In June 2008, Marcus was the surprise guest at „Social Entrepreneurship Forum“ in Potsdam. He showed the trailer of Heart of Jenin and the audience, mainly tough business men, have been deeply moved. So was I. At the following speakers’ dinner, I sat next to him. „This project’s energy is simply incredible. I would love to take part.“ „Welcome“ was his answer.
For the second time, I am here in Jenin now. Sitting in the basement of this old, beautifully renovated guesthouse. I’m enjoying the fresh air and the peace in the middle of this amazing, boiling hot, vivid, dusty city.

And here, in Jenin, I can feel this high energy again. This house is an open system, attracting people from all over the world. They come, they observe, they listen and then they get hooked – everybody ready to participate, contributing with whatever they can. With a brush in their hand to paint a window frame, or a camera to advise the kids how to shoot scenes of their daily life, with a knife to cut the kilos of freshly bought vegetables from the market around the corner to prepare dinner for numerous hungry stomachs, or sitting at one of the laptops, sending mails or working on the layout of an “Cinema Jenin coming soon” advertisement – or just sitting on the terrace till late, a glass of peppermint in one hand and a cigarette in the other, thinking out of the box to find solutions and new ideas or just talking about the daily impressions….

To give you an idea, let me describe to you five minutes of our daily Jenin life:

Mara is drawing plans for the future garden behind the cinema. Ulf is explaining today’s schedule of his workshop to the kids from the camp, while Fakhri’s cell, abandoned on the kitchen table, is playing „Letters to Elise“ for the 66th time. He forgot it there when he had to rush to the cinema to supervise the construction site. Stefan, sitting in his well equipped studio in the fresh basement, is cutting a new trailer.

Hitcham is leaving with a group of journalists to the camp to meet Ismael for an interview. He will translate. Since he arrived, our communication with the Jenin people has seriously improved, due to his reliable translations. Mara and myself, we decided to take a crash course in Arabic, back in Berlin. On the terrace, Marcus is talking about contracts to our local lawyer, who once again brought us a bowl of the most delicious figs ever. Jamila, our oriental princess, is preparing a trip to Ramallah with a Catalan photographer. Tom and Paul, our youngsters, have left the boring grown-ups for a hopefully more interesting occupation. Annette is checking the right colours for the so called „Japanese Suite“, our guesthouse’s luxury room. Julia and Stefan are painting the roof’s balustrade in an adorable, constant, calm, and efficient way. They definitely will be awarded the most valuable craftsmen of the year! Poor Julia, our pianist, who was supposed to have a music workshop at Cuneo Centre with children from the camp has to stay in bed and recover from her cold. Probably the result of some 40° in the shadow and the most efficient air-condition of a shuttle bus. And our third Julia is transforming a chaotic conglomeration of colors and materials by painting everything in this great Palestinian colour that could not decide whether to become green or blue. Aljoscha, the man with the microphone, is working on hours of recorded sound material. Matthäus is revising the registration form that our guests will need to fill out for the tourist authority upon their arrival. Achim, our magician is working on his next miracle. By fixing whatever is broken he is saving our lives at least once a day.

And in between our various occupations, people from Jenin are coming and going in and out our open house, discussing with us, and observing the European life in the heart of their city with great interest. We are happy to learn some Arabic words in order to help us to be as kind as they are when we are going out for a walk in the city. Almost every day, we are kindly invited to their homes where we are received in a most warmhearted way. We are thrilled by their kindness. Today, Hicham and me, we were visiting the lady who is sewing our curtains. I love to go there. We are received with big smiles and I even get a little kiss. Due to Hicham’s tireless translation, I am getting some insights into the hard lives of our friends. Well, there are so many more stories I would love to share with you. I even would love to sit down and write a book about these people and their country I am getting to know a little bit better every day. But now I should better continue to send mails to potential supporters…..

As master Thich Nhat Hanh said at the end of an inspiring retreat: “Don’t explain. You have to experience!”

So, when are you coming to Jenin?