Thursday : Nov 11 20 10
My flight from Boston's Logan airport to JFK was about half an hour which was great. I took the shuttle to Newark airport. The boarding and departure was on time despite the many layers of securities at the airport for those of us traveling to Israel. I slept a couple of hours and wake up to have dinner after which I watched the movie Gandhi and went back to sleep again , when I woke up we were two hours away from Ben Gurion int airport in Tel Aviv and my heart started beating faster, so I am finally getting to be here , to see all the holy sites I have been reading about since I was a child and many stories my many friends from the region have been telling me. I was excited.. We clapped and cheered as the plane made a safe landing. My excitement was short lived as I walked out of the plane into the beautiful warm weather of God's Country..'PRIVILEGE PASSENGER'
Friday 11.20.10
I was the only passenger who is Black / African Descent or you can say ( person of color) as officially referred to in America. Those of you that I have shared my airport experiences with, know that I am a 'privilege' passenger, and it didn't take long for the Israel security officials to figure that out, an officer pointed at me and asked me to step aside for security check whiles showing me his badge.
' I am use to this but at least they should have wait for me to streh my legs after 10 hours flight. The first officer asked me for my passport and asked me all sort of questions from my first, last and family names to my grand parents names and my job address. Then handed my passport to another officer who asked me the same questions and also asked me if I have another passport apart from the America one when I asked why should i have another passport?, his response: ' because you were born in Ghana and some people have two passports' and handed my passport to me.
Fastfoward to the passport control 'box' : I handed my passport to an officer in one of the kiosks and she also drilled me with the same questions in a nice way, much nicer than the guys from the plane gates. She then gave my passport to another officer who asked me to followed him which I did thinking that he was just going to do a body check and let me go since I was having an American Passport, I was wrong...... it took me more than two hours to leave the airport and according to other people, I was lucky....
I went through many interviews by about six different immigration officers asking me the same questions over and over and over again., they called my friends to verified if they were expecting me. The whole process was very intimidating and stressful. The last officer that interviewed me was a sweet lady, she was very respectful as she asked two additional questions: Are you a Muslim and do have any kids, what are their names? I answered and she made a last phone call to the friend who was picking me up and asked me to go wait for her . She came out a couple of minutes later and handed me my passport as she welcomed me to Israel. I was picked up by my friend Daniel and his friend. We drove to an open outdoor market call Mahne Yehuda in down town Jerusalem the market was busy Shabbat. We visited a young family for me to have diner and also see how the Shabbat is observed. . The street of the neighborhood the (Bak' a ) was empty as people wish each other Shabbat Shalom, its the Jewish observing of the sabbath I have already falling in love with the city of Prophets David, Solomon and Jesus.
Quote of the Day:
Holy Quran chapter 7:verse 1
'Glory to ((Allah)) Who did take His servant for a Journey by night from the Sacred Mosque (Mecca)to the farthest Mosque(Jerusalem), whose precincts We did bless,- in order that We might show him some of Our Signs: for He is the One Who heareth and seeth (all things).
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