I arrived back from Sinai mid August refreshed and full of spirit. It was great to be back in Nablus, a city which I now feel a part of. I arrived back though to a deserted Project Hope which has been closed for Ramadan. Some volunteers have been shipped to some of the Palestinian refugee camps in Amman (Jordan) but not wanting to lose precious time I declined this offer to continue working with the children of Balata and Nablus.
With Project Hope closed I am now living with a chap called Kevin. Having volunteered with Project Hope last year, he is now out here setting up his own charity recruiting music teachers to volunteer here (http://www.musicharvest.org/). He's a great guy with a dark humour and ginger hair. A perfect mix of physical and personal attributes some might say.
The trip in Sinai was a great success. With my Visa renewed and no problems at the border I now have a another three months to continue my work here. Nablus is alive at the moment. We are currently in the peak of Ramadan. There is no food for sale during the day, no falafel, no shwarma (kebab meat) and even worse no Kanafa (a beautiful cheese filled desert). There is no eating, drinking or smoking in the streets. The fasting starts at sunrise with the first call to prayer and ends at sunset with the Iftar celebration and the breaking of the fast. Families and friends come together from all around to celebrate Iftar with beautifully prepared food and drinks. From the balcony at Kevin's flat which towers high above the houses of Nablus one can see thousands of families in their kitchens and living rooms and on the balconies and roofs gorging away.
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| A view from the Balcony |
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| The morning clothes wash. |
Its business as usual though with the children except we meet in the early morning during Ramadan. The lessons are now becoming less formal and more fun with both whistles and guitar now being taught at the same time. Just before I left for Egypt a large package of instruments arrived in Jerusalem from Hobgoblin Music including three guitars, three violins and a further 50 D whistles. The violins I left in the capable hands of Kevin's brother Colm, a fine multi instrumentalist who I hijacked for my project. Unfortunately Colm has now left to return to his second year at university in Ireland. He will be missed though. Hopefully by Israeli airport staff as well, as I persuaded him to 'go commando' to the airport.
The arrival of the package of musical instruments to Jerusalem incidentally signalled the worst day of my stay here. I received notice by mail that they had arrived, however they were not to be delivered to Nablus and they were being held by customs at the main Post Office in Jerusalem. I headed off at once as the letter also stated there was a daily charge for there storage.
After the 2 hour journey through the West Bank, through Qalandia checkpoint and into Jerusalem I arrived at the sorting office. A large warehouse of a building with an Argos style collection point. I showed my letter to one of the workers who pointed me to an empty reception room with just one solitary worker receptionist busy at work. The problem it seemed had originated from the invoice. The invoice from hobgoblin had not stated the true cost of the instruments as to avoid the hefty importation tax the Israelis place on goods. They had listed each violin and guitar as being worth 99p and the 50 d whistles as being worth 99p collectively. The tax and customs office didn't appreciate this one bit.
'Is there a problem?' I kindly ask the receptionist. Pretty in face, Cold in heart..
'Wait here' The usual warm reception. I had been standing in front of her for at least 15 minutes.
'Could I ask what the problem is' She looked rather busy but I had now been standing there for 20 minutes while she sat there ignoring me with her eyes firmly glued to the computer screen.
'This invoice isn't real' She waves the paper in my face. There is no eye contact. A voice from the corner of the room behind the receptionist bellows out 'Come'. There, a tiny Uri Gellar look-a-like is waving at me with what appears to be another copy of the invoice. I walk past the receptionist and have a sly glance back to try and confirm my suspicions that the bitch was just on facebook. She was, and she was busy at work cultivating here huge facebook farm. Double Bitch.
We walk to the ware house were the package is there lying on a table and already opened. He gets out one of the bright purple violins and asks me what it is.'It's a violin.' Patience is growing thin. He gets out one of the guitars and repeats the question.'It's a guitar' He shows me the invoice and states that its not real. He swears. He is angry. He doesn't know where Nablus is. (The rest of the world know and refer to Nablus as Nablus. Israelis refer to it as the biblical city of Scrhem, a city destroyed nearly 3000 years ago.) I didn't raise my voice. A screaming contest was not going to win this guy over. I just reassured him that it was a real invoice from a real musical instrument shop. He could ring the contacts if need be. It stated on the invoice that they were charitable donations. He knew where Nablus was. I think he just wanted to get into an argument /debate.He shouted louder and louder before telling me that they're sending the instruments back to England right away because the invoice is false. My heart dropped like an anchor. All this hard work and sponsorship pissed into the wind by some tight fisted Israeli with small man syndrome. You can sum a guy up quite well when his knowledge of foul swear words out weigh his knowledge of the present perfect tense.
I reiterate my ignorance in an apologetic tone. I am the one in the wrong, you are right. I ask if there's a way we can sort it out. I propose that I show him the music instrument website so he can see the instruments and their retail worth. He grudgingly agrees and he takes me back to his office back past the receptionist who is still busy at work, cyber farming. I even stooped to the level extenuating a limp from a sprained ankle I suffered the other day. My ankle support was clearly visible. I needed everything, including pity.We sat in his dirty office surrounded by mouldy mugs and documents everywhere. I showed him my emails from Hobgoblin and he checked the website, calculator in toe. With his glasses perched on his nose he calculated the tax up on every tin-whistle, guitar and violin. In my attempt to soften the blow, I thought I'd tell him about the project, my love of Israeli music and culture and my intention to work with children in Israel. He was telling me how its expensive to have ideals. I agreed.
After adding up all the tax he showed me the calculator which showed the sum of a whopping 900 sheckles some £200. My time had come. My life had been leading up to this moment. I needed an Oscar winning performance to get out of this mess. I slowly (but dramatically) lowered my head into my shaking hands. I croaked my voice and remained silent. I looked at my flip flops for what seemed to be about 2 minutes.I don't know whether it was the limp, stories of woe and sorrow or my tales of charity and children. Maybe it was my politeness throughout the whole 2 hour ordeal or stories of a beautiful Israeli girl friend I once had. It was probably just a mixture of all the bull shit I sold him but he eventually picked up his calculator and furiously started tapping again.
He told me to go and collect the receipt from his receptionist. She managed to spare a few moments from mucking out the pigs to pass me the receipt. I paid £58 tax. I was delighted but exhausted. I had calculated myself that it would be roughly £200 and I had brought that amount with me in anticipation. Along with Kristi (an amazing Canadian volunteer who agreed to come with me for moral support), I loaded myself up and traipsed back to Nablus with all the instruments.It was one of my finest performances but I didn't recover from the ordeal for a good week. Charitable donations should be tax free. Project Hope is a registered Charity in two countries but it's location here in the Middle East is on the wrong side of the Iron wall. Water under the bridge. Back in Nablus and happy. The aims of the project are now shifting tilt somewhat. I have been predominantly working solely with children in the past three months whilst rehearsing and playing with a handful of internationals. In the next three months I will be concentrating on recruiting university students from the music department of the university in Nablus to join the band. We are scheduling a workshop for after Eid where myself Kevin and Lydia will play a few tunes and give a presentation on Ceilidhs' and the music itself.
These are exciting times. The project is expanding into Israel as well. My trip in Sinai was evidently meant to be. For who should I be camping next to on the red sea but a tin whistle playing Israeli activist who is just about to start teaching the tin-whistle to Palestinian children in Israel its-self. I am helping him out with 20 whistles and will help co-ordinate his lessons.He was not the only interesting Israeli activist I met in Sinai. Another chap I will talk about in my next blog.
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