It's been some time since the last blog post and after all the Jewish holidays it seems like a lot of things that has been in the stage of planning is now really happening. This is of course exiting but in the same time scary and challenging. I'm also starting to see the end of my internship which is very sad and not something that I look forward to. More than half the time has passed, but I'm sure that the coming weeks will be full of new experience as well as the feeling of having accomplished a lot of things and that I will use all the skills that I've learned so far.

There has been lots of challenges during the past weeks.  I've learned that to go from thinking and planning a project to actually doing it is so hard and takes so much time and reacquires tons of work. I remember that I was told in some course in the university in Lund that in building up new projects, policies, strategies and so on you have to expect all the bad things that theoretically could happen to actually happen. Therefore I understand the meaning of patience and let things take some time. I'm also starting to get a grip of what Israeli social work is and what it really means to be a social worker here. It's a lot of found raising, writing proposals, thinking about new projects and creating partnership. It's fun but can be frustrating and it doesn't work out every time. So again, patience and not giving up is so important from what I've learned.

One thing that I have been looking forward to so much is to start the After school program, and now it's finally happening. Tomorrow we are having our first meeting with the group and I am so exited. Even though I learn so much from working with the kids in the elementary school this is gonna be different and I'm going to get a new perspective on being a teenager in Rahat. Because there is no services for the youth in the community I hope that the students that will join the program will feel like they are exposed to new ideas, hobbies, perspectives and feel like their thoughts and opinion is important too. I'm also very happy to run it together with Danielle who has so many great ideas and I'm sure we will have a lot of fun. 

We got to host the overseas students from a human rights course in Ben Gurion University to talk about the issues that exists and how the A New Dawn is working with these problems. It was a great meeting, and I got to talk about how I experienced working in the school, what the reactions has been and what I have learned. I think the most interesting part was to share my thoughts with other people with a outside perspective. I've noticed that I see things with my European glasses as well as they do. They asked questions about things that has become so natural to me, but that I remember that I was reacting to in the beginning. The topics of the discussion was stigma, the right to your identity and somehow also urbanization. It made me think a lot about the kids in the school and how fast their society has been changing. I also got the feeling that what I do is so little compared to the whole picture. I guess I can see this as a lesson being a social worker. I will probably always have the feeling that I could do more. 

On the opposite I look back at the past months and I'm thinking about all these moments when I do something that is so simple to me, like singing head shoulders knees and toes with the first graders and they are unbelievably exited about it. I also started to practice a small dance show with groups of students. They love it and that kind of activity is so new to them. That's the positive and amazing things that makes me feel like the cultural exchange that I bring by being there is making a difference for these kids. 

Finally the green committee from Asalam also got to preform the song we have been practicing with them called I am the Earth. It was a big event in Rahat and the beginning of a science program runned by people working with the Dead Sea. The kids were great! They preformed the song and a play about astronomy. Parents, teachers and students from three schools in Rahat were there. I hope that this kind of things will continue and develop in the community. 

These are small glimpses of what is going on right now, but there are so much more happening. I know for sure that the coming weeks will be very busy, meaningful and evolving. 

The past week has been filled with different new projects. I hosted my first Be'er Sheva language exchange meeting last Monday. It was something I was very nervous about at first. Probably more than the first day of my internship. When I look back at it I'm not sure why I was so worried about it. Maybe it was because I'm starting to feel more confident working in the school and for the language exchange I was suddenly out of my comfort zone again. Anyways, as soon as I sat down in Golda's it was ok. When people arrived and seemed so laid back and friendly I realized that this is something people do for fun and it's not such a big deal. More than 30 people came and it all went really well! We had tables for Hebrew, English and Spanish. Tomorrow, at the next meeting there will probably be even more languages, I hope!

The aim of me running these meetings is to get some experience and ideas to do the same thing in Rahat. It's probably going to be very different from the meetings in Be'er Sheva, but that's also why I really want to do it. Every week some teachers are asking me about it and they are looking forward to come to the first meeting. For the past two weeks I've done some research asking for people´s opinion on how, where and when to do the exchange. The feedback and ideas I got from people in the school has been positive and very useful.

The science teacher i Asalam asked me to come to help some students to practice for a performance for members of different companies conducting research in the Dead Sea. It's the first year of a project like this and the goal is to inspire students from an early age to open their eyes for nature science, biology and global thinking. The participants are teachers and students from three elementary schools in Rahat. One part of the performance is the song "I am the Earth" that I helped teaching the Green Committee last week. We also made choreography and decorations. The exact date for the performance hasn't been decided yet but I'm looking forward! 

When it comes to the teaching things are going well. I've noticed that the kids love to do worksheets for English grammar. This was a bit surprising for me to see, since I remember how I used to dislike these kind of assignments in their age. In the same time it's fantastic to see how much they love learning English. Last week I started arranging an English corner in the library, that now has been cleared from a lot of things that were there when I first came to Asalam. The teachers and the headmaster gives me lots of freedom to do as I wish with the space, which feels great. I have found out so far that it takes some time just to find the right person to ask to, for example, move the copy machine or print things in color. Everyone is very helpful, but also very busy with their regular duties. I'm hoping to get a lot done this week and then continue to built it gradually by putting more things on the walls and also by letting the kids help out decorating. I will add a picture in my next post. 

Something that I have started to react more to lately is people response when I say that I'm volunteering in Rahat. The questions or sentences that follows is mostly "Be careful over there!", "Really....why?", "Wow, that must be very hard..." or "How do you even manage to get to Rahat?". On one hand I think it's great that they are curious and ask me about my internship. On the other hand it's making me a bit confused and upset to hear what a they think and know, but mostly doesn't know about it. It's hard to understand them since I love going there every day. I guess what they hear and what I see is not the same things. That makes me very sad but more importantly motivated to start the After school program and The Rahat Language Exchange. Just to make people encounter with the Rahat that I know of. For example: everyday when I'm waiting for the bus there is always some kids keeping me company. We speak a bit but mostly they just want to sit down and smile at me or maybe make sure that I get with the bus. It's a nice time of the day. It has also become a routine that the bus driver makes sure that if I ever need help I can feel free to ask him, and then he wishes me a wonderful day. And all of the sudden someone in the school serves me zatar-lunch on a break. Even though I can see that there are issues in Rahat as a city it's a very small piece of my whole experience working there so far. And over all, I have never been in a place where everyone is so caring and hospitable. This is what I wish that everyone knew about Rahat. 

Time flies and I realize that I have now been here for one and a half month. Because of the holiday Sukkot I haven't been able to get to Asalam every day. The beginning of last week was very busy though. I started by having a meeting with Julia in Jerusalem and we discussed me running the Be'er Sheva language exchange. It's a language café that will take place close to the university every Monday evening. The response so far has been great. The first meeting will take place next week and I can't wait! We also had lots of time to talk about the Masa Bedouin Coexistence fellowships and I got more involved in the preparation and how to recruit fellows. It's lots of work and I'm starting to get a grip of how much work there is working for a non-profit organization.

Last week the school prepared for visitors from the ministry of education. They were inspectors and I also heard that there is a price that one elementary school in Rahat could win. I helped seven students from the so called Green committee to practice a song in English to preform on that day. The song is called "I am the Earth" and was chosen by the teachers at the school. In the beginning it seemed to be too difficult to learn in just three days but after practicing over and over they learned the lyrics and it was great to see how they really gave hundred percent to memorize the song and to learn it quickly. Unfortunately I couldn't be there since I was in Jerusalem to attend a meeting with Julia and Jamal with the ministry of education.  

Last week I also got the chance to go to the youth at risk meetings for boys and for girls in Rahat. It was amazing to see what a difference A new Dawn really does for the youth and how the program works. The meetings is based on empowerment to help the youth to prepare for future employment and get more involved in the community and the society in general. I felt very welcome as a guest in both meetings and I really wish to attend more of these meetings. It was very interesting to speak with the teenagers, especially with the girls. We discussed things like family, life, music and friendship. Our lives are so different but in the same time there is a lot of similarities. They seemed to love to hear about my brothers and sisters and it was interesting for me to hear about their families and interests. We also took lots of "selfies" together witch they really like :)

The days are becoming longer. I think it's mainly since I'm getting more involved. There is a girl from Rahat also volunteering and teaching English and it's great sit down now and then to give each other ideas on what to do and different activities for the classes. Today I joined her afternoon English class which was lots of fun since she have bigger groups and she is also able to speak both English and Arabic with the children. Afterwards I was invited to come to a dinner in a family in Rahat. I had such a good time with amazing family members, delicious food and interesting cultural exchange. I'm so impressed by how close the families seems to be and how warm and welcoming they are. Before I left they told me that I should see them as my second family and the mother made sure I could call or visit them whenever I wanted. I came home feeling so happy about being able to see and experience this and to meet these amazing people!

Things are becoming more and more like a routine in the school and when I come in the morning I know exactly what to do. This is something I really appreciate . I'm also getting to know the groups and the chldren better every day and I remember more and more names. I can also see how much I'm learning by trying out what activities that's working well and not so well in different groups. Every group need a different type of teaching, some lessons is more about playing games and to having fun exploring the language on a basic level while others is eager to learn how to talk and want me to teach them grammar and a lot of new words. This week has been lot's of fun so far!

A couple of days ago I had a short teacher training with Julia. This helped a lot to come up with activities, games and how to plan a class. For example she suggested to play memory with flashcards and Bingo. Straight away I could tell that they loved it and they told me afterwards that they had fun at that I was "funny". That's was great to hear! I also decided to make some "Olivia-lesson-rules" like no hitting and pushing and no eating during the classes. This was a way to see their reaction, but also to explain how these things can be different among different people and in other schools.

This week I also came to a meeting with the Ministry of Education. The topic was to discuss bringing more fellows to work in the schools in Rahat and how to build that program. Many interesting possibilities and challenges were lifted as well as dilemmas that I actually experienced working in the school. For example what ages that is most suitable to teach and how to invest in different students with different abilities. I'm looking forward to see the progress, to contribute by sharing my thoughts about my internship and hopefully be there in January to welcome the new fellows.

Next week the school will be closed because of the holiday Eid-Al-Adha. I will take the opportunity to explore the southern parts of Israel a bit more and hopefully see some desert :)

A new year!

Last week was short because of Rosh Hashana - the jewish new years. I was in Asalam school only Sunday to Wednesday. Still it felt like a long week full of new experiences and reflections. Since the first week was mostly about getting to know the school, the organization and to get a perspective on what kind of work I will do there, the second one was more about trying to find ways to build an internship and how to grow in the role as a social worker.

I've tried to work on a theme about countries that the group of children seem to be interested in. I did this with two different groups. They were both into football and especially Real Madrid and Barcelona. Therefore I teach them about Spain. We looked at the map to see where those two cities are, and we listened to Spanish music. To follow up we played football together the next day. For some reason, and I don't know why this is where I felt that it was a big challenge to communicate. Much more difficult than in a classroom. Maybe because the situation was a bit different and confusing for everyone, and maybe my role as a teacher also was more diffuse. Anyhow, we manage to play a bit but there was lots of discussions between the children. Especially in the second group where two of the boys didn't let the two girls play. I was surprised at first and then I tried to figure out a way to solve it so everyone could play together. In the end the girls went aside to play. I felt like this class was a failure and that I will have to work on a way to communicate and work with this phenomena. I was also very upset personally since I thought that it was so unfair towards the girls. I didn't know how to react at all and especially since this probably is very cultural.

I've also been chocked how violent the kids are when they play. When I ask why they for example hit and push each other they don't see it as a problem at all. I spoke with one of the teachers about this, and she agreed with me and explained to me that it became so common to hit each other and to be violent. Because of this I decided to talk about friendship and different words for feeling in English by using youtube, the game pictionary with some basic words and by asking questions like "how are you today?" It was fun and a very good ending of the week in Asalam. Kasem, a teacher from the high school near Asalam, also came by the school to see how it works over there and to discuss a project about teaching English to adults in Rahat. Starting that kind of project, mostly by doing research is going to be very interesting for sure.    

Except for being in the school I also went to a meeting with Jamal. Five other social workers, all involved in working with the Bedouin community discussed methods to get parents more involved in their children's educaion. It was all in Hebrew so there were lots of things that I didn't understand. It was still interesting to see how a project starts and how much work there is to even get started. 

One week has passed

I have now been more than a week in the school. It feels so amazing to be going to a place where people are so enthusiastic about me being there. The kids are wonderful! I still haven't seen much of Rahat, but taking the bus every morning has been interesting every time. I try to speak with the bus drivers and they are always curious about why a Swedish is going to Rahat every day. It's still a bit difficult to explain.

I'm teaching groups with five children at the time. So far we have been introducing ourselves and I have been trying to explain where I come from and how things are in Sweden. The kids have so many questions and want to know how things are in my life. Both sides are struggling with communication, and even the most simple thing like talking about how many brothers and sisters we have is not easy. I can also see how frustrating it is not to be able to make yourself understood. It's difficult to be personal and that I wont be misunderstood. Probably the kids feel the same way, but they are helping each other to translate from Arabic to English.

Some of the hardest parts have been planning activities. It's not easy to come up with a class when you can't explain the games, meaning of words and not even tell if the kids understand me right. I would say that I didn't really expect it to be that difficult. Also I feel like it can be hard to understand some of the teachers sometimes. Everyone doesn't speak English, even though everyone is trying and really wishes to. I also struggled with expectations from the other teachers and from myself in the beginning of the week. Some of the English teachers are hoping that they will see a big improvement in the English language among the students during my time volunteering. They also hope that I will be a part of teaching the students that still can't read and write so well. That puts some pressure on me, since I'm not here as a teacher, but as a social worker I questioned if I'm really the right person for this project. After speaking with Julia during our weekly supervision she made it clear that I can't be responsible for teaching. She explained that the language is more of a tool to be able to do social work in Rahat and to work with coexistence and exchanging culture. Hearing that was a relief.

This week I also got the chance to meet up with Jamal to talk about my experience so far and to see how the organization is trying to expand. We replied emails and discussed what can be done this semester. I hope to start planning a English corner for adults in Rahat. I told the teachers and everyone is very exited and hoping that this will work out. Hearing this and seeing how some things are already changing to the better is hard to take in. I asked about a library in the beginning of the week, and Ghranema just told me that the library that is now used as a storage will be organized next week. They also ordered a new globe and maps for the school since I asked for it. This is great news! I also got to know that some of the kids in the groups are "trouble makers" and I didn't see this at all. So over all there are things that are hard and that I will have to work on. On the other hand everyone is so positive and grateful and I can see what the organization is accomplishing.

I found a globe in the libarary today. It's all in arabic, but a good way to explain where Sweden and Europe is, why it is colder there and the distance.  

   

The first two days in Rahat

Today I have been going from very nervous to very exited and enthusiastic. I met up with Julia and Jamal Sunday morning and after some introduction we went together to Asalam elementary school. I had a good feeling about this straight away, from seeing the excitement from the kids and the teachers engagement in A new Dawn's project at the school. Being in Rahat was also an important experience, as to see the social issues and the marginalization there. Even though the school seems like a secure and happy place for the kids Rahat as a city have some issues like unemployment and poverty. Jamal told me about some of the problems and how important it is for the young people to encounter the world outside Rahat and Israel.

After the visit at the elementary school we made a quick visit in the High School as well. There will hopefully be after school projects running there soon as a way to integrate the Bedouin youth.

During the second day I acknowledged how eager people from Rahat are in general to learn English and to be able to speak to me. On the bus to Rahat the driver asked me in Hebrew if I could teach him English. Due to my poor Hebrew and since I don't speak Arabic I couldn't explain to him exactly what I was supposed to do in Rahat or that I unfortunately couldn't teach him English that evening. It all was very frustrating but still inspiring for me since I realize the need of language exchange in Rahat.

At the school Ghranema, who is one of the English teachers, met me and we went on a tour around to show me the classrooms the schoolyard and the garden around. I noticed that it's a quite small school compared to the around 640 children going there. It's more similar to Swedish schools than I expected though (except for the big cage with all kinds of birds, including parrots and chicken in the schoolyard).

I attended three English classes with students from 3rd, 4th and 6th grade. The children were all chocked that I didn't speak Arabic or Hebrew. They actually didn't believe me at first. During the classes I was mostly observing, but I also tried to help the students with the assignments as much as I could. They were all very exited about my presence, as in their eyes I'm a native English speaking person even though I'm Swedish. Grhanema told me that I'm probably the first one they have ever met. It feels very different to be looked at as someone from a completely different world. I believe that that feeling and experience is an important lesson from today. By now I'm also starting to realize how comprehensive the segregation of the Bedouins in the Negev is.

I went home so overwhelmed by the warm welcoming and all the new impressions and thoughts. It feels great to have started and to be a part of the project, but I also have to remind myself that this is my first day and that things will have to develop further over time. Everything is still so new for me as well for the kids. Tomorrow I will have my first small groups of students. I'm really looking forward!