Watering the Sunflowers-July 21, 2010-Bethlehem

We started the day as always at 7 am. The children came and we divided into the groups. Some of them went to learn an African dance. The girls were really good at it. Our group is preparing a play with the theme of reconciliation. The guys are doing a dance/fight with swords that they made themselves. The girls are working on a dabka dance for the happy ending of our play, where the two families that have been fighting for years finally reconcile when they realized that they have more thing is in common than differences. I am also trying to teach the children a song, it is called I believe I can fly. The song is about believing in yourself and in your capabilities and that you can touch the sky if you really believe in yourself. It is very difficult to make the children follow instructions, sometimes even frustrating. At one point I told them that I am going back to PR because they are not behaving, then I came back…

On the last session we painted the wings for the small girls to dance over the song. The German volunteers that are doing the art workshop helped the girls to paint the wings that we are cutting.

In the afternoon we went to Bethlehem with the German group to paint over the separation wall. I was wondering what does it mean the fact that we are going there and painting over a wall so high that is causing so much suffering. What does it represent for Palestinians that we paint and leave and they stay here, looking at the wall and being its victims. I didn’t know what I was feeling, only painting, being present and solidary. The Palestinians in the shop nearby the wall, looked with curiosity, maybe they thought, one more group painting here. Also I reflected over the German comments about the wall in East Berlin and what it represented for them to be painting in Palestine. They knew better what this wall means. Some people stopped by, curious, some took pictures while we were just painting. It felt so nice to be there painting, and putting some color to the wall. The topic was you look at me I look at you. Painting for justice, peace and conservation of the environment. It was a sunflower with two faces looking at each other. We explained to the shop owners what it meant, when two people are looking at each other, they have to listen and talk to each other. One of them asked how much they had to pay for the painting, since now it looked so beautiful where before there was dark or graffiti. It was really nice because at the end one of them came and thanked us and was really happy about the painting. I told him that now it was his responsibility to water the sunflowers….