coming back

COMING BACK

I saw the sad spangle in sette (my grandma’s) tears when
she was telling me about my Palestine. I was setting with her in our garden in Bethlehem while she was drowned with her memories in our land before the 48 war; she was drowned with the wonderful mix-colors trees, with the olive trees, kenya, berries, figs, lotus, jujube, dates and castor-oil plant.

We deprived from the enjoyment of our land and we deprived to inhale the smell of its golden soil, just because very selfish people stole our land while its people were sleeping, but not every one was so, some Palestinian stayed awake to defend the land just as Battir!

(General old view,with the railway to the left)

(General view)

Battir is a rural Palestinian village located west of Bethlehem, characterized by its attractive nature and its traditional vegetable gardens; also it is famous by the Battiri eggplant.

It is rising from the sea almost 800 meters with an area of the urban village of about 420 acres. It is surrounded by Al-Walaja, Beit Jala, Husan, Al-Khader and Al-Qabu.

The day after I was sitting with sette, on Thursday, I went with the college to a field trip to Battir. I was so excited to go in this walk because I love walking so much. But that time the walk was different, its purpose was different and its situation was different!

We met in Beit Jala at 9 am. The weather was great with the golden sun rays. When we were at the top near to the DCO and I looked at the whole area I felt something strange, something gave me the power to start the walk.

The land is a Palestinian land but the Israeli government put it in area C when they divided our Palestine to three areas.

When we got down to the mountains under Beit Jala we started walking quickly. Me and other nine of my classmates were the fastest, may be what made us to walk quickly that we felt free and nothing and no one can stop us. We felt the meaning of freedom or rather part of it, and then we stopped to have a rest and to wait for the rest of the group. I sat with my friend under an olive tree and the whole valley was in front of us, it was attractive with the green carpet that covered it after the winter, so the scene was like a mountain ranges that flows one after the other.

(Retaining walls to protect the soil from erosion)

Then when we continued our way it was really nice when we were stopping at each unusual tree to predict its name and to discuss its components and its origin with prof Alice.

In additions, we saw many homes were built before 100-200 years ago but now they are empty from their people.

Almost the whole way was full of rocks, grass and spiny plants that obstructed our way but that did not stop us from walking, then we reached a very ancient building called Latton, was used for the manufacture of stone rock.

While we continued our walk the strange feeling that I felt at the beginning cam back again but in that time I knew it, it was the feeling of anger, oppression, humiliation and the dissatisfaction with the injustice. And so then I understood sette’s feeling when she said ( ya sette who knows Palestine must cry day and night)!

Later when I sat with my friend, Aya, on a huge rock to eat something. when we saw the homes and the building in Battir we knew that we almost arrived, then I started singing a song for Fairouz:

Snarga’ yawman ela hayena (we will come back one day to our neighborhood)

W tan’a almsafato ma bainana ( and the distances between us will decrease)

Fia Qalb mahlan…………...trn trn trn nnnn)

In that time I sang it from my heart and at that time I understood and I felt its meaning and its words, in that time it was not just a music with a lyrics but it was a real words because we will come back one day and I myself will inhale the soil smell and touch it by all my senses.

When we reached the bottom of the valley we saw the train crossed the rail in front of us with the blue and white flag! We had nothing to say, even what we can say, so we preferred to keep silent!

In 1948, the Zionists seized on some building in the village including its school and railway station which was built in the time of Ottomans. And to the south-west the Zionists set up a colony (Nefobattir) in 1950.

The funniest thing was that me and the other guys thought that we were the fastest so we will be there the first but when we reached the railway we knew that the rest took a shortcut and arrived to the downtown and so they were waiting for us, but anyway we were lucky that we saw many new things that other didn’t see.

After that when we reached to the top we were a half dead so we went with group to a small workshop to have lunch. The small factory makes masterworks by lime, stones and pottery.

We sat in the balcony, the view was so attractive and from this small balcony we saw whole Battir. its director and workers were so kind. They gave us a memorial gift, then we decided to go to plant olive trees. When we were walking in the village we saw how much the people there are good and generous as usually all the Arab, that everyone asked us to drink coffee and tea in their homes so we didn’t stop hearing (Ahla o Sahla,, tfadalo).

Finally we arrived to the spring and we walked down along with it till we reached the place to plant the trees.

It was a great feeling to plant even a small tree in my Palestine. I felt super happy, me and Aya caught the hatchet and worked together to plant the olive tree. After finishing, it was a wonderful teamwork contributes to return the freedom to our Palestine.

We sat beside the tree and looked at the attractive village from the top of the mountain, I started singing...