The Day the Circus Came

Amongst the dust and the chickens, beside the rumble of demolished homes, the circus came to Bedouin village of Al Hadidya in the Jordan Valley. The village of Al Hadidya has had many unwelcome visitations; the Israeli Army has come many times with soldiers and bulldozers, intent on removing the people from their land. So, despite being arranged in advance, the people of al Hadidya were a little wary when a van full of foreigners arrived. Having heard that there was a group of clowns from the BoomChucka Circus troupe (formerly known as Circus2Iraq) were in the West Bank and looking to perform in Palestine, I thought that this would be a good idea to get them into the Jordan Valley. Meeting them in Jericho, we drove up the valley to our first stop. “This is the forgotten part of the West Bank”, Jamil- journalist and translator for the day explained to the group. As they greeted us, we were shown around some of the homes that make up the spread-out camps that is the village of al Hadidya. I explained to the clowns that this village was perhaps the village most at risk from the Occupation. The Israelis had deemed the villagers to be ‘temporary residents’ and as such had no legal right to live on their homes and must leave or be forcefully evicted. If this was happening in Sudan, or in former Yugoslavia, people would not hesitate to use the words ‘ethnic cleansing’ to describe it. But that’s exactly what’s happening here. One group is being forced to leave the land, whilst Israelis are given incentives to settle here in the illegal settlement of Roi. I explained that the Boomchucka circus used to be known as circus to Iraq in my terrible Arabic. “They’re from Iraq?” one of the locals asked. “Er, no. England.” As the circus performers got ready, dressed up in their multi-coloured clothing and bright green face paint, one of them said “I feel like everyone’s staring at me dressed like this” I replied “don’t worry, I get stared at in pretty much the same way without the all the get-up.” So, to an audience of 4 kids, 9 adults, some sheep and chickens, with the destroyed buildings of the villagers as their stage, the performers began their show. To a combination of slapstick, tricks and fire (the troupe admitted to me that they might be the only circus that can’t juggle!), the kids stared in amazement. The magic tricks seemed to pass them by, the fire kept their attention, but the comedy pratfalls and slapstick dissolved them into fits of laughter. “It’s a shame we couldn’t stay to do our fire poi at night.” One of them said. “I think if you put on a fire act here at night the Israelis will shoot you!” said Jamil. Unfortunately, owing to a long running disagreement between the families of Al Hadidya, the clowns were not able to perform to all the kids there. We left, after being forced to take some of their cheese. The next stop (after lunch) was the village of Ein Al Beida, where we were promised a bigger audience. As we arrived and spoke to some villagers, word spread and kids and adults began to arrive. This time a respectable 30 people, aged between 2 and around 70 showed up for the performance. The full show produced yet more squeals of laughter from kids and adults alike (the group of old women in one corner seemed to find it all even more hilarious than the kids did), with highlights including strange multicoloured English people falling over each other and a green faced elf who played with fire. With that the clowns left the Jordan Valley, via Jericho, and on to play gigs in Al Azeria, near Jerusalem. They’ve another 5 weeks left in the West Bank, touring the region and playing to kids who have witnessed more tragedy that comedy in their lives. It’s a strange but welcome form of solidarity, and one answer to the common question ‘what can we do?’ The answer, in this case, is ‘make people laugh.’ For more info on the BoomChuka Circus visit www.circus2iraq.org This entry is filed under Tubas Region, Tubas Region - House Demolitions, Jordan Valley, Hadidya and Humsa, 2008.