Jeez,
I've never been made to feel more like a terrorist in my life. Arriving at Ben Gurion in Tel Aviv is reknowned for being pretty gruelling, espcially if you've got some dodgy stamps in your passport. Well, I've a bunch of Jordanian ones, an Egytptian visa and the best one of all... Yemen. Passport control are quite lovely until they see that one. Smile smile smile, oh Yemen... come with me. They asked me
so many personal questions it was insane. They didn't buy my travelling for a few months story and made it pretty clear if I
lied again they'd deport me straight away. I should have lied better, but it was 4am and they're tough. Are you a member of any
anti-Israeli organizations? How much money do you have? (to this is
replied, well £1500 savings and £1500 overdrawn, so about £0? They
weren't amused). What were you doing in Yemen? Studying? For only two weeks? uh huh... What type of arabic do you speak? Is it Palestinian?
Syrian? (basically wanting me to say I spoke terrorist). Anyhoo, so
finally got to go past passport control with my 2 month visa ("you're on
our system. Don't even try to leave and come back in") and got stopped
at the next point by some other douchebag who wanted to search my
luggage for an hour... Finally left the airport, some 4 plus hours
after landing, got a bus to Jerusalem (who ripped me off), then rickety
bus to Ramallah and even ricketier bus to Huwarra checkpoint where you
have to get off with all your luggage and walk through a massive cage
while Israelis point big guns at you. Got into a taxi to take me to
Nablus, took out my phone to phone my contact to tell me where to go
and lo and behold, my battery had died.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK. After much convincing, the taxi man
took my to internet which turned out to be somewhere I had visted last
year, the Yaffa centre which is a cultural centre mainly for the
refugees in Balata Camp (which is, incidentally where about 60
kidknapped Hamas affiliates were held hostage last year). Well there
was my knight in shining armour who gave me internet and called my
contact and found me another taxi and took my bags and escorted me to
my final destination. Ahmed = legend. Amazing, he even paid for the
taxi.
The school itself is really nice, it's a massive building which has
been donated to the school for 3 years. Crazy though, it's the same
place I was in last year for the first week. So I arrived after this
massively long and stressful journey and pitched up at the same place i
arrived at a year ago. I just started laughing but my taxi driver
didn't speak English and i was too delusional with lack of sleep to
string any arabic together. My first two days teaching have been ok,
but so tiring. You'd think they'd have no energy because it's Ramadan,
but no. Bouncy bouncy. I took my first drama class today which was
hellish. They can't take too much stimulation or they just go crazy. I
took them to the gym (like a large classroom with no desks) so we could
get space to do stuff but then they found the balls and it was downhill
from there. It must have been quite funny to watch, I pick one up to
put it away, turn my back for a second and BAM, there's five more
rolling around. I think most of the lesson was taken up with me trying
to get them back to the classroom again. I've decided to teach less
drama, and more 'animated English conversation". We finish at about 2.30 every
afternoon so i'm still going to try and volunteer somewhere as
otherwise you just come home and nap and eat and then go to sleep
again.
The school are really keen for us to stay the year - understandably. Vusa runs are too unreliable and that's not even an option for me. So they've hired an Israeli lawyer who's trying to get us work
permits. Apparently the school are paying him quite alot (if he
succeeds) but i don't know how it'll work out. They've also asked if
I'm willing to just 'expire' which basicaly means stay here illegally
for a year so when I leave they'll blacklist my name and i'll never be
allowed back in to the country. I'm not so keen on this. They were mean enough the first time.
No
bacon here and Ramadan is a bitch. I get so thirsty and there's no midmorning
coffee or anything. My new favourite thing to do is buy ice cream on
the way home from school and guzzle it the moment i get into the flat
and out of sight.
I'm going to spend the day with a
Palestinian friend tomorrow, he used to throw stones at the Israelis.
It's going to be fun.
