” My first day going to Hebron, Palestine. I can’t believe that I am in Palestine now. If you were to ask me a month ago, I probably will not tell you that I will be in Palestine. So how did I get myself here and most importantly what motivated me to want to be here?

My name is Noorchaya Yahya.  I am originally from Malaysia; however, I have lived almost half of my life in America. I received my BA and MA  in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESOL)) from the University of Northern Iowa, Iowa, USA. I returned to Malaysia and worked at the International Islamic University of Malaysia (IIUM) for several years.

I went back to the US and received my doctoral degree in Rhetoric and Linguistics from the Indiana University of Pennsylvania.  In the summer of 1997, I had the opportunity to teach in the Institute of English Language at Harvard where I was teaching English as a second language to international students from Asia and South America. In Fall 1997, I secured a job in the College of Education at Florida Atlantic  University (FAU) where I was tenured and promoted to an Associate Professor rank.

I spent 15 years of my career life in FAU teaching  TESOL methodology to pre and in-service teachers in the Florida schools. In 2007 till 2009, I spent my sabbatical year and extended my stay at Taibah University in Medina AlMunawwarah –that was my introduction to living and working in Saudi Arabia. I like living and working in Saudi Arabia so much that I applied for a job at King Saud University in Riyadh and have been there for the past 5 years. This is in a nutshell about myself and my career in the field of TESOL education.

The first half of Ramadan

Back to why I am in Palestine now– In mid-May 2017, King Salman of Saudi Arabia decided to award the universities and schools a shorter semester term. So all instructional and assessment exercises should be completed before Ramadhan- that’s when I decided to find a place to go during the first half of Ramadan as I will have some free time.

Last year I spent the last 10 days of Ramadan in Mecca, and I have been blessed to be able to spend my Ramadan in Medina and Mecca over the years that I was in Saudi Arabia. So this year, out of the blues, an idea came to mind about visiting the Al-Aqsa Mosque which I have never visited before.

Visiting Al-Aqsa

The reason I dismiss the thought of visiting Al-Aqsa all this time is that I have heard scary stories about coming into Palestine with regards to safety issues and entering Israel. One solution to this problem as I am more certain about coming to visit the Al-Aqsa Mosque is to find a solution.

Googling “Volunteer in Palestine”

The solution is to connect to a volunteer organization that can give me information about being in Palestine. This day and age where one can get most information by just googling, I resorted to googling “Volunteer in Palestine” and I was taken to the Excellence Center website. Everything else from here is history. I emailed Mr. Rafat Shantir the person in charge of the center and I was immediately given information and assistance on how to get here. Within a period of 3 weeks, my dream of being in Al-Aqsa Mosque was materializing.

Generous Palestinian family

In addition to this dream came other wonderful opportunities—I met a friendly and helpful team of dedicated staff at the Excellence Center, a kind and generous Palestinian family whom I live within Beit Ummar. So far, my sincere intention in praying in Al-Aqsa Mosque rippled into other amazing encounters with the people of Palestine.

Along the way to the Excellence Center in Hebron, I met a few individuals that guided me so as I will not be lost. At the Damascus gate in Jerusalem, I met a kind lady that walked me through the beautiful souq towards the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the second person that assisted me to get to the bus station from the Al-Aqsa Mosque was a man called Khalil.

He helped me carry my heavy suitcase and put me on the right bus, bus number 231 to Bethlehem and in the bus, I met another kind man that told me that he was going to AlKhalil  (Hebron in Arabic) and we took the same bus and he paid my bus fare. Although it was a tiring first day, it was an adventurous and fulfilling day for me.

Final remarks 

I had a great spread of Palestinian food on my second day of iftar at my host family’s house. My host mother made delicious Palestinian food—batata mashy (stuffed potatoes) caragana (stuffed grape leaves), salata (salad) and drank date juice. All in all my first day at the Excellence Center was a great start of my two-week stay in AlKhalil (Hebron)”!