Since 4 days I’m living with my friend Annika in our apartment in Ramallah. Today it’s Friday and around us the Muezzin is calling for the main prayer. We called the apartment “palace” as it is huge and in the 4.th floor. A big living room, 3 bedrooms, a bathroom, a guest toilet, a room to put cleaning stuff inside (the architect was maybe a woman) a big kitchen and two balconies. From one of the balconies we can see Jerusalem from the other Ramallah downtown. The apartment is located in an area called Ayn Minjed, which is a fancy neighbourhood Christians and Muslims are living here mixed (what is normal in Ramallah) The house we are living in is quite empty. Many people that have money leave the country to go to a safer place. To go to downtown we need 20 minutes walking or 10 minutes by “service”, something like a taxi-bus. On the entrance to or area are always sitting armed security men. I wonder if there is a politician living next to us that need to be protected.
Its hot these days, but not in our palace-we are cool here and I wonder if I m not living a strange dream here. I live in a rich and fancy area in a house which is called after the famous Arabic singer Fairuz which is singing: Ana la ansaki Falistin-I will never forget you Palestine…But in which part of Palestine am I now? My living room is as big as the apartment I was living in Beirut with 4 other people. I never will feel the real Palestine, because if I want to I can go tomorrow to the beach. I can just pass the wall and leave my dream apartment behind me.
But I m not gonna complain. It feels soooo good to have really my own room after 1 1/2 years living without own space and place.
I had already 3 Arabic lessons and it feels good, I have the feeling with the background I have already I will learn very fast.
If your ways are leading you to Ramallah you are always welcome in the palace-Ahlan wa sahlan

Saturday
In the early evening we arrived with a group from 19 participants in Ramallah.
The scouts of the Qadoura Camp did a official scout Welcome ceremony for us. The scout, aged between 12 and 24 observed us curiously. The scouts served us a delicious palestinian house made dinner. Later we walked to our flat which the scouts gave us for free-for the first time we passed through Ramallah downtown. Noises and smells on the street made us realise: we arrived in palestine now.


Sunday
In the morning we walked together to the Scouts center. The task for this day was to clean up the streets together with the scouts. Everyone started working- after some time we found out the system of cleaning up effissiantly. I observed the group and was happy to see the way how the 2 groups started to communicate with each other. Language was not a problem.


Songs, handsigns and simply the work together made it possible to connect to each other. When we finished cleaning up the street the scouts put up a new memory table of the people that got killed in the camp in the last years. Together we sang the Conference song for them and created like this a athmosphere of hope.


Remarkable at this day was what happened between Tali, the jewish israeli girl and the scouts. With unbelievable curiousity and openess they tried to discover each other.
I was sure that we are on the right place with the right people when i saw Tali playing flute, surrounded by a group of palestinians listening to her carefully and this in the middle of the streets of Ramallah.


For lunch Amin, one of our great friends and supporter in Ramallah arranged a meal in a Restaurant where we got food for half a price as aknowledgment of our volunteer work.
“In the afternoon we were invited to visit some families who live nearby Qadoura Scout Camp. We first talked to a mother who had two sons arrested years ago. They are still in the prison and, because of this, the all family is not allowed to leave Ramallah anymore. They can’t get the permissions even to visit them in prison. The second person that we talked with was also a mother. Her son was killed by the Israeli military forces on his way back home. All histories were very sad but, at the same time, we could see how strong a person becomes when being strong is the only way to keep going. We saw sadness but we also could see hope everywhere. Actually, the mother that lost a son is now a grandmother. Her grandson is called by her dead son’s name”( Shejla)

The evening we spend in our apartment, sitting together, chatting about the day, exchanging about our expieriences.
In the night I got a phonecall from Roi, asking me if an israeli girl is with us, that her mum is worried about her being in Ramallah and that she informed the police. I got scared in this moment. I didn´t know about the consequences for Tali and the Palestinians that hosted us in Ramallah that could come out from the circumstances that israeli citizens are not allowed to enter Ramallah by israeli law.
Annika, Tali and me decided together that Tali should leave the next morning.


Monday
Tali left in the morning. She told me later that she was questioned at the Kalandia Checkpoint about why she was in Ramallah and what she did there.
For her the expierience in Ramallah was life changing.

The group went to Hekmats house to visit the place where some month ago the idea came up to build a youth center combined with a hostel for travellers. The house, which is under construction and which was used as a horse club until now gave us room to create ideas and visions about the project, which we called: baituna-my home.
In the afternoon we went to the refugee camp ... which is located next to „baituna“ . For the youth from this camp our youthcenter would be interesting.
We found there a very professional and good youthcenter, which works there for years already. Are we actually needed here is the Question which comes to our minds.




Tuesday

“We were getting ready for breakfast when the invitation arrived – Chief Scout Mohamed, our host in Ramallah, was offering the breakfast in his cafeteria nearby. After the banquet (the best falafel ever…), we went back home for the morning gathering. The group decided to split - some people would go to the Youth Center’s project and some decided to stay and clean the area behind the building, which was really dirty.
We thought that it would also be a way to thank Mohamed for providing us a place to stay. The cleaning group started working, collecting all kinds of rubbish. After few minutes of work, two little girls, about 10 years old, started looking at us from the building above. We waved to them and a silent conversation started, so they went down to help. Half an hour later, 8 children were helping us to clean the land.
By lunch time we had to stop to meet the group in the city center, but the work was done and a mountain of garbage was inside plastic bags. We took some pictures, said goodbye to the children and went back to the apartment to admire from above the result of our hard work. Then somebody started knocking at the door. We opened it and the 2 girls that first started helping us were standing there, asking for more plastic bags, so they could continuous cleaning later. We found out that the results of our work were a lot bigger than we ever could expect or imagine “( Shejla)

In the afternoon we went shopping in little groups in Ramallah. One group visited the grave of Arafat another group I saw sitting at an Arguile Shop, smoking like the old Palestinian man and drinking Café.
At the early afternoon we had meeting in the Scout center again, where they prepared a Goodbye Party for us.
We all arrived at the Scout-center as we heard shooting near by. We got a call from Sheila and Darcio that they where hiding in some shop, because the Israeli Army is in the City Center.
What you do in some moments like that? Two participants near a shooting, a group of young people in a Scout´center shooting outside in the streets near by? I realized that you do nothing. Staying in safty was the best for us as we didn´t know the situation.

After some time, when the shooting end two Scouts where leaving to pick up Shejla and Darcio from their shelter.
They came back and told us their story:
„It was almost 6pm and we were late for a meeting and lost in Ramallah city center. For us all the streets seemed to be the same. Usually my husband is very good in finding our way back, but, this time, as we don't speak Arabic and didn't take note of the address or the name of the place where we should go, we could only try to remember how to get there. The streets were crowded close to the Baladna Ice Cream Shop, where we stopped to ask for directions, when we saw the soldiers crawling, hiding behind the cars parked, before standing up and starting shooting without any warning. Immediately after, an undercover agent, wearing a checked shirt, jeans and a cap, joined the uniformed soldiers and also started shooting. We got terrified by the brutality of the scene. We saw mothers in panic trying to protect their babies, children crying, people screaming. We heard noisy bombs, thousands of bullets, ambulance's siren, cars moving around, and shattered glass. About one hour later the army left the city, but, even before leaving the store that was our shelter, we knew that somebody had been executed”(Sheila)

The Scouts honoured our engagment in the volunteer work by making a scouts ceremony for us where we all became scouts of honour.
After all this what happened we where again invited to eat this famous falafel and we ate so much that we could dance Dabka anymore.

With joy and sorrows in our hearts we left back to the apartment. I think this was a feeling that was going through the whole days: on the one hand joy that we got from the people by joining their activities and work. On the other hand the suffering and desperation caused by the occupation.

The next morning we left one eye laughing-cause we where going to the beach to meet the other groups from the conference-the other eye crying-cause our Palestinian friends where not able to come with us as they need permission from the Israeli Army to leave the Westbank.

Yesterday I went with Jakob to Jenin. Jakob is organiser of the Conference „Walk your Talk“ and was in Jenin before.
Our goal is that we spend 3 or 4 days of the Conference in Jenin with about 80 participants.
In Jenin is in the West banc, which means in the occupied Palestinian territories. Foreigner only can enter when they get the permission from the Israeli Military. Palestinians have no control about their borders.
The „checkpoint“ is kind of a big hall, with little rooms inside and at least 5 security doors you have to go through.
We got the permission to enter, cause we know a german activist-Harry-who is working with: „Medicines without borders“ and has personal contacts with big people of this checkpoint. And without those contacts we would not have been able to enter.
Abdallh, he is in the Governorate of Jenin picked us up at the other side of the checkpoint.
He organised a whole day for us, drove us everywhere we wanted to go.

After a meeting with the Governor of Jenin itself, Abdallh brought us to the Arab-American University of Jenin. It’s outside of the town in the beautiful hills of Jenin. Before the withdrawal of 2 Israeli settlements between Jenin and the Uni it was not allowed for Palestinians to use the direct road.
The students had to take 60 km detour to get to the Uni.
The Uni is private and the name: “Arab-American” has only advertisement reasons, there is no further connection to America, except of the fact that the courses are given in English. We connected with the students working in the public relation office and inch Allah we will have an open meeting and conversation with some students about the Conference and what they think about the idea of coming to Jenin.

We visited the “Freedom theatre” in the Camp. There is a documentary film called: “Arna´s children” dealing with the theatre and its work and the occupation.
Juliano, the son of Arna, half Jewish-half Palestinian received us there. He had a strong opinion about the Conference coming to Jenin, especially Israelis.
He said that he does not has to prove to an Israeli that he is a human being…he does not want to be in the Zoo, where the occupier can come to visit Palestinians like monkeys.
He stressed out his main goal: to work against the normalisation of the state” being occupied”.
People, no matter which nationality are warmly welcomed, when they can take a clear and loud position against the occupation, the settlements in Palestine, the Apartheid-wall and if their speak out for the right of return of the Palestinian refugees.
In all this points I agree so much with Juliano and try to find a connection between our idea-to connect young people and their destinies with each other-and my clear political statement and opinion.
The lack of loud voices under the Israelis I met so far makes me feel really helpless.

Abdallh invited us to have lunch in house in a little village close to the town.
He has a garden where his wife is planting organic vegetables and fruits.
Abdallh is from the political party Fatah. With 17 the Israelis put him into prison because he belonged to a group where one person did a suicide attack in Israel. He stayed 8 years in jail. After this he was arrested several times again so that his full prison time amounts 10 years.
Abdallh is for the 2 state solution. For him any peace agreement with Israel could only become a question if Israel recognise his blame concerning the massacres and the expulsion of the Palestinians from 1948 on and the permanent suffering of the Palestinian Population under Israeli Occupation.

I met a lot of more people, but its impossible to write down everything.
On the checkpoint a group of man stand around. They presented us the guy who was the owner of the land where the huge checkpoint was built on and which the Israelis stole from him.
For the goodbye Abdallh gave us a Palestinian scarf with the Palestinian flag and Yasser Arafat on it.
Wisely we did not wear the scarves when we went through the checkpoint, fortunately again with Harry.
We were checked and Jakob had to pack out his backpack.
As the security guy saw the scarf with the Palestinian flag, he ask us what this is…it would be against his country…we couldn’t believe this comment and where laughing…so he decided that we only can enter the next morning. Only with Harry’s help and his diplomatic talk with this guy we could entered, our luggage was checked again, we had to go in some security rooms….it took a long time and its strange for me and I really want that I never get used to it.

Incredible hospitality and openness of the people I met yesterday made this day to the first good day since long time.

Next Tuesday I will return to stay for some days and we will have further conversation with young people about the Conference !