Jerusalem is Overwhelming. That’s an Understatement
 

Aside from the usual settling in hassles: bank card fails to work, phone needs unknown international code, apartment is about 50 degrees (no exaggeration), hot water in shower works sporadically, and this is a pretty exciting place. Already used to taking buses, I have been on and off to the “new city” and Tapiot for a space blanket and plastic plates (Ace Hardware). The owners of the apartment are kosher and took their plates and pots with them. Last night I took a walk through a park and down some ancient steps to a walkway with on one side an Arab neighborhood and on the other the Old City spread out beneath me. I even had a nice moment with two boys and their Nubian goat. Today after the obligatory visit to Orange, my phone provider. I walked from my apartment to the Old City. It took about 10 minutes and on the way I passed The Jerusalem Cinematheque: a scary place for me: “Jerusalem’s two-screen art house cinema is an institution. Its regular program includes foreign and specialty films along with general releases, typically screening four different films daily."

While in the old city, I went to the roof tops in the Arab quarter (past a yeshiva at the highest point of the building) with Ahmed, a 10 year old, who learned his English at the Christian school he attends. I sat in the Jewish Quarter near the Cardo and was asked by Abraham, an older gentleman wearing a fedora carrying a cane, if I wanted a tour of the Jewish Quarter where he said there was so much more than what the tourists usually saw- the Western or Wailing Wall. Abraham was born in the Jewish Quarter. I told him maybe some other time and that I had 4 months to tour the quarter and visit the Sephardic synagogue he wanted to show me.

Wandering down an alley in the Muslim Quarter, I was stopped by a guard whose first question was: Where are you going? And second was where you from are? I was headed in the direction of the Dome of the Rock which apparently is only open on Sunday mornings to non-Muslims (never the interior. Only Muslims can go inside.) Later I learned that a busload or more of Jewish settlers had landed on the Al -Aqsa Mosque in hopes of taking it back for Israel. They were promptly arrested but still not a good sign. I was reunited with Palestinian jeweler friends living and working in the souk not far from the Jaffa Gate. The family, whose business is also their home, has Jerusalem I.D.s but not Israeli passports. This means that they can only go away from Jerusalem for 2 years, and if they stay away longer they forfeit the right to come back to Jerusalem. The youngest, Amen with an MA in chemical engineering from Northwestern, had to return to Jerusalem instead of taking a job in the states or he would have lost his Jerusalem identity card. The day ended with finding far too many resources on the arts and Israeli identity for my research project.