Great People - Bad Situation — Kirkley Consulting

Apologies for the delay in this post, but we've been in Gaza for the last few days and have been a bit busy. Gaza - this place should be a resort town. It has long Mediterranean beaches, great weather, friendly locals (those not carrying the AK-47s anyway) and, needless to say, at the moment it's not overrun by tourists!

So, the trip to Gaza started with catching a taxi that can travel both in the West Bank and Israel proper - luckily we know a guy (a lot of stuff around here involves knowing a guy). The trip to the Gaza border crossing, Erez, takes about 1.5 hours. The crossing point looks like a large regional airport - from the Israel side. From the Gaza side, it looks like a 12m high cement wall with a small metal door in it!

After going though passport control it is a short walk through a couple of small security turnstiles - large enough for one person - without luggage, so a bit of a struggle when you're packing a laptop and a bag of clothes - to a metal door at which you just wait until someone, somewhere decides to open it - and then you're in Gaza. Now to just navigate the 500m no-mans-land to get to get to the Gaza side. This side of the crossing is a little more - lets say modest - ie a bit of a shed and a few demountables. I assume they are not allowed to build anything more substantial this close to the wall.

Once through here, it's a quick 30min drive into Gaza City and to the hotel, which is located on the beach and a 5min walk to the office. While in Gaza I put my skills to good use and worked on some budget spreadsheets for the the projects that we are running there.

We went out with Gazan friends most nights for dinner. And one night we headed to a local YMCA to watch our friend's daughters rehearse a play. The play was originally due to be performed the week the war broke out, so it's been delayed a little bit. Oh well, at least they're all safe and able to continue rehearsing - especially since the building next door to the girl's school got bombed - while school was in.

The war damage is not so obvious in the area where the office is. However, you can generally tell which are government buildings by the fact that they are now just piles of rubble. Rebuilding is yet to start because construction materials are not yet being allowed into Gaza.

There are plenty of issues to deal with in Gaza. However, the locals are remarkably resilient and maintain a level of optimism despite the current situation. In addition to being in the "Largest Jail (sic) on Earth", as the mugs we got from the Chairman Arafat Souvenir Shop proclaim, the locals have to deal with the local politics which have become more complicated, and conservative, since Hamas took over earlier this year. New laws are increasingly restricting freedoms (mainly for women) in the Strip. The even tried to ban women from using Hubbly Bubblys or Sheeshas (the middle eastern bong-like smoking apparatus). However, fear of a revolt (and I think some money changing hands) lifted the ban within a day. It just goes to show how fluid the local politics can be. Locals tell us that new laws seem to be coming into force almost daily.

The trouble, which I'm sure you heard about on the news, in Rafah is another example of the fluidity of local politics - let alone 'international' or Israeli politics. Don't worry, we were no where near the trouble. Actually, we were on the way back through the checkpoint (a 5 hour ordeal - but that's another story in itself.) when it was all going on.

Anyway, back in Ramallah now, and heading for Kenya tomorrow.

Here are some pics from Gaza.