Religious Affairs

Hebrews 11:1 To have faith is to be sure of the things we hope for, to be certain of the things we cannot see.

Counting my blessings. Having recently been reminded by a friend of what it’s like to lose a child, I consider myself blessed. I have a roof over my head, food in the fridge, a job that I enjoy, kids whom I love (my own and those I teach), clothes to wear, people to talk to…. I even sometimes have a computer that’s connected! Despite winter approaching and mornings and nights being chilly, I still have flowers blooming and surprising me every day. Today I discovered I had a white rose. I also went to church.

It’s on the American compound. They send a taxi as transport. He parks discreetly off the main road from our compound. I meet up with the other ladies. Three Blacks, one Indian and one White (me) – all South Africans. It takes us an hour to get there. Another half an hour to get in. At the outer perimeter, we exchange our resident permits for passes. At the inside perimeter, we exchange the passes for other passes. Someone on the inside has to sponsor your visit and may only sponsor two people at a time. Since we are five, they have to send three people to sign us in. Church is a small gathering. No more than twenty. I’m still the only one with Arian features. They do the normal singing, praising, worshipping, offering, preaching, announcing, blessing. They are all very sincere. They pray for Christians in Iraq who are being persecuted (killed). This congregation is helping to build a church in India, they are feeding the poor and they will contribute towards the repatriation of these Christians in Iraq who want to leave. I feel uplifted and comforted.

Hajj is upon us. The pilgrims have already started arriving. Those with communicable diseases are not allowed to enter. You should have a vaccination certificate to prove that you had been vaccinated for melingitis and flu. They are so shit scared of diseases which to me means that they are actually more likely to contract it. One of our new teachers who arrived a week ago, has been told to leave the country within the week. One of her blood tests came back inconclusive. Inconclusive!!! It means they could have made a mistake. They are now sending this lady home without proof of anything. And they won’t consider or discuss it. They have made a judgement call on her character. Yet in other countries there are advertising campaigns to encourage people: Know your status! She has to go home with that verdict hanging over her head and for her own consolation, have the tests redone. I am willing to put money on it being negative, but hey, who cares! We’re not in the land of the living.

The Arabic department at the school have put a presentation together about Hajj and the pilgrims and the brotherhood of mankind. It was very touching. Each child had to introduce himself by stating his name and where his from. We had about eight different countries represented: Britain, India, Pakistan, Sudan, Egypt, Syria, Jordan and Palestine. When the little boy in my class stood up and said: My name is Ibrahim Nasserallah, I am a Muslim and I come from Palestine, I felt like crying. Living closer to the region, one becomes more sensitised to the plight of the people living there. I respect the Israelis, and have always admired Golda Meir in particular, but what they are doing to the Palestinians, is atrocious. My little Ibrahim comes from the West Bank. During holidays he goes back to his grandmother who still lives there. His father is one of five. Every single one of his uncles has bullet wound scars. His dad is a doctor. They are not terrorists. The presentation was also repeated at the Islamic centre. Since most of the boys in my class participated, I asked if I could accompany them. We were meant to give our presentation and leave, but the cleric gave us no time to leave and started his sermon straight away – we had to sit through his terrible English, his loud voice, and his non-sensical justifications about the son of the slave-girl Hagar and so on and so forth. I’m not sure what his point was and who he was trying to convince (or convert). I could sit quietly through it, but was extremely proud of my boys who managed to behave throughout the ordeal. I couldn’t sit with them because I had to sit in the female section. Mohammed (not the prophet), who is the liveliest of them all, by divine intervention got isolated and ended up between two adults. My boys were bored out of their minds and were appalled at the man’s accent. They would have probably done a better job themselves. And he didn’t have the decency to thank them or even mention them. I though they were wonderful!