Saturday, 9 November, 6:00 PM in Acre, Palestine/Israel

   It's time for evening prayer.  I'm sitting on the floor in a child's bedroom in Zada's house in Nahef, a Palestinian village near Acre.  This is where Khitam's family is centered, though I sometimes think she is their center, she, the errant one.  A little background for those who don't know Khitam.

   Khitam Edelbi is a Palestinian friend of mine.  We met through a mutual friend, Claudia, who lives in California.  Claudia taught for a year at International College in Beirut, Lebanon, in the very early seventies, before Lebanon's civil war began.  I was teaching there, so we met.  Decades later, I called her, and as we were catching up on what each other had been doing for the past thirty years, I told her about my work in theater and education and she said: "Oh, I wish you and my friend Khitam could meet."  She told me that Khitam was doing creative and healing work with kids in Jerusalem using theater, so I suggested inviting her to come to Maine to visit our summer theater program for kids.  Khitam came for two or three or four weeks - I don't remember how long - we became good friends, and she returned for several summers.  That led to her applying to Lesley University in Cambridge to complete her BA which led her to stay on to get an MA in creative arts therapy which she did.
   Khitam returned to Palestine and began doing creative arts therapy with kids and teachers.  I began visiting her, doing some workshops where I could and observing her work.  She has developed an excellent reputation and is busy mostly working with teachers.  Whenever I get to observe her in action, I am wowed by her ability to connect very quickly with early education teachers who have had no experience with her work.  They quickly trust her and begin taking the kind of chances in her workshops that she wants them to help their students learn.  Khitam, my Palestinian sister, is a wise and witty friend and she is an excellent teacher.
   Now, I am back in Palestine, visiting Khitam and doing some workshops.  The muezzin has finished his evening call to prayer, which was short - the long ones seem to come in the morning, around 4:30, but I have become inured to those after being wakened the first couple of nights here.  I'll return to Zada's house and Khitam's family, but I want to go back to my arrival.
   I flew over on Alitalia, which I thought might offer good Italian food to compensate for the lack of leg room in tourist class.  I was wrong.  I make better pasta and serve better Italian wine!  I flew out of Boston to Rome, sleeping at least two and a half hours en route.  I had about the same amount of time in the airport in Rome to wander in a daze, order a coffee and get just that, coffee, instead of expresso which is what I thought I'd get.  I didn't know Italians served "coffee."  I recommend expresso, based on the coffee I had.  It was okay but when in Rome…  My flight to Tel Aviv was without incident and Khitam met me at the airport, where I cleared security and customs without incident.
   In an hour, we were at Khitam's house - half a house - where she and Ahmad live close to THE WALL, which you see from her house, two blocks away.  She fed me too much food - it's always too much food…my favorite comment on food here is from Lawrence in The Seven Pillars of Wisdom.  He's talking about an Arab sheikh named Auda Abu The (I'm not sure of the transliteration; his name is pronounced Owduh aboo tie): "His hospitality was overwhelming except to the very hungry," or words to that effect.  I went to bed around 11:30 which was 4:30 in Arrowsic, Maine, so even though I was tired, my body refused to sleep for a while, and not long after it did, the muezzin in the mosque near Khitam's decided it was time for me to wake, so he called: "La illa…"
   Tuesday, Khitam gave me a ride to the Aida Camp for Palestinian refugees in Bethlehem.  Over 4,000 people live in the camp, about half of them under 18, in an area with no green space.  It's not a tent camp, though it started as one.  It has been built into a small village.  On the edge of the camp is The Alrowwad Cultural and Theatre Society (ACTS), founded in 1998 by Abdelfattah Abusrour, a remarkable man.  My friend from college, Cotton, was there with Abed; Cotton was doing some filming for a short film he's making on people in Palestine.
  Abed grew up with his family in Aida Camp.  His family had fled there from Palestine.  A bright boy, Abed became interested in theater and painting and writing at an early age.  He also did well in school and eventually went to Paris to pursue and gain a Ph.D. in biology.  Even there, while studying, his interest in the arts continued and he and some fellow students developed a theater.  After graduation, he worked as a biologist for a while, but he missed the arts, especially theater, and Palestine, so he returned to Aida Camp in 1998, found a job with a pharmaceutical company and a teaching position with Bethlehem University and founded Alrowwad, which began in his parents' home, where he was living.

Al, Abed and Cotton

   Eventually, he and Alrowwad moved out of his parents' house.  He began to build a home for the program and has managed to raise enough funds for a building on the edge of the camp that houses pre-school programs, a library, a computer lab, a photography lab, a theater space for theater and dance and Palestine's first program for women's fitness.  He is now trying to raise funds to replace worn out computers, expand the library and open up space for preschool education.  At the same time, he is touring in a new play about the Palestine - Israel debacle, and he is traveling to France to try to raise interest there in a creative partnership with Alrowwad and then on to Amman, Jordan for a conference on education and the arts before returning home later this month, where his wife, Nahel, an elementary school teacher and assistant principal in Jerusalem, and his five kids, Kanaan, Adam, Ahmad, Rafa and Safa will be eagerly awaiting him.
   As I was saying, I'm here at Khitam's sister Zada's house.  Zada and Zaza and her sister Hinadi who is married to Zada's son, Inas are in the kitchen working on dinner for who-knows-how-many and that worries me because Khitam and I had a good late lunch in Acre.  Maybe I'll find room for a bite or two!

They also serve who only sit and wait.