages students to seek unlicensed medical attention. Accepting this guy's help was my own decision.

A Day in Nablus

Taxis and Taybeh

The other night was our first time going out to the Old City by ourselves. It had been a pretty long day so the plan was to just take a cab down there, have dinner, and maybe take a stroll. We ended up at this pretty good falafal and shwarma place.

After that, we wandered around a good bit and found ourselves at a photoshop near the center of downtown Nablus. We at first arrived there to look (skeptically) for a special cord we needed for a video project, but not only did they have the cord, but the man who owned the shop started a conversation with us that somehow led to us going upstairs and getting group portraits done. He was so excited to talk to us--I honestly don't believe it was about getting us to buy the photos (which we didn't end up doing). The atmosphere of the place was really really cool (this little kid was really really cute!!) and we met a recent grad of An Naja University (we had actually crashed the graduation ceremony the day before, lol). He was there to pick up his graduation photos with a friend and asked us a ton of things about the US.

The photoshop even had a picture of Zafer al-Masri (the founder of Tomorrow's Youth Organization) under the glass in the front counter.

From the photoshop, we hopped into a cab to get home. We told the cabbie we wanted to go to the Zafer al-Masri building. The cabbie nodded that he knew exactly where we were talking about and we were off. Five minutes later, we pulled up next to a skinny half-finished concrete 3-story building that was definitely not the 6-story monstrosity we live in. We were really confused until we remembered that the al-Masri family practically owns this city and many buildings are named after our good friend Zafer. Another five minutes of arguing with the cab driver didn't make our true destination any clearer and there was some confusion with how to activate our phone, and then who to call back at the center to get directions. We eventually got our EP Emma on the phone to talk to the cab driver. We all saw the cabbie's moment of realization and were immediately relieved and frustrated at the same time; "School!" he exclaimed (we'd said "school" at least 15 times before that). On the way to the Zafer al-Masri Foundation Building, the cab driver insisted on telling us what we needed to know to say for the next time we got in the car: "Duad Al-Talamood Zafer Masri!" He had us chanting it for a full fifteen minutes.

The next night we decided to avoid cabs and potentially confusion and hoof it around the local neighborhood. It was really cool. We shot a lot of footage of people on the streets, especially kids playing at night, but at one point, Jon got really close to a family getting into their car after buying smoothies at the juice shop (juice shops are all the rage in Nablus, fyi) and the father started walking toward Jon and I was sure he was going to have a go at him. Two minutes later, the man, who spoke very little English to our very little Arabic, was buying each of us smoothies. I am again and again caught off guard by the generosity of the Palestinian people. They are so filled with a kindness and genuineness that I have never before encountered as cultural cornerstone for a society. After all that's happened to these people, everyone we've met so far, instead of being suspicious of outsiders, they are reaching out and welcoming us into their community. I can't tell you how amazing that is, I hope that I can at least do them the favor of not taking it for granted for a second.

Somewhere in there this weekend, we also took a day trip out to a small town called "Taybeh" (which comes from the Arabic word "taybeen" which means kind) where we met up with a crazy/awesome priest-turned-tour-guide who gave us a tour of his church and his House of the Parables.

We had lunch there in the city, got a tour of a soap shop, and visited the only brewery in Palestine (Taybeh Beer: www.taybehbeer.com). We, of course, "supported" them by making some purchases and smuggling them back in our backpacks to the dry city of Nablus--got to help out the local businesses, right?

Video Blog #1

Nablus

Arriving in Nablus, I think we were all pretty caught off-guard. First of all, we have the most fantastic view of the city. Ever. This whole place is way more beautiful than I ever could have imagined.

We've now had two full days of training and it's been really really fun. We walked through the heart of Nablus (called the Old City) yesterday with Chelsea, the intern coordinator. It was very powerful to finally be on the ground, walking amongst the market stalls selling everything from cellphones to plastic colanders to live chickens and the houses, covered in posters of martyrs (and these are not necessarily people who took up arms--they are referred to here as "witnesses"). It was a very harsh reality, wandering through those winding, narrow streets between the tall, crowded buildings. I can't even begin to imagine what life here is like.

And, of course, no visit to the Old City would be complete without a taste of Nablus' famous dessert, a cheesy, sugary, fried food called "kanafa."

Today was our first day to really meet some of the kids that TYO is working with. Every Monday, they head out to a location in or near one of the camps to do sort of a day camp for the kids in the camp--essentially, they bring TYO to the kids who can't come to the Center every day. It was a lot of fun and hopefully I'll be able to post some video at some point soon.

The downside to all this activity and excitement is that I'm downright exhausted by the end of the day. At this point, I can't even see straight. Here's to hoping I can locate the "publish post" button. Cheers.

Jerusalem

We woke up in our hostel in Old Jaffa and took a walk thru the streets and flea markets in search of breakfast and satisfaction for our curiosity regarding our surroundings. We ended up at a bakery where we got some delicious pastries and toasted bagel-like sandwiches. From there, we took a walk along the Mediterranean Sea. It was beautiful.

Next, we took a bus to Jerusalem. After dragging our luggage across town (I've never regretted not buying a heavy-duty backpack more in my life), we finally arrived at our new hostel, Citadel Hostel. The place had a really awesome view from the roof.

We settled in and went almost immediately to visit the US Consulate to finally meet the other TYO interns and hear about their experiences, as well as the ambassadors' take on the situation in Nablus. We spent the next day-and-a half exploring the city of Jerusalem. It was amazing.

We went on a tour and walked through some old buildings and areas of the city that have been standing for over a millennia. Even walking through the markets, it is evident that very little of the Old City is anything but, well, old. It doesn't seem like anything has been torn down and rebuilt in at least a century. All of the buildings sort of meld together--forming an entirely different sort of city than the constantly-renewing American cities I'm used to. It was clear that this place had its own personality, shaped over a wider span of time than I could ever imagine. It was strange to think, stepping across the well-worn stone floor of the Holy Sepulchre, that millions--if not billions--of feet had tred across there, across centuries. There were even bowl-like divets in the winding staircase up to one of the altars where most people had put their foot--right in the center of the narrow stair. I was in awe--nothing really looked or felt old--it was just majestic and wholly, incredibly beautiful.

Three boarding passes and one taxi ride later . . .

We've arrived in Tel Aviv. Finally.

Security, especially going from Newark to Tel Aviv, was a nightmare. Our connector from Dallas to Newark ran late, so we had to run to the El Al flight to Israel, but we really thought we had sufficient time. Lo and behold, we got "randomly" pulled aside (all six of us, believe it or not) and we were held up for 2 1/2 hours (and the rest of the plane) while they took our bags apart and questioned us. Eventually, we found out that there was a medical emergency so the plane wasn't going to leave on time anyway, so apparently the Israeli attendants thought it would be ok to detain us--perhaps out of boredom? Whatever the reason, they ultimately decided to confiscate two cameras (although they left us the one that was obviously a video camera), a tripod, and an empty backpack. It was all very strange. Nonetheless, we got on the plane for Tel Aviv. We were served dinner, then the lights were turned down for sleep, and then we were served breakfast, both of which were very good.

After less that 12 hours, we made it to Israel. Yay! We took a cab ride across town to a small town on the edge of Tel Aviv called Old Jaffa, to stay at a hostel called the Old Jaffa Hostel.

The hostel is a beautiful old building on a cobblestone street. There's a flea market going on this morning that I really want to check out before we leave for Jerusalem.

And ending thought before I head down to the market: While I was on the plane though, I saw a kid using a Kindle. I was suddenly struck by the idea: the next generation of kids might not grow up with books. Sure, they will have digital files on hard drives whose appearance will mirror that of the original subject matter, but they will never feel the texture of printed pages between their fingers or smell the crisp fragrance of freshly-printed leafs of off-white paper. And maybe this will be a good thing--less tree-killing and whatnot--but I can't help but be sentimental. As a kid, I never went anywhere in a day without at least 3 or 4 books. These days, I hardly have time to crack a book outside of class. With this trip, it appears I will have more time for reading, but I think I forgot how voraciously and quickly I can read, and I only brought 2 books for this entire trip and after the flight here, I've already finished the longer of the two. I have several titles on my computer in an e-reader program, but I'm not entirely sure I can bring myself to stare at the screen long enough to finish even one of them. Guess I'll just stare at the computer screen while typing more blog posts instead ;)

Austin, Day 3

Training, day 2, went fairly well. We had a great talk from a local filmmaker named Keith Maitland (http://vimeo.com/user2198454) who had a lot of great things to say about storytelling, international travel, and blind high schoolers :)

The whole day was a bit of craziness because the National Team, us, was finally beginning to realize that, well, we leave TOMORROW. Crazy, I tell you. We're all hanging out in the co-op packing but we still can't really make out what exactly to do with ourselves. I know I should be getting to bed soon, but I'm completely overwhelmed by everything I feel like I have to do before tomorrow. There was a lot of stress earlier today, but I'm packed and I'm feeling a lot better but that doesn't quite help the to-do list, which means this post has to be short.

One cool link Andrea, our photographer, found last week about the West Bank (as a final prep before we go): http://www.cbc.ca/news/interactives/shatila/. Get ready. The next one of these posts will be from the West Bank.

Austin, Day 2

Fortune cookie I got at Thai Noodle House on Guadalupe in Austin while eating with teammates :)

We had our first day of training yesterday. It was great to finally meet the UT Team (University of Texas) and they're all really really cool people. While we're headed for the West Bank for our project, the UT Team is headed for Haiti. We leave Wednesday but they have until Saturday to do their last-minute packing :P

Training consisted of the twelve of us (5 from the National Team and 7 from the UT Team) sitting in on a bunch of discussion/informal lectures about various topics; everything from travel logistics and local culture to social media and photography (we actually had an AMAZING talk with a wonderful local photographer named Sarah Wilson: www.sarahwilsonphotography.com).

After hours, we went to a dive called TC's in East Austin to unwind to the jams of the Little Elmore Reed Blues Band (playing every "Blues" Monday at that exact locale). They were incredible and it was so much fun (and Austin earns even more points in my book . . .).

Hello, Austin

After 4 hours on a plane, we are finally here. Having never been to the city before, I had no idea what to expect from Austin. So far, the city has blown me away: it's beautiful, it's warm, it has a lake and parks, a cool music scene, young people, college campus, cool restaurants, bars and thrift stores. I'm just getting a really good vibe here. We went out to dinner at a Mexican restaurant with a couple members of the UT team and that was super fun. They gave us a mini tour of the city.

We've ended up staying at this uber cool co-op near the UT campus. Back in Ann Arbor, a lot of co-ops seem to be frat alternatives, but this place is so different. It's several stories high, painted a brilliant shade of lime green.

The central area on the first floor is a movie theater, dance floor, meeting place, and basket ball court.

I'm so excited for the next few days and the six weeks of post-production in Austin--it's going to be AMAZING!

T-minus 2 Days

Last weekend was amazing. I was able to spend a lot of time with my sister and the rest of my family, something I haven't been able to do much of in the past year. We spent the weekend at my family's cottage on the lake in Brooklyn, Michigan. It rained for the first half of the weekend and was blazing hot for the second half. Ahh, Michigan.

When I first got back from Costa Rica, I was very much "seasonally confused"--I kept feeling like I should be going back to classes. I soon realized that I was associating the chilly weather with fall, instead of spring, because I haven't been in Michigan for spring in nearly three years and, as you could probably guess, season changes are pretty near non-existent in Los Angeles. I've never been the kind to get homesick or dread leaving Michigan (ever, seriously), but the birds are singing and it's getting warmer and a large part of me, it seems, just wants to stay and enjoy the warm weather with my friends and family. But I leave Sunday.

The bags still aren't packed, and my to-do list is still out the door, but I like to think I'll be ready to go come Sunday. A lot of the other teams have already left the country, so I guess the National Team will be the last to go out into the field. I hope that doesn't put us at a disadvantage--I can't help but view this as a bit of a competition between the four teams--come on, SOW, put four teams in a big mansion for the summer and how can you not expect a little healthy competition? Lol. I'm looking forward to it.

Getting Ready for Nablus

I bought my 2-pack of moleskin notebooks today. It's the first preparation I make for every trip I make. I buy a pair of notebooks, the same color, one light and one dark. The light one is for field observations and notes and the second one is for thoughts and reflections about daily experiences. I have almost half a shelf of them at home now; the green ones are from Kenya, the purple ones for Costa Rica. And now I have a set of blank, red notebooks to fill with my observations and reflections from Nablus. Only now does the trip feel real.

Before this I was still recovering from three months living in rural Costa Rica. And although I'm still wrestling with re-entry and reverse culture shock, I'm getting ready to move on to an entirely new experience with SOW and Tomorrow's Youth Organization in the West Bank. I was going through the motions of getting ready: making lists, thanking donors, setting aside things to pack. But I didn't really feel like I was leaving until I left Barnes and Noble today with those notebooks in hand.

But now I'm ready. I'm ready to start observing and learning, playing and having fun, filmming and editing, experiencing and reflecting. This trip is just around the corner. And I can't wait.

Saying Goodbye to Costa Rica

Saying goodbye to Costa Rica was hard, but it's good to be home. It has been weird to have my phone and internet access 24/7 and I'm easing back into it, but it's hard, since I'm already looking towards my next trip: the West Bank.

I've still got a few loose ends with my semester in Costa Rica; I'll be posting a couple of last videos about the experience in the next couple days.

Block 3 - Chiquita Infiltration

For my Independent Project, I chose to go back to the banana workers union in Sixaola that we visited in week 2 of Block 2. I was very much drawn to all the social issues present in such an intense work environment with what seemed like very little benefits to those living there. According to the union's secretary general and head of the negotiating team (by the way, the union at this farm is the only banana workers' union in Costa Rica, which is a little scary), there is an intense and bitter rivalry between the union (the "syndicalists") and the company-sponsored solidarity association (the "solidaristas"), which is supposed to provide workers with the same protection and benefits as a union, but doesn't really do squat.

My host family was very welcoming and were very eager for me to experience every detail of their everyday lives. Twenty minutes after I got off the bus, they dragged me to the grocery store with them--in Panama.

My host sister and I standing on the bridge that connects Sixaola, Costa Rica with Guabito, Panama.

The next day we rode the "rola" (the cable system that runs through the banana plantation) to the river to swim.

I tried to conduct my interviews with the workers, but on the third day (after I'd made some really great progress: 11 interviews in 2 days), a Chiquita official walked into the fonda that my host mom owns and asked to meet with me. He told me that I was not allowed to interview Chiquita banana workers without Chiquita's permission. He gave me a lawyer's number and bid me adieu. I was shocked and angry that a corporation was trying to first of all limit the freedoms of these people to talk to me and second of all limit my freedom to talk to them! My initial backlash, naturally, turned into a video slam of Chiquita:



My first instinct was to continue interviewing workers despite Chiquita's demands (the lawyer sent me the paperwork which of course takes 5 weeks to process while I'm only on the plantation for 4 weeks, and even then no guarantees on permission), but I was worried that trying to get workers to talk to me anyway would put their jobs and livelihoods in danger. My host family assured me that they would find people and places safe to interview at and with. My sisters and their kids were great and I don't know what I would have done without them.

So I spent my month hanging out with my family, poking around the plantation (without permission, take that Chiquita!), and playing crazy eights with my best friend, a 42-year old solidarity association loyalist (not someone my sindicalista ass ever thought she'd be hanging out with).

My host family's house (the duplex right half). It has two bedrooms--I took one, 4 people slept in the other bedroom, 1 person slept on the couch, and 1 on the bed under the stairs.

For those of you who don't know, bananas do not grow on trees--they grow on plants. Why does that matter? Because plants are high maintenance and have to be replanted multiple times in a year as opposed to being part of a long-term infrastructure like, say, an apple tree that can live and produce apples for years and years. For this reason--along with the fact that bananas are produced year round not just in one season--banana plantations are very labor-intensive.

It was an incredible experience and I was so sad to leave. I really hope I can get the chance to come back.

One of my host sisters and my host mom and I.