That One Weekend In October I Didn't Write About

On the way north!

I didn't write about it at the time, but in October I spent a weekend in the northern West Bank village of Siris. This is that story.

Probably marks the moment at which I really realized how beautiful this land is. Like actually. It's kind of crazy.

I was sort of glued to the window the whole time.

My companions for the trip were Margo -- the director of the kindergarten/nursery/joyful den of chaos that I work in -- and my fellow volunteer in the kindergarten: Ben. He's German, whereas I just get the exciting job of being the American everyone assumes is German because I'm here with the Lutheran Church. 

We were visiting the family of a child from the kindergarten. The particularly precious one who chatters a lot (without me understanding) and who takes a strong, stubborn stance on which name/nickname she prefers -- although it tends to vary by day.

Mountains, sky, SIDEWAYS TREES, and then a lot of trash. The nicest roads in the West Bank are the ones maintained by the Israeli government to carry Israelis back-and-forth to their houses in the internationally-legally-quite-questionable settlements (Palestinians aren't generally allowed in those roads and can't live in those settlements) but the prettiest views are in the Palestinian areas (although that means trash cause often no money or access for bringing people to clean that up.

Also because Israel has security control over all but 3% of the West Bank, and there's a solid 70ish% with no Palestinian (A)uthority at all, which kind of makes infrastructure even harder to work out. (And even that 3% under full Palestinian control still has Israeli soldiers waltzing on a daily basis so that might be misleading too, lolz.)

Whatever -- back to the views.

TOPOGRAPHY. visceral, emotional, gorgeous, topography.

Also lots of dust. 

This was October, so my Arabic skills were to the point that I could at least put together phrases longer than "I don't know," but I was still barely beyond the versatility of a 1.5 year old or one of those plastic wheel toys with buttons that shout things like "Cat," or "Sheep," or "E-I-E-I-O."

(But on the bright side I could at least generally understand my fellow 1.5-year-olds when they begged me for their "bottle" or "mama" or "THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS" (as they point furiously at the paper-cut-out bee decoration hanging from the ceiling)).

On the way we saw some vegetables, so we stopped to ask a farmer if we could buy some! Margo gave them some Kayak (Jerusalem Bread) as a gift (delicious, and Jerusalem is the spiritual and vaguelypolitical capital of Palestine, and most Palestinians aren't allowed to go there, so the bread is thusly even more significant).

And then they gave us a pile of peppers and squash and enormous eggplants for free!

Here's Margo and Ben doing a little bit of picking and wandering as the kind Palestinian farmers let us explore for a bit.

 We took our time, but it was still reasonably early morning on Saturday when we arrived, and we'd be staying until Sunday around noon-ish. We were loved, taken care of, fed until we nearly burst from the built-up internal pressure of all that tender affection, delicious food, and the firm, insistent, but compassionate shouts of "EAT. EAT SOME MORE." (Yup. That happened.)

But the primary photo event of the weekend was, of course, olive picking. 

Which is pretty much the only type of thing you get invited to in October. 

Because nearly everyone and their grandma has their own patch or orchard or mountainside of Olive trees.

And now for some beautiful pictures of olive picking and family and new friends! 

(This is Kheirieh, the mom from the kindergarten who invited us -- she's also a nurse at the hospital next to the kindergarten!)

OLIVES

You might be aware of the fact that I'm not much of a fan of olives, but spending a lot of time with my face in olive trees this fall (and thus in a cloud of olive essence) has made me generally a lot more friendly and affectionate with these important and healthy agricultural products.

But no, I still won't eat them.

AND MORE FOOD! Also ladder cuz giggles.

Also also, you have not lived until you've had legitimately fresh fresh olive oil. By which I mean murky, nearly opaque olive oil that's weirdly spicy. 

It seems that many families in Palestine will basically fill every glass/plastic container they have lying around with fresh olive oil every fall, which is funny to me. 

(Why is our sprite so oozy and Mediterranean and sticky today?) 

sorting olives! and throwing away crappy ones!

These are a different color!

(L->R) Here's Mahammad and Aman, two new friends I made there, despite the rather large language barrier. I stumbled through some basic Arabic, and Aman struggled through some basic English.

Two things! The watch on my wrist is now lost. I lost it somewhere roundabouts February-ish, and I planned to replace it until mid-March, at which point I promptly forgot about it. Now I've acquired a rubber band at some point to accompany the yellow strings, which I sort of compulsively play with and wrap around my fingers in odd ways, but which gives me no assistance in telling time.

My problem is that watches (unlike strings and rubber bands that get weirdly tangled with string) are easy to take off. Thus when I leave Michael alone idly for a couple of minutes, the first thing he does is notice stuff on his wrist, the proper response to which is apparently to immediately take the watch off.

And so that's what I do. Usually I'm good at catching myself and putting the watch back on when I come back from whatever I was doing, but all it takes is one time in which Michael outsmarts me for my watch to be gone forever.

I probably took it off on a bus at some point and just left it there.

I could use some more discipline.

Second thing: Mahammed, on top of the ladder: Notice the tiny orange rake-type thing in his hand! That's what I affectionately call an "olive rake," and I became very familiar with them in October. You rake olives with it. Out of the tree. For hours. Until the plastic orange-tined fork becomes like a crude, flimsy extension of yourself and you are totally absorbed in the act of harvest and finally reunited -- one with the fruit of the earth and its cycles and thus fully reunited -- one with the earth itself in all its beauty and topography.

Either that or the olive fumes are more potent than I realized.