SJO

Near San José, Costa Rica

The bus I was waiting for had left hours ago, a taxi-driver told me. He had hailed me down as I paced back and forth at the abandoned bus-stop, clearly looking lost and stressed. The way he saw it, I had essentially two options: to ride with him and pay a sum so large even he admitted it was outrageous, or wait for another bus that almost certainly wasn't coming.

I was now visibly frought, and the taxi-driver told me that he didn't envy my decision. Best decisions are made without pressure, he said, so he would wait in the taxi while I made up my mind. I pulled out the paper with the hostel information, looking for any sort of guidance. As I unfolded it, it was odd to recall that only a few hours had passed since I'd booked the reservation--or, indeed, since I'd finally booked the trip. As I stood alone at the bus-stop, enclosed by vacant streets (minus the one taxi), I saw the consequences of my impulsivity. Cheap flights do not necessarily imply smooth logistics, I noted.

The paper gave a street address, and said that a yellow bus would come by the terminal frequently and stop a few blocks from the hostel. I looked again at the sign hanging over the bus station, that clearly told me I was in the right place. The taxi-driver himself had admited this, but said that as I had landed so late there was little point in waiting now. It was hard upon midnight. The taxi honked its horn.

I returned to the hostel paper, simultaneously wishing that the taxi-driver would drive away and persuade me to get in his car. Then I noticed that the paper had said something I hadn't noticed before--that the hostel gate would be locked at midnight, and any tardy travelers would be left outside and forfit their deposit. I looked at the time and groaned. I was going to be one of those travelers. Well Andrew, I thought to myself. This is going to be quite a memorable night.

Part bus, part deus-ex-machina, a shuttle emerged from the darkness and pulled up alongside me. And then my heart sank--it wasn't yellow, and its destination sign was for another city. As the bus doors breathed open, I stupidly stared up at the bus driver. ¨Thirty-fourth Street and Third Avenue?" I asked doubtfully.

"Nobody knows where that is," the bus driver said politely, taking advantage of a teachable moment. "Here, we talk about things being next to other things. What is your hotel by?" he chortled.

I stared at my paper dully. It said something about the Toyota Building, but given the awkward English I was unsure whether it was part of the directions or an advertisement. Not knowing what else to do, I answered, "El edificio de Toyota." The Toyota Building.

"Yes, of course!" The bus driver said, "get in." I looked at the paper one last time. The bus didn't match the paper's description or the taxi-driver's. He gave me a foreboding look from the other side of the road, shook his head, and murmured, "no."

I smiled at him helplessly and boarded the bus. I had no idea where I was going or if the bus was going there. And as the bus turned left at the first road, I saw my last hope fade; by my calculations San Jose simply couldn't be anywhere but to the right. Oh well, I thought again. If I'm going to be without a place to stay, it's probably best to be on a bus instead of in the street. And there was something decidedly romatic about being on a bus going nowhere. That is, I supposed, until we got there.

Still feeling claustrophobic from the plane, I opened the window and welcomed in the new climate. The air was warm and humid, but pleasantly so. The few people still awake waved at my head, protruding from the window like a canine on a joy-ride.

We drove for fifty minutes or so, and I knew then that the gate was certainly closed and that I had landed in Costa Rica without a place to sleep. Live in the moment, I told myself. It'll all work out.

The scenary faded and houses appeared in its wake, all of varying sizes and colors, perfectly interlocking with each other and the hills they rested upon. What a beautiful country, I thought.

The bus stoped, and I was instantly anxious for it to move again. The driver said something to the passenger behind him, and then like a game of telephone the message was gradually passed back to me. It was my stop. Disappointed (and nervous), I left the bus, and felt the eyes of the whole bus on me as I awkwardly turned in circles looking for something that would tell me where I was. The bus driver smiled, and continued to wait for some sign I was in the right place. I faked a thumbs-up and a smile and walked in a random direction. He smiled and drove away. Shit, I thought, as I took in my surroundings. A few palm leaves blew in the night breeze, and a stray napkin floated through the air like an airborne jellyfish. I'm totally alone, I realized.

I returned to my paper and it deciphered something about Taco Bell. I wander around the block a few times, and finally run into a man who was sweeping in front of a restaurant. "Excuse me, where is the Taco Bell?" I asked.

"You came all the way to Costa Rica to eat at Taco Bell?" he replied. "It's closed anyway."

"No, no," I said. "It's so I can find my hotel."

He seemed much happier and pointed me in the right direction. The directions then said (as I understood them) to turn two blocks north. I had no idea what way that was, and tried every direction until I found something that looked sort of promising. "Look for the blue house" it said. In the moonlight and the streetlight, everything seemed blue.

Eventually though, I found a gate that said in peeling letters, "JC Friends". I went up to it, and tried to pull it open, but my fears were confirmed. It was locked.

A few cats jumped around on the yard on the other side of the gate, each appearing quite happy to see me. I comforted myself knowing that the cats would probably very much like to let me in if they could. One of them purred and brushed his body up against the gate's bars. I felt happy.

A police officer appeared in the distance, and it occurred to me how bad it would look were I caught staring through a locked gate at one in the morning. Perhaps I should try and find the Parque Central and just sit on a bench, I thought. It would be better than talking to the police officer anyway.

The cats were growing more excited by the second, and one put out a paw and playfully touched my leg. Other purred and rolled over. Then the door to the building opened, and a dark figure walked across the yard. The cats scurried away and pretended to look angry at me.

"Andrew?" he asked.

"Sí..." I answered shakily.

"I've been waiting for you."

I felt guilty and overjoyed at the same time, and he onlocked the gate and let me through. The cats instantly stopped feigning their anger, and instead blocked my way to the house at the end of the yard, circling around my legs and purring. It was a lovely greeting after a stressful night.

We (including the cats) passed into the lobby and the man went to the computer. "We only have three guests," he said. "I decided to wait for you because I couldn't stand having just two." I thanked him profusely, and moved my items to my room, sent a brief email, and went to bed.

LAX

Near Los Angeles, United States

"We leave for LAX at ten o'clock," the bus driver smiled, stretching her lips so wide that her sunglasses rose up on her nose. She then began to talk about the various security functions of the airport shuttle which no one--myself included--seemed to particularly care about. My twenty or so shuttle companions were instead engaged in their own conversations (German, Chinese, and English were all simultaneously audible), all anticipating the day's coming adventures.

With a groan, the bus rolled forward and merged unto the freeway. For a moment I watched Union Station revolve as the bus turned, but soon it was eclipsed by some nameless office building. The Disney Center peeked out behind a string of corporate buildings, before it too was lost behind a partiucularly large and dull one and was not seen again. Then the Staples Center. A few underpasses. Cars.

Apart from myself--for the moment immersed in a novel--there was only one other person who sat alone, a middle-aged man who clicked through the photo archive in his camera, reflecting on the people and times that he was leaving behind as the bus drove away.

Two planes descended overhead, each bearing travels whose journey would end a few gates away from where mine would begin.

---------

LAX. Tickets. Can I see your passport? As always I've arrived in the terminal far too early, fighting the weight of my eyelids as I sit at the gate and watch people appear and disappear like a silent film with missing frames.

The man in front of me is on the phone with his wife, and things aren't going well. He's trying to fix something with her that's been broken a long time. He seems to want resolution before he gets on the plane, and his insistance is making the problem far worse. He walks away, but his voice and sadness trail behind him like the smoke of a cigarette.

Two women and two men stand at the newstand, thumbing through magazines they don't intend to buy. I hear bits of their conversation--bickering but affectionate--and try and deduce who is dating whom. Any permutation seems possible.

A young-man--his arms akimbo, his stature still--stands against the window and stares into the distance at the hazy Los Angeles skyline. He carries a large (ostensibly heavy) green backpack, but never thinks to set it down. Adults run by him, kids run into him, yet he stands still as his thoughts race.

A large group of Canadians appears in my seating area, exposed by their passports and my immediate neighbor's persistent "aboots". The whole group of them are clad in various shades of black and grey, a color motif stretching even into their gloves and fedoras. I ask them where they are coming from. "We're in various bands," says my neighbor, whose nose-ring wiggles as he speaks. "There's a big bagpipe convention."

"Good luck to you then," I say.

"It's over. It was in LA."

"Oh," I apologize. "How did it go?"

"Not very well," he and his nose-ring sighed.

A man sleeps with his head wrapped in a plaid shirt, his head balanced on his backpack in a way that is sure to render his back even more sore than air travel naturally induces.

A group of three men mutter in Portguese against the window. They carry with them large bags that undoubtedly bear some sort of instrument, and I wonder if these men were more victorious than the disallusioned Canadians I had just met. I eavesdrop on their conversation to find out, fail, and comfort myself knowing that I could hardly be expected to know the word "bagpipe" anyway.

The boarding call. Heads turn, and mouths yawn. The Canadians have left. The Portuguese move toward the line. The quiet man in the green backpack moves toward his sleeping friend, peeling the plaid shirt of his head to tell him it is time to board. The mysterious couples put the magazines back on the rack and rush past a disappointed cashier. Presumably somewhere a sad man is still on the phone with his wife.

I close my notebook, extract my ticket from its pages, and join them all at the gate.

Crowded Buses

Tel Aviv, Israel.

She had an accent, but it wasn't a strong one. To my American ears her melodic vowels might have been nothing more than a foreign variation of our mutual native tongue. Yet as she continued to talk I noticed that there were gaps in her English, as adjectives and nouns were transposed, and a few verbs hovered in the air to wait indefinitely for an actor and a recipient.

There were gaps in her memory as well; she asked me where I was from several times, each time seeming surprised that she was holding a handrail--however feebly--next to a genuine Yankee. Yet each time she seemed happy.

But the gaps were excusable. Details about my own identity didn't really factor into our conversation anyway, as she focused instead on shards of old stories and glimpses of old memories from a world that had flourished and died decades before my birth. This world, she said, was somewhere in Eastern Europe, though the precise location wasn't clear.

"It's been part of every empire at some point or another, and what it is now doesn't really matter. I wouldn't recognize the place; I know that. That world is gone." I was still curious to ask where it was specifically, but asking the question again didn't feel appropriate. To her its new nation-state label was entirely arbitrary; all that mattered was that it had been her home several decades ago. And now that that home was gone, it was as though the place didn't really exist at all.

After she disclosed her vague origins, she paused for nearly an entire minute, as though she were recycling thousands of memories beyond her thick, impenetrable sunglasses. Though the wrinkles on her face where still, her body tightened as did her grip upon the rail. The skin around her knuckles grew whiter than the rest of her skin, which was already a pale, pasty color.

"Then we came to Yaffo after the war." She said this as though it were the conclusion of a long story she had just finished telling me. Then she added abruptly, "This is your stop." She shook my hand as I passed to the door.

The Buds of Palestine

Adapted from an Amman taxi driver's lengthy monologue.

The trees are in bloom in Palestine, and they have been for thirty-two years.

When I left everything was lush, and though thirty years have gone by, there has been no bomb that has robbed Palestine of its splendor, that has imprinted anything but lushness upon its soil. The air in Palestine blows with the blessing of divinity, and thus will triumph over the petty smoke of men. Though the shadow of the sword is large upon the fields of Canaan, no arms can vanquish them. For God's shield meets them always.

And after thirty years the trees must still be in bloom.

Perhaps there are more trees now, after those buds became flowers and those flowers became fruit. They decayed and from their seeds were born new trees. Palestine is the same; it has died thousands of times over thousands of years, but it always emerges again. It is a sheet of earth connecting the river with the sea, cradled in the breast of divinity; it is God's to treasure and to dote upon. No exodus nor war has changed that.

The land is more powerful than its occupants, just as it always was; it alone could withstand the stain of war and the ravages of politics. Though its people perish, its soil still covers them like it covers the bones of the prophets. There is no tribe, no faith that can ever rule Palestine. Palestine is God's to rule.

But perhaps the trees have died.

Perhaps upon the land there is famine like in the old days, when Joseph took his family south for abundance and brought them into servitude. Perhaps there is nothing there but God's presence, flooding the land like He did the earth in its infancy, crushing its palms like pillars falling beneath temples. Perhaps therein is the riddle that explains why the land that radiates holiness is the stage upon which unholiness is waged.

It may be these things are true, because I have not been there for thirty-two years. And perhaps I never will again.

Perhaps nothing blooms in Palestine. Perhaps only the dust blows.

American Television

Northern Desert, Jordan.

My phone was dead and there were no clocks on the walls, but I nevertheless knew that it was well past midnight. Apart from Amr and I, the only thing awake in the house was the television, that--at this late hour--had shifted to slightly controversial television. As a country that has invested only minimally in entertainment, Jordan borrows movies and television shows from other countries. Turkish soap-operas are dubbed in Arabic, and B-grade American movies (generally starring the Coppola-family black sheep, Nicholas Cage) run with subtitles.

For the most part, the loans from American television are quite tame, but that night--as I heard the first chords of the Six Feet Under theme song--I found myself watching the one show I thought would never air on Jordanian television. Amr--who was open-minded but nevertheless quite conservative--seemed surprisingly familiar with the show and didn't change the channel.

It was a classic Six Feet Under plot, involving a deranged daughter stealing a dead-man's foot from the family funeral home. It had all the regular plot lubricants like drugs, infidelity, and family-feuding. Although it was heavily edited by the networks--both in actual scenes and in subtitle translations--it was still the last thing I would ever expect to see in Jordan.

With the cultural differences and network modifications, I wondered how much of the show Amr was actually understanding. After watching a tension-filled conversation in the beds of one of the show's central couples--a gay couple--Amr commented, "I'm so glad they're really good friends. They do everything together." At that point I realized that Amr and I were watching entirely different shows. But whatever show Amr was watching, he seemed to be enjoying it.

The show ended with an awkward moment between the mother and her daughter-in-law-to-be. In a conversation loaded with cultural references, I wondered why someone had bothered to write subtitles at all. Afterward, I gingerly asked Amr what he had thought of it. He admitted that he had been a bit confused by some parts, he nevertheless had enjoyed it. "It's a good show," he said.

"Do feel like you're missing anything by not being an American?"

Amr then tried to explain that the reason he had watched it was because he wasn't American. Like myself, Amr was the product of a small town where everyone knew everyone's business. Watching a TV show about other people's drama was therefore totally interesting.

In fact, Amr continued, watching drama about a family that was nothing like his own was much more enjoyable. He said he was best able to enjoy drama by watching people collapse over problems he would never have to worry about--virtually anything in Six Feet Under. "It's always the other people that are the most interesting," he offered.

"You know, Amr," I said, "That show takes place about thirty minutes from where I live. But I don't really understand the problems either."

"Then that's why we both like it," he concluded.

The Lonely Man in the Cafe

Amman, Jordan.

A man with a pipe needs no friends. He needs only a quiet night and an empty table. His smoke forms the men who would otherwise join him, but these ghosts of men do not restrain his thoughts as real men would. Rather they are the objects of his meditation, the substance of his reverie.

A man enters places that men never go.

He had a home once, now he has a house. His home is in another country—across a still river—but he has not been there in many years. In moments like these, when he sits alone and blows smoke-rings around his thoughts—weaving himself in a smokey matrix of memory—he can remember Palestine.

A son waits a few streets away. He does not know that his father is here, lost in memories he's never had, and walking through streets whose names he's never learned. Because to the son the memories of the father have become legend. And in this legend our hero is aging, fatigued, and lost. He is turning the key he's saved for generations into the door that was buried generations ago—beneath a hill beside his grandfather's grave.

The smoke rolls through the air like the green hills once did when they rested upon the clouds of paradise. Paradise has fallen, but thrives in the dreamer's ken.

Oh David! My house for yours,
And my son for Absalom?
May he forsake me, may he take me,
But no home but mine for him!

Soccer and Tea

Amman, Jordan.

I have never been very good at soccer. For about twenty years, I had convinced myself that it was because I was American, and the sport simply wasn't very common in my country. Indeed-- I persuaded myself further--it was perfectly understandable why I wouldn't have even basic skills. Yet as I stumbled on a deflated soccer ball--only to lose it to a 12-year-old opponent--I realized that nationality probably had nothing to do with it. I was just bad.

"Andrew!" called another young boy on my team, "get it back!" Unfortunately the ball was long-gone. My more athletic opponent was dribbling the ball toward his goal, and after he shoved aside an ailing member of my team, his shot was open. From my angle, his attempt was a miss--too far to the left. Yet to everyone else it was close enough. The goal had been somewhat variable the whole night it seemed, but never to my advantage.

"Mabruk!" called boys of his team and mine, "Well done!" Someone threw the ball back onto the street and we were at it again. Surely the ball had been white once, but the sun had set long ago, and a few months of dirt on the ball disguised it further. And in this neighborhood--among the poorest in Amman--there were no streetlights. The boys, however, saw no reason to stop playing.

After a few awkward minutes of chasing after an invisible ball (apologizing frequently for stepping on my young team-members), Ahmad--someone's older brother--appeared in the street and declared the game over. He asked everyone to thank their American guests (my friend Wes and I) for their contribution to the game, and to run home before their mothers worried too much. I was quickly smothered by the thanks of twelve-year-olds. "Thanks, Andrew," said one boy sincerely. "You were great," said another, who gave me a high-five as he walked down the street. There wasn't a hint of sarcasm in the boy's voice, and I assumed that in the dark the boy had confused me with my more atheltic friend Wes.

Ahmad watched the boys disperse and called us in for tea. Although I understood tea-invitations were central to Arab culture, I partially wondered if he wasn't trying to help my ego by offering an activity that required no athleticism. Surely anyone could drink tea. Wes and I assented, and followed him though the gate and into the backyard of his home. It was still winter then, and the cool night breeze made us remember it. Thankfully, Ahmad's family had prepared a fire next to a small shed. Only fire and company, it seemed, could survive the cold nights.

We spoke few words that night, but it wasn't uncomfortable. Ahmad and his family were happy to learn where we were from and to enjoy silence with us. Once they asked if we liked Jordan. We sincerely replied that we did. We knew they were our friends and we were theirs, and with this in our hearts we were content to let the cool wind blow and seek fire from the same hearth.