Saved by Ibn Battutah

This week has provided some glorious escape routes from reality. The first in the form of a beautiful book: 'Travels with a Tangerine' about the Arab explorer, Ibn Battutah, who generously donated his name to a place now very dear and familiar to us, and who was perhaps the greatest and boldest explorer of his time. Travelling three times the distance of Marco Polo, Ibn Battutah, or IB, as he's known in the book, set out from his native Tangier in 1325 on the pilgrimage to Mecca, returning 29 years later. The Yemen based author and Arabist, Tim Mackintosh Smith, clearly becomes obsessed by IB's adventures, and begins a similar journey himself, as he explains, 'in the footnotes of Ibn Battutah,' basing his travel plan on whatever he can find written about it from the time, and since then.

I'm becoming as obsessed myself. Not least because of the tantalising descriptions of the untainted Orient of the day - when Cairo was a burgeoning metropolis of half a million people (the population of the city is now 22 million), when travel was difficult, because the act of travelling was difficult, not because of swathes of land being governed by the likes of Islamic State. There are more details about near death experiences from boils on the bottom or over consumption of the delicacy 'fissikh' fermented fish, than there are about human-on-human atrocity.

So in this sense, it's incredibly refreshing, and reminds me a little of our first dreams about coming to live in this region. The mystery and exoticism of spices in dusty markets and minarets in silhouette to a setting tangerine sun. Perhaps it's only when delving into the lives of people, either living or dead, that a place really comes to life. And maybe we'll never find such magic in an inanimate relic, as we do in a life lived. As the author quotes the poet, Rumi:

"When we are dead, seek for our resting place
Not in the earth, but in the hearts of men."

So each time I get a spare minute from dwarf, domestic or work life, I plunge myself into a grapefruit oil bath with the audacious Tangerine, and am transported. Away from the images of 21 Coptic Christians lined up on a winter beach waiting to die; away from khaki clad Israeli soldiers in tanks they call cars; away from the voices of desperate Western leaders promising to stamp out extremism.

It's perhaps another bit of detritus from all this violence and bad news, and being based in one of the so-called holiest places on earth, that people living here can forget to have fun. We've met some fantastic people since arriving here a year ago. Israelis, Palestinians and internationals from all over the world. And for the first time in our lives we're living in a proper party house. It being the saccharine and revolting Valentine's day last weekend, J and I threw a party in order for people to come and forget the gloom of politics, and ignore the pink pulsating hearts. We hired speakers and lights and I made a playlist which admittedly was aimed at those who were born circa 1975, but it was appreciated. Everyone had a designated costume and in the end we were about 60 people from Austin Powers and Lady Penelpe to Bjorn Borg and Marie Freidriksson Roxette. People brought food and drink. Lola Flores and Antonio Banderas from Matador arrived with warm tortilla, carefully carved Spanish cheese and a bottle of sherry. Edward Scissorhands and Winona never left the dance floor. It was a riot.

The dwarves were immensely helpful, both before and after: Beforehand we swept the whole garden and cleaned the dust from the recent dust storm from most surfaces.

Here they are on what looks like a fag break:

Then they helped us prepare the snacks.

Then they put on their waitors outfits and warmed up on the dancefloor.

Batman, (who was it who said: 'Know thyself'? Well this dwarf does) asked at 8.15pm, if he could go to bed. They'd had a dance off from the moment the speakers arrived. Not so Spiderman - who was to be found dangling off Rienhold Messner's carabinas and then spinning into infinity with the only other 3 year old, until 11.30pm when he finally accepted defeat and took refuge in our bed with Batman - the location furthest from the pumping sub woofer on the speakers. Reinhold Messner arrived with Gertrude Bell with a tray laden with pots of Tiramisu. We erred towards national stereotyping where possible, and in an international community - there were rich pickings.

Our lovely 87 year old landlady is fortunately stone deaf, so we had no complaints from upstairs. And the best bit about adult parties is everyone eats all the food you've made and appreciates it, no one pukes, and everyone had gone by 2.30am.

The clear up operation the next day was a family affair. I washed up, the dwarves washed the floors, and J did multiple runs to the bottle bank.

We'll be having another party soon. I'm sure Ibn Battutah would approve.

Unholy Mess

A fierce wind has been roaring all night and we woke up this morning chewing the grit, our hair standing on end from the static. But at least the dust storm reflects the mood of this region more accurately than the eternal blue skies we've grown used to.

The dust-whipping wind takes me back to two years ago, when we'd just arrived in Jordan and were trying to find our way around, being buffeted by the elements, and rolling around in the back of yellow taxis. The static hair, the gritty mouth and the eternal question - what are we doing here?

J and I are planning a party for this weekend. It's a Valentine's Avoidance party to get us, and a good clutch of new friends, out of the Saturday-night-in-a-restaurant-surrounded-by-plastic-pink-hearts horror. I've been looking forward to it, I've hired speakers and lights from Yoav a charming sounding Israeli - though sadly he has no disco ball, and everyone's bringing food. Maybe it's the weather but just today I've been hit with a strange melancholia which is making me wish we could have all our home friends to the party. The new ones are totally great, but suddenly I miss home and wish we could arrange for an Easyjet fuselage full of all those familiar characters in our script before we cruised onto a different piste.

J and I had some work in Jordan over the weekend, so we took the dwarfs with us and they went to stay with the Glammy who's returned from her trip to the US, and now is engaged to a different man altogether. From a couple of disastrous Ahmads, she's moved to a Bader. We hope that Bader is the business, or at least a never-ending carriage in the love train. It was wonderful to see her as ever. More than being a nanny now, she's a friend to the dwarfs. And when you think about it, not much further in age from them, than we are from any of our new Arab and Israeli septua and octogenarian friends.

Jordan was still pulsating with grief and feelings of vengeance over the murder of Muath Kasasbeh, the Jordanian pilot and the latest victim of Da'esh (the Arab word for ISIS).

In some ways it was an inspiration to see a country coming together in this way. I've always wondered if Jordan's problems will come from the inside, by way of dissident groups. But this universal rallying behind King Abdullah is a change in mood, and perhaps for the better. But how much more vulnerable is Jordan making itself, by joining the fight against ISIS in such determined terms?

I dropped the boys in their Jordanian second home, with the Glammy and her Mum, and I drove to meet J who was arriving from Jerusalem that afternoon. I wondered who Jordanians really are, as I watched a shepherd and his young son dressed in shell-suits, holding staffs, herd their scraggy flock past a beauty salon: 'Jolie Femme' from where two botox-ed ladies emerged - their dark Arab tresses tinted a brassy blonde.

I went back to visit the young Syrian boy, Mohammed, with my Egyptian friend, to make another short film about his return to school. He and his family had moved house and he was obviously so excited about returning to school, having supported his parents and five sisters with a tiny salary from the sweet shop where he's worked since they fled to Jordan. His face lit up in a way we've never seen it do before. But then we discovered the local educational authorities in his area won't allow him to enrol.

In defiance, we visited the minister in Ramtha, Mohammed's adopted town. The snake-like man sat smoking at his desk, dressed in a pale brown leather jacket. He didn't stand up or say hello when we entered, and wouldn't allow his eyes to meet ours. 'Nothing I can do about it,' he shrugged. There's a lot of xenophobia and intentional non-assistance in relation to Syrians in Jordan. And yet, there has been no outbreak of violence within these enforced-mixed communities. And Mohammed's family's new apartment has been entirely decked in rugs and cushions courtesy of their Jordanian neighbours. The kindness of strangers still exists. But perhaps not within the ministries.

My Egyptian friend is a determined lady, and has begun the battle to try and shoehorn him in to a classroom soon, or Mohammed's disappointment will be too much to bear.

Everything I pick up to read, there's something about this dreaded Islamic State. In some ways I wish all news agencies could have a pact to stop reporting anything about them. The media attention is just what they crave. And as for anyone who actually watches those murderous videos...it's macabre and playing into their hands.

Are we still as ghoulish as ever, deep down?

I read today in the papers that the man who led Saddam Hussein to the gallows is selling the rope, and the current bid for it is $7 million. Israelis, Kuwaitis and Iranians are vying for the cord.

In some ways it was also the umbilical cord to all this madness and horror we're witnessing today.

The darkness is tangible in so many areas. Two contrasting articles I read recently struck another sort of chord - both in the Spectator. One by Paul Collier who claims that the young men turning to terror or 'war tourists' as he calls them, have nothing to do with religion. That there's a significant minority of young men around the world who are hormonally disposed to violence. And that what we are living now is a culture of violence, which is not necessarily related to religion.

The second article is by a British Muslim, Qanta Ahmed, who claims that Islamism and all its horror, is absolutely everything to do with Islam, and it's up to moderate Muslims to stand up to it. Interestingly, he quotes Egypt's President, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi (who although stamping down on Islamism, is behind as much violence himself). But his speech at Cario's Al Azhar University called for the rescue of Islam from 'ideology', saying: 'You Imams, are responsible before Allah. The entire world, I say it again, the entire world is waiting for your next move because the Islamic world is being torn, it is being destroyed, it is being lost. And it is being lost by our own hands.'

And often it feels like it's no longer just specifically the Islamic world. It affects each one of us from the depths of Nigeria to the streets of Birmingham.

And not just Islam. A friend just sent me a recent bit of prose from Matthew Parris in the Times. We all need to take responsibility.

Unholy mess
It’s 46 years since I’ve been to Jerusalem but the Christian quarter of the old city has hardly changed. People find it moving but it moves me only to despair.
How I longed for the open hillside, the grass, the cave, the wind, the stones and the silence. Now everything feels interior and crushing: Christian churches bicker over the demarcation of property, and pilgrims queue to light candles in dingy corners, kiss inanimate objects and weep with emotions induced by silver, gilt, glass, paint and carved wood.
Why was I not surprised to learn that, though the population of the Armenian quarter is falling all the time as Armenians queue for their Canadian visas, and though the Armenian Catholic church is pitched against the Armenian Orthodox church, the latter is now itself riven by an internal schism?
Bring in the bulldozers and sweep it all away. Were I not an atheist I might experience an anger that was divine. Amid all this nonsense about relics and holy places, this twisted icon worship and delusion, and the Jews at their Wailing Wall, and the Muslims grovelling in prayer, I can almost see the Jesus I was brought up to believe in, see him gazing sadly at the grotesquerie, and hear him lament, with TS Eliot:
That is not what I meant at all;
That is not it, at all.'

Sorry for my mood. Let's hope it's the wild and dusty wind which will blow over by tomorrow.

The dwarfs remain unaffected, it seems.

Their latest creations are a Mummy and a Daddy Robot from cereal packets. Pleased to see that gender roles are alive and well in this household. Although, I may be wearing a pinny, at least Daddy isn't wielding a gun. There may be some hope...

Swedishness and a Teddy Bears' Picnic

While looking through the nostaligia infused book: 'This is London' one evening with the dwarfs, Rashimi asked: 'Mummy why hath that politheman not got a gun?' Littered within the solid torrent of questions there sometimes comes an astute one. All policemen in Israel carry enormous guns. So it led to a lengthy discussion about the merits of 'twuncheonth' and the pitfalls of guns. The teachers in the nursery remarked: 'He asks very good questions,' that day's number being: 'What do whinotherotheth eat?' I was reasonably surprised that both teachers had to consult a book in the library to discover the answer. 'Gwath.' I'm quite pleased they won't be seeing him through secondary school.Though they are cosy and loving and this is all that matters at this stage.

It being a new year, albeit that the damp squib of February is already in motion, the dwarfs have been inadvertently roped into my focus on self improvement. You are unfortunately at the mercy of your mother until quite a late stage in life I realised. (No offence, Mum. Just...do you remember that wardrobe....? But it's okay - I've recovered...). While I haven't made them join me on the treadmill (which, incredibly, looks out onto Jerusalem Old City with a stunning view of the golden Dome of the Rock, and where I can listen to two whole podcasts with no interruption) the dwarfs in our life have been roped into Arabic classes on Monday evenings with two sweet children whose first language is Catalan. J and my wonderful teacher comes to our house and does play focused Arabic tuition with them. The Lozenge is a little bit reluctant as he loves nothing more than his own plan, and not one of mine, but gets into the swing eventually. And I noticed that since the weekly linguistic-injection, he and Rashimi have no problem calling: 'AFWAAAAN!' (excuse me) and 'MA'ASALAMEEEEEH' (Goodbye) on our local shopping street as they weave on their scooters between headscarved shoppers. What they need to learn how to say now is: 'Hold onto your headscarves laydeeeeeez, and watch your heels - we're coming THROOOOUUGH!!!.' Even the owners of the warmest and most expansive of child-loving bosoms can turn to me with a knitted, perfectly plucked brow, at times, as if to warn me that latest fly-by was just a little too close to the mock Louboutins for her liking.

As I watched the dwarfs' retreating back views I marvelled to myself that this place is really is their home. The headscarfs and the dodgy paving, the smoky smell of shwarma and shisha. All that still seems so foreign to me, is their normality.

The Lozenge's teachers have drawn J and I aside and told us that he zones in and out in class, which had been worrying me, until we had a fun dinner out with a Swedish couple who nearly choked on their chickpeas when we told them our worry: 'He's only 5! In Sweden we don't even start teaching them til 7, and we'd all be in the sandpit together all day at this stage - as we get so much time off to be parents.' And they laughed it off, whilst showing us this brilliant video - which totally conjures up the wonder of their land. And why an international community at times, is just so refreshing. One day we must try and get posted to Stockholm. And for once in my life, I could pass as a local.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_asVWhfZYg

And the best bit, is this couple love the video and say Swedes really are just like this. And one thing to note - that is the real Prime Minister in the vid.

All I can say is they are refreshing to be around. And I shall be hoisting a Swedish flag above our front door very soon - even with my supreme hatred for flags.

The other thing that struck me, is that I have, late in life, realised that perhaps I'm allergic to authority. And just the thought that some boring teacher could be trying to make the Lozenge step in line and be like everyone else, makes me want to metaphorically raise a finger to much of educational establishment. For an entire 5.3333 years, I have never heard the Lozenge say: 'I'm bored.' And I've never seen him 'zone out' at home. But fortunately I'm married to a diplomat and have spent 8.3333 years learning from him, so I kept my mouth shut in our meeting, and thought all these things instead.

As the Lozenge once retorted when I asked him not to ask Grandma: 'Where is my present?' the moment she arrived to stay with us, he replied: 'Okay, I won't say it. But Mummy, I can still think it, can't I.'

J has been away this week, and the dwarves and I have been having cosy times at 6am drinking hot chocolate in bed, followed by disco dressing (this morning to the Cure's: You're so wonderfully, wonderfully, wonderfully, wonderfully PRETTY! - which I really, really was not at that hour, but the dwarfs threw some excellent naked dance moves. Bottoms everywhere.), followed by breakfast and then the run to school.

Through the pain of the 5.50am alarm, I remind myself that these mallowy mornings will not last forever, and one day the dwarfs will be 'diants' as Rashimi says, and will not want to lie about in bed with me sipping on a chocolat chaud, or should I say, tiede.

The afternoons, when not designated to self improvement, we've been mucking about with their friends. I overheard the Lozenge and Rashimi comparing their toy chainsaws with each other (an inspired Christmas present from auntie Rosie and uncle 'Awee). Rashimi said: 'But mine can cut down tweeth weally, weally HARDly.' And in the Lozenge's thank you letter to auntie R he dictated for me to write: 'Thank you for the chainsaw. Next Christmath please can you give me a weal one so I can cut down weal trees with it, like Gran Gran and Grandpop do.' Oh to have two grandparents with a chainsaw licence.

Today is Friday. The joy of it. And the Lozenge is having two friends over - Julien (or according to Rashimi: JulieAnn), and 'Vewa from Thweden' without their parents. Rashimi remarked: 'Well Vewa can be my fwiend, and JulieAnn can be yours Lauwie.' Rashimi has already developed an eye for a  blonde Swede. Who wouldn't? Maybe one day I really can visit Stockholm!

The Lozenge has requested a teddy bears' picnic followed by a treasure hunt when they come round. I've been given instructions that I'm not allowed anything to do with the picnic - they will do it all themselves. And while they do that, I can go out and hide the 'tweathure'.

This is why I am freelance. The one thing I do not need, is another boss in my life.

The simplicity of the afternoon plan gave me this poignant feeling when I realised that in maybe only a year, a teddy bear's picnic will probably not be the Lozenge's top-number-one-exciting-plan.

So I'm letting him go WILD.

The teddy bears are the ones strewn to one side, without any cakes. This is 5 year old hospitality.

(Postscript: The TBP went like a storm. The only problem was that at 1.30pm I realised that I was alone in the house with 4 children 5 and under for the next 4 hours. And the TBP had taken all of 4 minutes. How did I get myself roped into this one? I wondered. And like all good Skandi children, 'JulieAnn' and 'Vewa' removed their shoes every time they came into the house. And every five minutes they ran out of the house and needed to put them on again. And none of them could do them up for themselves. So for the first three hours of the extravaganza, I was on my hands and knees doing up complicated shoe laces, patting down velcro, ramming sticky-socked heels down into the New Balance size 9's and trying to zip up pink Chinese boots without snagging them. 'I don't care about the mud!' 'KEEP ON YOUR SHOES at ALL TIMES!' I yodelled.)

By 9pm I was to be found sound asleep under the furled pages of my book. J returned to us safely, with a mere 2 child-ed weekend stretching ahead of us, under some gentle rays of February sun.

Oh yes, and we have another diminutive candidate for our family ranks who, all being well, will join us in early August.