After missing my flight out of Tel Aviv (who knew security there was especially tight?) I got over the shock of being grounded for five days with the promise of returning to Bil'in for their New Years Eve protest. I was running low on money, my phone was dead, and no one was expecting me. Good thing Bil'in is probably the most welcoming place in the world. New Orleans isn't far behind, but you still have to rely on Couch Surfer to find a place to stay.
I showed up in Bil'in, bags in tote, hair even blonder (I had to kill some time in Tel Aviv) and no plan in mind. The only thing I could think of was to head towards the wall in search of the demonstration. Within the minute I could taste the gas. No one around, still hundreds of meters away, but I could hear the pfft pfft and knew they were letting it rain down. I started to see small groups of protesters carrying flags, they got larger and larger, and more diverse. Turns out I was a little late. But something was still happening. An Israeli drum circle was going at it, and there were musicians scattered about with clarinets and saxophones. I did the protest dance for a little bit, getting closer, getting gassed, moving back, watching, getting closer....there were a lot more soldiers out today, but the protesters numbered in the hundreds. It would have been more but the IDF blocked off an entrance to the village, preventing buses and vans from entering.
Within minutes, I had my choice of places to stay.
Instead of spending New Years getting wasted in New Orleans, which, not gonna lie, I was pretty stoked for after two intense weeks in Palestine, I had a very chill New Years Eve in Bil'in with my friend Hamde, who took me around to different houses to talk to people, view some of the films being put together about Bil'in, and see the houses being built by his brothers for their new families. I talked to Hamde about his connection to Bil'in, how he left his job in Tel Aviv when his cousin Bassem was killed. Now he works with the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee as a photo-journalist. We rang in the new year with apple-flavored argeelah.
I went to bed contented, but couldn't sleep for hours because of the mosquitoes buzzing around my ear. I had to kill every last one of them. When Hamde knocked on the door at 9am, I told him to give me a few more hours. At 1pm, I wrenched myself out of bed and found Hamde napping next door. Five minutes later we were walking up the hill towards the village and that's when it began. A boy ran up and told Hamde something, he turned to me and said, "My cousin, the one who smelled the gas, she is died." He had mentioned her the night before, that she was in the hospital. We didn't expect this.
