Thursday, October 30, 2008

What is this all about?

I was talking to a colleauge today who was encouraging me to write about my experience here. Frankly, its been difficult to write because its hard not to witness things I see and go on a political tirade about everything in this part of the world. I was reading a blog by an American in Jerusalem, it was a great blog, but then she got angry with something she saw and wrote this dead-honest post, and now her blog is gone. Whether she took it down on her own accord, or somebody accused her of crossing some boundary and it was taken down, I don't know. Anyways, its a fine line. But there's things I see and experience that I think have nothing to do with politics, so yes, I can try to concentrate on those and hope its not too mundane.


I'm looking for a digital alarm clock to put on my bedside table. It's true that in the Middle East time has another meaning that in the western world. My habit of being a 15 minutes late to appointments kind of puts me in my natural habitat here. I rarely schedule meetings here, most work meetings are more like, "shall we talk about it this afternoon?" "yeah, that sounds good. maybe sometime after 1pm?" "Yeah, sure, anytime, anytime, I'll be around." and then maybe the meeting happens, maybe it doesn't. It makes me feel so undisciplined. Anyways...back to the digital alarm clock - impossible to find. I'm desperate for it to help me with my morning routine. I'm a clock watcher during my normal routine. You know, do I only have 5 minutes instead of 10 to do my hair? Again, I feel way too undisciplined without a clock.


Tonight I was returning to my house after seraching for a digital clock, and as I pulled up the road near my son's school, I saw these guys standing in the middle of the road with a big gun. It was dark, and I couldn't tell if the guys had uniforms (police) on or not, but as I drove closer, I realized these guys were rather young (maximum 20 years?)and had no uniforms. I live in one of hte most affluent neighborhoods of Ramallah, so can't figure out what this is. Believe it or not, play guns are rampant here, and are made to look very much like real ones. So as I approach these guys, and the one starts pointing the gun at my car, my heart goes to my throat and I slow down. When he kind of moves to the side and waves me on, I tell myself, "it's a play gun, it's a play gun" and then I look out the rear view mirror and see the guy pointing it directly into my rear window. I swerve, make a quick move with the car and turn down a side street so I come up to my house from behind it. I give my landlord a call, and luckily he's at home and comes out to meet me on the street. He takes his car and goes down to talk to the guys. Sure enough, they are toy guns, the kids come and apologize to me, and the landlord asks them where they go to school. "Ramallah Friends School" - the school of Palestine's elite who are on the ivy league schools in the States track. I am in shock.


I explain to my 6 year old son what has happened (luckily he didn't see the kids when we were in the car, so had no idea what was happening really). He says to me, "Mom, those boys aren't very safe." I chuckle, tell him how right he is and then after a short lecture on gun safety with my son, I tell him, "Neither are those boys very smart."

Sunday, October 19, 2008

The Nothing-ness of Newness

Communicating with friends who live the overseas life permanently, I've come to realize just how long and drawn out the adjustment can become. I moan, I groan, I'm crabby, I'm bored, I'm turned inward. Everything is great...honestly. Life is settling, but I don't have to be happy about it, do I?


I can't believe it - I just wrote a whole, crabby, venting post and it was deleted by Blogger. Ugh. I give up.