interrogation

arrived at Tel Aviv airport with N, our stories well rehearsed. walked confidently up to immigration desk together and presented passports. mine was stamped fairly quickly but then, reflected in the glass, I saw a uniformed person standing right behind me. I was told I could go but N was to be questioned. we're together I said so was directed to the 'holding pen' in the corner. won't bore you with the detail except to say we were asked the same questions about every half an hour, each time by a different person (politely). after about three hours I said we'd had nothing to drink so someone went away and came back with a bag with a bottle of water and a sandwich each. an hour later N was called in to another room so I followed and they said they knew she'd tried to get in before and been refused. she convinced them she was no threat (hijab equals terrorist of course) and they said we could go. we then had to retrieve our luggage and wait for someone to search it. that took another half an hour for the scanner person to come and then they spent about 20 minutes searching our luggage. I kept thinking how am I going to explain 60 biros? finally got out of the airport just after 11pm and after another wait of about half an hour got a shared taxi (sherut) to Damascus Gate in Jerusalem. another guy who'd been in the holding pen with us and was on the same programme had waited for us. he was British Pakistani and they didn't like that either. the sherut driver was a lunatic and drove so fast it was almost funny. no buses of course to Bethlehem at that hour so we hailed a taxi to take us to the hotel. he said he could drive us to the checkpoint so we could walk through and find our own way after that (for 90 shekels) or take us all the way there for 300. when we gasped he said he'd have to drive the long way round to avoid the checkpoints. (driver's Palestinian and not allowed into West Bank). as it was well after midnight and we didn't know where we were going anyway, we said yes. the taxi driver was very kind, kept asking other taxi drivers along the way where our hotel was, and finally phoned our emergency contact to get directions. we reached the hotel just before 1.30am to be greeted by kind hospitable Palestinians working in the hotel and shown our rooms. an experience I wouldn't have had on my own and N says she thinks they were polite to us because I was there (they were not so last time).