What You Think You See Isn't Always What You Get

More so than any other time in the past that I've lived here, that I've lived anywhere in the world, I am acutely aware of what others think of me. Not in that middle-school, "Does she think I look fat? Does he think I look cute?" kind of way but just in the projection of self into perception of other kind of way.

There are all kinds of cultural cues here which I do not even begin to understand. Secular Israelis are pretty sure I'm one of them, spotting me as they do in my daily tank top, yet are confused by either the watermelon kippah (!) or the long-sleeve shirts I wear to school every day in keeping with the modesty of teachers here despite the still-scorching heat. Religious Jews observe my signature skirt-over-pants approach to fashion, hipster as it is in San Francisco and Orthodox as it is here, and are almost certain they've found one of their own until they find the other clues that instantly and with certainty prove them wrong.

So there are the attributes of myself and my personality and my choices that I try to express to the world around me using this intricate system of mysterious cues, most of which I do not understand, and then there are the attributes which others assign to me based on elements of my appearance or actions which I don't even know communicate information within this culture, any of which may or may not be true.

*sigh*

It is enough to say the least so one day every week I give myself permission to completely embrace my true identity and express myself as 100% "Amerikai", a term my students use to describe me...or maybe not even 100% Amerikai, which would imply red-white-and-blue tshirts and a Star Spangled Banner ringtone (overheard on the #19 bus the other day) but more like 100% Myself. My Myself day this week was Sunday, and I wrote the following entry in my journal describing a snapshot of my experiences. The new undictionary word that I've coined at the end of the entry describes my six-year-old laptop that moves at dinosaur speed most of the time....

i am sitting on the deck of the "aroma" coffee shop in east jerusalem just outside the gate of the university...doing my homework and drinking espresso and still kind of marvelling at the fully-garbed muslim women sitting on one side of me and the israeli soldiers in full uniform carrying
automatic weapons sitting on the other side. "yesh li neshek?" the guard who searched my bag before i came in asked me. "do you have a gun?" because it is fully allowed and for people who are still completing their army service, even if they are not on active duty, it is required..."lo, lo ha yom," i replied. no, not today.

the song _crazy_ by gnarles barkley is playing over the sound system and i am thinking so much about home and my friends, wondering how and where they are and hoping they are okay and just adoring and missing so much of the life i've left behind for now

and as a total aside, as if the chacos and rei backpack and timex sports watch and h&m jeans and forever 21 sunglasses and and and don't give me away as american, the ibook totally does...no one uses macs here except americans, they are neither sold nor tech-supported so i get a lot of weird looks when using the ibookasaurus. who ever thought that everything about me would be foreign in the way that it is now, here in a place where so many people feel at home?