Happy New Year

1st January 2011

Well, today is a new day and a new year. I

The christmas period is now finally over and I can truthfully say that I' happy for it. Not because I don't like christmas, in fact I love it, but because it has been so far the toughest part of my stay in Palestine. Its hard to understand how much you appreciate your family and friends untill you are unable to be with them.

It is now nearly 8 months to the day that I left my home. It feels like from now until May it will be a real up hill struggle. The longer I stay, the more chance I have of not being able to stay. I had to renew my visa on the 27th at the Israeli ministry of interior in Jeruslem, this they did not do but instead an interview was set up for february 6th to dertimine whether I can stay a further three months or not. Many I know who have been to this interview have been given just hours to get out the country. Obviously this is playing on my mind somewhat. For the sake of my own mind I am trying to stay positive.

We had a great day and night in Bethlehem on the night of the 23rd and on christmas eve. In Ceilidh Beyond Borders fashion I organised a busking trip. We played outside the church of the nativity singing carols and playing reels and jigs. We then went and played in an Armenian christian bar around the corner. We played for nearly 5 hours whilst the owners plied us with beer and bottles of wine after wine until none uf us could play coherantly. We travelled back to Nablus before having a small get together in the music centre where we once again sang all the old classics including 'God rest ye merry gentlemen' and 'Last christmas' by Wham.

Christmas day was celebrated in my apartment. It was fine 5 course turkey dinner which was started in true British style with a Gin and Tonic at midday. 12 internationals attended and a good day was had by all.

So, party time is over. Its back to the grind as they say and there is much to do. In early april there will be a travelling bunch of muscians and dancers from Durham and hopefully SOAS Univervsity. Im organising it as a minature folk festival along with a good friend called Ffion . It will be hosted bythe Nablus culture centre where concerts, ceilidhs and workshops will be taking place. Legally or illegally I will be here Nablus for this. After, my fate is not in my hands bar some visa miracle. There will be more infomation coming soon on the Nablus Folk week I am organising.

The situation here is as tense as ever. Settlements grow, the US stalls and Palestinians suffer. Not one week ago ultra conservative settlers from one of the many illegal settlements on the outskirts of Nablus set fire to a Palestinian farmers flock lambs and a protester was killed by IDF forces at the weekly rally at Bil'n where the apartheid wall is being constructed. Hopefully this death and misery will not be in vain.

From Eid to Eid

As stated before in a previous blog, my time here in Nablus seems to go so much quicker than any place I have lived before. I find myself writing this blog on the 4^th December, nearly 7 months to the day that I left the relative safety and comforts of my home county Yorkshire for this troubled and tragic bit of the land the other side of the Mediterranean.

There are many things I need to state in this blog as I admit that I have been rather slack of late with my attempts to keep those who have been following my actions over here up to date. I apologise for this but in my defence I have been rather busy.

So, after 6 months of volunteering with 'Project Hope' (http://www.projecthope.ps/) I, with great sadness left. This was in fact inevitable as I knew all along, that at some point, my funding would desert me and I would need a means to keep myself fed, clothed and watered. So I have ventured out into the world of paid employment getting a job with a language school in central Nablus. The people there are good enough, the pay good and I can get by teaching just 6 hours a week which covers all my expenses over here.

I have moved ceilidh beyond borders to a new centre in Nablus, the Nablus Culture centre. By a stroke of fate, my arrival coincided with Kevins' the Irish chap I have often talked about previously. He has to his credit set up a remarkable project (http://www.musicharvest.org/) paving the way for musicians and music students to come to Nablus to volunteer teaching music in this centre. The Centre which had been out of action for some time is full of instruments but has no one to to teach them. This is all to common in many countries which have suffered as Palestine has, instruments donated but no one with the skills to teach or tune them.

The building itself is quite something. Well over a hundred years old, this building has seen it all. With its grand high column entrance, and bleached white brick it is both daunting and beautiful at the same time. Both inside and outside the building oozes class and eloquence. The main hall is like that of a small palace and the baby grand piano in the far corner only adds to it's grandeur. The smaller rooms branching off from the main hall are also equipped with pianos and various instruments ranging from flutes to trombones. There are exit signs in German dotted around the building which I thought was strange but I was to later find out that it was a German military garrison prior to and during WW1 just before the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. The Germans both equipped and trained the Ottomans who were then their allies. In the main hall there are crockery (Plates and bowls) on display with the German Imperial Emblem of that time. It makes me smile thinking that where the Generals of the 2^nd Reich once ate, we now ceilidh. How history is kind.

I'm living with Kevin in an apartment supported by music harvest, I spend my hours split between the culture centre and teaching English. There is much work to de done in the centre, as you can imagine with its lack of use in the past 5 years it has come into quite a state.

So winter has in theory arrived, but as the snow falls on England's' pasture green the rains refuse to come to Nablus. It is a record breaking year, still freakishly hot with temperatures ranging from 20 25 degrees. I am it seems for the first time in my stay riddled with home sickness and the thought of all that snow laying in Wakefield and on the tops of Holmfirth makes me sick jealousy. Never before have I been so sick of blue skies.

I have decided to stay in Palestine over Christmas for both financial and practical reasons. A decision which wasn't easy to take but alas, I suppose if there is anywhere in the world where I would have to spend Christmas, Bethlehem and Nablus would be the place.

Musically, there has been the usual bundle of activities I've been organising in Nablus. There have been the usual open mic's, but it was with great pride that last month there was finally a ceilidh. We called 6 dances for a mixed group of internationals and some locals. It was as much a rehearsal than anything as to give practise to the acting callers who were myself and a chap from Scotland called Jimmy. We have now ceilidh beyond borders.

I am still teaching music to the children as well but it's getting tough taking new students and watching other children just disappear back into the camps and villages from whence they came. It is no more a novelty now than brushing my teeth but I have to persevere. It has left me though with a select set of maybe 7 children who still going strong and new students who are showing promise and quickly catching.

I've had to find new tunes to teach as the ones I've been teaching have literally driven me crazy. I can no longer listen to Egan's polka or the Bear dance, no matter how well it's played. In fact, a reoccurring nightmare which has been plaguing me is to the beat of Egan's polka.