July 12 - a day in Taybeh

This was such a wonderful day of our trip. We started in the morning with a visit to the town's Catholic church. After hearing a bit about the church from the priest, we went outside to witness the beginning of a vacation Bible school. Tons of kids around, with youth leading actions and dance moves at the front. Quite fun! We didn't know the first few, so had to follow along with the kids... but you'll be glad to know that the Macarena and the Chicken Dance are universal.

The priest then took us on a tour of the Parable House - a 300 year-old house that the church uses to teach people about the parables. The priest showed us examples of things that occur in parables but that might be a bit far from our every day realities. The part I found the most interesting, though, was the lower room in the house. This was where the animals would have stayed, and it was explained to us that this was probably similar to the building in which Jesus was born - the family would have lived upstairs, but made space for Mary and Joseph down below with the animals. Cool.

Wonderful Palestinian hospitality never ceased to amaze me, and we finished our time at the Catholic church with drinks, cookies, and a peace dove carved out of olive wood for each of us - so that we too could be reminded to work for peace.

Our group then split up to go to the houses of a few different families in the town. And then we had a cooking lesson! Very fun. The family I visited with a few others had a lovely home and we had a great morning. We cored little eggplants and zucchini, then stuffed them with rice, spices, tomatoes and beef. The dish took a long time to cook, so we passed the time with tea, fruit, and Arabic music videos. Good times. And when it was ready, it was delicious!

We then had a *very* special treat in getting to see the Taybeh Brewery. Very cool. And I was able to bring home a nice Taybeh Beer beer glass for a certain father who enjoys a nice cold one now and again.

Back to the hotel, then, for a bit of free time. I wrote in my journal: "The setting of the guest house here is idyllic. I am sitting on our huge balcony - terrace, really - in the shade, lots of wind, looking out over hills, olive trees, the Dead Sea. Perfect."

We heard, later that afternoon, from Jean Zaru, a Quaker Palestinian woman and one of the founding members of Sabeel. She spoke to us about faith, women and the occupation. While women in the West Bank face inequality from many different perspectives, Jean told us that she is inspired by the truth that we are all equal, made in God's image.

We had an interesting activity that evening - a lectio divina. This is, briefly, where you take a piece of scripture and meditate on it. We used the graffiti we had seen on the wall the morning before as our scripture - we were each to pick one bit of graffiti and then share some of our reflections on that piece with the group. I chose, "I was just following orders." It raised many interesting questions for me... Who wrote this - an Israeli or a Palestinian? Feelings of guilt in this conflict could be very entwined - if an Israeli wrote it, perhaps they were feeling guilty for things they had done while serving in the military. If a Palestinian, maybe they felt bad for not being braver, for leaving a house that was about to be demolished or something. It follows that liberation and freedom would be entwined. The occupation affects both sides in a negative way, I think, so ending it would bring freedom to liberty to so many.