More scooter injuries, and teaching Palestinians that vegetarians don't eat chicken

Thursday I rode the scooter to the center with out incident (go me!!!) and there was much stuffing of tires to be done to buid the wall of our composting toilet. This work is a bit tedious but time goes by relatively quickly when I have Jason and Saleem to entertain me ☺ some of the people from Bustan Qaraaqa (http://www.bustanqaraaqa.org) came by to help with building and stuff. Alice is the one who actually knows what she is doing. So she comes and makes sure were not building a death trap and helps with a lot of the labor as well.  Jason didn’t need his scooter that night so I got to drive it home once again. When I got home I had a facebook message from my new friend Jeremy. Apparently because his father was born in Israel the Israeli government is forcing citizenship on him if he wants to work here. Sooo he was inviting people to a mock aliya party on Friday night. It turns out we were going to the same place for Shabbat services/dinner any ways so I told him I was in.

Friday I fell on the scooter….. again ☹ I was driving it to the site where I was supposed to help Saleem with the impact program which works with a group of teenagers to help them with their leadership, teamwork and communications skills. These kids will eventually be ambassadors of the Palestinian cause in other countries so we are supposed to be giving them the skills to tell their story to foreigners. I fell on the scooter while trying to go down a very steep unpaved hill. I tried to slow down but it skidded and I fell….. oh well I guess its part of the learning process. My knee was killing me since I had now fallen on it twice, but it still worked so I wasn’t too worried. I hobbled the scooter the rest of the way to the park and then met up with Saleem. We did programs with the kids for about an hour and a half. It was supposed to be 2 hours but they were 30 mins late (welcome to Balastine) They were working on trust with in the group that day so we did a lot of excercises for that and then they spend some time talking about what they did and how they felt about it. I only understand about 25% if that so I didn’t always know what was going on but I got the general gist and was able to be helpful and talk to them a little. After the program was over I went to girls lunch and then Bethany gave me a ride to Jerusalem on her scooter. 
I went to Shabbat services with Miriam and Naomi at the Jewish renewal community. They were pretty great. There was lots of singing and music and dancing and just general enthusiasm for praying.  We also participated in the potluck afterwards. It was very tastey and all veggie which was great for me. Afterwards we met up with Jeremy and some other friends on the Tayelet to drink wine and talk about political things. It was a very interesting and fun evening.

Saturday I slept in and then went back to Bethlehem. I had a pretty chill afternoon/evening. At around 9pm Rachel and Audra picked me up to go to a pork BBQ. It turns out we were the only women and foreigners there, which I think Rachel and Audra knew but I didn’t really think about it until we were there, but every one was very nice no sketchiness.  When I told the host I was a vegeatrian he said no problem we have chicken. I thought he was kidding but 20 minutes later he was trying to give me chicken so I had to explain I didn't eat that either. I am always afraid of being rude they were pretty cool about it, they even grilled onions and tomatoes for me because they were afraid I wasn’t going to have enough to eat. We stayed til after 1am, so I crashed pretty soon after I got home.

Sunday Bethany and I sat around in our pajamas all day. We did a bunch of Arabic studying, but all in PJs. I got dressed for about 30 mins to go buy groceries, but then came home showered and put the PJs right back on. Im so glad I have a full weekend.

Monday I scootered to the office for staff meeting, and then there were lots more meetings about the impact program and the center. In the afternoon Jason and I did more tire scavenging. For dinner that night I went to some friends of Bethany who were making Mexican food. It was delicious. They are going to have dinners every Monday from now on, so that should be nice. I also recruited one of them to volunteer at the center on Thursday (woot!) After dinner we hung out with Katie  for awhile and then bed time.

Today I woke up with some “tummy problems” basically I needed to stay with in close proximity of a bathroom, and since were still building the bathroom at the center I told Jason I wasn’t going to make it.  I barely ate all day, but I just ate some noodles and seem to be okay so far. Hopefully I will wake up tomorrow problem free and be productive.