al-quds. first days.

I'm sitting in a hostel near the old city, where there's free wireless and shay. Rosslind, my friend, and the other intern with me at UNRWA is living here for the time being. She also might move in with Michael and I, in order to bring down the rent, but I have to ask the landlord because I have a feeling that having a girl roommate isn't as norrmal here as elsewhere. I hope it works out for the best.

The manager here at the hostel, Osama, is quite nice. I almost wish I would stay here - the rent is cheap (about 25 shekels a day) and there are always interesting people around, but 7 months in a room with 8 others might get a bit annoying. We'll see. I could definitely see myself hanging out here more often.

I got lucky and found an apartment right inside the Old City of Jerusalem, inside the Damascus Gate, what the Palestinians call "Bab il3amood." The apartment has three pretty large bedrooms, a bathroom, and a small kitchen equipped with a small stove/oven, 6 arabic coffee pots, hundreds of pots/pans. There's also two sitting areas, and a balcony that sits right over a one-room mosque on the inside of the old city. The inside is rather shabby, but with some elbow grease, it has some serious potential. My roommate, Michael, is 30 and works at PASSIA with mom's cousin Sana. He's a good-hearted guy who spent 10 years after high school traveling and doing odd jobs, and then went to college at Concordia in Montreal.

I've been to UNRWA about 1.5 days so far, and it looks like the work is quite promising. As of now, I've been kind of shadowing others and taking care of administrative things - getting my id and my UN certificate squared away, meeting everyone, doing the security training, and taking a tour of the area. I'm actually working with the Headquarter's Public Information Office. HQ is technically based in Gaza, but they have essentially relocated to Jerusalem since 2005. Israel will not allow them to officially do so. So the HQ (at least PIO) is split up now between Gaza, Jerusalem, and Amman and it's making what should be streamlined work rather difficult. My main tasks at the office will be working on Media updates (updating the UN on how the conflict is covered in the media - they want me to read Arabic media so I really need to start practicing), writing articles for their website (for which I might be able to go into the West Bank to the camps), helping with the 1948 work (we are doing an event commemorating the 60 year anniversary) and working on popularizing UNRWA among youth (for which my work at AAI might prove to be very useful.) UNRWA so far seems to be a generally good - albeit bureaucratic - organization.

In terms of traveling into the West Bank, there's a lot to tell in terms of how the Israeli Army is supposed to treat us, and how they actually do. The most interesting, and depressing, part of what I've learned is that no international is obliged to show the IDF their passports as long as they present UN ID. UNRWA HAS relented, nonetheless, to allow the IDF to force Palestinian employees to show the army their Israeli IDs at any given checkpoint, despite the guaranteed protection accorded to UN employees and ESPECIALLY UN vehicles. The UN - and particularly UNRWA - seems to be particularly disliked by Israelis in particular, and especially by right wingers. The head of my department recently had her UN car torched in front of her house.

Being here is trying. I've been here less than 48 hours, and already I am unsure how to present myself to the Israelis and - moreso - to the Palestinians. "Being myself" is just awkward here, because when I put my jeans and sweater on in the morning, I just look different than the average Palestinian walking the streets.

When I walked up to the Dome of the Rock yesterday (after I failed to pull off the tricks necessary to unlock the door to my apartment), the Israeli guard at the entrance stopped me. "Ma ata rotze (What do you want here)?" he asked at first. I answered him in Arabic. "Shu (What?)" "Keef 7alak (How are you?)" he answered in kind, with a perfect Arabic accent. "Bseder (Fine)" I answered in Hebrew. "Min wain inta(Where are you from)" he continued in Arabic. After pausing for a second, I told him Ohio and showed him my ID. He debated with the other guard for a minute in Hebrew, and let me through. When I tried to walk into the Dome of the Rock to pray, the Palestinian lady at the door stopped me. "Assalamu 3alaikum" I told her. "Wa 3alaikum Issalam. Min wain inta?" Taken aback ... I told her " Falastini. Min Sukkan Amerka. (Palestinian, living in America.) She looked at me with an awkward face. "O nawwi titsali ilyom inshallah? (And you plan on praying today, Inshallah?)"

"Inshallah," I said, and I walked in and took off my Starbury tennis shoes.

wax on, wax off.

the first will be last.

today i start the documentation of my adventure to the land of milk and honey. zahrat almadaen. yerushalayim shel zahav. everybody's talking 'bout - jerusalem. i'm a bit more than 2 weeks away from my trek to the motherland, but i'm still here in our nation's fine capital, trying to accomplish more than congress has since i got here in early july.

i finished up work with aai last week (join our facebook group), and after some serious procrastination, managed to get a start on my personal statement. the plan is to return to the first exile - the hydroxide state, the great state, the second motherland - at the beginning of next week and leave from there around november 24th -- home.

a brief update - for the past 4 months i've been working with the arab american institute as a community relations consultant, particularly working with youth across the country, in an attempt to mobilize them politically, and to forge a network on that basis. last week, i finally confirmed that i'll be headed to the middle east - to jerusalem - to work with the united nations relief and works agency (unrwa - in english and arabic), a section of the UN which works with the Palestinian refugees. i'll be working in the public information office - more details are forthcoming.

as for now, i will continue to wax philosophic in a personal statement doomed to be edited, re-edited, and re-edited.


tzi 5*c