Placement: a note on subversion

I sat down near him on the cold tile floor, but not too near. Placement is an important thing. Placement around strangers communicates more than silence or a cluster bomb of words. Placing one’s self around strangers is a communication art of the most delicate—and powerful—kind. Most people forget and don’t utilize the opportunities to communicate to the world with intentional placement.

The old man wearing all black—black coat, black pants, black hat, black skin—had established himself there on the third step of Chicago’s Union Station west side concourse. It was too bitter cold to be outside. He had his small black duffle zipped open on his right side and his feet spread wide down on the first step. Every once in a while I could hear him rustling in plastic bags holding some kind of food. His frizzy black beard with white hairs weaving sporadically through it was at least 10 inches long and if he stood up I’m sure his tall frame would intimidate most strong men.

So there I sat about 15 feet away wearing Finnish boots, keeping warm under a green Italian coat gifted to me by a Danish friend, my outfit decorated by a Palestinian kofia, writing in a homemade journal with an Irish pen, snacking on M&Ms with a well traveled Taiwanese backpack beside me. I looked like a hodge-podge of nations, if anything coherent.

I didn’t know this gentle-faced homeless man, but all I wanted for him to know was that I trust him. I am in his line of vision and when I sit there I say “I know you see me. I want you to see me. It doesn’t matter to me that you’re homeless. You are a man worthy of honor and I am asking for your protection.” This sort of communication is unexpected. Hopefully it is also encouraging.

I didn’t want to sit directly next to him because, well, that would require a great amount of effort on both of our parts. Conversation, awkward and probably halting, would ensue after forced introductions... And I wasn’t invited. When I walked by the first time he did not look up to make either friendly or hostile eye contact. Maybe he noticed me anyways and wondered about my life. He might have thought up a story or made all kinds of assumptions. Or maybe he was entirely disinterested. Either way, by sitting on his side of the foyer I am asking to commune with him. I was communicating: “Hello. I see you.”

Noticing the humanness and existence of others can and will subvert power structures. The black man next to me had an unkempt beard, as do many (or even most) homeless men. Think: how frustrating would it be to try and shave regularly as a homeless person? Is there humiliation involved in walking into a public restroom to shave? And most homeless women have scraggly hair and dirty hands with hangnails and dry, cracking skin in the winter. To notice and to to acknowledge—if even just by sitting my world-traveled white rear in close proximity—is a powerful thing.

As George Orwell keenly noted and “as dictators seem to agree, such a bypassing of abstractions, such an insistence on the concrete, is a politically subversive act.” Sitting down next to a stranger when there are plenty of other options says, “I see you. Do you see me?” Though small and vastly insignificant, this momentary encounter with another human on the cold floor of a train station on a cold cold Chicago day made tandem our humanity. We shared a space and I chose to set my young, white, privileged presence near this older, darker, poorer presence. And we were both human.

And I got to thinking, We are America, this old man and I. For what is a nation but blood running through veins and songs spurring from lips? It is this, ultimately. Any nation that forgets this and thinks it is independent of its people is operating under false pretense. What is the United States but the immigrant, the mother, the soldier, the lead in the school play, the old kitschy couple, and the souls of our feet? We are the United States.

When this country ceases to be our own place it becomes a farce. Upon further thought I realized that, for my black comrade, this nation may have already become a farce. I have traveled and seen many places. All human. All nations. I am not owned by the United States, a product to be bought and sold. I make this nation alongside the homeless man sharing a seat with me.

Human placement can and does evoke revolutions: Tahrir Square, Cairo 2011. Strangers refused to go home—even in the face of violent opposition—and they ended a 3-decade-long presidency. Subversion is most powerful in its most human forms. You see, because structures normally set themselves above individuals. And governments forget that they only exist because of the people they serve. But Egypt is reminding her government she will not be harassed any longer.

Ultimately, choosing to be in an essential human state with others, sharing space and persevering in placement, disrupts systems because it forces the system to acknowledge its dependence on human existence. That is why people sit in. That is why people march. That’s why people protest in streets and refuse to go home. A nation stops without its citizens and does not exist apart from their imagination and participation.

So there we sat for about 50 minutes. He ate his food out of a crinkly bag and I scribbled words in my journal. On my way out I passed so near him that I could have touched the skin pulled tightly on his dry old hands. I tried to see his eyes, to let him see mine, but, stubbornly, he did not look up. So I walked on and out into the cold and the wind.

My Small Moment of Defiance. A difficult post.

The ancient streets of Jerusalem stretch 12 feet across in the widest sections—no cars allowed in the Old City where I was staying with one of my friends from university, Maggie Hovhenessian. The paths are lined with doorways opening to labyrinth-like churches and nunneries, “famous” hummus restaurants and shops strung wall-to-wall with beaded jewelry. There seems to be little or no pattern to the street design. For all of its history, Jerusalem has been sought after, fought for and traveled to. She has been destroyed and rebuilt over again. The city is more complex and layered than a budding young romance growing into a deep, true love.

Jerusalem’s convoluted construction is further complicated by her population. The Old City is organized in four quarters. There’s the Armenian quarter where, on one warm, heavy night, my host walked me beneath small spheres of light cast on the school’s courtyard. There she showed me her childhood schoolgirl places. Beautiful, exotic Armenian designs with bright blue peacocks made of smooth stone, decorated doorways and fountains.

There’s also the Muslim quarter. I saw much of this quarter on my own as I shopped for a leather purse and various gifts for home. Twice there I lost my way on the weaving road maze and felt threatened. Twice I enjoyed the warmth of Arab hospitality and openness to a stranger. The comparable poverty there was not quite surprising, though I wanted to wish it away.

In the Christian quarter we walked from shop to shop. We made side stops into twisty staircases of hidden Greek chapels. Leafy green and bits of natural light decorated the walls. My friend introduced me to her friends and we talked long with each one, laughing much. This quarter is predominantly Arabic speaking Palestinians, excepting some of the nuns and the monks and the ever-present tourists.

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Just before sunrise I stood on the porch of a rooftop flat above many other Jerusalem rooftops. What seemed like endless layers of square houses and apartments jutted up in the foreground without rhyme or reason. For generations Maggie’s family has lived in a sporadically designed set of close-knit, multi-level apartments that are hidden from view on the street (as are the rest of the homes in the Old City). Her door is only feet from station 8 on the Villa Dolorosa.

The morning mist obscured TV satellites and wires lined with drying laundry and I cried softly wondering if true hope could ever come to the people of this city.

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Kneeling on one knee I flicked through a basket of different plastic-wrapped prints of 5x7 paintings of Jerusalem. Pretty little things, those prints. The large stones of the street beneath me had divots and waves and ruts in them from the hundreds of years of travelers’ walking pilgrimages. I had been in The Old City for 24 hours and in Palestine for 32 days.

The constant traffic of shoppers, mothers, tourists, nuns, and small boys moved around me as I knelt next to the basket, trying to determine the best print for each cousin back home. Then, interrupting my very focused search for the perfect souvenir, a black pair of shoes stopped about three feet away, indicating a man was facing me, waiting for my attention. Then an indistinguishable male voice from above said, “Shalom!”

Shalom? I questioned with resentment in my mind, Hebrew? I’m in the Christian quarter where everyone speaks Arabic. Who says Shalom here? Looking up I saw a pale but strong elderly man with a big white beard, round hat, black ankle-length cloak, hands held behind his back. Behind him, hanging cloths of colorful woven fabric and traditional black Palestinian dresses with red stitching waved gently in the breezed created by the passersby. He smiled a kind, small smile.

“Hello,” I replied cooly with neither consideration nor interest.

I was frustrated that he assumed I would speak Hebrew. Looking away from him, I began shuffling through the prints again.

He kept still but for a knowing nod, “Ahhh,” looking down at me he asked “Are you here from America?”

“Yes.”

“How are you? Are you here for long?”

Curtly I replied, “I’m fine, thank you.”

I began to feel both of my knees resting on the ground and I intentionally remained in a knelt position. I did not feel like standing up to talk to this stranger. This man who had the gumption to assume I should speak Hebrew though I was in the Arabic-speaking quarter. I resented him and everything he stood for, everything he brought.

Within a few more seconds the tense encounter ended, the Jewish elder recognized my disinterestedness and he walked quietly on. It wasn’t until months after this encounter that, in my small moment of defiance, I had hated this man. Not because he did anything particular to me, but because he was a Jew in Israel.

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Maggie and I visited the fourth quarter, the Jewish quarter, on Shabbat. We entered the spacious, well kept area and Maggie explained excitedly, “Shabbat is a special time for you to be here. It’s different and people are quiet on the streets and happy.” As she explained this, there was a family of Jews dressed almost completely in black walking across the courtyard. The girls wore long skirts and the boys wore dress pants with small ringlet curls swinging gently on their cheeks, as they crossed the courtyard together. From there we proceeded toward the Western Wall.

The ancient wall is an area of significant history and fame. We wandered there, observing the circles of dancing and singing Zionists from a short distance. I leaned over to Maggie and whispered “It’s so hard. Their joy is at the expense of the lives of our friends.” At one point I was alone and had a question. I looked around trying to decide who to ask.

From far off I chose to walk carefully but purposefully up to two Israeli soldiers. They looked kind enough. A little unsure, I approached them and stuttered slightly “Excuse me... Shalom. Could you tell me what the hours of this place are? I mean, does it close or open at a certain time?”

Without even a hint of an accent—faded, corrupted, or otherwise—the soldier said to me, “I don’t speak English.” The look in his beautiful dark eyes and chiseled face, browned evenly by the semitic sun, filled me with shame. I looked away for a moment toward the space swarming with tourists and locals then I looked toward his softer, less arrogant comrade, and then back at him.

“But you just—” I started. Then I saw the large automatic weapon strapped across his broad, strong chest. A few pockets and a belt with a soldier’s equipment embellished simply the olive and khaki uniform. This man was an IDF soldier, part of one of the best trained and equipped armies in the world. Somehow I had forgotten that. In that moment I remembered I stopped seeing him as a man and my heart shifted. This is probably a zionist, fighting for Israel, his people’s homeland. In doing this, he has maimed Palestinian lives.

When he looked down at my nervous face and said, “I don’t speak English,” with pristine pronunciation his angry eyes and stubbornness communicated much more than his unwillingness to help a foreigner, especially an American. He was proud of Israel and served as her protector. Any intrusions—cultural or otherwise—were not welcome. Israel is a Jewish state, after all.

After my moment of hesitation I re-awoke my situation. I held his handsome eyes in mine for a second longer than felt comfortable—it was my small moment of defiance—and I then moved away in submission and exhaustion. The past month of my life I watched my friends submit and contort their lives to the Israeli occupation. Such a close encounter with any of that occupation’s perpetrators felt either like betrayal or weakness. And I hated that soldier for that feeling.

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