January 14, 2002 — Mudeif Productions

Exams continue for the students today. Grades 6-11 gather upstairs in the auditorium - it works better to have them mixed up together, so that cheating is minimized. Today was also the first time we've been to Jenin in almost two months (unless you count the emergency trip to get the kids home through the hills). There's no business going on, but it was good to see the streets full of people and activity again after the withdrawal of Israeli tanks - this means the surrounding villagers can once again head to the region's financial and commercial center.

*These billboards are prevalent throughout the Palestinian Territories.*

We headed off to do various errands. As Marthame passed by the Souq (market), he noticed a line of billboards printed in English and Arabic: "Better pains of peace than agonies of war." We had seen the same signs as we headed up to Zababdeh from Jericho a week ago, clearly a concerted effort by the P.A. to build popular support for dialogue. We've seen similar signs in Israel, but always by individuals and not the government. In any case, it's clearly not being received well here - all of them in Jenin (unlike Jericho) have been scarred-up with graffiti.

Elizabeth, meanwhile, visited a pet store - the front room had the usual fare of birds and the like. In the back, though, she was quite astonished to come face-to-face with a baboon. The back room is a kind of mini-zoo, with a fox, wolverines, and boa constrictors to draw in the crowds. Their conditions seemed clean enough, but still depressingly small for wild animals. From there, she and a teacher from AAUJ visited a friend in town, for a little coffee and dancing. As they left, she stopped in a store to get embroidery thread. The man who runs the store promised to send her patterns by internet (here's one of about eight patterns he sent). The work here is quite exquisite.

*A board game about settlement being played with all the irony we can muster.*

In the evening, we visited with one of the families connected with the University living in Zababdeh. Originally from Utah, they've come here for a year to live with Dad as he works at the University. By complete chance, they happen to know our favorite German board game, Siedler (translation: Settlers). It's an ironically appropriate game to play here, as each team builds settlements, monopolizes and steals resources, and then tries to build the longest road and the largest army. Sound familiar? Marthame's team won (what does that say about them?).