Border Crossings

I have been receiving articles from several sources, including the Israeli paper Haaretz and the online Electronic Intifada, from concerned friends. These articles detail new Israeli occupation policies at the border crossings. If you are going to or thought to be going to the West Bank, whether as a student, teacher, peace worker, or tourist, your passport is stamped with a new visa which effectively confines you to PA territories, meaning the West Bank—excluding East Jerusalem. If you enter through the airport and are so fortunate as to avoid this stamp, you are made to sign a document promising not to enter PA territories. Both methods are illegal under international law, and both can control my entire life as a professional in the West Bank who is required to have Israeli visas to be in Palestine. The joys of occupation. I was nervous to say the least. Imagine being a teacher: a pretty typical profession I would imagine. You go about teaching day in and out. You learn your students names and writing styles. You invest so much time in their education. Everyday you greet colleagues, work at your desk, prepare for class. Even though you are hired by the university, even though the Ministry of Education approved your hire, even though you have been teaching for years, you are denied the visa not only to work, but to even be present in your work place, in your home. I know that I am not alone in this experience. All nation states require so called foreigners to apply for visas to live or work or even visit. The problem here is that my nation state, the one where I live and work, has no authority to grant the visa because we are under occupation. Not only can I only be here as a tourist, and still I am not allowed to be in the area where I am, but that tourist visa expires every few months; moreover, it is not a simple trip to cross a border to renew a visa. Interrogation, harassment and humiliation not to mention the time and money make the inconvenience positively awful. How many years can I be a tourist? How many times do I have to lie about where I live, what I do, who I am? Sometimes I feel awful about the deception, and then I want to scream, “I’m a teacher! I am not doing anything wrong or bad or hurtful. I TEACH WRITING!” But it is mam-noo-a…forbidden, because I teach on the wrong side of the line. The lies become more intricate and the feeling more nauseating…and I wonder, when can I speak the truth? When can we be without fear at the border? When can Palestine have justice, freedom, peace?

Coming Home

Traveling is always a strange experience. Boarding a flight, staring at clouds through the small window, random conversations with random strangers who become your friend for the duration of the flight, de-boarding and finding yourself transported to a new universe. I rarely experience culture shock, but somehow, driving from the airport to my friend’s house struck me, overwhelmed me—even though I’ve been here a dozen times before. I just felt that I was so clearly and unmistakably in the Arab world—the architecture, the sandy hillsides, the sounds and smells. And though I forever respond routinely to the annoying observation that I live in the Middle East and that is just so incredible, wow, I was struck with the thought, “I live in the Middle East and this is just so incredible! Wow!” Still, it always feels like coming home. And it is coming home because as cheesy as it sounds, home is where the heart is, and my heart is firmly and forever here.

I went to my family, the family that has loved me and allowed me to be part of them for more than five years, and I was home. I love the welcome. I love the coming home. After two days, the exhaustion of jet lag and the days of Ramadan (without the structured time scheduling of the kids’ being in school) meant that I was insanely sleep deprived. After my first day teaching, I came home at 3 and crashed into a deep sleep. I remember waking up to the sounds of Arabic. A little boy was speaking, and I thought, “Arabic. Someone is speaking Arabic. I speak Arabic. I should go see who that is.” A second later, “More people speaking Arabic. I speak Arabic. I should go see.” Then I woke up a bit more and remembered where I was, smiling in my heavy drowsiness before re-embracing my exhaustion. I am home.