My First Demonstration! Oh Boy!

My friend got a warning from my embassy that there would be a protest which of course acted more like an invitation to people like me. A group of people would be meeting at Old Sanaa University and march towards the Lebanon embassy to protest Israel’s bombing of Beiruit. The first thing I thought was “that’s silly, why are they going to the Lebanese embassy? They should go to the Israeli embassy” and then I came to my senses. So easy to forget that I am not in America, even with the call for prayer reminding me five times a day.

My friend told me that these things “always start on time” so I aimed to be there a touch early. I hopped a shuttle and got there at 8:45, fifteen minutes before anything was set to start. I felt pretty conspicuous standing there, so I walked into the university and sat on a bench. Just when I was about to give up and go home, there was a racket outside and this gold-painted jeep that was covered with faded pictures of various figures and loudspeakers on the top drove up and started blasting Arabic music. I went outside and took a look at the protest mobile. It was painted (or rather, had been painted a long, long time ago) and was covered with various picture of important people who had been the cause of past demonstrations. There were four loudspeakers on the top, and a mess of fake flowers decorating the hood. I wondered if this guy rented out or what.

I stood around for another half hour while people slowly drifted in, greeting each other. I was the only westerner, and felt very conspicuous. There was a group of women there but they didn’t seem to want to have much to do with me. After a while my discomfort turned into sheer boredom and I headed to a local café and bought some bread in exchange for the privilege of being able to sit down and eat it. Finally, after a half hour, they got moving and I ran to catch up.

It was my first protest in about two years, and pretty much what you would expect except that instead of saying things like “Hell no we won’t go” they yelled “God is Great” and a few other remarks about various groups beginning with H. Everyone was very kind to me. At first I was a little shy with my camera, but when I dragged it out people started to point out things that I could take pictures of and the kids started begging to be in the shot. I have found that if you have encounter a group of camera shy people skeptical of westerners, the trick is to take a few pictures of the kids. People warm up to you right away.

After about an hour of marching we got to the Lebanese embassy. There was a bit of a tussle as the cops made a human wall to keep the less important protesters back while the featured protesters were able to walk up to the embassy and start making speeches using the protest-mobile. I hopped up on a ledge and got a good view from up high, snapping pictures with my crappy broken camera. At one point there was smoke and I jumped to try to photograph it and some kids saw me and called out to the crowd and they parted like the Red Sea. The kids pulled me through eagerly and I rushed ahead, nearly rendering myself blind when I almost walked into a smaller flag that was being burnt. Seriously, my eyelashes are a bit shorter. They burned it and stomped on it and I photographed it and everyone cheered and asked me where I was from. I told them I was Canadian.

So all in all, the protest was pretty much like the protests in Seattle. A useless outlet for anger and a way to make people think that they are doing something. Afterwards everyone all went off to chew qat and I was left alone wondering where the hell I was. A hour of marching can really take you out of the way.