Sick

Requiem Mass for Doreen

I found out that my bout of diarrhea and vomiting was not only me but many other people living around my area (radius 15 km) have been suffering from the same illness as well. No one knows the cause and its definitely not food related. It's something in the air. Conspiracy theories abound. All I know is many people have the same symptoms on the same day in various parts of the City and suburbs.

And it's been 3 days also that I'm suffering from asthma symptoms. Lots of wheezing and difficulty to breathe. I should go to the doctor. The national is over by now so the clinics should be opened.

I'm still sad that Doreen, our Armenian parishioner, died suddenly last week from a brain hemorrhage. No words, The weather seems to reflect my mood ... dark gray skies, threats of rain that never come, chilly yet hot.

First week of school is underway. The streets are suddenly packed with students, parents and cars once in the morning and once in the afternoon; at the start and end of each school day. Then the rest of the time the streets are relatively quiet. Life isn't back to normal but we try to tell ourselves it is. 

Back to school

Back to school

Today is the first day of school. The streets are full of students in uniforms and bags. Teachers carrying textbooks and lists hurry to school. Parents comforted primary 1 and kindergarten children as it's their first time in school without their parents. Entrances to school are jammed with cars bringing students for the first assembly of the academic year. However school will last only till 11am. That's because a nationwide strike has been called to pressure the govt to accept a ceasefire deal.

Yes the country is at a standstill today. Private and public sectors are all joining in. Banks, post Offices, public transport, shops, restaurants, schools, all will be closed. Since last nights hundreds of thousands of israelis have blocked major highways, burning dumpsters and clashing with police. Event the airport is closed. An estimated 2.5 billion $ will be lost today as the economy shuts down. In any other country the govt would have crashed ... but not here. Where will all this lead us? We're crushed between leftists and rightists; between muslims and jews; between israel and palestine. Christians are in a difficult situation ... our patriarch has told us not to take sides. But that only means we become enemies to both sides. 

I guess all the stress has upset my health. I've been vomiting and having diarrhea for 2 days now. It's making me weak. Maybe I should go see the doctor, But the clinics are closed ... they're on strike too.

Sad

Fallen laurel tree

It's been a dreadful week of bad news one after another. This morning I received a message that a dear friend from the Armenian catholic community that I served for more than 5 years had died from a brain hemorrhage during an operation. It's doubly painful when she lived near my house and had asked to see last month but I could not reach her as the landowner of the block of apartments had locked the main door without a bell or intercom. It's very sad. Tomorrow is her funeral. Our small Armenian community will be present. 

And one of the last magnificent laurel trees outside New Gate have died and fallen from a rotten core. There were once 5 huge majestic laurels along that part of the City Wall but now with the death of this one, only two remain. The sparrows and bulbuls have nowhere else to build their nests. 

Empty streets

Everything here just seems to be so gloomy. Even the weather. It's gray, cloudy and chilly with humidity in the nights and early mornings. Few people in the streets under this tense situation. Police are everywhere ... even mounted police who are only deployed if there's a riot. 

Two volunteers from France and the Philippines had to cancel their flights here to help me in the library because of flight stoppages and restriction of travel by their governments. Both are expert librarians working in prestiges libraries with many years of experience. Now I'm stuck alone to work by myself.

Let's hope for better days ... Here it's only prayers. There's nothing else anyone of us can do.

Autumn

Dates on palms

As we head to autumn, the weather strangely has gone all hot again like mid-summer. 30 degrees or more. The nights are quite cool though ... but daytime is oppressive with the heat. The fruit trees are ripening their fruit for the autumn harvest. I see dates on the palm trees and pomegranates growing wild by the streets ... that's a sure sign of autumn and the Jewish New Year. In fact some shops are already selling ripe dates, grapes and guava ... all autumn fruit though it's still a bit too early. They're not very sweet too. The best fruit comes in October.

Mounted Police on watch

Security continues to be tight in and around the City. Youths are stopped and checked randomly. Streets are a lot more quieter. No one wants trouble. Life as it is, is difficult. War has made it worse. Food prices have skyrocketed. One kilo of tomatoes used to cost 3 to 5 shekels. Now it's 32 shekels ... almost US$10. People can't afford to eat normally now. Buying things nowadays are checked if it's absolutely worth buying or necessary or could be done without. Every cent is counted.  Because daily life is now becoming difficult, tensions among people are short and arguments and fights are more frequent.

There was a fierce exchange of fighting up in the north, but all is calm now. Let's hope negotiations are successful and peace returns.

Geez Youth

Tigrinian children at Mass

More bits of ceiling have collapsed in the rooms and corridor of the wing whose terrace is under renovation. And then on Friday night when I came home, there was no electricity in our entire wing. In the dark and receiving instructions over my handphone from our janitor, I had to grope through the main power box in our corridor to at least restore electricity to my room as I'm the only one staying in this bloc. I finally managed to do it after half an hour. Next morning our janitor came back to work and discovered one of the rooms had water (or asphalt) leaking down its roof and caused a short-circuit in the electric wires, thus resulting in the entire wing being blacked-out. The nightmare just gets worse.

Hymns with drum

Saturday morning was a consolation for me to celebrate Mass with the Geez Rite Catholics .... mainly Tigrinians who were celebrating the Feast of the Assumption. Every year on this feast, the youth group would offer Mass and sing in a lively liturgy. I loved it. This year they even had the huge drum which they played during the post-communion hymn. Unfortunately the feast was marred by riots in Tel Aviv when Eritrean and Tigrinians fought over political differences back in their hoe country ... killing one and injuring several. Because of the complicated political situation in their countries, our Catholics prefer to be called Geez Rite based on the ancient liturgical language. In fact our Catholics belong to Ethiopian, Eritrean and Tigrinian communities. 

Tensions in the north of the country flared last night when Lebanon and Israel exchanged missile attacks. Hopefully today there is calm and people can go to on in normal daily life. The disruptions from north and south is taking its toll even for some people here in the center ... psychologically. Nobody wins in a war; everyone and everyone absolutely suffers.

Nightmare

Cemented terrace at 4am

Last night was the nightmare to top everything. The workers on the terrace began to pump cement over the asphalt covering. Because our street is too narrow, the cement truck was parked some 50 meters down the road. A long pipe brought the cement not just to our door but up 5 floors to the terrace. And that was 8pm. They completed the work at 2.30am. And the pump was directly above my room. The noise and chaos went on all night and I couldn't sleep a wink. Workers shouting from above my room to 5 floors below and down the street. Fallen pipes and heavy equipment caused our ceiling to crack at various places. And nobody was supervising the work. I had only 2 hours of sleep as I had to go to the Ivrea convent for Mass at 5.30. Absolute nightmare.

Pieces of ceiling fall off

Now at 9am my head is still reeling from the noise and lack of sleep. But I can't afford to rest as there's a researcher coming to do last minute work on the martyrs of Damascus before their canonization in October. The library is officially closed for summer but under these circumstances, I have to let the researcher do his work. It's going to be one exhausting day. 

Stromata

Full moon

The full moon is slowly waning ... and that spells the coming of autumn. In fact the nights are much cooler now; and during the day, though hot at 29 degrees, a cool breeze blows through. Hopefully this will bring rain and snow this winter. We need it.

Renovation work on the terrace is a nightmare ... because there is no supervisor. Incompetent workers drilled holes through the roof into rooms below. I don't know how they'll repair that. When the rains come, we'll see if they had even been repaired at all. Workers steal food and drinks from our students' fridge. Wiped clean. Nothing left. 

Full sun

I've been losing my memory again ... not knowing where I am, what I'm doing ... I actually was lost twice during Mass yesterday morning. Not sure what triggered this. Maybe lack of magnesium. Anyway I've decided not to go anywhere except home and work. That'll keep me safe from getting lost in the streets.

I thought I'd spend my summer watching Dr. Who episodes ... but summer is almost over and I've hardly seen a full episode. Too much work. Unbelievable how time flies.