The Wadi

Wadi Natroun: Literally it means the valley of salt, and for you arabic speakers who don't recognize the word 'natroun,' its because its not arabic:> its from the old coptic language that predated arabic in Egypt, and which also happens to be the language used in the mass liturgies of the Egyptian Coptic Churches. Take a pinch of the wadi's sand to your tongue and the first point about the name becomes clear, and in looking accross the Wadi valley at the four Coptic Monasteries the other point becomes clear. Stronghold may be a gross overstatement, but Wadi Natroun is one of the locational centers for the Coptic Christianity religious minority since the 4th century when Egyptian Christians fled to the desert to escape Roman persecution. It is surely the monastic center of Coptic Christianity, as even the Coptic Pope Shenuda himself comes from Deir Bishoi, the largest of the Coptic monasteries there.

I've been to the Wadi several times during my stay here in Egypt since the Iskander family (from Dr. Magda Iskander, the director of Care with Love and my volunteer facilitator) owns several pieces of land in the area being used by Care With Love in two ways: 1) During the 3-month home health care provider training, every class spends a 3-day spiritual retreat on the farm, and 2) a sister organization to CWL, Friends of Children With Cancer, is building on part of the farm the Health and Hope Oasis--a massive project creating a facility for kids with cancer to come between treatments to heal in the beautifully health-condusive environment of Wadi Natroun, including also a hospice. At the end of January I went on one of the CWL retreats, and yesterday I documented a volunteer workday at the H+HO.

CWL Retreat
The departure time was 9 AM at the Ezbetinakhl office, which meant we left promptly at 9:30 (even I didn't arrive until 9:15). I had prepared a bag with a blanket and lots of reading material based on the fact that it was January in the northern desert of Egypt, and that I was going to be completely surrounded by Arabic for three days. It wasn't the arabic itself that bothered me so much as the mass of seminars and lectures for the students that were sure to give me some free time in the quiet of Wadi Natroun. But in staying true to my experience here in Egypt, nothing is ever as ou expect: neither was it quiet or free:>

I really underestimated what a trip this was for these trainees born and raised in Cairo, some never having travelled outside the city. It was really a time of celebration, and the initial bus-ride manifest this as I witnessed and necessarily partook in an impromptu and completely accapella time of singing, clapping, and even dancing (yes, its possible on a moving bus as long as you're on a straight highway). The excitement translated to pure energy upon arrival, as clean air and open spaces brought forth a flurry of activity, including games and races. It seemed that my idea of a vacation on a farm differed wildly from theirs, and I was glad because of it. Those three days I was reminded what it means to really live--to wake up early and go to bed late, to laugh and cry together, to cook and clean and play, to share and learn. I didn't open a single book, but boy was I glad I brought that blanket. A few highlights from the weekend...

--We Cairenes met the other class from Alexandria when we arrived--and surprise surprise!! 15 Muslims from Cairo and 6 Christians from Alexandria. Accordingly, the first meal saw 6 Alexandrians on one side of the table, and 15 Cairenes on the other. Thankfully, the trainers immediately displaced the unions and I didn't have to choose which side to sit on. And from that time forth, the groups began to mingle, though with some reserve, but mingling nonetheless.

--After a night of mosquito hell (where not only wrapping from head to foot in two blankets or my neighbor's flagrant snoring could keep them away), we all awoke to an early morning of riveting exercises. As I waited outside with the other guy trainees talking of the coming day's schedule, I began to notice some women I hadn't seen present the day before. Or wait, was that samah, and wafi, and seham without the higab (the traditional head-covering)?? Really, I almost didn't recognize them without the higab, as evidently the remote location away from parents, peers, and general society created an environment where the higab was unnecessary. In fact, many of the Muslim girls didn't wear it for three days, but as soon as we got on the bus to go home, guess what reappeared?? Sidenote about the higab--you know for quite some time before the 1980's, the higab was hard to find in Egypt?? Its only been a recent movement in which the higab has reappeared on the streets of Cairo. I've heard that the older generation of Islamic women has retired quite a liberal wardrobe replaced by more conservative coverings (ironically, though not an ounce of skin be showing, loose-fitting clothing is definitely not in style). The reasons for the resurgence in the higab vary depending on who you talk to/read. "The Koran says to," say some; for others its a matter of identity; other's talk of peer pressure; still other's talk of parent's orders. Regardless, it is a major islamic cultural element here in Egypt, as the rarer sight of a non-veiled woman generally means one of two things: 1) she comes from a wealthy Muslim family, or 2) she is Christian (which by no means rules out being rich).

--It surprised me when they told me we were going to the monestaries--all of us 20 or so Christians and Muslims in the lone pickup truck outside. Expert strategy made it work and we were on our way, any temporary discomfort absorbed by the latest round of songs and clapping. The weekend was certainly a 'spiritual retreat,' but outside of the institutionalized religion that divides people. It was a time to listen and think and share about the travels on life's road. And as potential caregivers, it was a time to meditate on making the "decision to love," both in the workplace and in the home. But after two days of solid relationship building, did we have to bring institutionalized religion back into the mix so soon?? The atmosphere was charged as we entered the first monestary--all were excited for our little tourist outing. After a short lecture on the history of Deyr Bishoi, a monk tour guide took us around the monastery, sharing some of the traditional stories associated with certain places, like the place where one of the monk's staff grew into a huge tree inside a building. After the tour, for the free time I followed all of the students back to the church, where together--Muslim and Chrisian--they prayed to St. Bishoi--a past monk who long ago, on an evening in which the monks were traveling to meet Christ in the desert, stopped to help an old and crippled man, sacrificing his chance to meet Christ. Or so they all thought, for the old man revealed himself as the Christ to St. Bishoi. As a man of such great spiritual discipline and example, the beloved Christian Egyptian monk (and others like him) are respected not only by Christians, but Muslims also as one in a long line of holy men seeking God. So for ten minutes the distinctions disappeared as all payed their respects, said a prayer, and even visited the giftshop for some of the famous Bishoi candles and holy oil.

So all in all, an incredible trip--so much learned about ourselves and each other. And as if the trip wasn't already good enough, I returned home with a basketful of fresh oranges and mandarins straight from the tree!!

Volunteer Day
The pre-understanding: 150 kids from a school in the rich part of Cairo aged 12-16 performing a day's worth of service on project in progress called the Health and Hope Oasis.
The translation: 4 buses full of 200 girls, aged 10-16 performing a half-day of service.
The finished product: Two half-mile lengths of road manually cleared and 200 bushes planted on the sides in six hours.

I've worked the landscaping business the last two summers, and I'm not sure 200 professional landscapers could have finished what those girls did in that time. For what its worth, I came to find out that the group was the equivalent of what we call "Girl Scouts," and I was witness to impecable organization and maximum efficiency, which I must say was actually incredibly therapeutic after seven months here. Gloved with water at the waist, these girls expertly worked with shovels, axes, and hoes with such amazing enthusiasm--and though they didn't commit to just build the rest of the project, we did talk them into coming back in June for another day of service!!

Finding Passports

In my time here I've met many Africans trying to get to what is called the "1st world." Finding the means to do so is impossibly difficult. Here are a couple of stories from people trying...

I arrived back to Cairo from Jerusalem late on the night of December 30th, about four hours before Egyptian security forces were ordered to disperse the ongoing four-month Sudanese demonstration. The news broke early on the 31st, as BBC and other local correspondents had recently begun following the story and were on hand when the events transpired (perhaps in anticipation of the looming crisis that had become all but inevitable). Now two months after the tragedy, the following has been established (courtesy of research by Sakkakini Catholic Church):

On September 29th, a group of 20 Sudanese began a sit-in demonstration outside the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) office premises in Mohandiseen that lasted until December 30th, when Egyptian police violently brought the demonstration to an end. On peak days during the four months, as many as 2500 crowded in a small fenced in public garden about 50 by 30m, with around 1000 permanently living under makeshift tents. The main demand of the protesters was resettlement on grounds that Sudanese in Egypt are "faced daily with discrimination, violence, and violations of their human rights." Offered voluntary repatriation was rejected by the demonstration leadership. UNHCR officials met with the leaders of the demonstration several times, but as the demands were outside of the UNHCR's mandate, negotiations came to an end in the middle of December.

Early in the morning of December 31st, with around 2,000 demonstrators present in the garden, Egyptian police intervened to disperse the protest. With fire hoses the demonstrators were sprayed alternately with hot and cold water, and when the demonstrators persevered in remaining, the police moved into the garden with force despite the presence of many young children. The combination of police brutality and a panic-caused stampede resulted in the death of at least 27 people, many of them children below the age of 10. Hundreds were injured and many belongings and important documents were lost.

After taken to police centers for identification, many demonstrators were released the following day, but over 600 were imprisoned on threat of deportation. The UNHCR intervened on behalf of the demonstrators providing new documentation, and all but 180 Sudanese have yet to be released.


Who were these protesters?
These couple thousand of disgruntled Sudanese were a mix of the impossibly difficult distinction of 'refugees' and 'economic migrants'--regardless, all were jobless, school-less, mostly homeless (many forewent their Cairo housing in an all effort to leave), moneyless, passport-less, and hopeful that the demonstration was to be the end of time in Egypt. The Sudanese are people trapped in Cairo, unable to leave and either unable (due to safety concerns) or un-willing (due to the perceived abhorrent quality of life) to return to Sudan. As migrants from Sudan, all of them had registered with the office of the United Nations Headquarters for Refugees (UNHCR) here in Cairo, thus commencing the individual process of potential resettlement--an incredibly anxious, tiresome, and long process (years) for which only a very limited percentage have been successful.

Much of the permanent sector of the demonstration was composed of family units camping in the garden. Thousands of others visited daily bringing supplies. As the demonstration gained momentum, protest leaders circulated word to remove Sudanese children from the refugee schools by posting signs inside. Fathers quit jobs and mothers moved out of apartments on the rumored promise of sure resettlement for all living in the garden. Reports exist of volunteer doctors from local NGOs being denied access to the garden by the leaders in a bid to pressure the UNHCR by squalid conditions in the camp.


Why were they protesting and what were there demands?
Since the last quarter of the 1900's when the Sudanese civil war swept the country, Cairo has continually received a steady flow of refugees thanks to Egypt's open-border policy with Sudan. Yet, as undebatably financially and logistically impossible for the UNHCR to send every potential refugee to another country, and further impounded by the effect of 'successful' word reaching and enticing networks of family and friends yet in Sudan to come to Cairo, the rate of entrance has been much greater than that of the exit. The UNHCR's process became highly selective, accepting a chosen few (often with some degree of uncommon education) for settlement based on a series of intensive interviews. Therefore, a great number of Sudanese have assembled here in Cairo over the years in a country which, for as open as the border policy is, has internal refugee regulations which are incredibly restricting. Work, school, social security, and health care are all not permitted, thus the only protection a refugee has is the registration with the UNHCR, and the only hope is with the resettlement process.

It was approximately one year ago that this process was shut down, throwing a thick shadow on what was an already dark future for Sudanese in Egypt. A small group of Sudanese decided to take matters into their own hands, forcing confrontation on the issue through a sit-in protest in front of the UNHCR premises in Mohandiseen. As the demonstration gained momentum through growing Sudanese involvement and press coverage, the leaders' demands grew bolder, eventually arriving at 'resettlement or bust.'


Why was no agreement reached?
The protest leaders were offered comprehensive aid for voluntary repatriation, but the offer was rejected on grounds of absolute resettlement--sadly and obviously unrealistic demand for the following reasons: The UNHCR has operated under both tight regulations and a limited budget for years. Resettlement was granted to those few for whom it was judged that returning home was impossible due to personal safety concerns resulting from political unrest during the civil war. As of 2005, a peace agreement has been signed between the north and the south, which surely doesn't guarantee safety in Sudan, but is a step on the road to safety. Thus, in the eyes of the UNHCR, finding living and working accommodations in the West for 2500 Sudanese is not only nearly impossible due to the closed doors of the first world and the ever-slimming budget of the UNHCR, but is actually a step in the wrong direction from creating a stable Sudan. Can you imagine what kind of statement would the UNHCR be making if it resettled 2500 demonstrating Sudanese? The next week would surely see a protest twice that size, for which the UNHCR would accordingly be responsible to resettle.


Why were the Egyptian police sent to disperse the protest?
It was in early December that I first saw an article on BBC about the Sudanese sit-in. This article and several following began to explore the issues behind the demonstration, illumining the largely unknown marginalized world of the Sudanese in Cairo along with the Egyptian government's dehumanizing regulations. It wasn't long after the appearance of these stories that the demonstration was dispersed by Egyptian police.

And the other side of the story: As the protest (which was largely by Southern Christian Sudanese) in front of the UNHCR grew in size, it began to block entrance to the adjacent local mosque. For several months the mosque operated under restricted access, even during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. In reflecting now, its remarkable that for four months Egypt and its citizens had patience considering the already tense relations between Egyptians and visiting Sudanese. Within their own country many Egyptians cannot find work, their hospitals cannot handle the patient-load, and the schools are over-crowded. In the opinions of some educated Egyptians, the swamped Egyptian economy simply cannot handle an influx of 35,000 laborers looking for work, inadequate health care will always seek to aid Egyptians first, and over-crowded Egyptian schools cannot increase its class sizes over the 50-60 that exist now. In a developing country unable to yet accommodate its own citizens, 70,000 refugees is a large burden (It is for this reason then that government of Egypt should agree to abide by the laws of the United Nations that Egypt signed regarding the treatment of refugees, which allows the UN access to build permanent camps containing schools and clinics for refugees--but that’s another topic for another time...).

Thus, the issue with dispersal of the protest does not question the essence of the action, but the way in which it was carried out. On the January 1st I went out to the sight of the abandoned protest and found a second protest--this time by Egyptians against the government's methodology in handling the dispersal. It was solely due to the lack of organized strategy that the dispersal rapidly descended into chaos, at which point police began to use extreme brutality to regain control.


Fast forward six weeks: My Cameroonian friend Simplice had his passport and wallet stolen at one of the African Cup matches. Simplice arrived here by land from Cameroon about the same time I did last August on his way to Europe, Canada, America, Australia--anywhere he can get a quality education with the goal of returning to Cameroon to establish a health NGO in Cameroon. Since august we've been trying for visas: the guy's got a fully valid passport and Egyptian residence visa, has two years of collegiate credit, and speaks both French and English fluently, but the discovered frustrating (can I say infuriating??) reality is that the doors are shut. I've discovered through this process that my hands are tied as well--evidently I'm free to help myself and my countrymen, but unless I've got lots of money, there's nothing i can do to help someone get into my country. So he's stuck here like so many others, recently having decided to study for the TOEFL to enter a university back in South Africa.

Anyhow--Simplice had his passport stolen which was bad news for a guy jobless, moneyless, and now document-less in Cairo. Despite filing a report with the Egyptian police, a month passed without any word. Sometimes mysterious things happen (seem to happen a lot here): on the night before we were going to inquire as to the cost of all new documentations from the Cameroon embassy, I received a strange call from an American in Maadi asking for Simplice Tse. I told him that the number he called was mine, but that Simplice was a good friend. The American then relayed that the previous night he had received a call from someone speaking Arabic, and all that he could gather was that this individual possessed something of Simplice's. As Simplice lives in a group flat with 6-10 other Africans and has no money to buy a cell phone, he has no phone #. The man with Simplice's passport also had a list of Simplice's contact numbers, of which the man was calling randomly to try and make contact with Simplice. He randomly reached the American who in turn called the contact number Simplice had given him, and my phone rang on Saturday night. Simplice routinely calls me 2 or 3 times a week, and on Sunday morning, he called: we met, we called the American who gave us the number of the man with Simplice's passport, and we then arranged with this man a place to meet to get Simplice's "belongings." 10 hours and fifty Egyptian pounds later, Simplice's passport and wallet were in hand.

Besides being a crazy passport story with a happy ending, we had a chance to talk to what turned out to be a Sudanese man as we walked the hour-long journey across Cairo to his home where the passport was. He said he was leaving the stadium when an Egyptian man asked him if he knew the man whom the passport and wallet belonged to. Thinking on his feet from a heart of good will, he replied that the man was his brother and that he would return the passport to him (it seems that upon finding the passport and wallet without any money or credit cards, the thief was uninterested in his spoils).

Now, there are two amazing points about this story: 1--As the black market for passports is thriving in Cairo, we asked this him why he didn't sell the passport. He said that he'd honestly checked into it, and could have for as much as 5,000 Egyptian pounds. Yet, when it came down to it, he decided that whoever the passport belonged to was his African brother, and that to return it was the right thing to do. Simplice and I were in shock--in a place where Egyptians make on average 250-500 L.E. per month, the man and his family could have lived off the money from the passport for years! 2--We came to find out that this guy had been at the demonstration in Mohandiseen on the night in which the police came six weeks earlier--and he had the scar to prove it. We observed a recent six inch long, thick scar on the lower abdomen of the man, who had evidently been stabbed in the stomach during the chaos. He was taken to a hospital where he underwent immediate surgery by an Italian doctor from the UN. He had lost everything amidst the chaos that fateful night, and thus it was with incredible surprise and relief that, upon discharge after having recuperated for a month, the man discovered that his bill had been comped by the mysterious doctor.

The fifty pounds we gave this man was nothing more than a token of inexpressible appreciation. I'm meeting and speaking with many people this year who live under the oppressive powers of a variety of so many different systems, from political to economical to even cultural or religious. Whether they are escaping to safety like the Sudanese man or ambitious to help their country like Simplice, these people are just trying to live the "normal (and consequentially happy) life" that our globalization presents to them, a way of life that's so often cutthroat to get the edge on someone else. But what a movement by this Sudanese man in the face of what could have been viewed as divine opportunity, and what a movement by Simplice to get on that lorry heading to Chad, to Sudan, to Egypt: these are movements amidst the pressures of this world to abide in humanity. These are the actions that move others to stop, to unwrap from the world, to listen, to be moved to share, and to live henceforth in love. Can't 'one person at a time' infectiously grow to bring conflicted countries to peace, that all may reside in the place they call home? And can't 'one person at a time' infectiously grow to bring developed nations to share with those in need??

Break the Blog Silence

Ouch--December 21st was a long time ago. So I got really busy. I know, bad excuse, but its the truth. And now that I'm logged on I do feel terrible, and as a matter of fact, I want to say here that I'm going to finish strong this year on the blog front (some of you may have heard this before??). Whats different about this commitment is that its in writing for all to see. Yani... I suppose one should break a big blog silence in a big way--sorry so long, but so much to say!! As for the experiences in Israel/Palestine, you'll have to either 1)read the newsletters at www.sths-elca.org/reinking_mission.asp and/or 2)wait a couple months and let me tell you about it in person:>