Now it's personal.

It has taken the kidnapping of a good friend and the (temporary) release of my boss from a travel ban to jolt me from my blogging lethargy. Here is part one.

Part 1

I had intended this blog to be about that oh-so Arab Spring cliché - ‘the power of social media’ - because at first that seemed to be the most interesting angle from which to tell the story of two memorable events that took place close to me over the last week. Then it struck me that perhaps I was missing the point and like so many jaded foreign correspondents searching for a ‘modern’ take on an old tale I was bypassing what was important - the flesh and blood at the centre. Anyway judge for yourselves.

The Rise of the Map Geek

Back in May I made some cosmetic changes to this blog to reflect more my life in Ramallah. An explanation of the new look is a little overdue. (If you have subscribed and are reading this in an email format you will have to visit the actual blog page for this to make any sense.)

The new background is an artificially aged satellite picture of Ramallah extracted from Google Earth. My office, from where I'm writing this now, is just above the 'b' in the 'Ramallah Ramblings' title at the top of the page. Just above the 's' in the title is Manara Square, a mini Trafalgar complete with lions, which marks the centre of town and the location of these photos of the World Cup and 'El Clasico' celebrations last year. My apartment is about 3 inches to the south hidden by these words. (Click on the picture to the right for an unobstructed view.)

Reasons to be cheerful? Not yet.

If the hopes of some are to be believed these last few days could prove to have been pretty important in the history of this region and the lives of the Palestinian people. Fortunately, you don't have to rely on me for analysis. You don't even have to read some leftist rag.

Nook Neurosis

(WARNING: This post contains material of a pretentious and self-indulgent nature.)

The following is a delayed response to a post by Chloe in which she ponders the question: To Kindle or not to Kindle...?

In her post, Chloe, committed bibliophile that she is, questions whether forsaking the emotional and physical relationship between reader and book is too heavy a price to pay for the clear practical benefits of using an e-reader. Here's my two-penneth.

More holidays than blog posts

So I lied. 'Normal Ramallah-related service' (see my post from 10th May) will have to wait a little longer. A serious confidence and spare-time drought has reduced my ramblings from a slow trickle to barely a dribble. As a result I've actually been on holiday again since I last posted so I'm going to ease myself back in by posting a few photos with oh-so-witty captions. This is the ultimate exercise in lazy blogging, I know, but it shouldn't be too demanding of you either.

Ultimately Unsure...

In a post from last year I wrote about Ultimate Peace, an US/Israeli initiative which attempts to achieve a form of reconciliation between Israeli and Palestinian children through the magic of frisbee.

When I got home I was asked to write an article for Ultimatum, the annual magazine of the sport's governing body in UK. The article was finally published this week. It goes into a bit more detail than the original post and hopefully reflects how my views settled after I had had a little time to ponder. You can read it here.

Rambling to Ramallah - Part II - Touring Turkey

(As you can see I've given the blog a bit of a revamp. More on this to come. The upshot is I've spent so long faffing around with the design I've left little time for writing. Hence the rather large photo to word ratio in this post. This is a relief to you I'm sure. This will be my last holiday related post. Normal Ramallah-related service will resume shortly.)

Long story short, I decided to skip Syria, stay in Turkey for two weeks and fly to Tel Aviv from Istanbul. Turkey is a wonderful country with stunningly diverse scenery and in Istanbul has one of the most mesmerising cities I've ever visited.

Rambling to Ramallah - Part I - Just BBBBecause

Originally posted on 15th April en route from Bucharest to Istanbul

Now this is the business. A (faux) wood panelled compartment, rainy Romanian countryside trundled past the window and no bog roll for 19 hours. This is international train travel and it kicks Easyjet's orange ass every day of the week. (Let's ignore the fact that I face a 1am bus replacement service due a busted bridge on the Bulgaria-Turkey border - all part of the experience, don't you know.)

Ramble VIII - The Greener Grass of Home?

Just a quickie to pass on some news and a few photos.

This is likely to be my penultimate post as I'm heading home a little earlier than planned. Rather unexpectedly, I have been offered a job in London. It is too good an opportunity to pass up and despite reservations about leaving Ramallah after such a short time, with my current project not quite finished, I will be packing my bag and flying home at the end of the month.

Ramble VII - Head Spin

Apologies to all my followers for the recent blog drought. I'm sure the nervous anticipation has been terribly bothersome for you both. To make up for the dry patch this is a bumper post, consisting of two parts, covering my travels to some new parts in the last couple of weeks. Its a bit long but there are plenty of photos. (As usual, click to enlarge)