The Prodigal Son Gives Two Cents

I refer to Egypt as home, and to returning to America as "going back to the states." I don't know exactly when I this happened. All I know is by the time I moved in with Kent, I was referring to my life in these terms. I am invested in that big mess of a country at the top of Africa.

I've been following the news closely this week, from BBC to activist blogs, to nomadlifers in Egypt's first hand accounts and feelings. I can't help but feel frustrated on two levels.

In the past the United States has stepped in and pressured Mubarak for democratic reform, and while changes were small, it showed promise. This time around Rice essentially bowed out, and the state department called the referendum a "domestic affair." Do I think the United States has any right to force democracy on countries? No. I think that often times the US assumes democracy is the holy path to political salvation and destroys a country's infrastructure trying to impose it. But while I don't feel the USA has a responsibility to convert the heathens to democracy, I know we have a history of shoving our nose in places that it doesn't belong. The constitutional amendment in Egypt is a prime example of a vote the United States would rush to the soapbox to condemn.

But our government didn't. What does this mean to me? That the United States is so afraid of another religious leader/party taking power in the Middle East that we are willing to abandon the "ever-important" mission of spreading democracy to the farthest reaches of the earth. Forget civil rights, the US is happy to encourage despotism where it previously supported self-determination, as long as the despot is less threatening than public will.

Beyond being obviously hypocritical, (we are good at that in the US) it makes me wonder what will happen to US foreign policy in the coming years. Is it possible that our mission of "spreading democracy" may finally be put to bed out of fear of unfriendly voters?

On a second note, while I was not surprised by the low voter turnout in Egypt. I was disheartened by the responses Egyptians gave me in regards to the constitutional amendments. I know some very intelligent, analytical locals; but when I asked how they felt about the protests or the constitution in general the answers were the same. They weren't concerned, it wasn't going to affect them. The government was too corrupt to care. They had better things to spend their time on.

Makes me wonder, beyond the United States' PR people, who really cares about democracy anymore? And as long as the elite possesses such a cynical attitude towards self-efficacy, could anything ever change for Egypt?


I don't know, but the second question really worries me.

Jerusalem

One of the rewards of traveling is the people you meet. Over the past year I have been incredibly lucky, the people I've met have opened my world just as much as the things I've seen and the stories I tell.

Every child is taught 'Don't talk to strangers' and 'If someone offers you a ride, don't get in their car.'

We know life out there can be dangerous, but when you're a lone nomad in an ancient city, in a tension-filled country, you become a little more willing to take risks on people. Two weeks ago I went to Jerusalem alone, within 4 hours of getting off the sherut (service taxi) the ink had already worn away on my photocopied pages of the guidebook and I was trying to map a route to the Wailing Wall.

Out of nowhere, I was tapped on the shoulder by a 30ish guy, who asked me if I knew where the Mount of Olives was. I kindly explained to him that I was an idiot and he'd be better off asking the signpost if it had seen any dancing clowns lately than try and get directions out of me. Turned out he was Israeli, he and his two friends were playing tourist for the day. They had gotten bored with the old city and wanted to see if they could walk to Mount of Olives.

They invited me along. There's a backpacker culture when you travel; team up with other hostelers/hikers and make a day of it. But these people weren't backpackers, they were locals, locals inviting me to get in their car. I hesitated for a few seconds, but decided if I was ever going to make friends, I had to start somewhere.

It was a good choice. Biblically, Mount of Olives is famous as the mountain Jesus entered Jerusalem from, but now a days it offers a spectacular view over the old city as well as a more sobering view of the Israeli/West Bank partition wall on the other side of the mountain. The partition wall is called different things, based on whose team you're on. On the Israeli side they refer to it was the separation wall, while in Palestine it is the apartheid wall, the annexation wall, the racial segregation wall. One thing I've realized in this country is that the words you use to describe something or someone have a lot of meaning. (The importance of names in this country will, for the flow of the entry, be postponed for another day)

The section of the wall that I was looking at from the mountain cut a neighborhood in half. Adds a whole new degree of difficulty to borrowing a cup of sugar from your neighbor when you first have to cross a police check-point. The wall runs inside the West Bank, not on the border, "encircling Palestinian towns and villages and cutting off communities and families from each other, separating farmers from their land and Palestinians from their places of work, education and health care facilities and other essential services." (Amnesty International)

If the wall was built between the border of Israeli and the West Bank, along the Green Line, then the Israeli claim that it is a matter of security would seem more valid, and the wall would look less like an attempt at land-grabbing and oppression. One of the documentaries our sister company is working on is about a refugee camp in the West Bank, Aidia. In the documentary, the 'star,' an old man and ex-PLO member, travels two hours every other day to till a plot of land he has purchased for his sons, hoping it would ensure them a good future. The wall's construction has since cut him off from his land, and the documentary is looking for funding to be able to address the affects of this on the star and his family's lives. A report from Amnesty International gives more information on how the wall violates Palestinian rights.

It was one of the Israeli's who pointed the wall out to me as we stood on top of the mountain. She had disdain in her voice when she talked about it, but explained that three years ago Jerusalem was a ghost town, and while the wall was troublesome, it had stifled the bombing attempts, an unfortunate side effect was that it also stifled the Palestinian people.

But back to the fluffy stuff:

Afterward I was treated to an amazing picnic, with a ridiculous amount of food, brought home to play with a newly rescued and retardedly cute street cat, and taken out at night to some great bars. I slept in one girl's house, and ate leftovers from the picnic while I wandered around the city again the next day, and was sent home with a bottle of wine.

Amazing people. Sometimes I have all the luck.


(Karim, I expect more educational information in the comments on this one too. Get on it.)

In the family

After the Purim party at the Kibbutz on Friday night, I went to stay with a friend's aunt. An entire set of extended family is all within a 10 mile radius, with three generations having houses on the same driveway. It's been a long time since I've been inside someone's familial house. It was pretty fantastic, and the whole Jewish-feeding-syndrome isn't exaggerated. All I did for two days was eat. Every conversation went: "Megan, are you okay? Do you want anything? a nap? some tea? a jacket? Do you want some fruit?" "No, no thank you." "Okay, so no fruit, how about an apple?" I liked it.

At the Purim party there was a little bit of a scene (not my fault) and my friend would wait until I was out of the room before telling the story to whatever family member was in front of her. Then when I returned to the room the questions changed slightly to "Megan, are you okay? Do you want anything? a nap? some tea? a jacket? Have you met any nice boys yet? I hear you were quite a hit at the party. They were shoving each other? It's that blond hair."

I went out for a drink with two of the twenty-something male cousins. While chatting, cousin #2 interrupts to tell me that cousin #1 is talking in Hebrew about me with a friend. They chat for a minute more, the friend walks off, and cousin #1 returns to the table’s conversation without saying a word.

Later on the friend I was traveling with told me this was the conversation I couldn’t understand:

“Hey, how are you? She’s American, right?

“Yeah.”

“Does she speak any Hebrew?”

“No.”

“My friend wants to meet her; can he come talk to her?”

“No, he can’t.”

“Oh.”

Absolutely hilarious.

I really have to get a handle on the language if men are ever going to get past the guards.

The Kibbutz Party

[Me at the kibbutz this weekend, with my favorite hilltop of the Golan Heights]

I am doing Israel backwards. I entered the country at Eliat, hopped a bus to the Arab city of Nazareth and have since managed to go to a Kibbutz on the Sea of Galilee, and a very americanized area of small settlements created and supported by Edmond de Rothschild.

It's okay. So I have a warped understanding of Israel, a little more travel will fix that.

But the main point is, this weekend I was invited to a Purim Party. Purim is the Jewish holiday
that commemorates a story from the book of Esther, where the Jews were saved from Haman's plot to exterminate them. It's also an excuse to do all the things that are usually forbidden AND dress up in costumes. How could I not love this?

More interesting to me than the history of Purim was life on a kibbutz, technically its a collective. But to me it looked like a life-long summer camp.

Kibbutzim is one of the largest communal movements in history. It stems from the members Jewish population wanting to claim positions as farmers, move away from the stigma of the jews only having "clean jobs", but lacking the resources to do it individually. Supposedly they wanted to start a society free of exploitation, where all workers would be equal. Hell of a dream, it worked surprisingly well and 7% of the current population lives on Kibbutz's today.


The Kibbutz I visited was on the Sea of Galilee and besides being next to the Golan Heights (a whole other history lesson).* All the people there have grown up together in a community numbering around 300. At the age of 16 kibbutz members leave the family home and move into their own dorm style strip mall. If you're not married by the age of 25, again you get shifted to a different strip mall of apartments. People grow up with a whole lot of freedom, but not a lot to do with it.

The party itself wasn't as wild as Madison on Halloween, but its free alcohol and Jews dressed like 80's rock stars. All this on a banana plantation, pretty awesome.

I had a great time. Danced a lot, learned Arak tastes best mixed with lemonade and mint and served from a giant bucket.** Met some new people, argued terrorism with a special units soldier at 5 am after puking three times. All in all, a good party.

*back when Syria held the Golan Heights, snipers used to sit on the top of the hill and shoot into the Kibbutz. They killed a man inside his home once. I've been told it's a big part of the reason Israel is afraid to give the Golan Heights back.

**I kept calling it "jew wop" in my head, which is still hilarious, even now that I'm sober. So many racist implications, so close to 50's glib banter, fabulous.

Red Headed Step-Child

So I've been doing a lot of photoshop art lately, and it makes sense to keep it off Active Culture.

so, there's a new comic up at www.thematteroffrance.blogspot.com

Enjoy. Or don't.