This weekend has been incredibly interesting!!
Friday morning:we were whisked away to Dalun (or Dalon as people seem to call it). Once we had settled at the NGO where we were going to be sleeping we went along to a lesson for adults about conflict management in a Village half an hour away. The men seemed to contribute a lot more than the women who for the most part were very quiet but everybody seemed happy especially after Peter taught everybody a song about the importance of togetherness. A minutes drive later and we were in a Chiefs palace getting our photo taken with him. He seemed very happy to have us and after a quick talk to him (with the help of a translator) we went back to the NGO (Ghanain Danish Community Programme).
We then had a kabalat Shabbat around a table for about 16 of us and when we started singing more people joined us. This was very surreal and was followed by a question and answer session that seemed to go on for the rest of the trip away from Jisonayili. The singing seemed to attract more people and also made people more interested in what being Jewish actually was. Murderer Nina was very good at explaining most things and people went away happy.
And then the true highlight of the evening... African dancing and drumming. Yes, I had a go at playing the drums and Maisel took loads of photos of people dancing too. We also tried to teach some Israeli dancing but we were so interested in theirs that it didn't last very long.
Sleep...
In the morning after making a short visit to Simli radio (which P'nina is explaining more about) we went to see the Chief of the Village. He was very happy to accept our offering of Fanta and Coke (a crate load) and after sharing Kola nuts with each other (a symbol of friendship because when you break them in half they look like a heart). He told us about some of the problems and then we went off to visit the village, we went into a youth centre, saw fish being prepared, frogs mating, got accosted by kids (Dan seemed a bit too eager to put them on his shoulders trying to get me to do the same), and also saw a pineapple and mango forest which I though was very cool.
In the afternoon we met some of the people to talk more about Jewish and English culture and discuss the differences and then we went back home with some us on the back of a pickup truck (I don't know why Sam and Sasha seemed so comfortable in the back, I was sure I was going to fall out at times). When we left people wished us Shaba Shalo or Shalom Shab or just plain Shaaa. We knew what they meant...
Todays activity has been cancelled because there has been a death in the community but we are all still extremely happy with our experience.
P.S. sorry Dan
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