I wish everyone could see these hills through my eyes and feel as I did driving to Nablus. The drive took about 1.5 hrs; so, I had plenty of time to soak up what these hills exude of secrets, grief, and promises. Here are just a few pictures that I took along the way; although my photography does not do nature justice.
A friend of mine asked if I could bring back a container of Palestinian soil and I've been gathering dirt from every place that I go in the West Bank. The dying wish of a dispossessed Palestinian man was to be buried in his homeland. His children tried but failed to get permission from Israel to transport his body. At the very least, they want to sprinkle earth from Palestine over his grave to fulfill their father's wasiyyeh, a sacred request in Arab culture.
I have known and heard of similar stories, including my own grandmothers, of that generation that lived and died in exile with the persistent dream of returning home. I tried to imagine his loss and look around me through his eyes today, as if seeing my homeland for the first time since childhood, remembering the life and culture that the world took away from me, and finding it once again at the end of my life. My heart swelled with such love and longing and I felt my throat tighten with tears. I so wanted to pull over, get out of the car, find a place on the slope of one of these hills and lay there until the sun set. But Shaher was waiting for me at Huwarra, so I settled on pictures.
Balata is on fire; Shaher and I go to Nablus and Jenin
I wasn't allowed to drive my car past the Huwarra checkpoint and tried to drive to another entry
with the hope of finding a more accommodating soldier. But no luck. I had to park my car and cross by foot. It was okay because Shaher was waiting for me on the other side and he was able to at least convince the soldiers to let me park my car at that entry. It took a while to get through this process. In the meantime, there was an ambulance carrying a patient that arrived at the checkpoint while I was waiting. Look carefully at this picture and you can see the ambulance just behind the barrier. I was there for about 20 minutes, and when I left, the ambulance was still waiting.
I had planned to stop by the Balata refugee camp to see Sol and sit in on her class with the kids; but there were difficulties in Balata. Four young men had been killed by the IOF [israeli offense forces - as w
e call the IDF] and the funeral procession was bringing people out into the streets. Soldiers often come to these demonstrations and start shooting; so, we decided to skip Balata. However, we still had to drive through the area. The march was just beginning to start up, so we still had time. We stopped to ask a few people if the road was open, even though we knew it was. This was so that people knew we were Arabs. Shaher was driving a Jeep marked with a Canadian affiliation. We didn't want to risk being mistaken for an enemy. Tires were burning in the streets and I took a picture of one on our way into Nablus and onto Jenin.
Jenin has been largely rebuilt since the massacre in 2002 when I was last there. BTW, that's how I know Shaher. He and Amjad, whom we met up with later, became like my brothers during that time. They stuck with me nearly the whole time I was there and helped me get in and out of unfamiliar places. If anyone is interested, there are videos on "google videos" from that time that all three of us shot of the camp during that time. You can also go to http://susanabulhawastuff.blogspot.com// and find them there.
We got to the NGO that I'd like to work with in getting a playground into the camp and spoke at some length about an implementation plan. The group runs a complete children's center with summer camps and ongoing activities throughout the year, including libraries, after school help, sports, etc.
We talked about many aspects of getting a playground into Jenin. The biggest and most delicate issue in erecting these playgrounds is not funding or land, but how to build it in such a way to ensure that the kids will not destroy it. It's difficult to understand the psychology that develops in children who are constantly awoken in the middle of night by the sounds of helicopters and gunfire; who live with a real insecurity that they might not live to adulthood and who face violence from multiple sources. They have a lot of anger and fears that manifest in destructive tendencies. But as this is a given reality, so is it a given reality that they have the right to play and they deserve outlets of creative and positive expression of play. The only solution then is a creative way to give them play areas that will want to take care of.
Our experience, especially with the playgrounds we installed in Gaza, has taught us that if the children themselves participate in the construction and are allowed to have their names and hopes associated with the playground, they will keep take care of it as if it were their own homes. In Rafah, the kids and their parents have constructed a beautiful garden around the playground that they helped install, for example.
The location in the Jenin refugee camp for a new playground
The site was quite large, with a dirt field where kids play football. It's located in a central location between homes and next to a school. Perfect! Here are some pictures.
We talked about the potential layout and came up with a tentative plan to install a playground next to existing old and run-down swings, to paint the surrounding wall so the kids themselves can draw murals, and in some sections, to tile the wall with tiles that each kid can paint and individualize with expressions of themselves. We also spoke of getting the kids involved in landscaping the area and naming some trees after their relatives who are shaheeds [martyrs]. 
The end result will hopefully have a nice playground, the existing football field in a nicely landscaped and decorated children and community area. We also talked about putting up a small store that would be offered to a needy family as a business in exchange for them taking responsibility over general upkeep of the site.
I got some action pictures of the kids taking foul shots on the goalie.
They were all like little men, but one in particular made an impression on me. He was the youngest, smallest, most fierce, and best ball player with a great smile [when he finally agreed to smile]. His name is Ayman and he's five years old going on 18.
Amjad arrives; he and Shaher had been shot in the time since I saw them last
Amjad arrived at the location while we were surveying the site. It was really great to see him. He married a couple of years ago and now has a little boy. Both he and Shaher are two very gentle souls with a deep love of the land and passionate desire to help their communities. Later on in the day, I learned that both of them had been shot after I left Jenin. Shaher was shot in 2002, not long after I left, while on his way to a wedding. A tank in front of them opened fire for no discernable reason, shattering the windshield and front dash of the car. Shaher was hit by several bullets through his left arm and abdomen. Obvisously, he recovered, but he still has shrapnel in his body and some functional impairment on his left side. The groom in the passenger seat was not hit. Amjad was shot on a evening in 2004 while on his way home from a card game with friends. A group of plain clothed soldiers surrounded his serveece [he drives a cab for a living even though he has an engineering college degree] demanding in Arabic that he get out of the car. Afraid, he sped off, but they opened fire and a bullet went through his door and through both of his thighs. It took two hours to get him to a hospital in Jenin because they had to first get an ambulance and find someone in town who had a permit to cross the checkpoint who could drive him in the ambulance to the hospital. After a couple of surgeries and two years of physical therapy, he can walk with an imperceptible limp, but with no sensation in his lower leg, much atrophy, and no control of his toes.
Wafaa; more playground sites, a great meal and a wonderful time with good friends
Amjad's wife, Wafaa me up with us and all of us ran a couple of errands together to distribute some mawa3een from the World Food Program to a couple of families in a village called Taybe [there are three Taybe's in Palestine, btw], which is also where Amjad lives. We dropped Wafaa off at their house and went to see a couple of other potential sites in Taybe. Shaher has started his own charitable organization and works there on a volunteer basis in addition to his paying job and he has the ability to get things done in Taybe. The whole thing took about 20 minutes and when we got back, Wafaa had already made a meal that would have taken me all day to prepare!
She and Amjad are clearly deeply in love and it was so nice to see them together. She and I bonded instantly and I really didn't want to leave them when it came time for me to go. Still, we had a good 2-3 hours together, eating and talking. Amjad and I shared a sheesha [hubbly bubbly] after dinner, too. The last time I had a sheesha was equally special and I 
couldn't help but remember that time as well.
Shaher and I left around 6:15 and on the way to Huwarra, he remembered that the checkpoint closes at 7pm and we had about an hour's drive. [Actually, it isn't Huwarra, but the adjacent gateway - remember they wouldn't let me through Huwarra]. Anyway, Shaher stepped on the gas and we got there just in time, but it seems the soldiers had decided to close up early. The gate was closed, but I could cross by foot to get to my car. However, it was dark and dangerous to be walking around. So we waited in teh car with teh headlights on until a soldier emerged from the tower. We explained the situation and he came back after 10 minutes with permission for me to get out of the car and walk across the checkpoint. Shaher was not allowed to get out of the car and the dude followed by movement with a gun pointed at me until I got to the car. whatever! what the hell kind of man points a gun at a clearly unarmed woman walking to her car in the dark. They're such little people inside all that armour and behind their guns.
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