First Days in Ramallah: hangin' with Huda

So we’ve been in Ramallah for about a week now, in our new home. We found an apartment through an acquaintance, a friend of Yael’s, named Reem, who is Palestinian but lived in Hamilton for many years. Reem called up Huda, an elderly friend of her mother’s who rents out apartments. The place was a bit of a mess but Huda promised to paint it and have it cleaned, which she did. Being the fussy-pants’ that we are however, we needed to do a bit more work on it, like trying to air out the mattress of stale cigarette smoke and covering the kitchen cupboards in peel and stick plastic. I’ve never used that stuff in my life, but for some reason we decided it needed to go everywhere. I have become an expert in laying it perfectly – must be all those years of model-making.

I think Huda was so excited to see tenants who actually removed garbage that she decided to spring for a new fridge for us. Well, we did encourage her a little, pointing out the puddle trailing out from the rusting refrigerator door and telling her all the food we just bought was about to go bad. So the next day, off we went to the appliance store and shopping, showing us where the bakery was, where to buy the best fish, vegetables and kitchen supplies. We followed her through the streets, trailing behind her as she zigzagged through Al Manara (1), more comfortable walking in the middle of the road than on the sidewalk.

We decided she was our new Palestinian grandmother, as she was constantly inviting us in for coffee, tea, lunch and dinner, bringing us apples from the market and fresh towels. For the first 3 days, she pretty much insisted we eat every meal at her place and we did. She seemed to be feeding everyone: the painter, the cleaning lady, the man and his 3 little boys who came to put hooks up and take away the garbage. But as she explained to us, while we uselessly protested yet another helping of fish and rice, it was their culture.

While not a great listener (although this comes in handy for avoiding certain subjects), Huda told us a lot about her life as one of Ramallah’s original residents, how she was one of 12 children, 6 boys and 6 girls, how her parents were married for 75 years and died on the same day. Her husband was a high school principal who died of emphysema and all of her children and grandchildren now live abroad, in the US and UK. When she visits them, even with her American passport, she can’t travel through Israel, she must go through Amman. She owns 4 houses in Ramallah: living in one, selling another, renting one and leaving one vacant. She explained that she only rents to foreigners, not to Arabs. I thought this was a type of grandmotherly racism that I am familiar with, but directed at Muslims, as she is Christian. Then she explained that there are old Jordanian tenancy laws (left over from Ottoman days) still in effect in Palestine, which rule that rent cannot be increased. Ever. These families pay approximately 15-25 Jordanian dollars, the equivalent of 25-45 dollars per month because their rent has never changed. The socialist principles behind this are not bad, it is a kind of rent-to–own rule, except that property values in Ramallah have increased, as has the cost of living, property taxes etc. and there is no way to adjust to the new economy. This is why she is leaving one of her houses vacant (2).

Other than hanging out with Huda, we’ve been easing ourselves into our new life in Ramallah, venturing out in the morning for walks, trying to get around in a city built on the side of a mountain, inevitably climbing steps and steep hills only to head straight back down again. Being from Winnipeg, where the only topography was the garbage hill where we went tobogganing, I feel constantly winded. We come home tired at 10am, ready for a nap.

Elle and I are happy in what we call our little ‘cave’ (3) and would be content to sit around playing with our computers all day, but we are here to make a film so we have been making an effort to get out and take in some culture. Yesterday we went to the opening of the Al-Kasaba (the movie theatre in Ramallah) Film Festival for the opening of ‘Salt of this Sea’, the new film by Palestinian-American Annemarie Jacir. We knew to expect a few speeches, having just been to Shashat (4), but we didn’t expect to have to sit through an hour of speeches, letters, musical numbers and finally a piped-in instrumental version of what I assume was the Palestinian National Anthem that we were all instructed to stand to. Having just been to yoga, we were a bit tired and hungry and just wanted to see the film. At least it was good.

Speaking of yoga, we found a yoga school one day while we were with Huda at the post office so we decided to try it. The class was of course in Arabic but we figured as long we followed along we should be okay. Little did we know that the room is kept really dark (5), so it is hard to see what he is doing. The class was called Hatha yoga but it is actually more martial arts style. Our ‘Sensei’ makes us do all the poses with a kind of militaristic flourish; high leg kicks and the like. I’m not sure it is a good or bad thing that we don’t understand a word he is saying, because he has a lot to say at the end during meditation, which I understood to be a quiet time but apparently not. We like it though, and come home exhausted and sore from climbing the hills, tai-kwon-do yoga ready for Huda to invite us in for tea and cookies. Not exactly home, but we like it so far.

Footnotes

1. Al Manara is the radial center of downtown Ramallah. I have posted a video on my Facebook page.
2. Also, tenants cannot be evicted from their home, unless the landlord is willing to give them key money, which is equivalent to the price of an apartment of the same size. The house that we live in has 5 apartments, 2 of which are rented to foreigners, 3 locked into tenancies with families who have been living there anywhere from 30-50 years as children and grandchildren have assumed the house. Despite an apparent housing shortage in Ramallah, many houses are being left vacant because it is too risky to take on a tenant you can’t ever get rid of.
3. It seems everyone else in Ramallah has beautiful views of the valley from their apartment but us.
4. Shashat is the Women’s Film Festival in Palestine going on right now.
5. We think this for modesty but it also could just be his style…