Kalandia

H. drops us off at the Kalandia checkpoint. He offers apologies: he’d have driven us to Jerusalem, but his green id and Palestinian license plates mean he can go no further. We thank him profusely for his assistance, and he and Anna exchange phone numbers: while I’m heading back to Paris the next day, she might have a chance to return to Ramallah. As we’re about to get out of the car, H. gives both of us a misbaha – muslim prayer beads – as a farewell gift.

Kalandia – also the name of the nearby village and refugee camp – is the main border crossing between Jerusalem and Ramallah. After the wall went up in 2002, every West Bank resident wishing to visit Jerusalem had to go through this checkpoint, and all but the holders of a special permit are denied passage. Traffic flows freely from the Israeli side – the border police is not worried about people getting into the West Bank – but, coming from Ramallah, one has to stand in line to go through a metal detector and to get one’s id checked, after standing in another line to get into the exclusion zone, where only small groups of people are allowed.

“Entry is one by one – please await your turn patiently”, requests a sign above the first turning door.

This time around, there aren’t as many people as the day before, and the wait lasts, at most, 15 minutes. As before, no one pays any particular attention to my cameras or to the film rolls that airport security in Paris thought looked like explosives. As I pick up my belongings, however, the tired-looking servicewoman behind the bulletproof glass motions me to come closer and asks for my passport. She quickly leafs through it and, finding the Israeli visa, hands it back to me and nods for me to go through. The previous day, she had waved me through when I started to awkwardly go through my bag to fish out my passport. Palestinians aren’t so lucky: all of their id are subject to thorough verification.

“We wish you a safe and pleasant stay”, offers another sign.

And we’re out to the parking lot, on the other side. In Israel.

On the green and white Mercedes minibus bearing the number 18 – connecting the Arab bus station near the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem to central Ramallah – we sit silent. A Palestinian kid dressed in the latest hip hop fashion plays on his Playstation Portable, and we’re trying to process the day’s emotions. Anna scribbles some words of Arabic and Hebrew vocabulary on a sheet of paper, and hands it to me, for future reference. We munch on salted beans we bought from a Palestinian peddler before going through the checkpoint.

I already know, by then, that when I get home the next day, I will have to write about what I saw. And that some day, sooner or later, I will have to take a seat again on this bus number 18, to Ramallah.

Inshallah.