Translator: Liliane Tambasco Reviewer: Denise RQ
I am here today to tell you the story of my grandmother.
That's her, on the upper left hand side of the photo.
This photo was taken probably around 1942
so she'd have been 11 or 12 years old at the time.
That's her with her siblings and her mother,
who actually passed away soon afterwards.
So growing up, my grandmother used to tell me
the same five or six stories about her childhood.
These were usually happy stories,
but there was one in particular that wasn't.
I remember hearing bits of this story when I was 10, 12, or 15 years old
usually sitting with my grandparents in their London home, after dinner.
The story was never fully coherent, except for one image
that has remained seared in my mind since then.
That's the image of my grandmother as a teenager,
standing alone in the middle of her room terrified,
packing her bag hurriedly.
Her father had rounded her and her siblings up
and told them to pack up only what they needed for a short time,
that they were in danger and needed to leave immediately,
but would surely be back home soon.
Foreign forces have invaded their hometown
and began bombing areas near them.
Families began pouring out of their homes in terror.
Some of them taking their chances and heading straight into the sea,
others beginning what would be a long and arduous journey on foot.
Luckily, my grandmother and her family made it out safely that day.
And we were among the fortunate few
to be able to board a plane onto safer ground.
So this is probably one of the final photos
taken of grandmother before she left her home.
This year, the year that I turned 30,
I decided to go to the place where my grandmother had grown up.
After arriving and having some random conversations
with people that I never met before
and telling them that I was looking for her house,
I was soon armed with a couple of leads to start my search.
I arrived in her hometown and straight away
called the local tour guide,
who pointed me in the direction of her neighborhood.
Within minutes, I found myself standing on the same street
that she had stood on nearly 70 years before
smelling the same sea breeze and touching the same old stone.
I felt myself melting completely into the atmosphere
knowing that a part of me, somehow, had always been there.
I called my grandmother as I stood on her street,
this is what the street looks like now.
As I was standing in this spot I spoke to her,
hoping that maybe with her on the other side of the line,
I might be able to somehow find her house.
She kept saying to me on the phone, "King George Avenue, Tamara."
That's were the house was.
I went looking up and down the street,
searching for any house that might fit her description;
three levels, with the trading floor at the bottom,
on a street corner, with balconies.
I didn't find the house that day
or the next day that I went back.
But somehow, it didn't really matter because I already knew
that I'd found some kind of silent treasure in Jaffa.
That's what Jaffa, her hometown, looks like now.
In Arabic, people call it, "The Bride of the Sea."
(Arabic) "The Bride of the Sea."
So, in 1940 -no 1948, in fact -
1948, was the year that my grandmother
was forced to leave Palestine and to leave her home.
This is her, with her sister Malikah and her brother Naim
with Palestine in the background.
Her story, although specially in this detail,
is not actually a unique one.
That year, around 800,000 Palestinians were forced
to leave their homes or fled in terror.
That's around 80% of the Arab population of Palestine at the time.
Around 531 villages were destroyed or resettled
by Zionist Army Forces in the 1948 war,
and it lead up to the establishment of the State of Israel.
Why this story matters for us today?
Not because this is the story of my grandmother,
I think it matters for us because this story is representative
of different moments in history,
moments that marked the upheaval and struggle experienced
by so many different people in so many different parts of the world.
It matters because this is a similar story,
although a different moment in history,
experienced by Jewish refugees fleeing from oppression
in the 1930s and 1940s.
It matters because as a result of that particular moment in 1948,
hundreds of thousands of Palestinians continue to struggle today,
as the children, the grandchildren, and even the great-grandchildren
of those families displaced in 1948,
continue to live in temporary refugees camps
scattered across the Arab world
still waiting to return home.
Some of them still owe their keys
and their deeds to their old houses.
It matters because, as we speak,
next door to Israel and Palestine, in Syria,
a new generation of landless and homeless people is being created
some of whom will be absorbed
into the fabric of this very country, in the coming years.
All of this people that I am mentioning,
and there're many, many more of them around the world,
including my grandmother story,
all of those people continue to wait to return home
for so many years.
I am not sure when my grandmother might have given up on the idea
that she might be able to go home,
but I know it's something that have stayed with her all this time,
and that is why she was able to transmit such a strong feeling to me.
I imagine that's the same for many refugees
who somehow, imagine, and believe, and hope, as they should
that they will return home soon.
I think it also matters,
because through this story you can engage with an experience
that might otherwise be completely alien to you.
I really believe in the power of stories
to open hearts and minds,
I think that's what is needed today more than ever,
a reminder of our shared humanity.
I think that if we can start to see these struggles of oppression
not as political struggles but as human struggles,
for the most basic rights,
then maybe we can begin to change the way that we perceive them.
The word "makan" means place in Arabic.
Makan is the name of the project I am now working on
that hopes to do just this: to cut through the political
in order to reach the most human core of the Palestinian struggle,
to try and remind people that ultimately,
what Palestinians are trying or are hoping for on a day-to-day basis
and working towards is quite simply a dignified life
and a place where they can raise their children in safety.
I am working on Makan
with a fellow Palestinian colleague, Tariq.
Him and I are both the fruits of the story
that I've shared with you today,
the offspring of ancestors who found themselves
in the wrong place at the wrong time.
We've both, in our different ways, searched for our place
in this greater story.
So before I continue, I want to tell you
how the search for my grandmother's house actually find out,
because I had pretty much given up
on the hope of actually finding her house
when I was there in Jaffa on my last day or two.
But on that last day, I had what it seemed at the time
like a random encounter with two local older men
who knew Jaffa inside out
and who had actually heard of my grandmother's family.
One of them, Abu George, a Palestinian who has been in Jaffa since 1950s
and the other Yossi, an Israeli.
I had the fortune of meeting them
and they willingly became my guides for the next hour,
practically holding my hand
as we embarked upon the adventure of looking for my grandmother's house.
This is a selfie that I took with them
just before I left Jaffa actually.
That's Yossi on the left hand side
and Abu George in the middle.
I think you can tell from their faces how lovely they are.
So soon after I took that photo, just before I left Jaffa,
I pressed a piece of paper with my details on it
into Yossi's hand,
Yossi who had voluntarily offered
to continue the search for my grandmother's house.
And he, in turn, gave me a piece of Jaffa stone
to give to my grandmother.
I left, and within a few days,
I was back on stable ground, at home, in London.
The sharpness of the experiences I'd accumulated on my trip
began to blur at the edges,
and Palestine, once again, began to regain that mythical quality
that it has always had for me.
And then I received an e-mail from Yossi
which I am actually going to try and read out to you.
The e-mail was titled - well, with a few typos -
but it was titled, "Your grandmother's house."
He meant "your great-grandfather", the father of my grandmother.
So in it, he writes, "Hi, Tamara how are you?
I don't know if you got my e-mail so I will send it again.
I found your grandfather's house.
The building exists, and it was even studied
by students of Architecture at Tel Aviv University.
I am attaching here the connection to the work of the students,
and I hope that your grandmother shall recognize the house.
It is a very impressive building.
Your grandfather built it as the first house in north Alnuzha.
Let's hope that someday you'll be able to live in it.
(Arabic) Say hello to your grandmother.
(English) It means say hello to your grandmother.
Yours, Yossi."
This is a photo of the house, from the project,
the architecture project that Yossi was talking about.
This's what it looks like today.
When I saw this photo, I realized I had actually passed this house
and even taken a photo of it, when I was in Jaffa.
I just had no idea,
I had no way of knowing that this was the house.
So, when I received that e-mail from Yossi, I burst into tears;
maybe because I was crying on behalf of my grandmother
and all that she had lost.
Or maybe because through Yossi,
I had unearthed this family treasure
and somehow, what was always an almost legendary family story,
had come true.
I want to leave you with one final thought.
The reason why I am standing here today,
apart from because of Stewart,
is because of my very dear Israeli friend Noam.
And my friendship with Noam has tested me,
it has tested my willingness and my ability
to maintain an open heart and an open mind.
She is the first close Israeli friend that I have had,
and it has really taught me
to not allow the identities and labels
of Israeli, Palestinian, Arab, Jewish, whatever
to actually dictate the human connection
that you develop with a person.
It has really served to remind me that,
that actually, all that ultimately matters is that connection
that you can develop with people or the person around you.
Similarly, in this talk today, I chose to not immediately tell you
where my grandmother had grown up,
- although you probably figured it out from Stewart's talk before -
I didn't initially want to tell you that she was Palestinian
or grew up in Palestine,
precisely because I wanted to avoid
any potential, preconceived notions or judgments
that you might have had when hearing that word,
I wanted you to care about her history
not because where she was from
but purely because of the fact that she is human
and because of the particular injustice that she suffered,
and that so many people have suffered
and indeed today, continue to suffer.
And I really believe that if we can do that,
if we can begin to break down and break through our prejudices,
that we all have,
and allow those identities and labels that we place on people
to slowly melt away,
then maybe, we can remind ourselves
that every person deserves a place on this Earth,
a place where they can raise their children in safety,
a place where they melt into the atmosphere,
knowing that they belong, knowing that they are free.
Then maybe we can start to value each life equally.
Thank you.
(Applause)