Sunday, 17 November, Adahya and another beautiful day in the neighborhood.
   "We rarely hear the inward music, but we are dancing to it nevertheless…"  Rumi

Reem, Khitam and Audi jamming

   That's a quote Al Mada uses in their brochure.  Al Mada is an arts based community development association. whose work is based on the belief that the arts provide a platform for individuals to create, express and heal.  This small NGO (non-governmental agency or non-profit) is young, having been founded in 2009 by its director, Reem Abdul-Hadi.  Khitam and I drove to Ramallah, yesterday, to meet Reem and her husband, Audi Tourjaman, musician and music educator.  Reem and Audi are a handsome couple, middle aged I suppose - young to me - bright, articulate and educated.  We spoke in English most of the time, reminding me of my linguistic limitations.
   Most of the time we talked about their program, how they work and who they work with and the possibility for future collaboration.  Like Nasser and Abed, Reem and Audi talk about a different model for education, one that is student centered, one that uses the arts for self-expression and creative learning (as opposed to "rote learning").  It's worth quoting the introductory statement in their brochure:
     "We believe sustainable community development is measured not only by how much a community earns or produces but also by the level of sustained freedom and the ability of community members to interact and access social services, employment, education and networking opportunities."
   That statement implies a lot about the condition of Palestinians.  Here's what I mean.  "Sustained freedom" does not really exist in occupied Palestine.  Whether you live in area A (Palestinian Authority control), B (shared control between PA and Israel) or C (the largest portion and Israeli controlled), your freedom is sustained at the whim of Israel's government and army.  At any time, the Israeli army can enter any part of occupied Palestine to question, search and arrest Palestinians citizens.  This often happens in the middle of the night.

A serious Reem

   "The ability of community members to interact" depends on their ability to make contact with each other; if you look at a current map of Israel and Palestine, you can see how difficult that is.  Without an Israeli ID or special permission, you cannot enter Jerusalem if you live on the West Bank.  To get from one Palestinian community to another, e.g. East Jerusalem to Bethlehem, you must pass through at least one check point.  This is not difficult for me with a US passport, though I can be stopped and searched. For a Palestinian, even with an Israeli passport or ID card, it can be difficult; without one of those, it's impossible.  Hence, for Palestinians to meet and plan and execute anything, a dance concert for example, is difficult logistically, before any actual planning begins!  Once the event is planned, it may have to be repeated, playing once in Jerusalem and another time in Ramallah, on the West Bank, so that it's available to any Palestinian audience, and anyone else.  Most people in Ramallah cannot go into Jerusalem.
   "Access social services, employment, education and networking opportunities" is almost a joke.  If you cannot travel easily from one community to another in your own country, if you cannot call a meeting and know that those on a committee can meet at a certain time, if you cannot pass easily from one location to another in your country, how can you plan anything, including access to medical care for a medical emergency?

…and a serious Audi

 The result?  Sustainable community development aint easy.  In Maine, imagine trying to plan a concert in Portland which you hope people from Wiscasset, Brunswick, Freeport, Lewiston and Auburn will attend.  However, people in Lewiston and Auburn need special permission to get into Portland, people from Wiscasset have to pass through two checkpoints and those from Brunswick and Freeport through one, in addition to needing a Portland identity card!  Or for an event in Battle Creek, Michigan, my home town, the same restrictions applying to people from Kalamazoo, Marshall, Albion and Ann Arbor, for starters.  It's difficult enough to plan such an event without restrictions!
   So, Reem and Audi are like salmon ready to spawn, swimming upstream, against the current and, there are dams in the stream that prohibit passage unless there is a fish ladder which may or may not be open.  I use this image because of a visit to two of our sons in Washington last month where we watched salmon swimming upstream to spawn and from reading about dams being removed in Maine, allowing fish to migrate.
   "What can Palestinians do?" I asked.  "Nothing," Audi said.  Power and water and commerce are controlled by Israel.  Land development is controlled by Israel.  Palestinians cannot ship goods out of the country without Israel's permission.  The result?  Palestinian farmers and artisans depend on the occupying power to get their goods to market and they often don't make it.  Palestinian landowners whose families have been on their land for generations but do not have written deeds to prove their ownership are subject to the whims of Israel's development plans, which often means land is seized, especially the heights, and a settlement is built.

Khitam, digging the rhythm

   However, it's not true that Palestinians "can do nothing," and Reem and Audi's work with Al Mada is testimony to that.  An example is their work with teenagers.  Recognizing the needs of teens who struggle anyway, being adolescents, they have developed a program that guides participants from a "who, me?" reaction to creating their own music through the experience of composing and playing and singing enough original music to fill a CD.  Working with the Ministry of Education and UNRWA, they have also developed workshops that teach music therapy to educators, counselors and social workers.
   There's more that I'll leave for another blog or conversation.  This work is inspiring.  I remember looking at those salmon swimming against the current in a stream outside Seattle.  I was with our son Geoff and his family, and we were all amazed at how hard they had to work, how some of them didn't make it and were floating by the river bank while the others swam hard enough to maintain their place in the current, and then struggled to advance.  It was never easy, but they kept trying, despite the force of the current's working against them, so they could return to their place and spawn.  So it is at Al Mada.
   "Music is the language of the spirit.  It opens the secret of life, bringing peace, abolishing strife."
                                                                                                                    Khalil Gibran