I've got some new shoes on

And oddly enough, everything's not alright - they are killing my feet!
It's 11:30pm and I have a full day of classes tomorrow, and thus should have closed my eyes hours ago.. BUT I just remembered my password to get on here, so I thought I would seize the moment!
Cliff notes to hold you over:
1. came home from Palestine 2 days before christmas 2009
2. lived in Seattle with the folks and worked at Urban Coffee Lounge for a few months
3. just arrived in New York City (Brooklyn to be precise)
4. began my tenure with the New York City Teaching Fellows 2010 Cohort 20 TODAY.
5. Come fall, I will be teaching in one of the many district 75 schools in Brooklyn (D75 schools are focused completely on students with disabilities that require extra love).
6. I have no idea where I'll be teaching yet! yikes..
7. I thought it was a good idea to move into an apartment with complete strangers from an add I found on Craigslist (turns out I was correct)
8. I joined a farm share!

Okay, bed is calling my name.. more to come. Good night from the Big Apple!

I've left my heart in Palestine

I'm home in Seattle.
Overwhelmed by the lack of money, job, car.
Exhausted by everything - it wasn't like this coming home from Korea.
Unsure of how to cope with/understand Palestine from the first world democracy we live in here.
Certain I will return.

The Kindness of Strangers

The sweat is dripping down my back and my right side is starting to hurt from forgetting to switch the shovel to my left hand. Out in Beit Sahour the weather is calm, dark, and overcast. I imagine everyone but me is praying for rain. Sarah, Patrick, and I are begrudgingly rebuilding the tire wall we had nearly finished the week before - devious kids, a rouge car, a sheep stampede perhaps? This is the part about building a leadership center that isn't fun. The high ropes course is done, the compost toilets are waiting for the cement to dry, so we are building a wall. Stuffing tires with rocks, empty plastic bottles, doll fragments, anything we can find. A long process of shoveling, packing, testing for empty pockets, packing again, testing again.
I'm aimlessly pushing a pile of dirt back and forth on the pavement, waiting for the next holler of, "more dirt!", thinking more about how my hands hurt or how cold I am, than the kids this is being built for. In my exhausted and apathetic state I look up and find myself standing in front of a grinning Palestinian fellow. He's smiling ear to ear and confidently walking around our small group. Inspecting. Admiring.
"Where are you from? What are you doing?" he asks. Direct questions, yes. But completely sincere. I explain we are from various places in the states, working in Palestine at various organizations - all lending a hand on the side to build the center.
"Very good! Very good! Ahlan wasahalan!" Welcome! he proclaims, as he clasps my hands, looking me directly in the eye. Before I know what's happening, He's opening his van doors and haphazardly carting a large bucket our way. I miss what he says and hear, "I want to give you olive oil". There is nothing better than locally pressed olive oil. My mouth begins to water. To my shock and horror, he lifts the lid from the bucket to expose 3 gallons of olives. No oil. How do I avert the inevitable situation to come? I have already expressed my delight in his gift, there's no way to back out now. He ladles out a handful of olives and by the universal gesture meaning "please take one", pushes it my way.
I tense up, my mouth goes dry, I can't do this. I have never liked olives. Not one kind has graced my pallet and been deemed acceptable to swallow. With the few seconds I have, I decipher the smallest and least harmful fruit. With a smile that would fool hollywood directors, I pop it in my mouth and begin chewing. Staying just long enough for him to see the delight in my face, I turn and walk towards the shed where I know I can squirm in disgust in solitude.
walking back, I look up at sarah and say, "it wasn't that bad"

The story of my first olive.