51st State

This morning we woke comfortably at Katrina and Francisco's apartment. We did the normal tea, packing, toothbrushing routine, then set off toward the border (with a quick falafel and chocolate bar stop, as we hear Israel is expensive). The road to Eilat is somewhat lined with palm trees, surrounded by purplish mountains.


Purple mountains and palm fronds of Aqaba

Approaching the border felt normal enough, and despite my inhibitions about supporting Israel with money or even my attention, I couldn't help but feel refreshed by seeing young, energetic, uncovered, English speaking women commanding the post as compared to the universal theme of old, fat, uneducated men.


Goodbye Jordan!

However these girls and everyone here seems convinced that Chris and I are up to no good, starting with a lengthy game of 20 questions and proceeding to a ridiculously thorough bag and bike search. A team of 10 or so young workers painstakingly routed through all of our tightly packed possessions, dumping (very delicately) everything from every bag and filling plastic bins around the room. They confiscated my sunblock, later interrogating me about them but eventually returning the bottles. It would have all been humorous had it not lasted well over 6 hours. I wish I could have captured the process on film but that's a big No No around here.

We also got strip searched. The female security very thoroughly scanned every inch of me to see if I had hidden weapons or who knows chemical bombs inside my pelvis and breasts. Again, hilarious.

We must appear suspicious because Chris has a beard (Muslim?) and admitted to studying Arabic (minor alarm when flipping through his mosque- and script-filled sketchbook). We also have Syrian stamps and admitted we have a Palestinian friend in Ramallah, who we intend to visit. However the guards are all incredibly nice and I think they believe we are innocent, it's just procedure.


6 hours and counting..

We are now waiting for our passports and approval to enter. The sun is slowly creeping down and I'm afraid our chances of getting to Ramallah today are dashed.