I climbed onto the bus, nodded to the driver and sat down on the first seat to the left, dropping my pannier bags beside me. Rooster was stowed into the luggage compartment underneath.
“Welcome, Mr Fee-liks,” said the conductor, smiling broadly as he walked towards me from the back of the bus.
“Yeah, cheers,” I said, not really feeling like smiling myself.
Man, what a day!
I’d just been denied entry into Israel at the Allenby border crossing, and was being deported back to Jordan.
To my right was the quiet Arab chap in the dark suit who'd been sitting at the back of the bus on the way into Allenby earlier in the day. I nodded and smiled, and he returned the greeting. I guessed he was being deported too.
I’d spent a total of 4 hours in Israel, or to be exact, Israeli immigration, and it had been an unpleasant experience. I’d gotten grilled for over an hour about my ‘plans’, made to wait for almost another three hours, and then escorted out of the building and put back on the bus to Jordan.
Well, that nailed Jerusalem in the ‘Jerusalem to Kashmir’ ride. How about ‘Bethany-beyond-the Jordan to Kashmir’?
It didn’t have quite the same creative ring to it, but I’d work on the branding later. Creativity, like life, is a plastic process.
In the meantime, I actually felt OK to be heading back to Jordan. It’s laid back, the folks are basically friendly and trustworthy, and I wasn’t going to be confronted with wholesale ethnic war.
A year in Malaysia listening to my Palestinian friends tell their stories, and a couple of weeks in Amman, listening to the same, had somewhat coalesced my views on the Zionist regime. I’m not a big fan.
The bus pulled away from the curb, and I settled into my seat and took a breath – I needed to collect myself. I felt like I'd been in a pressure cooker for the last few hours, and however I emerged, rare or well done, I’d be dining out on this experience for a while.
I felt a mixture of emotions; sad, angry, annoyed, happy, and not the least, ‘what the fuck!’, but I also felt shamed, and in a way, humiliated by the experience.
I was the boy who’d missed the penalty kick, and the team lost. I was the dummy at the bottom of the class who’d failed the maths test. I’d forgotten my lines in the Nativity Play in front of the entire school, and I’d be eating my sandwiches alone in the playground for the next week, at least.
Shame, I mused, as I sat alone in my seat, is like taking a shower and watching yourself drain away down the plughole, and I did wonder how the Palestinians in Israel cope with it, day in, day out.
How do you not throw stones? How do you not let hate overtake you? How do you keep the ventricles of the heart open?
I also wondered how much of the pain and struggle of human existence is simply the need to be treated as, exactly that, human. Of course, this sword cuts across the whole spectrum of social interaction, in both directions, and how was the human race, I further mused, going to cope when the United Nations finally disclosed that there were alien bases on the dark side of the moon…
Shit! My passport! I don’t have my passport!
“Stop the bus!” I shouted, leaping out of my seat. “Stop the bus!” The conductor and the driver turned around with looks verging on horror. “My passport, my passport! I don’t have my passport!” I called.
Somehow in the strained atmosphere of Allenby and all things Borg, I’d completely forgotten about it on my way out of the building. Perhaps I'd gotten distracted by the children running around with the machine guns?
“Hey, no problem, no problem, Mr Fee-liks!” said the driver, keeping on driving and holding my passport up in his right hand. He handed it to the conductor who passed it across.
“Thanks,” I said, much relieved, “I thought I’d forgotten it.”
“No problem, no problem!” laughed the driver. Well, that explains how they knew my name.
I opened it up to take a look.
Oh, fuck! Oh, seriously, fuck, fuck, fuck! My stomach dropped.
The Israelis had put a very large, and very obvious ‘Denied Entry into Israel' stamp into my passport, and this was potentially disastrous. My planned route was up through Syria and Iran, and any whiff of an Israeli connection at the border of either of these countries meant you don’t get in.
Iraq and Afghanistan were 'off the map' from the get go, and now taking Palestine, my starting point, along with Syria and Iran, out of a cycling trip that followed Jesus's supposed route to India, didn't leave much.
Specifically it left only Pakistan and India. Hell, I could have just flown to Delhi and done a little loop!
Looping around Pakistan and India in the footsteps of Jesus on a bike?
“This is insane!” I said, out loud, holding up the passport for all to see. “What is wrong with these people?”
All three faces turned to look.
‘They’ve given me a reject stamp! What the fuck! Why did they do this?” I was outraged. At Allenby I’d asked specifically for ‘no stamp’, and I couldn’t help but think that this reject stamp was purely punitive.
Ok, don't let me into your country, fine! But why make life difficult for me after I'd gone? The bastards knew it would create problems...
"And they've even spelled it wrong!" I said. The Israelis had spelled 'Entry denied' as 'Entery denied'. "They're fuckin' morons!"
I was very pissed off.
The Arab chap across the aisle turned and chuckled. “They are Israelis, Mr Fee-liks, they can do what they want!"
“Yes, happens all the time, Mr Fee-liks, nothing to worry about,” said the conductor, also chuckling.
"Yes," I said, "but why me?"
There was a momentary pause, and all three began to laugh.
"Fuck, what's the joke here?” I asked, staring into three highly amused faces. All three gazed back, teeth shining in the half light of the bus.
Well, it was obvious that the indignant Australian cyclist flipping out in seat 1A was the joke. “This is nuts!” I said, exasperated, and throwing my hands in the air.
“Yes, Mr Fee-liks, it is nuts!” said the conductor, and he looked at me with such kindness and genuine amusement, that for the first time since I'd entered Allenby, I didn't feel completely alone, nor a total fool. "It is Israel!" he added, shrugging his shoulders.
"Oh, man!" I said, "Maybe I should go back and complain about the spelling mistake!" which brought a renewed gale of laughter from all three men.
"Yes, yes, I can take you back!" said the bus driver.
"No, forget it, man," I said, now laughing myself. "Fuck 'em!"
This bus was Loony Tunes, but I kinda liked it.
We drove past the white porta-huts behind the cyclone fences on the Israeli side of the border, and if the men in the huts with earphones on were tuning into the conversations, all they would be hearing is insane laughter
At least we're having fun, you fuckers!
I told my story.
“You told the Israelis the truth, Mr Fee-liks?” asked the conductor when I’d finished, somewhat dumbfounded.
“Well, yes, kind of,” I said, which ignited more laughter. This was one hell of a bus.
“Always, the Israelis do this, Mr Fee-liks,” he said, patting me on the shoulder. "They do not want you to see what they are doing in the Palestinian areas."
"How many people do they chuck out?" I asked.
“Always we have people on the bus,” he said.
"Idiots like me, you mean?" I made a face, and shook my head.
"No, no, Mr Fee-liks, you are our friend!" called the bus driver, and he honked the horn, Toot! Toot!
Yep, this was my kinda bus all right...
It looked like this was the best part of their day, viz,; ‘How are the deportees going to react today?’
I felt very much better, almost terrific.
I introduced myself to the Arab chap across the aisle.
Adil was a Palestinian working in Amman, and was trying to get back to Gaza to visit his family.
“They rejected you, too?” I asked.
“Well, yes, I am Palestinian,” he said, with a turn of the head. Being Palestinian, Adil was obviously better acquainted with the whims of Israeli border control than myself, and a lot more philosophical.
“How will you get back home?” I asked.
“I go back to Amman, and maybe tomorrow try at another border crossing,” he said.
“What are your chances?”
“Well, you never know,” he said, quietly, a faint smile crossing his lips. ”And as you say, Mr Fee-liks, it is… insane.”
Adil’s reply caused another ripple of laughter around the bus, and there was no doubt about it, I felt good.
I liked these guys. Maybe we could take the bus all the way to India?
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