Rania’s Story
My refugee story starts a few generations ago with the forcible uprooting of two families forced out of their homes in Ramleh and Jerusalem.
My grandmother was pregnant with my father when they fled their home and the shop they owned in Ramleh. Finding refuge with family in Hebron, my grandmother gave birth to my father, only to be displaced once again to Egypt while he was a senior in high school.
My mother’s father was only 14 when his family was forced out and lost their home in Jerusalem. They moved to the Gaza Strip, inconceivable now, given the brutal permit system dividing up Palestine and the restriction of movement within the occupied territory. Much like my other side of the family, my mother’s side faced multiple displacements in each generation, moving to Egypt where she was born, then to Libya, and finally to Hebron.
I was born in Libya and lived my childhood between there and Jordan. In 1986, my family relocated to the West Bank. I attended UNRWA schools in a refugee camp for two years while living with my aunt and grandparents in Hebron, as they were much better than the public schools. I continued to remain connected with UNRWA long after primary school, volunteering at various summer programs in between my years at college and working with Palestine refugees. Every day on my way to school, I walked in and out of Al Fawar refugee camp. There, I learned about my family’s story and how we and others lost our homes. It was in these classrooms where my understanding of social justice, equity, and civic work was shaped.
One childhood memory that always stuck with me was from my first trip to Jerusalem with my grandparents, aunt, and uncle. I remember Fairouz was playing on the radio and I hummed along as we watched the hills separating Jerusalem from the Mediterranean. While driving on the Hebron-Jerusalem highway and entering what is now known as West Jerusalem, I heard my grandfather enthusiastically shout, “look, there’s our home!” Everyone in the car turned and saw the house, except me. I thought, “What house? Where? Why can’t we go there? Can we go back?” As I bombarded my grandparents with questions, they struggled to explain to me, a young child, the nuances of displacement and the reasons we were not allowed to return to their house. I don’t remember their answers. All that stayed with me was the devastating fact that I could not see it.
The next morning, I went to school and told my teacher Ms. Rasha what happened. She suggested that on the next trip I should tell my grandfather to let me know when we were getting close to the house and so when we pass by it, I would be prepared to take a mental photo of it. She gave me a sketchbook and a pencil to keep with me so that I could draw the features of the house before my memory started to fade.
We went on several trips that summer, and on each one of these trips I would keenly focus on different details of the home. A few weeks after my first glance of the house, I had drawn the entire balcony, and by the end of the summer, I had an outline of our family’s home, complete with the ornate windows and doors, all the way down to the small details of the stone bricks along the facade.
This started my fascination with buildings, their designs, and the way parts of people’s cultures and identity manifested in these structures. I started drawing not only my grandfather’s home but other buildings that I saw.
None of us were allowed to step foot in or near my grandfather’s home, as it now belonged to an Israeli family, but I had preserved it’s exterior in my sketchbook that summer. Now, many sketches and years later, I live in Seattle, Washington. I’m a community architect and focus my work on social justice and equity. I design affordable housing and see it as my mission to help ensure all people have the right to a home, something that has been denied to countless Palestine refugees like myself. Whether in my local under-served neighborhoods in Washington state or my fellow displaced and under-served people elsewhere, I hope my work as an architect allows people to create a space to feel safe and secure.
Though I’m now based in the Pacific Northwest, I lived in Palestine during the formative years of my life, and it will always be home to me. I’ve always been fascinated by the stories we as Palestinians create of our homes, streets, villages, and places we share, and this sentiment has only been magnified given my family’s experience with displacement and narrative around what home looks like.
