Even when I think something is black and white, you manage to find the rainbow in everything!

Robynnnnnn!!!!!!!!!!!
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That was for the love of me life, Robyn, who lost our engagement ring. Robyn, I want you to know that losing that funky-coloured mood ring has permanently scarred me, and I will never recover. The wedding is off!
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Besides that melodraumatic tidbit, it is now time for an update, from Wednesday to today:
1. Ein Hod/Ein Hud
2. Taibe
3. Summer plans?

Alright, 1.
Ein Hod is located in a small area in the hills about 15 minutes outside of Haifa. It was originally intended to be a Moshav, but the idea fell through. In 1953, one of the founders of the Dada Movement became the driving force behind the move to make it into an artists' colony. We stopped in a coffee shop that reminded me of something straight out of Pearl Street mall. Verrry indie.

Pre-1948, there lived the family of Al-Hija, constructed of 700-900 people, living in the area now known as Ein Hod. It was an agricultural land; they tended goats and cows, and grew vegetables and other such things you do in an agricultural society. When the fighting began, most people ended up in Jenin in the West Bank. However, 35 people were left and hid for many years in the hill nearby (now called Ein Hud). Sometime around 1988 the Israeli government issued a counting of all the unrecognized villages and wanted to lay down the law; what it did was make the people living in these villages aware that there were other groups just like them out there and biding their time. This is how the associaton of Arabs in Unrecognized Villages first came into existance.

As Israeli citizens, they should have been granted certain rights. Running water, electricity, a good school system... a whole smattering of things should have been given to these people living in what we would call the dregs of poverty. The people there have been somewhat content with there lot in life and make the best of it, but are probably relieved at the changes that have been made.

They were just recently granted recognized status in 2005, and as recently as within the last year, they finally got a paved street. Very few of their houses have legal building permits, and only two of the houses have electricty--however, they're very clever and have managed to work around it. Each house is connected to 9 other houses, supplying the power for them. At this point there are probably 15-20 houses minimum around there, 5-10 in the construction process. The Israeli government was supposed to give them money for building schools and teachers to teach them, but they didn't exactly fulfill their promises. There are 4 classrooms for the elementary school kids; there are no preschools, and anybody who gets past 7th grade will most likely be sent to Haifa or another nearby area for more education. Because there are so few children, the 1st and 2nd grade are combined and 3rd and 4th grade are combined, so on and so forth.

We walked around with the guy who is basically the mayor of the village; if not in name, than in action. He showed us his house that was supplied everyone else with electricty, the new floors that were being built for the children to live when they grew up, and where the army accidentally sent a bullet into his shower while they were training. I didn't really understand that part; the army is posted a decent distance away from Ein Hud (we couldn't see them) and is... well... the army. It really shook me up.

After the walk, we sat in the restaurant for about two hours, and food just kept coming and coming and wouldn't stop... we were warned about it, but it was made clear to us why the mayor only eats one meal a day. There was too much food than is healthy for more than one meal a day. He kept talking to us throughout the meal, and David was translating the entire time. Mayor Man spoke a mixture of Hebrew and Arabic; it was really exciting to be able to understand the majority of the Hebrew. Hopefully the Arabic will come soon......

Sleepy now. 2 will come tomorrow.