Corona's here --
The lanky teenager said to me on the stair in perfect English. "Corona, the virus." He was warning the obvious foreigner. I stand out because I don't cover my hair, I don't dye my gray hair and I walk every where I can.
I had just passed two 12 or 13 year olds sneaking a cigarette on the stairs. The stairs are a quick way down a steep hill and bypass a busy road with no sidewalk on the way to the university from my university housing. I like the stairs even though they cut through backyards littered with trash. But the spring flowers and green grass have pushed through the discarded plastic bottles and bags, And the almond trees are still in full bloom.
When I arrived at the university, on of the doctors told me that Corona exposure had come to Nablus via a South Korean family who was seen eating Kanafah in the old city. When they returned home, several family members came down with the Corona virus. Who knows who they exposed. The old suk (market) is a busy place and the most famous Kanafah cafes usually have lines of people waiting.
AN ASIDE: The following week, folks from the embassy would come to Nablus to visit the Fulbrighters here and video the making of Kanafah at a local sweet shop. When you mention Nablus everyone asks if you have eaten Kanafah. It is reportedly the best in Nablus due to the cheese or the water or the love with which it is constructed.
When I checked the online news, the story was corrected to 70 some South Koreans who were Holy Land tourists tromping all over the holy sites -- the churches and shrines in Israel and Palestine, and of course, stopping for Kanafah in Nablus. As a result, Israel called for travel bans and the ministry of health in Palestine called doctors in for special training and canceled meetings with internationals.
So I am watching and reading about the frenzy that is stirred up and spinning when we are faced with uncertainty and the loss of control. Will it be like the 1918 flu? Is it worse than influenza? Or it is only a media hoax by one side of the political spectrum. Viruses don't respect checkpoints and walls. You can have this virus and not have symptoms . . . sneaky and unpredictable.
I have learned a lot about coping with uncertainty here in this occupied land. People complain and manage and move on. After a particularly tense and unsuccessful meeting with a vice president at the university this week, where we tried to secure support for a needed division in medical education to focus solely on curriculum development and evaluation, one of the doctors on the hot seat invited my colleague and I to his village for lunch. . . something to look forward to.
This past Friday I joined a group of Palestinian hikers on a spectacular Spring day--the nicest I have experienced since I arrived during winter. Buses arrived from Nablus and Ramallah and Hebron (a 3 hour bus ride) to hike 13 kilometers along the Masar Ibrahim, Abraham's Path. The 300 kilometer trail was created ten years ago by local and international NGOs to mimic the Camino that walks through rural villages in Northern Spain. This is not a walking culture, but several hundred Palestinians hiked on Friday and picnicked--building fires to make Kanafah and barbecue, and sweet tea. The hike started in Burqin, a village between Jerusalem and Galilee, at a 4th century church built to commemorate Christ's healing of ten lepers. We tromped alongside fields with onions and cauliflower heads as large as pumpkins. It was a glorious day and one Palestinian who spoke excellent English told me: Leaving our country is difficult these days, but we love our land and know how to have fun. On that note, I wish you lightness of heart and am sharing pictures from the glorious spring walk.