"Haven't you studied Arabic enough?" 8/19/2014

I caught a bus from Amman to the King Hussein/Allenby Bridge at 7am. The trip to the border was less than 45 minutes and we spent much more time at the border crossing than we did on the road. We passed through countless inspection points and security lines. At this border crossing alone my passport was checked ten different times by ten different people. This was especially frustrating since I did not know which guards would be issuing the visa stamps, so every time I reluctantly handed my passport over to a Jordanian border agent, this was the conversation we had:

“Don’t put a stamp in my passport, okay?”
“Why?”
“Because I need to travel to other Arab countries and they won’t allow me in if I’ve been to Israel.”
“But this isn’t an Israeli stamp, it’s Jordanian.”
“Yes, but they will see that I’m at this particular border crossing so it’s obvious where I went.”
“You'll need to talk to the other guard about that.”

As a side note, I have a second passport. I asked the Jordanians to please put the exit visa in this passport so that I could use it to enter Israel without showing my original one. The problem is, without an exit visa, this second passport is worthless because it doesn’t show where I came from or if I got permission to leave. Arriving at a country with a completely blank passport is quite suspicious. Needless to say, the Jordanians did not stamp it but they did stamp a separate sheet of paper. So, when I came to the Israeli border, I had to show them my original passport, with my stamps from Lebanon and Yemen. This led to me being questioned more than anyone else in line, but it was not nearly as bad as it could have been. The questions were pretty straightforward: Why are you here, where are you staying, are you meeting anyone, why are you in Jordan, etc. The border agent asked me if I had been to Israel before and I told her I had. 

“So why are you coming back?” I thought it was a weird question.
“Um, I just really liked it last time so I decided to come back.” Lying was necessary for a lot of the questions she asked me.

“Where are you traveling?”
“Jerusalem.”
“Just Jerusalem?”
“Yes.”
“So why were you in Yemen?”
“Study.”
“What were you studying?”
“I’m sorry, what?”
“What were you studying?”
“Uh, Arabic.”
“Arabic? So what were you doing in Lebanon?”
“Tourism.”
“That’s a strange place to go for tourism.” (It’s not).

Then she started to ask me how long I’m staying in Amman for and for what purpose.

“I’m studying there.”
“Arabic?”
“Yeah.”
“Haven’t you studied Arabic enough?”

I wanted to tell her that I ask myself that everyday. She called up her supervisor and told him about me living in Amman and going to Yemen. It ended up being fine and she gave me a card that acted as my tourist visa.

I exchanged some dollars and dinars for shekels and waited outside for the bus to Jerusalem. The trip from the border took no time at all, probably less than 30 minutes. I was dropped off at Damascus gate in the old city and took a cab to my hostel, which was located right next to Jaffa Gate and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where Jesus was supposedly crucified. All the rooms were built into the walls of the old city, about 600 years old in this location. It was a good attempt authenticity, but it really just felt like I was sleeping in a tomb. I walked into the hostel f0r the first time and the man at the front desk greets me, “Hi, Hannah!” I mentioned later that business must be pretty slow if he immediately knew it was me. He said that all but two of the guests had cancelled their reservations because of the travel warnings. He asked me why I wasn’t scared to come like everyone else and I told him I didn’t think that the West Bank would be too dangerous. Later that night we talked about the ceasefire which was due to expire at midnight and it’s possible extension. I went to use the hostel’s computer and five minutes later I see an update from Ha’aretz: Three rockets fired from Gaza, thus violating the ceasefire. 

I spent the afternoon of the 19th wandering around the old city. I was constantly lost, wandering in and out of all quarters (Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Armenian) and, from the looks of some people, walking into areas where I should not have been. I wandered just outside the walls of the old city and sat down in the National Garden to do some people watching. There were many Orthodox Jews, tourists, and young Israelis. I saw an old man, apparently homeless, wearing a kuffiyeh and ambling down the path towards me. He stopped next to me and I greeted him in Arabic. Students of Arabic are often told just how awestruck and appreciative Arabs will be when you speak even a few words of their language. The truth is that is not often the case but in this instance the man’s face lit up and he gave me a big toothless grin. “Marhaba!” he said and I asked him to sit down with me. He told me all about his life in Jerusalem--about the British school he went to as a child in the 60’s, where he learned English, and about his uncle who stole his ID card and residency documentation so now he cannot prove his home is actually his. He certainly had some strange notions about other Arab countries. When I mentioned Jordan he said, “Jordan’s good! Everything is so cheap.” When I told him about studying in Yemen he said, “Yemen is a very rich country with a huge river running through the middle of it.” I wandered back inside the city walls into the Jewish Quarter and noticed this sticker on a lamp post. It says, in Arabic and presumably also in Hebrew, “Don’t even think about touching a Jewish girl.” It’s obviously a threat to Arab men from some Jewish organization whose Hebrew name I couldn’t read. 

I went back into the Muslim Quarter and came across Abu Shukri Restaurant, supposedly the best hummus in Jerusalem. I sat down and ordered hummus, falafel, and a coke and was immediately overcome with an intense loneliness. I was so happy to be in Jerusalem and Palestine, especially by myself, but I realized how far removed I was from anyone I really cared about. I think a huge factor in my loneliness was my lack of a computer or a phone. I could not carry my laptop with me since my backpack was already far too heavy, my phone would not work in Palestine, and I forgot to bring my iPad. I was able to use the hostel’s computer for a little bit each evening, but I still have not been that disconnected for a long time. Experiences like that make me never want internet on my phone. Always being connected to everyone I know-- it is comforting, but it is just not the way humans should be.

After a few hours in Jerusalem I was in full haggling-mode. I forgot what it was like because haggling is pretty scarce in Amman. It is so fun and so enraging at the same time. Like when the owner of a juice stand tried to charge me $4 for an orange and I told him he’s crazy and he explained that since he uses it to make juice, it is more expensive.  Most shop owners and taxi drivers in Jerusalem are incredibly bold when it comes to cheating tourists, regularly asking for at least five times the fair price. More on that later.