Al shabaab and sartorial dilemas

The Glammy has taken to calling the Lozenge and Rashimi 'al shabaab' which always makes me laugh  because in Arabic it means: 'the lads' or 'the youths'. But most English speakers would recognise it because of the Somali terrorist group that goes by that name. Similar to 'taleban' (which translates as 'students' in Arabic) madrassa (simply 'school'), and the prefix 'Abu' - often linked to terrorists such as Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada, which simply means 'father of'. We in the West have some murky associations with words that are used harmlessly and daily in the Arabic language.

Pretty much the only way to get al shabaab to put clothes on in the mornings is, normally in a last ditch attempt at around 8.50am, to do 'disco dressing' where I put on some music really loud, and when I press pause, they have to put on an item of clothing. I can still almost dress Rashimi by brute force, but even so, he still enjoys the dancing. The situation is deemed to get worse as the Lozenge took one look at his school uniform and said: 'I will not be wearing that at my nurthery.' 

We went to meet his new class teachers this morning - one very stout, and one very slim, a bit like an Arab version of Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker but hopefully more benevolent, and the Lozenge seemed taken by the place, which is a good start. Then we went to buy him some new pants in one of the dreaded Malls that make me feel like epilepsy is coming on, and whilst thumbing through the boys underpants selection in Mothercare (at double the price of the UK) the Lozenge started wailing: 'But I don't want pantth with crocodileth on them!' So we bought some with 'monthterth' instead from H and M at a mere £5 a pair. They'd better last a year or two at that price, and Rashimi will definitely be inheriting them.

We left Mall-ville after the Lozenge had eaten a Starbucks muffin which they had heated up to mask its stale-ness which meant all the chocolate chips were melted and we cruised back in the Chevy in 40 degrees covered in chocolate to the flat to join the Glammy and Rashimi. The Glammy was chatting nervously with Sayyad about the regional state of affairs. Everyone here fears another war like Iraq, and because some of the intelligence from Syria that the US is going by is allegedly generated by Israel, neighbouring Arab states such as Jordan, are extremely nervous. This country has absorbed so many people from the last 100 years of upheavals - from Palestine, Iraq, Egypt, Yemen and now Syria - they are terrified they will be drawn in or somehow implicated in this one, particularly if the US strikes and the Syrians consider Jordan as an accomplice. 

Rashimi and the Lozenge really missed each other this morning - and were not happy to be separated. They have done everything together for the last 3 months and are very much each other's wing men. The Glammy said that Rashimi was calling: 'Lolli! Lolli!' around every corner wondering where his brother was. Rashimi is quite talkative these days and has taken to calling J, 'dood,' and calling out 'ovileeeeee!' when he wants an olive.

I left the Lozenge with the Glammy and Rashimi and drove to Jordan University to meet J for lunch. We had planned to meet a wonderful Palestinian man, Mohammed, who is Emeritus Professor of English Literature at Jordan University and studied at Cambridge. He's now well into his 70's. (hurrah, another grown up friend). We had fascinating chats with him. He's going to introduce me to a Palestinian farmer in his late 80's who lives in the Jordan valley and still farms, who will hopefully be part of my Palestinian Nakbah series. 

We drove back home in a mansaf (Jordanian national rice dish) coma listening to Paul Simon - over the brow of the hill to reveal the dusty city that has become our home, sweeping below us. 'These are the days of miracle and wonder...' 

In many senses for us as a family, these days are wonderful and miraculous, but the Chinese curse: 'may you live in interesting times' seems a little more applicable politically at the moment.

A distant drum beat?

You can't enter a conversation with anyone here in Jordan at the moment without 'the question' coming into conversation. With the US and the UK currently in discussion about whether to strike Syria - whatever 'strike' will mean in this instance - the air is buzzing with views and concerns about what the implications will be for Jordan, and the region.

Last night J and I had a dinner on our balcony for the Duke, his wife, and wonderful Widad, the collector of Arab costumes and other heritage. We sat eating, drinking, and listening, late into the night as these experienced souls spoke about their memories, hopes and fears for the Arab world. In the warm air laced with cigarette smoke and a whiff of mint from the jug of Pimms, I studied the three fascinating faces in the half light. They must have witnessed at least 6 wars in their lifetimes, including 1967, two Gulf wars, Iran-Iraq and two Intifadas. They've witnessed the smoke, the fire and lived with the ashes. No wonder they were sounding concerned about this being the seed of another.

They spoke about how when they were young, there hadn't been such a problem with sectarianism or fundamentalism the way we experience it now, and that in Palestine, Egypt and Jordan, where they were all brought up and educated, Christians, Muslims (both Shia and Sunni), and Jews lived unremarkably together to the extent that they often wouldn't think about who was who. And they were all grateful for the Hashemites, the ruling tribe of Jordan, for their broad minded and liberal style of leadership, which in their collective view is what the continued, albeit precarious, peace within Jordan is partially down to. But for how much longer if these decisions bring the strife this way?

But they all laughingly agreed, that greater than any further war on their doorstep, their biggest fear is Alzheimers, and the Duke admitted to counting backwards at regular intervals just to make sure of his continued mental agility. From an outsider's view, it didn't look like there was a problem with any of the three minds around our table that evening, as they sat chuckling and smoking and imparting the vital vignettes of wisdom to the more junior outsiders.

As the UN weapons inspectors pick through chemical evidence outside Damascus and world leaders debate the necessity of a strike on Syria, the Lozenge is preparing himself for his first term at a 'new nurthery' and the shuttle service to and fro in a diminutive orange minibus. Rashimi will have  the Glammy to himself in the mornings once more as the Lozenge climbs into his first school uniform and embarks on bilingual mornings in Arabic and English. I think he's ready, but it still feels like a big step.

This afternoon he and Rashimi nipped off with the Glammy to the bird garden, armed with an empty jam jar, to look for 'worms under rockth.' These tiny trainee men are so physically close and yet so psychologically far from these fundamental world decisions that will influence events on our own doorstep. And we, as adults, have no more input into these decisions than the  Lozenge, or the worms, when it comes down to it.

***

(I need to stop because the Lozenge and Rashimi have just arrived back with an empty jar and an instruction. 'Will you pleathe thtop working at your computer, Mummy.' It's tea time, and today I hope they'll eat it. Yesterday he refused my pizza saying: 'It tathted a bit pizza-ey.')

Fatima's photo

http://www.unicef.org/photography/photo_week.php#UNI146440

Above is one of my photographs of Fatima which was selected as photo of the week by UNICEF in New York. I must tell her. She will be very proud.

Looking out for each other

The deepening groove

I found this poem as I was waiting for the video files to transfer to New York. I thought it reflected the psychologist's remarks in de Lisle's book.

Plumbing the Deepening Groove

That survival is impossible without repetition
of patterns is platitude - see moon rise or whorls in wolf fur -

but how explain the human need to reenact primal dramas,
even when the act perpetuates a cycle of abuse?

The boy who hides in the tool shed with buckle-shaped welts
rising like figs from his arms will curse his father,

and in turn beat his son. Like a wave anguish rises,
never understands itself before emptying in a fist.

The spurned daughter will seek out loves who abandon her,
self-will degenerating in the face of what feels familiar.

Childhood, seen in light of recurrence, takes on the heft
of conspiracy, casts a shadow across an entire life,

making it appear that nothing could have happened
differently, that free and easy is the stuff of semblance.

Then of the prerogatives, reclamation is principal,
to appraise the past the way a painter subsumes old canvas

with new layers of paint, each brushstroke unconcerned,
sure, dismantling the contour of what once was realised

so that new forms can emerge to contradict the suggestion
that survival is impossible without repetition.

by Ravi Shankar

The wheel of chaos within the chaos

Za'atari refugee camp

Sitting in the silver Pajero with UN staff was the tower of Babel you might expect. In the vehicle with me was a Pakistani, a Tunisian and Argentinian and a Palestinian, and we idly chatted as we drove towards the satellite towns of Irbid and Mafraq to visit Syrians with two UN representatives who were visiting from New York.

With a video camera and a stills camera hanging from each shoulder, a big backpack full of kit and a tripod slung on a remaining inch of shoulder, I knew it was going to be hot and highly charged in 40 degrees with an agenda that looked optimistic. The problem with visiting reps is they are always accompanied by an entourage. This day was no exception and we travelled in a convoy of 3 cars with many other personnel joining us at each stop.

It was interesting to see the kind of support the UN provides for Syrian children in Jordan, and our first visit was to somewhere called a 'child friendly space' - jargon for a room where children can have some organised playtime with trained local supervisors. It was impressive and the children looked happy, although it turned out to be the only place where I was allowed to actually film and take photos, which is ironic considering I had been booked for the day to film and take photos. Luckily I got a bit done there. I wasn't allowed into the flat to visit a Syrian family, so I hung about outside until they all came out - and then had to try and grab some shots of the reps getting in and out of cars. 

We arrived at Za'atari camp at about 1.30pm - already two hours late, and the main street, coined: 'The Champs Elysees' was eerily quiet. As we arrived at 'base camp' from where, behind barbed wire and railings, all the agencies function, there was talk of some demonstrations in the camp. We visited a small school where I wasn't really allowed to talk to children, or get them to talk to me, but I managed to get some quite rough footage and photos, dodging between the packs of photographers and other journalists who were there to film a Danish Princess who was also visiting that day. 

Then there was a press conference which the representatives led - and I was told with about a minute to spare, that they needed it filmed. So I jostled for space, with no time to put up a tripod with the other press, and filmed the conference hand held. By that stage it probably looked like I'd just jumped out of the shower and the last thing I felt like was lunch with the gang. 

So as they were having lunch I set up my camera to get at least one interview from one of the reps after he swallowed his last mouthful - with a dusty wind howling and the sun beating down on the hard, beige ground. There was much to-ing and fro-ing from people in different logo-ed vests and it was at that point the tragic story of the suspected Syrian government sarin gas attack, killing over 1000 people, broke. And there on the mobile phones of some of the UN workers, were pictures of lines and lines of little children wrapped in white shrouds, looking to a casual observer, as if they were asleep. 

I sat on a step, thinking of my own boys' faces when they're sleeping, and thinking how far away this aid circus felt from these daily tragedies: like Dunblane and Lockerbie and Hungerford happening day on day on day on day, but with no one taking account. 

Looking at the exhausted faces of employees of the aid scene - you can see how much they're trying to help. But you can feel the wheel of chaos within the chaos, and when you're there, you can't help but spin with it. You can notice order in the rows of tents and caravans in the camp, but these white carapaces are where order ends. And you can't help but doubt that the hardest work from the most qualified people in fluorescent vests, would ever sort this out. This crisis defies any good will or training or money, it seems.

After a snatched interview with one of the reps I had to rip home from Za'atari camp to send the video files to New York. The bandwidth here is slower than the US, and after a stack of technical hitches I was still sitting at my desk at 11pm talking to Pedro, the tech help in NYC. I resigned myself to an all-nighter and as the little green bars edged their way from 0% to 100% as the five video files snailed their way through, I made a loaf of bread, tidied my office and read some poetry. By 3.30am they'd made it and I lay down on our bed and ran over in my head,  the images and the sounds of the day.

As the little children in the UN child friendly space in Irbid sang, 'If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands,' in Arabic, their fellow citizens on the other side of the border, just an hour's drive from here, were lining up the tiny corpses for that day's horror to be seen by the world. 

Isn't it time that Ban Ki Moon and his bands of supposedly highly qualified, and very definitely highly paid colleagues and allied parties, did something more dramatic to end this hell?  

A monkey's glee

It would seem we've settled back in and some people at least are pleased to see us. Yesterday, the monkey in the Bird Park started running up and down his cage, jumping up and down and squeaking with excitement when he saw the Lozenge and Rashimi pass by. It's been a couple of months since they've been there, feeding him bananas. The Lozenge said he wanted to go and sleep in his cage with him. The monkey's welcome was amazingly human, it was really quite moving. And his reaction perked up the Lozenge who is suffering from extraordinary numbers of mosquito bites on his arms. 'I think I taste thweet like pancaketh to the mosquito,' he said.

I visited the expensive doctor who assured me that the genetically modified freckle on my face which seems to grow larger each summer, was cute, and what's more could serve as an 'evil eye' to ward off bad things; and issued me with two wrist braces in Granny knicker beige which the boys are fascinated by and spend much time ripping off and sticking back the velcro as we watch television. When I explained to the doc that my wrists hurt because my little boys always want lifting and cuddling, and he told me not to forget about cuddling my husband too. So I definitely got my money's worth from my consultation at any rate. J was delighted but asked nervously what age the doctor was. (At least 55 I'd say and definitely a bon viveur.)

The wrist braces were well timed, as tomorrow I've been booked to go both filming and taking photographs in Za'atari refugee camp and three of the host communities: Mafraq, Irbid and Azraq. I've got all my kit together - film camera, stills camera, tripod and the rest and have that frisson of nervous energy in my stomach which being a one woman band instills. And I'm also wondering if the doctor should have also issued me with a couple of spare arms for this job too. I need to edit everything by next Wednesday when the terrible news will break, that there are now 1 million Syrian refugee children in this region.

Do as you have been done by

In the fabulous graphic novel by Guy de Lisle, Jerusalem: chronicles from the holy city, I've just reached the part where the protagonist finds a bar and gets talking to a psychologist on the next door stool. He questions her about why Israel might treat Palestinians the way it does. She tritely replies: 'You see, people who were battered as kids are likely to batter their own kids in turn. So we thought, maybe the same pattern applies to entire populations?'

The protagonist replies: 'But if today's persecuted people all persecute others tomorrow, we won't be out of the woods anytime soon. It's endless.'

The novel, written in cartoon strips, gives a wry look at life in one of the most complicated parts of the world, and the depiction of the pyschologist is, I hope, with tongue in cheek, but when you look East, West and North and South from Jordan, you've got to wonder.

Syrians continue to spill over any border they can - with 20,000 people arriving in Iraqi Kurdistan since last Thursday. It is particularly hot and dry, with most air conditioning units, including ours, giving up under the weight of all that water sucked from the air. And I can't imagine what it's like in the camps, let alone on a roof top, or a dusty plain.

It looks worryingly like Lebanon might be sucked into the mix, with its equal thirds of Sunni, Shia and Christian populations.

And now Egypt too, with nearly 1000 dead in the last week. The Egyptian miliatary are becoming increasingly heavy handed with protesters, with equally vicious retaliation from Muslim Brotherhood supporters. But many locals here, including the Glammy and Egyptians like Sayyad our janitor, think the military crack down is a good thing because in their view the Brotherhood spells trouble. 'These people are terrorists,' one Egyptian said to me. 'The army needs to bat them down.'

Bad examples beget bad behaviour, for sure. But during a meeting with the UN this week, I talked to a man who has lived and worked with his family in this region all his career, he said none of these Sunni - Shia - Christian rivalries existed 10 years ago in Syria or Egypt. They've been sparked, he said, by the cruel and irresponsible leadership of the likes of Al Assad.

In a tragic of example of this, I read about the disappearance of the Italian Jesuit, Father Paolo Dall'Oglio from Raqqa, from a city in northern Syria now held by Jihadists. He settled in Syria in the 80's after he went there to study Arabic. After restoring a monastery in Deir Mar Musa in northern Damascus, he concentrated his energies on improving relations between Syria's religious communities who 'lived in harmony but ignorance of each other.'

No one knows where he is. And with 100,000 killed in Syria's civil war so far, it's humans like he who are so desperately required to try and restore balance in this regional melting pot which is beginning to risk self immolation.

Trouble

A weekend full of pure cheekiness

Rebuilding and a mishap on the multi-storey

Today I've come to sit and type in my favourite cafe in Amman and I'm looking at this view, over East Amman towards the beautiful black and white Abu Darwish Mosque, to perk myself up.

You miss family and friends more when you've just seen them, and my mind is still full of little memory bubbles of laughter with people. And I think I had perhaps belittled in my mind, the process of settling back into a newish place after a month's holiday. It's as though all the purposeful bricks I put down in the past six months have tumbled and I need to begin again. And because we now know we're going to be living in Jerusalem from January next year, I want to make the absolute most of the last 6 months here, but I hadn't expected to return to Amman to start building again. And all this in an oven of a den, in 40 degrees.

This coupled with pains in my forearms, probably from over-hammering it on the work front immediately before we left, and hauling two heavy dwarves and multiple bags around the UK for a month, has not helped my mood these last two days.

I called our health insurance provider to make sure I was covered for a visit to the (extortionate) GP and physiotherapist if required. And they replied, that no, I wasn't covered for outpatients visits or physiotherapy. Just surgery. Only the dwarves are covered as outpatients. Of course, I thought as I put the phone down, concentrating not to slam it. An insurance company would never insure a mother of two young children for outpatient visits or physio, or they'd be shelling out on a weekly basis. Such is the lot of the working mother, we are bound to have bits that play up, stop working or fall off. Just like the aging, rusty car that the insurance provider shakes his head at. 'No longer insurable, that one. Sorry mate.'

The well-insured and generally bomb proof Rashimi has had the squits for a couple of weeks now and has a severe bottom rash that I worried would get infected, especially under a nappy in this heat, so the Glammy, the Lozenge and I accompanied him to the paediatrician for an inspection . After much howling and protesting from the rashy Rashimi, the doc prescribed a list of about 7 lotions and potions and drops, and suggested we take a stool sample and find some lactose free milk for him. This required almost half a days worth of  driving around Amman in thick traffic collecting plastic sample pots from the Arab Medical Centre and looking around pharmacies and supermarkets for the rest of the potions which came in at around £75 (not covered). Plus the Medical Centre explained that we'd need to get the stool sample to their lab within 30 minutes of its arrival at the very most, for it to be worth testing.

My huffing and puffing got a lot worse and by 5pm I was extremely pleased to see J come in through the door and the prospect of someone with whom to laugh about my day during which we had been paying the Glammy £7 per hour as an escort and taxi service and I'd got no work done.

As J was making himself a cup of tea, I noticed that a nappy-less Rashimi had deposited a potential sample on the floor on the balcony and was just calculating whether it had been there for too long to qualify when I heard a wail from the Lozenge who was zooming a toy car up the ramp to his wooden garage. There was another potential sample distributed all over the top of the multistorey. 'I can't drive my carth on that, Mummy,' sobbed the Lozenge. 'That'th dithguthitng!'  And as J and I frantically discussed whether we would have time to get some of it to the lab within the 30 minute window, the wailing from both boys got so piercing we canned the idea and decided a cool bath and early bed was the only option left for today for them both.

Reclined, nearly naked on my bed with the 'Ay theeee', as the Lozenge calls it, on its coldest, full blast setting, retreating into the delights of The Week, Spectator, FT Mag and so on, that I'd brought back with me, I could see why expat Mums might end up stocking the cupboards with gin and not venturing much further than the toddler group.  And as for Bupa, no wonder they don't cover us for any form of therapy…we'd all be there on that couch, getting our money's worth.

Slowly slowly catchy monkey

I'm not sure 'spring into action' is quite how my day could be described. My brain has turned to marshmallow; I've forgotten most of the Arabic I've spent the last 6 months learning; my jeans must have shrunk or something; and even the external hard drive for my computer is reminding me it hasn't been used for a month.

Fortunately we had one day yesterday of moving slowly as the Glammy was at home with jet lag after her trip to the USA so I had the perfect excuse to postpone my cranking up (the alternative to springing into action). The Lozenge came tripping into the room saying: 'Ith it a big bad Mummy day today, then?' Which it was - and I'm a little bigger and badder than before our holiday. The dwarves and I trailed after J to the embassy where we paddled in the pool, chatted and reminded ourselves of where we were. The Lozenge asked for some 'Ay Theee' (air conditioning) in the red hot Chevy and sighed: 'It'th hot, but it'th nithe to be in our red car again.'

On our way back we drove past the house of Syrians next door and I felt sad to think that each of the 35 days we've spent away, every one so varied and fun and full of time with family, would have been 35 of the same, and the same again for the ladies and children within its beige walls.

Now, back at my desk, working out which way to point myself first, I'm looking at a little piece of paper on which I scrawled this Sanscrit pick me up before we left when I was trying to finish all my work before I left:

Look to this day, for it is life, The very life of life.
In its brief course lie all the realities of existence,
The joy of growth,
The splendour of action,
The glory of power.
For yesterday is but a memory and tomorrow is only a vision.
But today well lived makes every yesterday a memory of happiness
And every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well, therefore, to this day.

Slowly slowly catchy monkey...

Tomorrow is certainly a vision of hope.

Now I am going to shut the computer and cook tea for the dwarves who are happily reunited with the Glammy in a sandy playground somewhere.

re:Treat

I'm back in my den in Jordan with the fan pointed at my face. Ever since I staggered to our departure gate at T3 with bulging tote, large tripod and two excitable tots, I've been thinking about all we've done and the people we've seen over the last month's holiday in the UK.

In the FT magazine this weekend, The Shrink and The Sage discuss the question: should we retreat? It's come to be a modern day requirement to escape from the every day chaos and go to a place which is less busy to allow your thoughts to bubble unhindered and get back in touch with your self and your direction. 

Although I'm not sure that this retreat (East Anglia, London, Scotland; pebble beaches, roses, vegetable gardens, barbecued sausages, trampolines, sand pits, fonts, black currants, spaniels, boats, black taxis, red buses, day trains, sleeper trains, grass, grass and grass; baby cousins, big cousins, grandparents, uncles, aunts, friends, friends, friends, friends of friends; jelly making, stream damming, dog wrangling, baby squeezing, bouncing, climbing, running...and some sleeping in between) would be everyone's idea of a retreat. But if you concentrate on the second syllable, that was it. Just a month's worth of treat upon treat and a wondrous computer-free month full of things and people and places we are far from here. No time to navel gaze but time instead to have our heads raised, and to fill our heads and hearts with the wonder of everything that is part of the UK in July and its 1050 shades of green. 

We took off out of Heathrow. The Lozenge cackled like a happy harridan and Rashimi, from my lap, gazed out onto the blue, the green, the reservoirs and the houses. We were all excited about being back together with J, who had left us 10 days before to get back to his Arabic books. And this made the wrench of saying goodbye to everyone else, a little easier.

The Lozenge spent the flight with his nose pressed against the iPad watching Bob the Builder. Rashimi was on my lap for 4.5 hours, mostly having fun kicking the video screen down onto my shins, nicking my drink, wriggling and squirming, when he wasn't batting his eyelids at the beautiful 8 year old Jordanian girl across the aisle. Every man and woman who passed stopped to tickle his feet or kiss his cheeks. Now I realise why he looked so bored during our trips to Waitrose. (Not so, I.)

As we touched down at midnight, I said to the boys: 'Look, there's Amman down there.' Rashimi called: 'Man? Man?' into the dark window, wondering where the man was.

J was there waiting when we came scooting into the arrivals hall with an overloaded trolley and the boys couldn't have run quicker into his arms, with their crocs slapping on the marble shrieking: 'Daddddeeeee!' 

We got back to our flat to discover St Grace had tidied every cupboard and dusted every nook and cranny. It feels quite zen and ordered to be back here. With less choice of people, things and places, there is inevitably less chaos, making our base more of a clear, clean springboard from which to lead our lives. 

Now I have no excuse but to spring into action again. But I'm so glad for having had all that time for happy messiness and no particular direction other than to spend time with people we love. The perfect retreat.