FELAbration

I’ve never had my bottom grabbed like when I pushed my way towards the stage through a sea of Nigerian men.

I had come back to Lagos to wait out my final days in Nigeria. I craved the luxuries afforded by the US Embassy digs (hot water, shower heads, couches and cable TV) as well as the company of friends I knew I could trust. To my delight, my visit coincided with Felabration - a week of concerts in honor of the late Fela Kuti, father of Afrobeat, political activist and husband to 27 of his back-up singers. I quickly signed on for the outing to the final evening at Fela’s Shrine (a large music venue built by Fela adjoined to his house where he preformed regularly while he was alive.

The night had started calmly around 10pm. We got to the Shrine and collected all-access passes secured through my “media connections” (I was with the CNN, BBC, AP, etc. contingent). I invented some obscure Internet-based media outfit to represent. Scamming? Who cares, this is Nigeria! With this pass came free booze, free reign back stage and access to a balcony VIP area where all the Westerners were gathered. We climbed the stairs to the balcony and looked over the hundreds and then thousands of young Nigerian men who were gathering below in anticipation of the nights unnamed acts.

The structure was wooden with an A-frame roof made of aging, yet not meriting concern, wood. A few no-name mediocre hip-hop type entertainers tried to warm up the crowd. Big rumors preceded this event - Common, Eryka Baidu, Flea. No one held their breath, however. A few months prior J-Zee and Beyonce failed to materialize at a concert billed with them as the headliners. One great musician, however was guaranteed - Femi Kuti, son to the late Fela. The excitement was high, but the show slow to get going. The crowd suffered through bad DJs and dance squads until finally the “big hitters” came out and jammed until the early morning. Flea and Femi were the only names I recognized.

The media boys were a bit braver than I and ventured first down into the crowd to rock amongst “the people” rather than in the sheltered elite in the VIP area. I stayed behind with the other woman, Kati. We weren’t quite ready to give up the comfort of chairs, elbow room and a sightline to the stage.

After a while one song in the jam session blended into the next. No new (or big) names emerged. We searched back stage to no avail. It resembled the VIP area. Backstage with Fela would have been wild - sex, drugs & afrobeat. Backstage at Felabration was...well...there was an open bar. We sipped our drinks as the boys came by glowing from the energy of the crowd. “You really must go,” they said.

We finished our drink and walked to the edge of the crowd. It was a sea of black. People were packed shoulder to shoulder. One couldn’t sway alone or help being swayed along with those around. We parted our first path and started in. I almost tripped, but the tightly packed bodies kept me up. We met elbows and resistance at first. When people turned to see we were women and WHITE we were pulled to the front, 5 to 10 hands groping us at any given time. Instead of being boxed out like the boys had encountered and endured, we were shepherded through, everyone in front of us wanting “a piece” and taking a handful. Finally we made it to the front. I looked up. Femi was jamming on his saxophone, nearly sweating on my. I checked in with Kati. We had made it. The hands had calmed as we stayed still. Both of us had charted escape routes under the stage. We, however, focused on the music, trying our hardest to ignore men asking for our phone numbers, our hands in marriage and offering us water. We had regained our sightline to the stage.

To our right was a small square platform jutting off the center of the stage. It was populated by photographers and security. We hardly noticed until a series of taps made it our way. Everyone in the immediate area was directing us to the security guard. What could we have done wrong? Was he scared for our safety? Before we could figure out what he was trying to communicate, we were being pulled in that direction. Dozens of hands were pushing us (gently) and then grabbed our legs, lifting us straight on to the platform. I fumbled, trying to get control over my own limbs and grabbing the security guards arms as I was raised above the crowd. When I collected myself I looked up at the thousands of Nigerian eyes on me. No time to think...I smiled, we danced.

Luckily I had been practicing in the discos of Benin City where I was considered “a good dancer for an oyibo (foreigner). I was dizzied by the spotlights and the cheers. I listened and felt the music that was being made a few feet away. The energy was incredible. “This is what a rock star feels like,” I thought.

Race to a Standstill

There are many reasons one might encounter traffic jams in Nigeria. I’ve experienced the following on my limited travels through the country: flooding, armed robbers, check points, burning fuel tanker, bus crash. I became accustomed to these “hold ups,” but always assumed that there would be a catalyst to traffic. I was wrong.

On the road from Ibadan to Lagos cars and trucks came to a complete stop. I looked ahead to try to see what had happened ahead. Impatient motorists crossed to the other side and drove towards the jam’s epicenter where oncoming traffic normally would be. Two lanes became four (this is a normal response to traffic in Nigeria).

Young men were around directing traffic and helping cars, vans, buses and trucks, trying to improve the hold up. The jam was bad. What could it be? We inched forward. Others tried to squeeze forward. Four lanes became eight.

In the race to get ahead, buses got suck in muddy potholes. Vehicles continued to crisscross over the median. I wondered what they were doing once they reached the issue ahead.

I started to see things moving ahead. But there was no accident, no robbers, no fire - just the proverbial smoke. What had happened?

The Answer: Impatience. Traffic had slowed as it had neared the city. Trying to get ahead, drivers had reacted. Two lanes had turned to 4, turned to 6, turned to 8 until northbound faced vehicles faced southbound traffic and no one could move. It took over 45 minutes to untangle the mess while approaching vehicles complicated matters. I shrugged my shoulders and laughed - T.I.A. (This is Africa).

Powered by JESUS!

The minibus had broken down 2 times already (20 minutes apart). We had 2 hours left in our journey to Ibadan. There seemed to be a leak in the water. The van kept overheating. The first time the passengers had pooled our water to get us going. The second time the driver had disappeared into the brush in search of a bore hole, emerging 10 minutes later with a canister of water. We couldn’t sustain this. We’d never make it.

We continued slowly. Small motorbikes (okadas) were passing us at about 25 miles per hour. We stopped for a third time - no water around. The van cooled as passengers chose either to get out (and bake in the sun) or stay in (and bake in the van). After a while we re-boarded.

The woman next to me closed her eyes and started rocking back and forth muttering prayers and praising Jesus. The entire bus joined in as the driver turned the key. The engine purred and we moved slowly down the highway. “Praise Jesus!” “Oh Jesus, help us, see us through!” “Jesus, give us the power!”

One by one the passengers stopped vocalizing their prayers, but the woman next to me continued for 45 minutes. So did the bus. We made the 4 1/2 hour trip in just under 8 hours. Thank, God!

"Big Men"

I walked into the party with my friend, 10-10. Young men and women were waiting around just inside the the large compound gate. We continued through the front door. The room was lined with white leather couches, glass coffee tables, empty bottles of Hennessy and BIG men (well-fed and important).

We walked directly to a man in a white button-down shirt. I was introduced to him as “the Chairman,” with no explanation. I was then seated next to another man who had lived in New York for 25 years while 10-10 made the rounds.

Where was I? Who are these people? I was the only woman inside. I was the only non-Nigerian (probably for miles). I made small talk...

So, what do you do in Benin City now that you are back from NY? He was a contractor and “dabbled” in politics. In Nigeria this told me one thing. Leave that line of conversation. Getting into a discussion about corruption in this country would not be a good idea. I followed his lead and we discussed the upcoming American election - a much safer option (socially and perhaps even physically).

I looked around my surroundings. The plot of land was small and the architecture felt cramped. The living room was taller than it was wide and had an overly steep staircase leading up to a sliver of a balcony which ran around the perimeter of the wall half-way up. The curtains were ample as was the decorative metallic hardware. The floors were polished marble. Each architectural and decorative element seemed to display wealth rather than service any function. Then I noticed the door.

The door was metal and 9-inches to one foot thick. “That is quite a door,” I commented to the nice man from New York. He informed me that it was bullet proof. “Why does our host need a bullet proof door?” It slipped. “For security,” was the answer I got, but not really the answer to my intended meaning. I decided, however, to save my hardline questioning for 10-10.

All of a sudden “the Chairman” stood up and the entire room followed suit. He walked out the bullet proof door and the rest followed out in a seemingly intentional pecking order. I sat alone, wondering what had happened. Again, where was I?

I found 10-10 and we said our goodbyes (to those who were left...mostly young men paying their dues by cleaning up after the party). As I settled into the car I asked about our host, my new friend and “the Chairman.”

My friend: a contractor for the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), the government agency responsible for distributing oil revenues through public works projects in the Delta. *Note: This does not necessarily mean that the money ever makes it to public works.

Our host: contractor for the NDDC and cousin to the Chairman of the NDDC.

The Chairman: the Chairman of the NDDC.

...BIG men!

Malaria & My Trip to a Nigerian Hospital

Since arriving in Nigeria, I’ve mostly been hot. When I’m not hot, I’m comfortable. Cold is a word that I reserve for specifying how I would like my bottled water. When I became chilled and goose bumps started popping on Wednesday night, I knew something was wrong.

Within one hour, my forehead was burning up. I returned home from my friend’s house and went straight for my sweatshirt and thermometer. One hundred and two point four degrees. I popped some drugs, collected an arsenal of bottled water and went to bed, telling my Bengali housemate, Rafiq, that tonight I would not be locking my door and that if I did not emerge in the morning, he should come in. I had a sneaking suspicion that this Mac truck of an illness that had hit me might be malaria – the high fever, the pounding head, the aching bones, the fatigue.

Soon after closing my door, dressing myself in socks and my warmest lounge wear and wrapping myself in my silk sleeping sheet that was usually more than warm enough for these Nigerian nights, I began to shiver. I reached for my cell phone and called Rafiq in the other room. “Do you have an extra blanket?” I asked. He brought his blanket and spent the next hour or so brining blood to my extremities by squeezing my feet, arms and hands as well as calming the headache with pressure points and head massage. I fell asleep.

In the middle of the night (around midnight – I had gone to bed at 8:30pm), my fever piqued. I cast off the blankets, tore off my shirt and lay in a pool of my own sweat. I forced myself to drink the line of bottled water that I had gathered with great foresight. I thought I’d call and tell them I wouldn’t be able to go to work tomorrow. I popped more pills in hopes of calming the fever.

As the sun broke, so had my fever. Ninety-nine point eight, much better. I almost felt whole as I called Cynthia, the woman I ride to work with, to tell her I would be spending the day in bed rather than at my desk. She suggested that she still pick me up and we go to the hospital for a malaria test. I agreed, still tired and achy.

A little delirious and still half-asleep I prepared myself for my trip to the hospital. I took money and a bottle of water…I knew that these were the most important things. I didn’t imagine I would stay long and thought that if I had forgotten anything, I could surely purchase it. Other things seemed trivial – my phone, my computer, movies, a book, my iPod, toilet paper.

We pulled up to the hospital. It was a private hospital – one of the best in Benin City. It was a large cement building surrounded by dirt. It almost looked as if it had been newly finished – structurally sound, but still a bit rough around the edges. The doctor was outside and greeted us with a smile, showing us through the front door where the nurses gathered in their white nurse uniforms, some with small white nurse hats. Their dress reminded me of Halloween more than it instilled confidence. They stared at me. I stared at them. One sat me down right there in reception, stuck a thermometer in my armpit and took my pulse. She flipped through a disorganized notebook to find a blank page to write my name on and recorded my data before taking me to the doctor in his office.

I sat down, staring at a large diagram of the female anatomy behind the doctor’s head. “When was you last menstruation?” he asked. What? I’m here for malaria, not a pregnancy test (Nigerians are obsessed with pregnancy, children, fertility, etc.)

“I don’t know,” I replied, a bit annoyed that he wasn’t getting straight to the heart of the issue. I had DVDs waiting for me at home.

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

“I don’t know. Less than a month ago,” I replied. He pointed to the calendar and continued his questioning. I was not of the state of mind that I wanted to expend my precious energy on figuring out when my last menstruation was. I saw little to no relevance (at least not until he had determined that I needed some form of treatment that could endanger a fetus). I knew I wasn’t pregnant and threw out some numbers to appease him, “I don’t know…the 6th…or the 13th.”

“You know you really should know when your last menstruation was,” he said. “It is important to know so that you know when you get pregnant.”

“No sh*t, Sherlock,” I felt like saying, but bit my tongue. I just wanted my diagnosis and drugs so that I could go home.

“What is your blood type?” he continued. Another toughie. I knew I should know this one…I didn’t.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“No.”

“You should.”

“I know.”

“It should be in your passport.”

“It’s not.”

“It’s in all passports.”

“Not mine.” I pulled out my passport annoyed to be arguing over whether or not blood type is listed in American passports instead of him asking me about my symptoms.

“It is in all other passports. Look next time,” he said still trying to prove his point. “It is important to know your blood type because if you get pregnant and you are…blah blah blah blah…and your fetus…blah blah blah.” I couldn’t believe he was talking about pregnancy again. I could think of many better reasons to know my blood type. As my blood, whatever type it may be, began to boil, he began to ask about my symptoms and I calmed down.

“Fever, chills, sweating, headache, bone ache, diarrhea, nausea, fatigue,” I rattled off the list I had been waiting to share.

He asked a few more questions about other symptoms and jotted notes down in the book. “Sounds like malaria. I’d like to keep you here for 24-hours of observation,” he concluded in less than half of the time he had spent on women’s issues of fertility and menstruation. What? I wasn’t prepared for this! He must have seen the shock and disappointment in my eyes and said that, maybe, if I was doing really well, I could go home in the evening.

I went out to the waiting area and told Cynthia the diagnosis and the request that I stay. A nurse came over and requested that they find someone to stay with me as well as bring some food for me so that I could start my drug regiment. They walked me to my room. I went, first cutting the deal that if I had to stay past 5 o’clock that the driver would go to my house and pick up my phone, computer and some DVDs to keep me sane.

The room was basic. There were two beds with slightly shaky metal frames. The mattresses were covered first in a plastic sheet and then a blue and yellow checkered fitted sheet. There was a pillow and no blanket. A plastic chair sat next to the bed, as did a wooden school desk and attached chair. A small room was to the side blocked by a curtain. Inside was a bag of cement. I lay down.

The hospital was clean – I was grateful for that. I knew it would be basic, but was a little shocked at how basic. I hadn’t expected a TV or an intercom system and could deal with the fact that they brought a second fitted sheet to me instead of a blanket, but had assumed that a hospital (on the higher end) would offer things such as clean drinking water (essential for maintaining hydration), some sort of food (critical to have with some drugs) and toilet paper (do I need to explain?). With a full staff of nurses, it also surprised me that they insisted that I have a babysitter. The company was appreciated, but made me feel like a bit of a burden.

When my food arrived in a small cooler, I ate it up, ready to get on with the drug regiment. Grace, my babysitter for the day, got the nurse to tell her I was ready. She brought in a weathered IV stand. “I don’t want a drip,” I insisted. This sparked a big conversation and the doctor was called in. “Nope,” I shook my head. “I’d like to take the medicine orally.” At first they thought I was afraid of needles. Then I told them that my doctor at home had suggested that whenever traveling that avoid needles. They showed me their sterilized supplies in hermetically sealed wrappers and I politely declined. With a small crowd gathered I looked at the doctor and said that I will start with the oral treatment and that if I got significantly worse, that we could revisit the issue. The American-style medical self-advocacy was a bit foreign to the hospital staff, but went over fine in the end. I got my oral medication and began on the road to recovery.

When 4 o’clock rolled around, I called for the nurse and began my advocacy again. I was determined to go home and spend the night in my bed. The doctor came in and I pinched my cheeks, sat up and looked as perky as possible. “I’d like to go home.”

He smiled and agreed. He also said that my test results were back and that I had malaria (they had taken blood earlier – I had given in and allowed a sterilized and sealed needle for this purpose). We had a brief exchange where he said that even if the test result had come back negative that it would still have been malaria. He used some metaphor about Bin Laden – a malaria test can’t check every blood cell for the parasite, America can’t check every Afghani cave for Bin Laden…even if malaria or Bin Laden aren’t found, we still know they are there. I wondered if he would have used this metaphor had I not been American. I hoped that modern science in Nigeria was more accurate than American intelligence in Afghanistan.

I took my 6 bags of pills and headed home.

Video!

I've been using a small video camera to capture some of my activities with kiva.org. If you have some spare time, feel free to peruse.

http://www.youtube.com/jaheinzelman

This is Africa…

Yesterday in my neighborhood I jogged past a very pregnant goat that was startled by my presence as she ate some rubbish at the side of the road.

Today I escaped the rain by seeking refuge in a market stall that sold “bush meat.” Furry heads surrounded me and large rat-looking creatures were splayed out and dried on sticks.

I’ve moved to an apartment without a generator – I can now appreciate the frustration that comes with nightly blackouts lasting upwards of 3 hours.

Two days ago I saw small child naked and squatting over a nicely formed poop outside his house.

Today, same small child, same cement slab by the side of his house, same morning ritual.

I’ve realized how absolutely inept I am at washing clothes – I’ve never lived in a place where I needed to use a Laundromat let alone my own two hands.

The top story on the news the other day was how the some Nigerian religious figure had issued an official statement that a pilgrimage to the Holy land is optional for Christians, not mandatory.

There are chickens outside my office. No one can tell me whom they belong to.

On my 6-hour 330-mile journey from Lagos to Benin City, the driver waved a vendor over to the van at a stoplight and purchased two pairs of boxer shorts.

In one week I saw two dead people lying by the road. It was explained to me that the third one (I thought was dead) was not. He had had a seizure and was just lying there with foam on his mouth. One knows he’s not dead because people are stepping over him rather than keeping a distance and walking around.

A W.A.S.P. in Nigeria

I am a WASP – white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant. My parents rarely yelled, spankings were rare and more painful for my mother than me and requests were granted only when accompanied by the obligatory “please” and followed by “thank you.” On Sundays my family sat in well-ordered pews quietly listening to sermons, bowing our heads in silent prayers and rising (as directed) to sing hymns from notations in a book. At school my friends and I were scolded for being late in an effort to train us all in the expectations of the culturally dominant WASPs who value time commitments and punctuality.

For a WASP, Nigeria is a challenge. It is a harsh culture (by my comparison) with none of the comfortable social rules of home. People bark orders that pang on my eardrums. Daily prayers are shouted with chaotic fervor. Ten a.m. means noon…or one…maybe 3pm. People are friendly once one breaks through, but few smiles are plastered on to pretend that there is a fondness for you that is not there. In all of this there is good and bad.

At first I feared that I had signed up to spend 3 months among people who were rude – a people who had no respect for one another. Little things grated on me. Things like being told, “Give me your flash drive” when I expected a softer, “May I borrow your flash drive, please” or having “Are you getting me?” “Am I clear?” and “Do you understand?” snapped at me in between thoughts as if I were a mentally retarded child with an impatient teacher. I’ve come to realize that this is a Nigerian’s way of ensuring that their numerous accents, languages and dialects don’t inhibit communication with me as well as each other. Just as I have accepted that the tones in which people speak, constantly reminding myself that they are not mad, rude or intentionally aggressive…they are Nigerian.

Almost 6 weeks in, I’ve learned to accept and adapt. I’ve quickly been trained to know that the “diplomatic” presentation of my thoughts and/or requests will fall on deaf ears. I must be direct and blunt – using the kind of tone that my mother would employ when she caught me watching TV rather than doing my chores…after three requests. I am most successful when I am truly annoyed with the person to who I am speaking. In church or during morning prayers, I’ve concluded that closing my eyes, bowing my head and following my own tradition is still more comfortable. Waving my hands, knitting my brow and punctuating my prayers with an energetic “In the name of Je-sus!” is too distracting and feels forced. “My way” seems to be accepted. And when I’m feeling saucy, I’ll demand a “please” before submitting to a task or an “I beg-o” as they say in Nigerian Pigeon English. There is a happy balance to everything and I am finding that space and becoming a Nigerian WASP – my skin is thinker and I’m more likely to bite.

Buckets

In a one-hour flight I went from bucket showers to buckets of $300 bottles of champagne. Benin City and Lagos: 328-miles and a world apart.

Friday 11:00 AM: I arrived at the house of a friend of a friend of a friend, Erin. Her freelance journalist roommate, Will, let me into the armored US Embassy quarters and returned to his computer to finish an article to meet a deadline. With little within walking distance and having been deprived of the comforts of the familiar for the past month, I hunkered down and watched the programming piped in for the American military stationed abroad. There was news, movies, a history channel – all with “commercials” about how everyone “at home” supports our American troops, how important it is to vote, where to get help with alcoholism, how child molestation is wrong and whistle blowing is okay.

Friday 6:30 PM: There was a live band at the “American Club” – a well-lit gathering place serving frozen margaritas from concentrate and processed cheese. It’s a gathering place for American Embassy staff and expats that find themselves missing home. There is wireless Internet, a basketball court, swing set, a pool and a pantry of American goods for sale ranging from Pace Picante Sauce to Chex Mix and Heinz 57. For some, it is a Friday night tradition. For others, it is a place to open the evening with relatively inexpensive booze and a networking hub.


Friday 8:45 PM: High heels and lipstick, five women went to the Bambudah Lounge to meet “friends” – a Rawandan runway model slash socialite and her latest lover, a jovial Lebanese man who attempted to prove himself by sponsoring our drinks with little to no concern about cost. Five women, ten passion fruit martinis, $170 USD. We sat legs crossed on couches listening to ambient beats and discussing who knows who from Harvard and how Bambudah’s brunch was supposedly good. We killed time until we could be appropriately late for our next engagement – a champagne party at a private residence.

Friday 10:45 PM: The large black gate of the compound swung open and the security guards waved us in. We parked among Land Rovers and Mercedes then entered the champagne party through a foyer filled with family photographs. Our hosts were two brothers. Their mother slept upstairs with the help of a sedative. Friendships seemed flat, but the bubbles in the champagne provided a temporary fix. People rattled off where they had gone to school in the States and the UK in perfectly cultivated and clear accents. The dress code was collared shirts, some worn with blazers. Are we in Africa?

Saturday 12:00 AM or so: The party moved to Volar, a dark club with a deep beat. Outside boys hustled to sell gum and mentos for 100 Naira (80 or so cents) as people pushed to purchase tickets for 2,000 ($17). Bodies pressed against one another trying to get in past the newly erected gates. Keeping people out seems to be the best way to get people in. Our affiliation with the boys from the champagne party earned us entrée and a table that was soon covered with more buckets of bubbly. I watched those around me, drunk on money and high-priced booze.

Saturday 12:00 PM: We headed out for food. Lettuce and a latte – two things I can’t get in Benin City, but can at over-priced colonial cafes. Lagos is small…at least “this” Lagos is. Of course we ran into people. Conversation centered on planning beach weekends, upcoming live music events and lamenting the challenges of finding a new crew for the boat, preferably Indians.

Saturday 3:00 PM: We had been invited to a wedding. In Nigeria these types of affairs are open to all who come into contact with an invitation or someone who has. I got more than a reception befitting a friend of a friend of a coworker. We were seated at a prominent central table with the other “oyibos” (white people). Well-wishers showered us with gifts of umbrellas, plates, notebooks, rubbish bins and pens with congratulations to the couple printed in slightly smeared ink. Family members paraded by thanking us for coming, one going as far as saying that our presence (“oyibos”) had added status to this nuptial celebration. In some’s eyes, we were more important that a good band. We were like making the NY Times wedding section.

Saturday 9:30 PM: After a brief rest, we got dolled up again. The girls headed out to a club called “10” and I joined Will for a more low-key get-together at Bar Beach, an outdoor venue of plastic chairs and tables in the sand. The waves were violent and crashed less than 50 yards from where we sat. A man dressed like the wild Fela Kuti danced on a stage and I was introduced to the journalists stationed in Nigeria – Mr. CNN, Mr. BBC and Ms. AP. They were all very nice and terribly interesting. I marveled at the life they must lead. I wish I could have had more time with them, but text message after text message was beckoning me to meet the ladies at “10” and the hard-working journalists were ready to head home.

Saturday 11:45 PM: I arrived at “10” and began to walk through the small rooms looking for the ladies. Will grabbed my arm and pulled me into the VIP room where I found the crew along with 4 bottles of high-end champagne sitting on our table. A glass fell into my hand as everyone chattered about Kanu, the club’s owner and famous Nigerian footballer that now plays in the UK. He was standing arms length away. I was more focused on the wallpaper – gorgeous, black with modern pastel floral accents. The VIP room was in the center of the box-shaped club with windows and crystal curtains dividing us from the masses. The music was as fantastic as the design elements and I lost myself in the beats while also trying to figure out how some of the girls had gotten so intoxicated in the short time I was gone and who these men were buying us champagne.

12:Something AM: The stay at “10” was too short for my taste, but then again, I had been absent for most of the early part. Before I knew it we were off again, following someone’s crush to another club that everyone seemed to detest “on a Saturday night.” When we arrived, I saw why…The club, Caliente, was overflowing with oily oil men, 16-year old Lebanese teens and prostitutes. I almost vomited in my mouth when a 60-something Scottish man with a turkey neck commented that it must be his lucky night when I slid in next to him at the bar. I couldn’t stomach the thought long enough even to get a free drink. The bar tender, a flaming gay Latino, kept sucking on a lollipop and dancing to the music rather than serving drinks. Everything about him annoyed me, especially the cheap red satin button-down shirt that was worn by the staff. A short Turkish man with man-boobs approached the group. It was explained to me that he was in love with Erin and had been for the past few months of seeing her out at clubs – this was very unrequited. In a unified decision we left, the Turk crying and everyone in the car agreeing “Thursdays are the night for Caliente, not Saturday.”

Sunday: The day was low-key – more television, some wireless Internet and the game of Life. Later in the evening we went to see some live Nigerian music at a local art gallery. I was tired, not terribly social and trying to mentally prepare for the next day when I would be visiting Nigerian entrepreneurs, some who make in one year, what I saw consumed in two nights. It was in this no-mans-land that the contrast seemed so stark. While at the clubs or in the markets, the worlds were too far apart. Still, it is only in quiet moments of reflection that I can fathom the great divide between the moneyed and impoverished Nigeria. I am uniquely privileged to have seen and experienced both.

The Little Things That Make Me Smile and Scratch My Head

There are a number of things here in Nigeria that are just different enough to bring laughter and puzzlement to my days…

“Oyibo” – Wherever I go, people call out “Oyibo.” Naturally, I initially thought this meant “hello” or served as some sort of greeting. I suppose it is a greeting of sorts, but literally means “white person.” It isn’t an insult, just a way to get my attention and a wave. Generally oyibos remain in Lagos, the business capital, or Port Harcourt, where the oil flows. I’ve seen two other oyibos in my first month here in Benin City – not many. I’m certainly an anomaly. I wish I could capture the curiosity and discovery that I see in the eyes of the children I meet. They look at me with a deep attention. Every movement is watched. Every action is noted. For many, I am the first white person they have seen outside of the manufactured distance of a television screen. They are excited and confused. Some try to stay very still as not to let on to their interest. Others creep up next to me and casually rub against my skin or run around giggling with their siblings, beaming smiles on their faces.

Divine Businesses – Nigeria, and especially Benin City, is a very religious place. In the north of the country Islam reigns. In the south, various Christian denominations rule, ranging from Pentecostal to Baptist, Catholic to Apocalyptic. The seriousness of faith is evident just driving down the road passing signs displaying religiously themed business names. Some are expected (e.g. Christ’s Bookshop and Religious Store). Some make me smile in their randomness (e.g. God’s Time Aluminum Co.). Others make me laugh out loud with comical plays on words (my favorite, God’s Power Electrical Supplies).

“This House is Not For Sale” – you will find these words scribbled in paint across houses throughout Benin (and probably Nigeria). From a Western perspective this seems odd. If it is not explicitly stated that the house is for sale, then why would it be assumed otherwise? Why would the aesthetic of one’s home be sacrificed to clarify this seemingly intuitive statement? The answer: fraud within the family. Apparently it is not uncommon for one family member to try and sell the house out from under another.

Soup – Tired of eating a diet based primarily on an endless variety of starches, one evening I decided to order “soup and salad.” Both of these words are used in relation to Nigerian food, however, “salad” is more of a cabbage garnish topped with a dollop of mayonnaise and soup is not spooned into ones mouth, but eaten as more of a sauce with pounded yam and other cassava-based starchy staples. One orders their starch as the main and specifies which soup for flavor (like ordering rice with a side of salmon or a whole grain sandwich with turkey). The difference is subtle, but important. To me, my order of “soup and salad” seemed to me to be a smart alternative to a carb overload, but the looks I got were riddled with confusion and amazement. The restaurant staff was so baffled by my order that it was on the house. From what I can tell as a result of my questioning, an equivalent order in America might be a bowl of alfredo sauce with a side of parsley and an orange slice.

Vegetarianism: Appalling or Appealing

I am an adventurous eater and I love meat. Typically, subsiding on local cuisine is a highlight of my international travel. When it comes to food, I will unapologetically use the overused cliché, “I’ll try anything once.” After one day in Nigeria, however, I’m wondering if I should cross meat off the list for the rest of my stay.

LUNCH: I dined at the small restaurant that sits on the same property as the NGO I am working with. I had a delicious pile of rice colored yellow with what I imagine was broth and spices. Atop the pile were a few cubes of beef also nicely flavored, but terribly tough. I did my best to cut off small pieces with the dull butter knives offered at the table. Even the small bites squeaked and bounced my molars apart as downward pressure was released. I chalked it up to being a small informal lunch spot with little competition in the area.

DINNER: “Maybe I’ll have chicken,” I thought. After a brief description of the menu items I was not familiar with, I settled on somovita, a polenta-like maize dish, with vegetable soup and my meat of choice: chicken. It sounded delicious. And it was…mostly. The vegetable soup was spicy. Generous amounts of hot pepper made the predominantly spinach “soup” (it was more like a thin stew) exciting. Mmmmm. Fish bones found in the soup led me to believe that it was not just vegetables, but this was fine by my non-vegetarian standards. I appreciated the complexity of flavors. What I didn’t appreciate was small bulbous pieces of what I can only assume was cartilage. Maybe chicken kneecaps? Slices of beef hooves, perhaps? Whatever it was it looked like small mushrooms, but was definitively an animal product. I avoided them and headed for the large piece of meat that sat covered in the green goodness that dominated the bowl. At first I thought maybe they didn’t hear me say chicken. This beef was even tougher than the beef I had had at lunch. I could hardly separate it from the bone and it had a large outer layer of stiff gelatinous fat. This couldn’t be chicken…oh, but it was. Upon further investigative surgery it became apparent that the meat underneath was chicken – the texture and color was a dead giveaway. I couldn’t quite tell which part of the chicken sat on my plate, but I think a piece I had assumed was the bone of the beef when I was operating under the mix-up theory was the neck. I feverously sawed at the unrecognizable piece of poultry. The knife was not up to the task and I carefully tried to pull pieces of the chicken off with my bare hands (the somovita was meant to be eaten with ones fingers so I was well within social bounds). With a tag-team effort by the knife and fingers, I was successful at getting nibbles of chicken off the bone, but it was tedious. Too tedious, really, to make the less than mediocre morsels worth the work. I focused on the vegetable soup and avoiding the cartilage.

The lesson I seem to be learning here is that caging animals and force-feeding them corn to fatten them up and keep them tender is cruel, but is a drastic improvement over eating lean free-range animals in West Africa. I’ll give Nigerian meat a few more shots, but I may just have to become the first vegetarian to be motivated by the lack of animal cruelty.

Unclaimed

Heather

There have been a lot of goodbyes on my trip. Some have been easy, some have been difficult. Today I said goodbye to Heather, but strangely after 2 ½ months of travel together, it didn’t seem like a real goodbye as we embraced on the side of the road in Jerusalem. It seemed more like a divergence of paths that would most certainly meet again.

We met in Egypt at Abu Simbal. Heather had just crossed from Sudan and I was on a hunt for other travelers to fill a felucca to head up the Nile. Three days floating and I thought she was alright – a hot & cold 31-year old Canadian engineer who had embarked on the same kind of journey as I had, one of adventure and self-discovery.

The more time we spent together, the more I liked her and the more the similarities between us became evident – to the point of being eerie at times. We solved problems the same way, had the same laissez-faire attitude towards banking, enjoyed the same type of travel experience (prioritizing people over sights and splurging on spas now and again), both peed with the bathroom door open, fairly consistently were drawn to the same souvenirs, obsessed over little things deconstructing emails and events of great and little significance and most importantly enjoyed one another’s company. Of course there were differences that often overshadowed our similarities to people who met us, but our combined personalities made ideal travel partners often playing good cop/bad cop and navigating our way as women through Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Israel.

I now sit here on the bus heading to Amman where I will fly home in a few day, county the many blessings that have come my way in the Middle East. Heather, despite our little stresses, is one of the greatest. It is a special person you can meet one day and spend the next 75 days and nights with. Thank you, Heather. ‘Til next time, dear friend.

Kosher McDonalds

Tonight Heather and I took a stroll through Jerusalem people watching and putzing. We stumbled across McDonalds. Some of the Israeli franchises look just like home. Others display signs in blue and white rather than the classic red and yellow. The difference: Kosher McDonalds. Other than the color scheme we wondered what was different. We approached the golden arches and walked inside and stood in front of the menu boards.

“I don’t see a cheeseburger, do you? Meat and dairy is a kosher no-no.”
“No, wait. Is that cheese on the #4?”
“No, I think that is thousand island dressing. Maybe with non-dairy dressing.”
“Is mayonnaise dairy?”
“Sometimes. Maybe here it is just transfats. What about the #4? Hey, look, there is ice cream. Dairy!”

With high-level philosophical conversations such as these around every corner, I wondered how we would ever return to regular life. Traveling offers non-stop entertainment or at least the opportunity for it – the investigation of what differentiates kosher McDonalds from regular McDonalds, just one example.

So, for the answer: #4 was a cheeseburger and we were in a regular McDonalds. Kosher McDonalds does not serve cheese, is closed on the Sabbath and offers ice cream, but in a section completely separated from the rest of the eating establishment.

1984 in 2008

At the end of the long fenced-in walkway was a small kiosk and revolving entryway that could be locked with the push of a button. We had to show our passports to a young Israeli soldier behind bulletproof glass and proceeded across an empty parking lot. We passed a large poster covering a piece of the wall from top to bottom. “Peace Be With You,” it wished us in English, Arabic and Hebrew. “Peace Be With You,” from Israel’s Ministry of Tourism. Other than this colorful sign everything was grey, blocky and bulletproof.

We proceeded into another covered walkway and descended into a cold and sterile building where we cued up for our departure out of the West Bank. Metal bars wound around the floor keeping us all in line while another remotely controlled vertical turnstile regulated the flow of people entering the next room. We waited, hearing voices being projected over a loudspeaker in the next room where a large x-ray was barely visible around the corner. We waited, as two by two the line grew shorter.

The x-ray machine was sandwiched between two large bulletproof window. A tall man about twenty stood behind one with a large semi-automatic riffle. The other room was vacant. Cameras were pointed at us from every angle. A woman’s voice shouted directives at us, “Show me your passport!” and “Keep moving.” We waved our passports around in the air in front of the cameras. We spoke into the air saying that we were still waiting for our bags to come through the x-ray. The conveyor belt started moving again. “Keep moving,” she repeated still out of sight somewhat reminiscent of the Great Oz – confused, angry and invisible.

Our bags came through and we grabbed them and proceeded to stand in front of one of four doors. The door’s sign read “Wait for Green Light.” We waited. The green light lit up and we shuffled into the next small room where another empty bulletproof window sat and another door stood closed and imposing. Cameras and speakers placed to allow for the soldiers to conduct invasive strip searches without placing themselves in harms way. Luckily our U.S. and Canadian passports gave us a pass on such antics. We waited in front of the next door for its light to turn green.

The door opened onto a larger room where we joined another line. We waited to show our passports and Israeli visas to a young pierced female soldier. Most of those in line were tourists or foreign aid workers, but some were Palestinian. We watched one of every few get turned back, all Palestinians. Those who were approved based on the permissions they presented were also subject to a fingerprint scan before passing through the final turnstile. We were approved and walked out of the blocky maze-like structure, nodding goodbye to another heavily armed soldier lingering behind the final bulletproof kiosk. The next time we passed through, the dehumanizing mechanical nature of the experience stayed the same, but the route changed. Different doors led to different rooms. Changing the path would prove to be challenging for those hoping to plan and execute an attack. Keep them guessing, keep them in.

The Wall

There are two walkways next to one another divided by grey bars, one buffered by a 30' wall separating Israel from Palestine. There are two signs – Exit & Entrance. I looked to Heather as we approached. Were we exiting Palestine or entering Israel? This was only the beginning of the confusion. A woman repeating “Inshallah,” or “God willing” passed under the entrance sign. We followed, but took our time slowly proceeding down the “entrance” path while looking at the graffiti that covered the wall – “Down with the wall,” “Free Palestine,” “Only God can Judge.” I stopped. One particular image caught my eye. A woman in a headscarf was sprayed on the cold gray wall. The text below read “I am not a terrorist.” I unzipped my backpack and reached from my camera to capture and image that was just about to take on a stronger meaning for Heather and me. As I framed the shot, a woman approached on the other side of the bars heading back into Palestine. She stopped.

The pride she had put into her outfit was apparent. She wore a pressed white blazer and matching hat. She clenched her purse in her right hand. Her hair had been styled for her visit to Jerusalem – only 15 minutes by bus, this was a big trip. But she was walking the wrong way. On the other side of the bars, she was walking back to Bethlehem, agitated. She stopped and spoke to us.

“They said they would help me. They said if I went back to get my papers that they would help me through. When I came back, they laughed at me. They laughed at me.” Her emotions were erupting as she spoke. She had been strong and had held it together, but with kind ears listening the building frustration, shame and anger melted into tears. Her words were jumbled and confused by despair. Her pain was chillingly clear and her story echoed by the graffiti behind her.

“I was born in Jerusalem. This is my home. Jerusalem is my home. They said they would help, but instead they laughed. I am a human. I did as they asked. I took a taxi back home to get my papers. I took a taxi. I had it. I had it. I am not a football. I am a human. I did as they said.” She was crumbling before me. Heather and I both reached through the bars and grabbed her hand as tears streamed down our faces as she continued, “They wouldn’t treat their sisters like this. All they did was laugh…They said they would help, but they laughed at me. They treat me like I’m not human. They played with me. They wouldn’t do this to their sister…”

The woman who had led us under the entrance sign appeared again, now on the other side of the bars still repeating “Inshallah” as she walked, head down, back into Bethlehem. She stopped where we stood with the woman in white, grabbed her hand and led her back as well. Heather and I stood still for a moment. Wiped our tears and in a haze began our own journey through the dehumanizing border crossing from the West Bank back into Israel.

Onward Christian Tourists

Israel is crawling with tour buses filled with religious “pilgrims.” They wear nametags, feast on buffet dinners and hold prayer sessions at all of the major sites – where Jesus was born, where Jesus died, where Gabrielle told the shepards of Christ’s birth, where Jesus turned water into wine, where Jesus attended synagogue, where Jesus started preaching, Joseph’s carpentry shop, where Mary was told she was to bear the son of God, where Mary dripped breast milk on a rock…you get the picture.

One would think that these would be places of great piousness, places where groups from Sri Lanka to Spain would gather in harmony to celebrate the teachings of Our Lord, Jesus and all that he stood for…one would think these would be places of love and generosity. In reality, however, Christian values give way to fervor. Guides elbow those who aren’t paying members of their group. Priests bark orders at antsy pilgrims trying to get a glimpse before their turn. It’s a rat race in which the idol symbols of Christianity create a momentary fanaticism and in which the cornerstones of Christianity are lost. Granted, the Ten Commandments didn’t specifically include “Thou shalt not yell at your neighbor for waling into your photo,” but the general principles should lead one to this conclusion. It is sad to see the good of Christianity crumble in the very places is should be the strongest. The tour buses can take these people to places where Jesus walked, but apparently can’t make them walk like Jesus.

The Great Escape from Lebanon

It was Wednesday, May 7th late in the afternoon and our final day of a 3-day rental car. We had driven around the small, but stunning Lebanese countryside. As we neared Beirut we looked at the clock and lamented the fact that our return would be perfectly in sync with rush hour traffic jams (the Lebanese have little respect for lanes and are notoriously aggressive drivers). We had been on this stretch of highway north of Beirut plenty of times before, but on mini buses and in taxis rather than in our own vehicle. We knew what to expect. Or so we thought.

Elissa, my favorite Lebanese pop star was in the CD player. We sung along smiling, turning it down as we came to a checkpoint. Strange, we thought, we had gone through many checkpoints on our 3-day journey, but never one in the middle of a freeway. Most were on rural roads entering and exiting small towns. Additionally, before this one none had checked our passports or inquired about our destination. Usually we just got waived through, two white girls in a Toyota Yaris with a huge “Budget” sticker in the back windshield. Sign #1.

We continued with Elissa towards Beirut remarking that the traffic was unusually light. It wasn’t Friday (the holy day for Muslims). It wasn’t Sunday (the holy day for Christians). It wasn’t a government holiday as far as we knew. I also hadn’t seen many minibuses – only private cars zipping between lanes racing to their destinations. Sign #2.

We discussed. If something were wrong in Beirut the soldiers at the checkpoint would have told us, no? Should we stop and check the Internet? Would the Canadian Embassy on the outskirts of town be open? Our instincts were kicking in. Something was going on.

As we drove farther we counted the tanks. There were more than before…markedly more. Maybe 9 times as many with guns pointed direct at oncoming traffic. Soldiers loitered looking official in what turned out to be the quiet before the storm. We detoured to find Internet, but our brief search was futile. With other cars still heading towards the city center we decided to stop wasting time and get back to our hotel where we could collect more information. If something was wrong, time was of the essence.

As we turned off the freeway towards our hotel, we saw a massive military mobilization. The nearby overpass had been blocked above and below and tires lay strewn across the road (these would later be burned in protest). Three large trucks were parked carrying upwards of 90 soldiers in brown fatigues only two blocks from our hotel. We parked.

Our hotel was an inviting place. The doors were always open welcoming guests into a small lobby where people gathered to share tales of the day and get advice from the friendly family that ran the place. As we ascended the stairs reality struck. The door was closed. This was serious. When we pushed the door open some turned to see who we were. Others remained glued to the television awaiting news from outside. I knew the answer before I asked. “What is going on?”

It was 6:00pm. We needed a plan. Take the rental back (not to the airport as it was on lock down, no one could enter) and leave immediately OR wait until morning to head for the Syrian border. We consulted with the other tourists that had been around all day. One had just arrived and was sticking around in hopes that people would still be going salsa dancing. Others seemed lost, glued to the Internet or hiding out in their rooms watching BBC World or CNN International. We only had one more planned day in Beirut. It was supposed to be a relaxed day on the Mediterranean beachside. Tempting, but self-preservation won out. I called my mother. “We’re okay. We’re leaving. I’ll call you from Damascus tomorrow. This call is expensive.”

The North Beirut Budget rental office was supposed to be closed but due to the forced closure of the airport location, it had remained open a little later than usual. 7:00pm – the man was sliding the chain link gate closed as we pulled up. He slid it open again and checked our car in. We said we were heading for Syria. He called a cab - $100 to the border, what??? No. We could do better with a share taxi. The man at Budget kindly offered to drive us to the bus station where we’d hopefully find others heading the same way. We threw our bags in the back of the Budget vehicle and kindly declined stopping for a beer in route. At the station we found a share taxi for $15 each. We just had to wait for the car to fill up – three more people. We moved our bags into the trunk of our escape vehicle – a ghetto-licious white Cadillac with maroon velvet seats.
Soon a Syrian family arrived and joined the car. We packed the three of them plus baby in the back and Heather and I sat front and center with the driver. Goodbye Beirut. I thought about Rein, the yoga instructor, Yosef, the law professor, Ahmed, our VIP sugardaddy, Mohamad and Bassem, who had taken us to the south, the brothers who ran our hotlel. Heather and I could grab our backpacks, hop in a white Caddy and pull a family Von Trapp (leave), but what could they do? My heart sank for these people who had touched my life and a country on the possible brink of another long and painful civil war. I felt as though I was abandoning them – using my privilege, my birthright. But there was noting I could do. My sympathy was not going to stop bullets, bombs and burning tires. I had to go.

The dark roads to the border were still relatively quiet. Families were inside awaiting news on the next development. Checkpoints waved us through. We arrived at the border around 10:15pm and stamped out of Lebanon with a new challenge: getting back into Syria.

The border guard said that with my American passport I’d have to wait 3 hours for approval from Damascus. Just like before, this was expected, but with an ETA of 3:00am in Damascus, the annoyance factor was escalated. He said that maybe it would be shorter, but our Cadillac and family could not wait. The guard assured us that another taxi would be available to take us. Worse case scenario, we figured, we could sleep on the cold barren floor of the 24-hour border facility.

It’s unclear if the God’s were smiling on us or if suspicious forces were at play, but my visa got processing in record time: 1 hour and 30 minutes. No taxis were outside, but the guards found us a ride with an Armenian Syrian who seemed friendly enough. With few options and the border guards with all of our information as well as his, we accepted.

We drove to the first customs checkpoint. Passport photos matched the passengers. “Who’s bags are those?”
“The American’s,” our driver replied.
“Go.”
We pulled up to the next stop where they checked our car registration. The soldiers pointed at me.
“American,” it was clarified by our driver. I wondered why he wasn’t saying anything about the Canadian in the back seat. We were waved on.

On the road to Damascus, we had successfully left Lebanon. I very selfishly hoped that if war was inevitable that fighting would break sooner rather than later making our epic tale of flight that much more dramatic and confirming our good decision-making rather than proving us to have overreacted. I felt a little guilty for this, but hey, if it was going to happen anyway…

As my moral fabric was stretched by my conflicting feelings and thoughts, I was soon distracted by a wee detour. We pulled up next to a small shack-like house on the side of the road. Pictures of Hezbollah leaders were displayed prominently in the front windows. Our ride got out and walked inside. It is unclear what transpired in the house, but it sent my mind racing. Could this all be an elaborate setup and Heather and I were soon to be en route to a Hezbollah safe house in Syria where we would be used as trivial pawns in the politics of a pending war that’s implications went far beyond Lebanon’s borders? My fears were not quelled when a man accompanied our driver back out to the car and words containing “American” were exchanged.

I grew tenser and tenser as early morning calls and texts (maybe 1am at this point) kept coming in on the phone. Coded conversations activated my survival instincts and I began looking for a way to secure my safety.

“Are you Christian?” I asked pointing to the picture of Jesus Christ saved as the wallpaper on his phone. I got a puzzled look. He didn’t understand. “Christian?” I crossed myself as I had seen on my few experiences at mass or watching mobster flicks. “Enta (You)?”

“Aywa, yes, yes.”
“Me too! Me too!” I said hoping to invoke some sort of guilt and or sympathy that might prevent my “captor” from delivering me into the hands of Hezbollah.

The calls kept coming in and as we neared Damascus he began slowing down as we passed cars stopped on the side of the freeway. He looked inside trying to see if it was whomever he had been conversing with over the cellular network. My hands were shaking as he began to ruffle through some things and grabbed a Red Label box from the back as he drove. Heather seemed calm in the back listening to her iPod. She remained so as we pulled to the side of the road and came to a stop behind a car with a man leaning against the driver side door. Our driver was fiddling with the box which based on the way he was handling it, did not contain whiskey as the outside would suggest. I offered to hold it for him in an attempt to provide helpful and see if it was a gun that he would use to escort us into the hands of Hezbollah. He, of course, didn’t want to hand it over and soon opened his door and exited.

Our lights still on shown on the two men like spotlights along the surprisingly busy highway. Our driver handed over the Red Label box. The other man, slightly portly and in his late 30’s, reached into the pockets of his khaki pants and pulled out a wad of Syrian currency. He counted off more bills than I could keep track of and handed it to our driver. The deal was done, and we were not part of it.

Our driver came back and let us know that “his friend” was going all the way towards our hotel if we wanted a ride. I was still shaking and we declined and requested he take us to the turnoff where we could get a cab. He agreed and we drove a few more miles to a turnoff where he flagged us a cab, negotiated us a good rate and sent us on our way.

Turned out that we had been accessories to help smooth the journey for this well-meaning smuggler. It was a win/win of sorts. Relieved and exhausted by the day, we checked into our hotel and awoke the next morning to news of bombs and bullets in Beirut. God had given me the adventure I was after…and then some.

Yes, it Snows in the Middle East

Many people have asked me, "Isn't it hot in the Middle East?"

Yes and no. Hot enough to wear sandles all the time (well at least since returning from Egypt), but my toes got chilly as we passed through a newly opened mountain pass in Lebanon and got stuck in the ICE! An old woman had to help us get our guttless Yaris back on track.

The Great Escape from Lebanon

The Real Thing

Documentaries, Associated Press photographs, breaking news…they all aim to give one a sense of being there, of understanding. But nothing comes close to the real thing.

The Palestinian Refugee Camp: I drove by it, nothing more. The walls were high and lined with spirals of barbed wire. A small orchard of citrus trees buffered the wall on the inside. The entrance was blockaded with sand bags and soldiers. Inside acres of homes – permanent homes reminded me that thee were much more than camps, but after decades of use had morphed into neighborhoods. My mind raced with excitement and curiosity. My imagination saw children kicking balls in the street, mothers washing clothes and laboring over the stove. It saw fanatic congregation around a dining room table. I “saw” Iranian money and Western fear. I saw 18 years of Israeli occupation and the children going inside. I saw a world I could never completely imagine or comprehend. Then we were past – on to new neighborhoods in the relaxed beach town of Saida. Ones that didn’t have the history, the tensions and the propaganda to fuel my spinning stories or created the knotted feeling in my gut out of brick, mortar and orange trees.

The Beeka Valley: Where Hezbollah is the people’s party in the Beeka Valley, grown out of social services and good works. In the West we tend to think of it only as an extremist group of terrorists and fanatical Muslims. In America, they are labeled terrorists. In Lebanon they are, to some, heroes – the teachers, the food banks, the advocates for the needs of the common man (yes, man, Hezbollah isn’t quite ready for “person” yet). The truth is somewhere in between. I knew this as we drove out of Beirut towards the ruins of Balbeck, but wasn’t prepared for the emotions and spinning thoughts that joined me on the road. Every 25 meters of road a light pole rose from the center divide for 4km down a main of road. Two banners hang on each – one yellow, one green, both bearing Hezbollah’s iconic symbol. Below hung banners of different political martyrs or leaders. Seemingly calling for unity of this selfless front. I all of a sudden became very self conscious driving my little blue rental car into the belly of a political movement that hates everything that has shaped me as a person…okay, not everything, but as I looked into the faces of the selfless men who died for the cause on the passing banners, I felt small contemplating the passion behind this foreign and fanatical belief system.

The feelings I had driving around Lebanon may not have been fact checked, they may have been driven by emotion and influenced by Western propaganda and/or “framing,” but it was more intense and interesting than hitting play on a DVD or picking up the morning paper over coffee.

Peace of Mind...

For those of you following my blog and the international news simultaneously, you may have wondered about my whereabouts/safety as Beirut is burning (turns out that many people were wrong in their belief that violence would wait until summer). I was in Beirut on Wednesday, but the quick escalation of tensions and military presence led to a game time decision not to spend Thursday on the Mediterranean, but instead flee the country Wednesday night. With Beirut waking to demarcation lines, burning tyres and roadblocks on Thursday morning, we made the right decision and are now safe in Damascus again, missing Lebanon and sending positive thoughts to all the wonderful people we met while there.

More detail on this adventure will be forthcoming. For now, just wanted you all to know that I am safe.

Yoga With Hezbollah

So far Lebanon seemed to offer everything I had missed traveling in the Middle East - chunky meal-sized salads, an active nightlife and style. The ecolodge I visited after a big weekend had one more refreshing offering: yoga.

Arriving at the ecolodge I expected to see Lebanese hippies with scraggly beards and lose-fitting pants eating all-organic vegetarian meals properly balanced with lentils for protein. Instead, after the long descent on a bumpy dirt road, I arrived to find the majority of the beds rented out to a number of conventional Muslim families, the women in full dress - hijab, long sleeves, long pants/skirts. There was one trendy hippy soaking in the serenity of this valley venue along the river, but I soon discovered that she was the yoga instructor and had been enlisted by one of more progressive Muslim women to teach a class at 5:00. It was 4:00.

Over the next hour none of the women said hello. They seemed to resent our presence as they puffed their water pipes and watched their children run around. I made a quiet quip to Heather about the potential of them being Hezbollah...or at least supporters. Later this suspicion was confirmed when some we overheard them speaking politics. I looked at their conservative dress and tried to picture how this yoga class with Hezbollah was going to go...and what was I going to wear that would both be acceptable yet provide the freedom that downward dog requires of attire?

The ecolodge deck was covered with 11 yoga mats - 5 on each side and one for the instructor in the middle. The class started promptly at 5 o'clock with 8 of the participants present. Heather and I had taken two mats in the back hoping to avoid the discomfort of accidentally showing crack to Hezbollah. Five uncomfortable looking women huddled close on the other side. The division was stark and verging on confrontational. "Hezbollah" v. "The West" with our new age Lebanese yoga instructor figuratively and literally in the middle acting as the DMZ. Her spiritual intuition caught on and she wanted to broker peace if not understanding. She asked one of the women to move to the mat between Heather in her knee-bearing peddle pushers and me in zebra print pajama pants.

I wasn't sure if she was going to break through the terror that made her eyes expand and shrink at the same time behind her glasses. With hesitation she rose and cautiously walked towards us in her ankle-length corduroy jumper. The discomfort rose a notch. Soon back-up arrived and two men and another woman joined us. Heather and I had already been moved forward at the instructor's orders. Hezbollah, as a result, strategically shifted positions to avoid placing the men behind us in full view of our dangerously seductive bottoms. The class continued with breathing exercises and continued slowly: child's pose, the warrior, the mountain (or downward dog) leading up to salutation to the sun. The pre-teen boys had gathered to watch much to the dismay of their mothers.

If yoga with Hezbollah wasn't uncomfortable enough, the mainly vegetarian diet I had been maintaining while traveling with my legume-loving friend, Heather, was causing some intestinal disruptions. I clenched in the name of peace. If fired, I would have launched a direct hit on the still traumatized woman in the corduroy jumper now behind me.

The class lasted an hour and a half. Some of Hezbollah lost interest around 2/3 of the way through and started putting on the shoes over the socks that they had kept on. Others lasted through the whole session, battling with their insecurities on the fairly public display of body movement. A few asked about classes offered in Beirut and seemed to be drawn to the Thursday morning class that attracted and "older female crowd." While only one offered a smile of acknowledgement and a few words to Heather and me later that evening, I couldn't help but think that this experience had brought all of us closer and given us a bit of clarity about the politics of people. Our silly tensions were based on perceptions of the West and of fanatical Muslims and our assumed perception of us. Our fear of each other's rejection was probably the strongest factor in our pseudo stand-off and could have easily been tossed aside for a comaraderie surrounding a few of our undeniable commonalities like it was hard to touch our toes and keep our knees straight at the same time.

VIPs Beirut Style

Individually Heather and I both have a knack for getting special treatment. Together we're dangerous.

Scene: Saturday night at Matise, one of Beirut's hottest bars. It's packed with beautiful people. Heather and I are both wearing jeans that haven't been properly washed in a while. I have a black T-shirt and leopard print high heels I bought in Australia for $15. Heather has a black cotton long-sleeve t-shirt and ecco sandals cushioned for comfort.

We enter pushing our way through the satiny dresses, long flowing gorgeous Arab hair, sultry cologne and dress shirts. We try to find an opening at the bar. Our neutral make-up and signature scent of au du deodorant isn't doing much to get us the attention we need. We walk around looking lost avoiding getting burned by the dangling cigarettes of other patrons too cool to care.

A man catches our eye and calls us to the steps behind the bar. He asks us what we want and it is ours. He tells us to stay. Normally we wouldn't be allowed here, but he's the purchasing manager for Matise as well as 14 other of Beirut's hottest bars and nightclubs. We've hit the proverbial jackpot. We're his guest for the rest of the evening.

After Matise we move to Cristal, Beirut's most exclusive reservations-only club. It's just around the corner, but the valet pulls up in our black Land Rover. We drive slowly about 100 meters with the windows down. Another car full of "friends" follows. One minute (maybe less). We get out and a different valet takes the car. This is apparently not a club you can walk up to. We go inside. The walls are black. The ceilings are high. Tables are tiered and a large crystal chandelier hangs from the ceiling. It's nice although a bit of a cliche. Heather is in heaven with the free table snacks of carrot sticks and pistachio nuts. We have a drink and dance on the pleather benches (the Lebanese apparently don't believe in dance floors at dance clubs).

We leave ahead of the curve. Our host is not one to be caught tailing the in-crowd. On our way out a tall thin blondish woman is arguing with the bouncer. He won't let her in without a reservation. She claims she wants to show her Irish-looking boyfriend the club and that she was here last week with her modeling agency. She emphasizes that she is a model. When this does not work she claims this is racism and that she is being discriminated because of her blue eyes. A little tipsy from the free booze, I interject in the sweetest and most sincerely innocent tone, "No, you're not being discriminated against. You just don't have a reservation. I have blue eyes and was just inside...you just have to know the right people." At this the model started buttering up to me. Stick thin 1/2 Lebanese, 1/4 Brazilian, 1/4 Ukranian model in a minidress and staletos trying to get into a Beirut club by talking to me, chubby American in jeans and a t-shirt. Funny. Our Land Rover pulled up. She didn't get in.

The night ended at a quieter venue, somewhat of an underground bar owned by the uncle of our host. The blues played in the background and we chatted into the night with a host of interesting and cosmopolitan clientèle. Out of the crowds in this swanky and exclusive Hamra establishment we ushered out our night as Beirut's strangest looking VIPs.

Tourism in the Toilet

500 toilets were placed on an open lot in Beirut. Large signs read "Isn't 15 years in the toilets enough?"* and advirtising a two week line-up of speakers, film and music events promoting peace. For the final event, there were about 200 Lebanese, 6 expats and two tourists (us) in attendance. Wanting more information about the event than we could gleem from the mostly Arabic information sheets, we sat down with a man who looked like he was "involved." A professor of law at the American University Beirut, he started with the typical questions, "Where are you from?" and "Are you working here in Beirut?" The answer to the latter typically raised curiosity at notch..."You are tourists?" In this case it evoked an even more impassioned response, "Why did you come to Lebanon? War could break out any day!" Phrased like this we realized that our typical answers fell short..."I've always wanted to visit Lebanon," "We came for the food," "We're only staying for two weeks." Writing this now, I realize how stupid this sounds. But what isn't stated is the numerous websites, travelers and Lebanese residents we consulted before entering the country. Our decision, however seemingly absurd, was a thoroughly calculated risk.

There are other tourists in Lebanon too. We've met five and seen another five or ten. I suppose it's not your optimal holiday destination right now with large areas of the country inadvisable to travel ("the south" and "the east"). And of course, you will notice many holes in the photographic account of my visit to Lebanon as the soldiers standing guard at all major and minor city sights pop out to force-delete any pictures on ones camera. The upside is the visa is "on sale" down from $20 to enter the country to free and the food and the nightlife is unaffected. War or not, Beirut is still the Middle East's most vibrant city as they say.

*During the Civil War from 1975-1990 many Lebanese sought shelter in the center of their homes and apartments. This was often the bathroom, or toilet.

Tourism in the Toilet

500 toilets were placed on an open lot in Beirut. Large signs read "Isn't 15 years in the toilets enough?"

Next Stop Lebanon

Aside from the pending civil war, Lebanon reminds me a lot of Northern California - urban cliffs rising out of the sea, lush green mountains an hours drive from Beirut, wine country and a love for culinary delights, a plethora of Mercedes and womens' shoulders. Christians, Muslims and Atheists...okay, no Jews, but...there are ecolodges, ski resorts, yoga centers, theaters, bars, nightclubs, karaoke, fashionistas, hippy intellectuals and political activists. Political activists is where we start to diverge.

Lebanon doesn't have a President. Instead it has tanks and barbed wire, propaganda posters with the faces of past and hopefully political leaders and an uncommonly strong police presence. "Police" may actually be too soft a word. We're not talking your friendly neighborhood K9 unit that makes PR appearances at community barbecues, but soldiers in full camouflage, large automatic weapons and tanks with cannons poised for battle pointing at the traffic passing by. Unlike the stray armory scattered around Jordan, Egypt and Syria, these weapons are around major landmarks as well as on seemingly innocuous back streets. They are strategically placed in case today is the day Lebanon's 30+ political factions take up arms. The core difference, I suppose, is that these shows of military strength are not shows, they are functional.

And the people not in camouflage? They are at restaurants enjoying Sunday brunch sipping coffee or at the clubs with cocktails. The are seemingly worrying more about their hair or getting the latest sunglasses than the big question of - WHEN? The streets are crowded (except for the ghost town-like downtown area that is more like what one would expect). Life goes on. Although, when asked it is on their mind. Most make few predictions, but say "They say it's going to be a hot summer." The same is probably true for Northern California, but the implications are slightly different.

The Rest of Syria

The eastern part of Syria where we were celebrities forced into using Arabic was really the highlight. What followed will likely go down in my memory as "the rest."

We spent a few days in Aleppo, Syria's business/trade center. It felt a lot like Damascus, Syria's governmental center. We explored the old city's cobbled streets and bustling souq (market), just as we had in Damascus, before leaving for Hama. When we arrived in Hama, a town that boasts about its river powered water wheels, we discovered that the reason they boast about them is that they are the only thing special about the town. We took a long river walk around and spent the rest of the day getting our pictures taken being superimposed on mountain landscapes in photoshop. Add me holding a squirrel, Heather riding a fox, a few tropical birds flying around and copies of our eyes enlarged and slightly translucent overlooking the scene from the clouds. A later version had each of us popping out of eggshells in matching shirts. The whole endeavor was great fun. I'm sure our crazy images are being used as marketing materials somewhere in Syria.

From Hama we spent a day exploring Krak de Chivillers, a huge castle where we continued our obsession with photographs, snapping glamor shots with our own cameras and posing like Charlie's Angels in long stone corridors.

Our taxi to Krak had to return to Hama, but we wanted to go 45 minutes west to the coastal town of Tartous. We were told that if we stood by the road that a minibus would pick us up for a fare. Before a minibus arrived, however, an 18-wheeler carrying what we may have correctly understood as a load of bananas stopped. The ride was short, the road was major and the driver very friendly. We took the calculated risk and jumped aboard.

Tartous was a bit dirty - a rather unappealing touristy "beach" town. We played cards at a local coffee shop where we drew a rather large crowed of staring men smoking arguillas...the usual here in the Middle East. The highlight of Tartous was a small island 3km off the coast - Arward: population 1,500. The Lonely Planet described it as a glorified garbage dump (a description that had oddly attracted both Heather and I to the off-the-beaten path adventure). The description was a bit of an overstatement. There was trash, but no more than many other places in the developing world. We walked around exploring the narrow cobbled streets and the small ship building yards. A young woman sitting on her balcony invited us up to her second floor home. We sat drinking "fresh & cold" a.k.a. orange juice with her and her middle aged brother, making conversation about politics (her views, really, not ours) as well as her brother's various injuries collected on his many trips around the world as a professional boat captain. I was sorry we had already checked out of our hotel or we may have extended our time on the island. As it were, time was forgiving, but not ample. We needed to get to the border in time to ensure entrance to our next stop: Lebanon.

On Demand

Dier ez-Zur, Syria. The sun had gone down in this rural city a few hours northwest of the Iraq border. We were wondering through the streets lined with shoe shops and sweets looking for sustenance - some hummus perhaps? It was 7:10pm and the restaurant we found was temporarily closed for cleaning (what?#@%!). They told us to come back in 1/2 hour. We wandered around the corner. Before us stood a movie theater. The movie playing, "Millions" (a 2004 release), was in English.

We walked inside. Four men sat in the lobby. "What time is the next showing?" we asked. "Seven" was the reply. I looked at my watch - 7:15pm.

"Now? What have we missed so far?"
"Now." I took the lack of expansion on the second part of the question as an indication of their English ability.
"How much?"
"60 Syrian Pounds." ($1.15)
"Okay. We're in."

We paid our money and pulled the curtains aside to enter the theater. No film. No audience. The lights dimmed. "I'm going to get some water, mai. I'll be right back." I ran outside as the film started.The wheels (or reels) were in motion and couldn't be stopped in this comical scenario of a movie on demand that couldn't wait. The preview was for the movie we were about to see. I made it back in time for the feature film. There was a constant buzz from the audio system. The volume was a little low. I went back to ask them to turn it up. Half way through the movie colored flood lights illuminated the screen from below. The movie stopped. They changed reels. It began again...on demand, sort of.

"Bush Bad"

If I had a nickel for every time someone asked me what it was like traveling as an American I could fund this trip...or at least a flashy dinner at the Sheraton. Truly, however, I've had few problems. Even in Vietnam I was warmly welcomed...until Syria.

In 2002 George W. Bush declared Syria as part of the infamous "Axis of Evil" (or "Beyond the Axis of Evil" specifically) grouping them with North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Cuba and Libya. Syria was thus labeled a friend of terrorism. Memories are not short here.

In the more isolated towns in Eastern Syria Heather and I are quite the attraction. Our blue eyes and broad smiles draw crowds to restaurants where people watch us eat. We are the subject of numerous camera phone captures and photo requests (one man stopped us on a bridge, took pictures of us with various bystanders and returned 15 minutes later to sell the photographs). People joke with us in broken English (if we are lucky) and our basic Arabic. They give us pastries. They invite us for bottomless cups of tea.

"What is your name?" ...smile
"What is your work?" ...smile
"Where do you come from?" ...screech

The room drops 10 degrees. Laughter tails off. Smiles turn slightly down while eyes inquire about my politics. Some leave it there and move to the next shop passing on the spectacle disgusted by my national origin. Others inquire outright or strongly state their opinion by saying "Bush bad" grimacing or clearly displaying a thumbs down. With my agreement the room slowly starts to loosen, things warm and then..."Tony Blair?" Discussing the complexities of politics is out. Simplicity is the way. "Blair Bad," I shake my head and crinkle my nose. Relief again.

Heather and I have discussed whether or not I should just say that I am Canadian - they'd never know. The problem is that they'd also never know laughter with an American, the kind and curious heart of an American, the human face of an American - all of which transcend policy and politics. That said, there have been times I've let Heather answer the "Where are you from?" question for "us."

Our Palmyra

Heather and I joke that we can't just have a "normal" tourist day. We try to do the "regular" thing and something always happens. Like at Palmyra...

Palmyra: Syria's biggest tourist sight. It's a 50 hectare area that was once an impressive Roman city. It's vastness is far surpassed by the laziness of tourists who casually stroll down the center colonnade, explore the most notable temple and quickly seek refuge in their air conditioned bus or hotel room. Heather and I opted for the road less traveled and it made all the difference...

A small path diverged in the desert heading towards Roman tombs ripe for exploring. We stopped for a brief water and date break and broke from the masses...well, all 5 tourists that had made it to the end of the colonnade. One, however, had stuck with us - a young local man who had been watching us from a short distance snapping photos of us on his phone with a smarmy smile.

As we started to descent down the slight hill towards the tombs we noticed the man was following us. Having our pictures taken was nothing new, but this man was slightly off. Both of us had a bad feeling. We debated turning back. Instead we stopped to let him pass hoping he would continue on. Five feet, 10, 15, stop. He stalled looking even more suspicious (there is little to pretend to be occupied by in the open desert.) We started again. He started again.

"Yalla! Go!" we said in Arabic and gestured to him to stay away. We asked which way he was going and indicated that we would go in the opposite direction to keep our separation. He went his way, we went ours. Unfortunately "his way" changed course and brought him back to us. We stood rigidly with unfriendly faces, "Imshi! Get Away!" we demanded using a more forceful Arabic term, "Imshi!" He smirked as he continued his path towards us. Seemingly pleased with the distress he had caused, he passed. We moved in the opposite direction continuing to watch behind us. It was over.

We thought about Nicole Vienneau, the 33 year old Canadian woman who went missing in Syria last year. Even at Syria's most frequented sight and in a pair we felt alone, threatened. What had this man's intentions been? What would have happened had we not been so strong? What would have happened had "we" been only one solo traveler? We were safe but thought we should tell someone about our experience. Before leaving we returned to the ticket office where the guides were congregated around the fan. We relayed our story and provided a description of the man.

"Wait 10 minutes." We thought they were getting the police. Instead, the ticket man returned with the assailant in tow. "Is this him?"

"Yes."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, mia mia - 100%"

There were some quick and heated words exchanged and SLAP, the young man's head nearly spun around, more strong warnings and an apology followed. He was about to cry from the shame. We were about to cry from the shock.

The guides and the ticket man were quite proud of their show of strength and assured us that our stalker would not return to bother anyone. "Palmyra is safe," they repeated. "Everything okay now?"

We felt sick.