So I've always loved, and I mean LOVED food. I have never been shy to try to cook but only now, having found myself in Germany sharing a life and a home with the man I love have I really made cooking a habit.
I've always also struggled with depression and anxiety, they ebb and flow but in the last year my whole life has been uprooted voluntarily and not and I've been under extreme pressure from the biggest changes in my life ever, all within less than a year.
I have toyed on and off with paleo eating- I started thinking about meat quality and the detriments of bread on my body when I did my first Whole30 three years ago. I had changed the way I made food choices but was very far from paleo. My struggles recently have spurred me to finally take the plunge. I've started lifting weights and gone "primal" -I LOVE raw milk dairy my body does so well on it.
Since 2013 the chorus of women preaching that paleo is about nutrition seeking- and not fasting and low carb mania has grown. I am so lucky to have found leaders like Diane SanFillipo, Noelle Tarr, Liz Wolfe and Stefani Ruper. I'm learning to really love and nourish my own body and I'm going to be sharing the foods I love the best and use to nourish our little home.

So, this is not an original recipe but I was invited by my awesome parents to go to Amsterdam for the weekend and I knew I'd have to prepare food for the bread and sugar situation that is eating in Europe with standard American eaters.

I went with Nom Nom Paleo's Spicy Tuna Cakes- recipe here!

 

When you leave it  all behind for somewhere brand new, a lot of things happen.  The experience can swing from loneliness to closeness. I'm fascinated by the way expatriate life affects different people. I've been slowly documenting the day to day of the expat English teachers at my private school, here's a peek of what I have so far. I've found someone downtown who will develop my film and work with me to decide what to print and how. The old guys at this photo shop are wonderful. They started gently questioning my choice to  use film, but once I pulled out both my OM-1 and my Nikon they seemed to understand. I'm excited to have partners instead of a nameless developer and printer. 












   

Everything here is holy, every mountain is named in my Bible. This is the promised land. I was warned that this place might not bring me any closer to my faith, that it might wreck what I had instead of strengthening it as so many of the faithful hope for when they come to Israel and Palestine.

This weekend I made a pilgrimage of sorts to an organic farm that sits precariously on the edge of Bethlehem. Comfortably and entirely in Area C which is under full Israeli control still. I was drawn there when my colleague, our dreamy eyed art teacher, told me about a farm where I could camp. As a girl who has grown up in jungles and deserts and around campfires in every imaginable corner of the earth- I was very interested.

I adore my city with it's hilly roads and bustling souk but I was ready to get out into nature. It's a tricky thing with land so divided, settled and tightly controlled.
So, on Thursday I made my way up to the station where I could pick up a three row minivan-like taxi which would take me to Ramallah. The drive to Ramallah is lovely, winding and devoid of too many checkpoints. It is my favorite drive here, I can be so distracted by the scenery I don't notice the countless close calls we have with oncoming traffic, which is really something.

Once in Ramallah, I grabbed a Brazilian soda (hello nostalgia) and walked up to the station there. There were about 5 times more people going to Beit Lahem than there were taxis. After 45 minutes of nursing my Guarana I talk my way into a car whose driver has just returned and is charging us all 5 shekels extra to make the trip. We grudgingly give in, it'll be evening soon and I'm not trying to make this trip in the dark thankyouverymuch. The trip started out normally enough, but a sudden stop in traffic and an ominous message on the walkie talkie and we were off roading it. There was a checkpoint up ahead, so we careened precariously up above the highway on dirt roads. Occasionally the driver would jump out, cursing under his breath to move rocks or goats from the roadway.
This particular detour lets out at the entrance to a settlement. We tried to blend in with the outgoing traffic which won't be stopped by soldiers. Everyone stares, we were the only non settler car on the road.


After another checkpoint, a spectacular wadi and an hour of driving we arrive in Bethlehem and I find a local cab to get me out to Area C and Hosh Yasmin. The sun is setting. I arrive just in time.

Hosh Yasmin is heaven on earth. She sits on a hill overlooking a valley. There's a city in the distance I honestly don't know whether it's Ramallah or Jerusalem. It's all so close. The farm feels like it's a million miles from everything despite the fact that I can see the massive wall, and I noticed that strangely, I was on the other side of it. Not the side with houses and mosques but the....other one.
The building here has been threatened by bulldozers multiple times but it's pre 1948 so Mazan the owner has been able to run this place and keep it open to Israelis and Palestinians.


I dropped my backpack in my tent and ordered
 dinner- the food here is legendary. Farm to table is a common enough concept here, but this stuff is organic. I order a lamb dish  and hummus. The lamb reminds me of my mother's pot roast. It tastes familiar and yet so new. It's heaven.
After dinner, homemade Arak- a liquor common throughout the levant, Turkey and Greece in different forms and with different names. We don't drink at all in Nablus- it's a dry town. I
drank very, very slowly.








The next morning I woke up at 6am and strapped on my backpack. I was determined to walk to the Church of the Nativity and get out of town before the crowds bear down on Bethelem. I walked for an hour and a half, though what must have been an Israeli neighborhood and past a massive sign warning me I'm entering Area A and outlining the illegality of this crossing for Israeli citizens.

 

Waking up in my tent!

Olives at Hosh Yasmin

You know it, it's a tourist destination in it's own right. Great street artists have emblazoned it with their work alongside the rough spray paint scrawls of whomever gets close enough. I stroll past the wall, stopping to take in it's sheer size only for a minute before turning back to my mission.

I wore

A lot. Considering it's nearly 90 out and sunny all day. Of course, that's pretty normal. Nablus is definitely on the more conservative end of the list of middle eastern cities and because there are so few westerners here, all eyes are on us. I try to err on the side of caution with my dress, as a teacher of young women I want to make sure I look like a role model as much as possible. I was able to convert this into an outfit which enabled me to scale the side of a building, though.

It's all about versatility, right?

I thought

Boycotting Israel is a lot harder when you're in Palestine. Nablusi stores are boycotting Israeli products and I've found myself staring blankly at the grocery store knowing well that the Israeli apple juice tastes a million times better than it's local equivalent and feeling a tinge of guilt. I inadvertently purchased all Palestinian goods this morning at the corner store and Oum Sana at the register praised my choices profusely. I blushed. It was entirely a coincidence. I don't know how to even begin falling in line with the boycott movement that my students and colleagues adhere to- everything here seems to be Israeli. We are, after all living on land they control at the end of the day. I do feel as if it's important to stand with my hosts and avoid that gorgeous juice with Hebrew written on the label, so for now that trip to Super Store is a little more complicated, but that's what you get in a complicated land.

I saw

See that window? That's how we got onto the roof. Yeah.

One of the benefits of my lifetime of nomadism is that I quickly settle into any new place, I'm not easily fazed or made wary of newness. I still see each new city he way I did growing up- so eager to soak up every little thing, to find rhythm and find home. Ever since I stepped on a plane out of Egypt I have missed living in the Middle East. I didn't know where I'd end up- Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine but as soon as I graduated from college I started to look at how I would get where I wanted to be.
I did not think that I would end up in Nablus of all places, and that it would feel so...right. It's been a day, so these are of course, first impressions. I've spent years ready to return to my comfort zone- learning a new city, speaking in broken Arabic, the constant stimulation of living somewhere new has been absent for so long. I think that's the source of the calm and sheer contentment I feel.

I should have done this sooner.

Morning ritual on the balcony.

Nablus itself is terrifically charming- sand coloured 5 to 10 story buildings climb up two mountains on either side, the roads twist up the hills and cats dart between stalls in the souk. We live partway up one mountain, the top is covered in scraggly evergreens and there's a Samaritan (yes, those Samaritans) village up there. Our apartment is huge, with large windows we keep open all day. Naturally, we are between a house with a whole brood of roosters and a mosque- 5am is rough right now. I'm sure I'll learn to ignore it.

The community of expats (the word for us in Shaami is Ajaniib) at Teach for Palestine and another school at which I've taken a part time teaching position has so far been wonderful. At TFP we live in two apartments next to each other, it's been wonderful so far to be able to sit in the kitchen talking until late at night all together. Between TFP and Pioneers Baccalaureate School we represent about 2/3 of the total expat population of Nablus and we're less than 20.

Due to some border control issues, PBS was unable to bring a half dozen or so of it's volunteers and needed help to teach English in their lower school.
I have never thought about teaching little kids but given my boundless energy and patience with little ones, I volunteered to teach one section of the second grade class.

Pioneers Baccalaureate  School

I'm slightly terrified, in a healthy way. I'm also totally excited to do something completely different for eight hours a week.

Seriously, anyone with advice for teaching little ones in general or teaching english please reach out to me. I'll be very well equipped by the school but I'm sure there are tips and tricks people have picked up along the way.

For now I'm desperately in need of a nap, I start teacher training tomorrow so we'll see how that goes.

Exploring the Old City

I'm packing all of my clothes, all of my art, furniture and beloved textiles away.
Every day my walls are a little more empty and my living room, more cluttered with boxes.
I love it.
A lot of things about this move have felt at once rushed and too slow, and that's where I am right now. According to my planner I have 14 days until I get on a plane to Tel Aviv, too much time to already be packing everything I own but also so short that I need to quickly buy and arrange everything I can't when I'm overseas.

The closer I get to the move, the less I think I'll be back in the US when I tell people I will.
I've arranged an internship at a newspaper for the winter in Morocco- a place I've always wanted to live which will take me to at least March. Talking to my mother, who is herself packing out for a move to Germany with the State Department, I started considering a move there to teach English after I finish my TEFL. American University here in DC has a distance learning MA in International Relations that I could pursue anywhere in the world with decent internet. That prospect has seriously altered what I'm considering for my future. I can see it, teaching English in Bonn or Amman and taking graduate classes. What better way to learn? It sure beats living in the US on a tight budget and doing the old school university thing...again.

For now, I'm registered for a November GRE in Ramallah. Study tips are welcomed!

Travel planning is like a drug, now that I've begun I refuse to stop adding destinations. I'm not sure I've ever felt so at liberty to chase what matters to me.

This past year in the US has been a long layover between university and adulthood, despite all the "adult" things I committed to doing- job, apartment, happy hours- that's not who I am at 24.

So here I stand, among my boxes, ready to pack them away for a long time.

I feel free.