Arabic: http://bit.ly/buildings-vs-memories-al-ayyam-Ar
English: http://bit.ly/buildings-vs-memories
Restoration of Buildings vs Memories
By Sam Bahour
I’m almost embarrassed to admit it. I’ve lived in Palestine for 21 years and passed by the village of 'Ein Siniya hundreds of times, but can’t recall ever actually visiting it, that is, until today.
Sam
Bahour is a Palestinian-American business consultant from Youngstown, Ohio
living in Ramallah/Al-Bireh in the West Bank. He is an Advisory Committee
member of The Danish House in Palestine and co-author
of "Homeland: Oral Histories of Palestine and Palestinians"
(1994). He blogs at www.ePalestine.com.
Arabic: http://bit.ly/buildings-vs-memories-al-ayyam-Ar
English: http://bit.ly/buildings-vs-memories
Restoration of Buildings vs Memories
By Sam Bahour
.tif) |
| Home of Jamil Al Husseini, ‘Ein Siniya, Palestine (Photo credit: DHIP) |
I’m almost embarrassed to admit it. I’ve lived in Palestine for 21 years and passed by the village of 'Ein Siniya hundreds of times, but can’t recall ever actually visiting it, that is, until today.
'Ein
Siniya is a small Palestinian village
in the West Bank’s Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate, 10 kilometers north of
Ramallah, northeast of Jifna, the village renowned for its apricots. It lies in
a valley surrounded by olive and fig terraces. Its population has grown from
701 persons in 2007 to 885 today, a whopping 12% increase. It was the home of Faisal
Husseini, the legendary Palestinian leader who spent his life defending
Palestinian rights in Jerusalem. ‘Ein Siniya is what one would call a sleepy,
laid-back village, but today it came alive and I was there to witness this
refreshing awakening.
I arrived to 'Ein Siniya driving behind
a minibus from The Danish House in Palestine
that was transporting people who were heading to the same venue that I was.
Turning off the main road into the village, we turned right and then took the
first left. The first thing I noticed is what one usually sees in all
Palestinian villages, a group of children. This group was a cheerful one of young
girls seemingly excited at all the odd traffic crawling up their street. A few hundred
meters up the hill, on the right, was the historic home that we were coming to
visit, the home of Mr. Jamil Al Husseini.
Standing in front of this huge, run-down
home was actress Faten Khoury. She was oddly standing halfway in the street,
not to be missed. She was frozen in a pose, staring at the long, stone
staircase that hugged the backside of the building and led to the first floor
of this abandoned, eerie home. She held a suitcase in one hand and a white photo
album in the other. As we exited our cars and the bus unloaded, many stopped to
talk to Faten, but she would not budge. She just stared up the staircase,
clearly leading us to where we were to go, without saying a word.
Upstairs we entered through an old,
traditional doorway, narrow and with a heavy steel door. We then walked across
a sheet of metal flooring, placed on an old outside terrace that led to a large
room. Along the way there were rooms to our right, the first had two young
girls, in traditional costume, sitting on the floor kneeling bread dough. The
next room had a young man, also in traditional dress, manually milling freshly
picked olives with a stone. At the end of the terrace walkway we entered a
larger room, possibly what was once the family’s living room.
.JPG) |
| Emilie Simonsen (Photo credit: Mohammed Abbas) |
The room was full of people sitting on
the ten or so rows of chairs. In the front of the room was a table, with a
foreign lady sitting alone. She had her headphones on and reverted back and
forth between diligently typing away on her laptop and putting on a pair of
white gloves, before picking up an artifact, pieces of a colorful broken ceramic
dish, which she used a small brush to meticulously brush the edges of the dish
pieces off. We later learned this she was Ms. Emilie Simonsen, a Danish actress
visiting Palestine, playing the role of a historic restoration expert.
As we found our seats, more and more
people flowed in, young and old. Emilie paid no attention to all the buzz in
the room; she just kept doing her thing. Sitting behind me was a row of the
most beautiful young girls from the village. The sat diligently waiting, trying
to understand who were all these strange people who all of the sudden arrived
out of nowhere. I asked them where they were from and what they were all
waiting for? Without hesitation, one replied, “We are from here, 'Ein Siniya,
and we await the skit, there is going to be a skit here. Where are you from?” I
replied, “Al-Bireh, near Ramallah,” thinking they would only know the larger
city near mine. One of the girls, around 9 years old, answered, “I know where
Al-Bireh is; it’s where the Al-Bireh Secondary Girls School is located.” I was
clearly not needed for these girls to navigate their geography.
Not before long, there was only standing
room left. Then entered an older, well-dressed man. He was ushered to sit in
the first row. This was the owner of the house, Jamil Al Husseini. It was then
announced that the show was about to begin. The room fell silent.
Actress Faten hesitatingly entered the
room, still holding her photo album as she placed her luggage to the side. She
then spent the next ten minutes thrashing around the room, talking to herself,
reminiscing about days long gone. She recalled her father’s descriptions of his
home back in Palestine, this home. She walked through the rooms, shocked that,
although she never lived in this home, she felt like she knew every nook and
cranny—the wooden window frames, the arched windows that separated the rooms,
the porch, the now-broken vase sitting on Emilie’s table waiting to be logged
in her laptop, the tiled floors, and so on. She spoke of the home as if she
could see all its long-gone residents still there. Actually, as Faten
reminisced, a group of young actors and actresses from Ashtar
Theater were playing out the home’s original
family members, as if they had come back to life. As Faten moved from one room
to another, she slammed a door, startling Emilie, the foreign actress.
Emilie abruptly stopped bushing the
artifact in her hand, threw off her white gloves and removed her headphones to
jump up and scold Faten for being in the house. Emilie explained that the house
was very old and is being restored and no one was allowed in. Faten replied, in
vain, that this was her family’s home and she could envision all the memories
as if they were alive. Emilie was unable to see this, being only privy to the
material artifacts that she was brushing and logging into her laptop. As photos
of past times, when the home was full of life, were displayed on the stone wall
of the living room, Faten, frustrated with Emilie’s inability to feel the
living past of the home, summed up the stance: “You are only interested in the
restoration of the buildings, not the memories.” The audience was moved. I had
a serious outbreak of goose bumps.
.JPG) |
| Emilie Simonsen (L), Ashtar team, Faten Khoury (R) (Photo Credit: Mohammed Abbas) |
A few minutes later, the skit ended. It
took this talented team of actors and actresses merely twenty minutes to strike
a deep chord in each of us. Lost homes, time passed, history maintained through
oral storytelling, refugees coming home, today’s material world seeking to
merely see the stones and not the families who lived in the homes or what
happened to them, or where they went, or how they died. In those short, twenty
minutes, a number of deep feelings that every Palestinian has was touched.
Following the skit, the floor was open
for discussion. The first to speak, remaining true to our culture, was the owner
of the home. He thanked everyone for coming and welcomed us to his home, a
heavy-on-the-heart welcome given the condition of the building, but an
exceedingly warm welcome taking into consideration that it was now filled, once
again, by village boys and girls, adults, and everyone else, most importantly
Jamil himself, the homeowner.
When I spoke during the discussion
period, I challenged the young ones in the room. I told them I’m going to write
this article about the event and want them to send me their reflections so I
can include them. Immediately after the event, the entire group of young girls
who were sitting in the row behind me came up to me. One of the girls, Bisan, an
unquestionable future leader, garnered enough courage to speak to me on their
behalf. With her red cheeks and beautiful smile, she said they wanted to ask
how they can send me what they write. I gave them my business card and told
them my email is listed. One of the girls asked if she can send hers to me on
Facebook, or Face, as she called it. Another sign of the times. They
were so excited, they made the rest of a normal day great.
I barely got home that evening when I
found this message from Bisan:
‘I am Bisan Jabr Ahmed, I was in ‘Ein
Siniya theater and I’m ten years old. I felt that this play expressed our
Palestinian heritage and took me back to the old days, how our parents used to
live, while now everyone is busy with Face. How in the old times my parents and
I worked together in our home and how we cooperated and how we disagreed.’
She then asked me to let her know next
time I come to 'Ein Siniya. Bisan and her generation are thirsty to live, while
the military occupation that keeps its boot on their necks make it hard for
them to even breathe.
Then a few hours later, I received this
message:
‘I am Sama’a Khater. I’m nine years old.
I loved the skit which was played in 'Ein Siniya. Although it was short, it
expressed the feelings of people in old days, and made me feel very sad.’
The idea to bring Palestinian oral
histories to life has been the passion and project of actress Faten Khoury for
years. With the support of The Danish House in Palestine and many generous others,
she was able to link with the professional Danish actress Emilie who works in
Denmark to revive history through theater. This skit was a pilot for a much larger
project that Faten is working on, the creation of a Theatrical Museum of
Oral History. I support this project wholeheartedly and made it my firm’s current
corporate social responsibility project. Please help bring it to life if you
can by visiting here and making a donation.
Bottom line, 'Ein Siniya’s population in
the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, was
114. Today in 2015, 'Ein Siniya’s population is 885 persons strong. Given every
act of the Israeli military occupation for the last five decades has been
designed to get Palestinians to leave Palestine, 'Ein Siniya is a living testament
to our resilience and determination to not only remain on the land, but to grow
despite all odds. I, for one, commit to redoubling my efforts to ensure that
Bisan and her friends will all have a future worth living for.
Arabic: http://bit.ly/buildings-vs-memories-al-ayyam-Ar
