reflection. (highlight in order to read, i know its weird!)

1. Class Discussion/ Facilitation/ Conversation

This seemed to be a bit of a problem in our class. There were always long pauses, lulls in the conversation where people would just kind of sit and stare at each other until somebody else started the conversations up again. I hate awkward silences, and so I often would be the one to break it, even if I didn’t really have anything particularly profound to contribute. Perhaps next class if there was more of a set rule/grading system of participation it would help. Or if every day there were 2 or 3 discussion leaders that came up with questions or discussion topics?

2. Video Conferencing

I loved the video conferences! They were always something I would look forward to that week. Besides the occasional technical difficulties, they were a success. I am so thankful for this technology, because it opens up, literally, the world to us. A world of opportunities for conversation and discussion and dialogue and discovery… its really incredible. Its weird to think that im sitting there, watching a person that’s halfway across the world, having a conversation with them with just a second of a lag. Seeing faces is so different than hearing a voice or reading an email.

3. Readings and the topics

To be completely honest, the Karen Armstrong book was a real struggle for me. So many names and dates over and over again- they tended to blend in. not that I didn’t learn from it, because i did, but it was hard to read. The other readings tended to be a lot more interesting and easy to digest, thank goodness. Sometimes the reading load was really heavy, though.

4. Lecturers and Speakers

I loved all the lecturers and speakers that we had. I thought it was a really good idea to have us all write a few questions out beforehand, especially considering the conversation issues we sometimes have. I felt very fortunate to have had the calibur of speakers that we had in class.

5. Blogging

a.Class Blog

I love what our class blog turned into- the page itself is beautiful and whenever anybody found anything interesting they would put it on the page so we could all enjoy it- super cool.

b. Individual Blog

I had never blogged before this class, and it really took some getting used to for me. I had to constantly remind myself to update, and it took me forever to follow everybody I wanted to and that kind of stuff- I am not good with technology.

c. Individual Responses and Comments to other people's blogs

this is something that I think needs to be altered a bit for the next class. And I am totally guilty of this, too, but we were not very good at going on other people’s blogs and commenting/reading. I think if there was some sort of guideline about a minimum number of weekly comments that would be really helpful.

6. Syallabus and its clarity

save for a few small typo-ish errors, there were no real problems with the syllabus. At the very beginning I was a bit confused with due dates because of the way they were layed out on the syllabus, but once I figured it out it wasn’t at all an issue.

7. Final Project

a. Own Project

it took me a long time to figure out what I wanted to to- I have never really had so much choice in the matter of a project like this so I was a bit shocked about the freedom! My mind isn’t really too creative, so I considered writing a paper, but with another term paper due the same week (14 pages) I opted for a multi media project. Shannon and I joined forces since we were doing the same idea, and it was such a good idea.l I LOVED DOING MY PROJECT. I loved every minute of it. the interviews were all so incredibly interesting and made me SO EXCITED for the trip! I loved how diverse the people that we interviewed were, they gave so many different perspectives.

b. Learning from others people's projects

it was so interesting to see what other people had chosen to research, what stood out to them, what they were so interested in. there were some projects, like Sarah’s, that I had never heard about before, but I learned so much about. (great job, Sarah!) I was impressed with the papers and the powerpoints AND the videos, like Charus! She did sooo great! Jenna’s painting was also INCREDIBLE. I was so impressed with out class and the work that everybody did!

8. Personal Reflection

a. what you have learned and how you have grown

I feel so much more informed about the area and about the history of the city of Jerusalem. I had no idea, or I guess I just had never really sat down to think about how much had happened, how many rulers had risen and fallen and how many people had lived or died there. Incredible.

b. what were you initial opinions and how have they changed throughout the class.

I went into the class with an open mind, slightly leaning towards the Palestinian side of things. Im proud to say that I am more neutral now, mostly because of the personal interaction that I had with some jews/Israelis. That’s where I wanted to end up and Im so happy I got here.

c. what will you do to learn more if you wish to do so.

I want to keep up with the news and hopefully try to keep in contact with some of the people I meet.

project update

well, shannon and i have now joined forces and are doing our project(s) together! yay!

we did our first two interviews yesterday and they were SO GOOD! one was my friends mother, and it was really cool to get her perspective (her father is palestinian) and the other was Kasa!

Kasa's interview was incredible, so heartfelt and deeply important to her. it made me so excited to go to this city that is so incredibly important to her.

she also told us some of the cool spots we need to go to in Jerusalem and shes going to hook us up with her sister and/or cousins!

basically yesterday made me 10000 times more excited for our trip to jerusalem! is it june 9th yetttttt?

readings for thursday

so this reading talks about the Basic Law:Jerusalem Capital of Israel 1980. and in this Basic Law, there are only 2 parts- seems pretty simple, pretty easy to not violate.

notttt. because the second part, the one that talks about not allowing and wall or structure to be built that separated West Jerusalem from East Jerusalem. well. not only did they violate that, they actively did it themselves. that is kind of mind blowing to me- that they could completely go against 50% of the law that they wrote THEMSELVES.

but as soon as i started to get indignant, i remembered part of the interview that shannon and i did today with Kasa. (yay Kasa! i love that woman) Kasa was saying that everything Israel does is for the good of everyone there, that Israel always acts in the interest of protecting people, israelis and palestinians. it would be easy to understand and justify a lot of Israels actions if you had that viewpoint.

im also SO EXCITED to meet with PYALARA tomorrow! i felt like since we just met with a jewish/israeli group it would be kind of unfair if we didnt meet with a muslim/palestinian group, seeing as al Kuds is boycotting and we dont get to speak to them. i was interested to read the overview of the group, because when i asked my (palestinian) boyfriend about them he had never heard of the group, which i found surprising. i really really like their well-being program, i feel like something like that is really useful to the youth in such an... intense area. i hope that they are really using their efforts for good, and not for a brian-washing type deal. their Youth Times magazine seems incredibly impressive.

i found the overview of the political context to be a little harder to read, and i tried to figure out the chart on youth population % to be impossible to read/understand. i think it was missing some headings or something.

i cant wait to meet with a big group of students tomorrow!

my interview questions

ok. this is the third time that ive typed this post. lets all say a little prayer before i continue that it shows up this time.

so these are the questions that i plan on asking. i tried to keep them simple, because they could elicit lengthy answers and off-shoot questions.
i would be incredibly grateful to any help that you guys could give me- comments, suggestions, anything!

1. have you ever been to Jerusalem?
if yes:
when did you go there, and why?
what did you think about the city itself? and was the divide between Muslims, Jews, and Christians obvious?

2. what did you grow up hearing/knowing about jerusalem? was it brought up a lot in your religion? in your family?

3. when you hear about Jerusalem, what comes to mind?

4. what would you like to happen in the future for Jerusalem? (stay divided between Israel and Palestine? unite under one of the countries? ect)

5. do you think the world has an accurate perception of the city? is it biased towards one side of the other?

i think this will post, inshallah.

video confrence

well i am a tad bit peeved because i typed out this longggg descriptive post about the video confrence we had last week and apparently my computer took the liberty of deleting it. fantastic.
so to sum it up, i had positive and negative feelings looking back on the video chat. i still think its SO COOL that we can carry on a conversation and see a group of people across the world! and i love michal, i thought she was great and i LOVED the point she kept making about how in day to day jerusalem the conflict isnt like we think it is and there arent all these negative feelings that we think are so prevalent.
i was disappointed in the number of students that showed up, though. i felt like the two girls might have been a little nervous or overwhelmed withall of us asking the two of them questions. i also felt bad that we, lovely americans that we are, had to conduct the whole thing in English. however, i thought those girls were a good mix of backgrounds and i loved their responses.
im so excited to meet this class when we go to Jerusalem!

Project outline

i know this is late guys, i had mucho trouble figuring out what my project would be.

I want to conduct a series of interviews with different types of people about Jerusalem, what the city means to them and how it affects their lives.

and my "different types of people" i mean a Palestinian Muslim who grew up in Palestine, a Palestinian/American, and I'm hoping to get Kasa, possibly a few American Jewish people, including people that have traveled to Jerusalem and a Christian or two.

I want to get tons of different perspectives on the city, and see what they do or dont think about the city, how important it may or may not be to them.

week 8 readings

the first reading i read, "seizing locality in Jerusalem" was not over a topic i would normally consider interesting- yeah, architecture doesnt really whip me into much of a frenzy. but what i DID think was interesting was the fact that the Israeli government was trying to use architecture to unite the city of Jerusalem- i never thought it could be used like that. very interesting application.

in the next group of readings i was kind of disappointed by the poem. not by what it said, but there was nothing really poetic about it to me, just the spacing.

"Jerusalem has and continues to be the center of strife. The stones of Jerusalem's history have been carved in history. Palestine represents a point of intersections wherein numerous civilizations flourished."

thats the first couple lines put into paragraph form... i feel like it could have been in the jacket of Armstrong's book.

the next reading i found interesting because of the idea that Israelis have that they have to be in control of the city in order for it to be kept an "open city". hm. i probably wouldnt consider Jerusalem as an open city, especially bc of the wall that they build splitting it.

in my opinion, the type of wall that the Israelis built is a wall of agression. again, open is not the word i would use to describe.

i hope that when we go to Jerusalem the walls are less of a problem than they seem to me now, that the city is as open as the Israelis like to claim