Mima: [00:00:00] I’m Palestinian or from Palestine, how would that change your perspective? How would that change our dynamic? How would that change our relationship? And I say that because Palestinians are not these people who are far removed you know, from you or from anyone. like We have the same hopes and the same dreams, we have same aspirations. So many of us want to be doctors, want to be nurses, want to be lawyers or going to school for PhDs. We are your next door neighbors, we’re your co workers and colleagues, we are your child’s classmate, and childhood friend. And so, when we think of the Palestinian person or Palestinians in general, these are people that are all around you. These are your best friends, your next door neighbors. These are people that you know, people that you run into a daily basis.
Narrator: Welcome to Learning to Listen to Palestine, where stories come alive and hearts connect. Each week, your host, Lani [00:01:00] Lanchester, will dive into the untold histories, powerful narratives, and insightful interviews that bring us closer to understanding Palestine. Ready to be educated, empowered, and motivated?
Let’s get started.
Lani Lanchester: Welcome to Learning to Listen to Palestine. My name is Lani Lanchester. And we are here on a journey. I’m taking you on my journey as I am Learning to Listen to Palestine. So this is the book that I’ve written recently that called Learning to Listen to Palestine. And it covers my journey as I have been listening to stories, doing some research, trying to understand what I am learning. And it has changed my outlook on the world. And wonderful thing has happened is I have met a new friend, her name is Mima, and she is Palestinian. And so, she’s going to come on in just a moment and tell us [00:02:00] her story.
But first, I want to show you one other resource. This is called The Book of Forgiving by Desmond Tutu. And this is a resource that I’m going to be talking about a lot for this month. There are several books that my book uses as a foundation, and this is one of them. The Book of Forgiving is an amazing book because it gives hope it gives hope for restoration and for healing. And Mima, you and I had a conversation a while ago about healing and about trauma. And it was such an amazing conversation.
So I’m so happy to have you on today.
Mima: Thank you for having me, Lani. It’s great seeing you again and to be able to share my story on a platform like this. So for those of you who are listening to the podcast, my name is Mima, and I currently live in California, but was born in Gaza and Palestine in the 80s. I have [00:03:00] lived in the U.S. for a fair majority of my life. But there has always been this unique balance of identity, of being tied to the land and being tied to the culture of my Palestinian ancestors and being from this place, but also, trying to weave and navigate and integrate life here in the West.
Lani Lanchester: So Mima, one of the things that was really interesting is your family. You have a beautiful family here in California now. Would you tell me about your family?
Mima: Of course. Interesting enough. I am not just Palestinian, I am also Irish and Native American from my mom’s side. So back in the 80s, my mom and my dad met at university in the U.S. in the Midwest. And one thing led to another and they ended up getting married, and conceiving my older brother.
And then, after this happened, my dad thought, oh, well, why don’t we just move everything back to Palestine. And my mom, not really knowing any [00:04:00] better said, yeah, of course, that sounds like a great idea. Let’s do that. And so in the 80s, they uprooted and went to Palestine. And my mom was pregnant with me. And so, that kind of begins my journey coming into the world. If it were up to my mom, she would have come back to the U.S. To have me. But she reached a point in her pregnancy where there was some uprising happening in Palestine at the time. Flights were starting to be grounded. There were strict curfews that were in place. And then, she was very pregnant. So when she had the chance to get on a plane, they said, no, we’re not letting you on a plane. So my mom had to end up staying in Palestine and giving birth to me there.
Lani Lanchester: Oh, and you have a daughter now too, right?
Mima: I do. Yes. I have a daughter. She’s six and a half months. And thank you. Thank you. what’s really interesting about having a daughter is, growing up and even [00:05:00] after leaving Palestine and coming back to the U.S. which I think, we’ll get into in a little bit here, I had such a tense relationship with my own mother. And it took me a while to come to terms and understand what happened in Palestine. Like what her situation left her with. I would say, a diminished ability to parent, and a diminished ability to provide me what I felt I needed as a child. And so, what’s tied in with the story and part of this podcast that we’ve talked through is really coming to terms of healing and forgiveness and recognizing that my story with my own mother does not have to be my daughter’s story with me.
Lani Lanchester: So, you’re trying to work your way through everything that you went through, your mom went through, your dad went through, in order to provide for a better life for your daughter.
Mima: Yes, exactly. Yeah.[00:06:00]
Lani Lanchester: That’s an amazing thing. So, tell me about your dad, and what happened in Palestine with your dad.
Mima: wow. Where do I start? once they were back in Palestine, and my mother was ready to give birth. I don’t know what’s appropriate to mention on your podcast, or if there are certain terms you’re looking to stay away from. But when I was born in Palestine, it was born before the inception or creation, if you will of a political group, otherwise known as Hamas. And so I think, that’s important to mention because you know, there were things that were going on while my mom was pregnant. So my mom, while she was pregnant, was shot at with rubber bullets. She was targeted by a stun grenade. She recalled a story where she woke up on the ground. and Her sense of hearing and her, vision was blurred for a moment. And this was just typical life there. And then, there were things happening like the houses of our neighbors were being raised to the ground. They were being bulldozed [00:07:00] randomly, things like night raids.
So the reason why I’m bringing this
Lani Lanchester: she’s, she’s, uh, an American
Mima: She is
Lani Lanchester: In Palestine, pregnant,
Mima: Yes.
Lani Lanchester: and she’s being shot with rubber bullets.
Mima: Yes.
Lani Lanchester: And this was before Hamas.
Mima: Yes. So think, it’s important to mention that it was before Hamas because you know, this entity or this group is used a lot of times to justify things, but it’s important to know that the genocide that’s happening and the atrocities that are happening didn’t start in October of 2023.
Like They’ve been happening in the 80s when I was born and even before the 80s started. And it spared no one. you know, My mom, if you looked at her, she’s obviously not Palestinian, she’s very light skinned, she has very red hair and green eyes. And she was very pregnant with me at the same time.
So, the rubber bullets were forms of crowd control. And although, you know, one would think, oh, they’re coated in rubber. They can’t do that [00:08:00] much damage. Rubber bullets have been known to be lethal, you know, when fired in close proximity. So my mother, I had mentioned that she had tried to go back to the U.S. but they said, no, you’re too pregnant. It was these events that she said, okay, this isn’t right. And I don’t want to give birth and bring a kid into this type of atmosphere, but she had to stay back and she had to give birth because they wouldn’t let her on a plane. She, at that time, I think was about seven or eight months pregnant with me.
So, to answer your question, what happened to my dad? My mother, actually, when she gave birth shortly after, there was a night raid that happened and my dad had been abducted in the middle of the night, which was a very common thing. And it still is common. But even back then in the 80s before these political powers.
Lani Lanchester: So when you say abducted, does that mean arrested? Does that mean arrested with a charge or taken without a [00:09:00] charge?
Mima: Taken without a charge.
Lani Lanchester: Was there a reason why? Was he targeted for any reason? Because he’d America as a student, right?
Mima: Yeah. As far as I know, there weren’t any reasons. and so when I was born and, I should say after I was born and I’ll get into this a little bit, we had a next door neighbor that my mom was living with at this time because my dad had been thrown into jail. There was a night raid that I can recall from when I was little that this woman, the next door neighbor was holding me, and they broke into the house in the middle of the night. When I say they, I’m talking about the occupation force. Um,
Lani Lanchester: Israeli Defense Force, the IDF.
Mima: Yes Yes. And they came in and they pulled all of the male family members out of the bed in the middle of the night, and they just took them off. And so, this has been known to be common practice, to instigate fear, to destabilize. This was just something that was common. And sometimes, you had no [00:10:00] idea where exactly a person was, where they were imprisoned. And you had no idea when they would be released, and you had no idea for how long they would be held. And most times, people aren’t charged with anything. It’s just, they take it, they take a person away. and then they, they release them when they feel like it. So
Lani Lanchester: Yeah I don’t even know what to ask with something like that. It feels so random and hopeless and helpless, you know, for your mom, especially, ’cause she is out of her own country, living with Palestinians. So, how did she manage without your dad in Palestine, in Gaza?
Mima: Yeah, it was the next door neighbor. Her name was Hidyat. So Hidyat spoke multiple languages, was very intelligent. And Hidyat kind of assumed care of me when my mom was trying to gather herself. Because my mom didn’t speak Arabic. Hidyat spoke very eloquent English among a few other languages.
And so it was Hidyat that really said, you know what? You have a place [00:11:00] here. You’re safe here with me. You don’t have to worry about a whole lot, and I will help you out. And so my mom, I can remember her just being very frazzled, and just not being quite there and a bit disembodied. But for obvious reason, she was like that.
Lani Lanchester: I see. Yeah, that would be frightening. So, what did your mom end up doing?
Mima: So at some point, my mom had met someone, an Israeli woman who worked at the Ben Gurion Airport. And this woman had told her, you know what, I don’t know when I’ll be able to get you on a flight. So many flights were being canceled. So many flights were grounded. And then the flights that were leaving were pretty packed with people who are trying to escape, and those were usually Israeli citizens and not Palestinian citizens.
But my mom had an advantage that she wasn’t from Palestine. So this woman made a deal with her and said, if I can find you a spot on a plane, I’m going to give you a call, [00:12:00] but you have to have your bags already packed, and you have to be here within 15 minutes or else, I don’t know what I’m going to be able to get you on a plane.
And when that would be, or if that would even happen anytime soon. And so,
Lani Lanchester: So things have been different back then. Because in Gaza now, people can’t even get out of Gaza. So, there must not have been walled in the way they are now in the 80s. Okay.
Mima: What we call the apartheid wall did not exist at that time. There were various roadblocks and blockades, but it was, it was nothing like what it is today. And at this time, so the timeframe that I’m explaining this part of the story was during the first intifada. I know that this is not a history lesson of a podcast, but for the first Intifada, you can imagine, it’s like the first major uprising of Palestinians saying, no more. You’re coming through, you’re doing all this crowd control to us, you’re bombing us, you’re shooting at us.
Lani Lanchester: What does Intifada mean? Can you tell [00:13:00] me?
yeah, oh gosh, there’s,
Mima: So, there’s a few different meanings for Intifada. But the major meaning for Intifada is just uprising. It’s a resistance movement.
Lani Lanchester: So, it could be like anybody, a slave who’s been kept down, getting a job, and having some sort of their own means, rather than, it doesn’t necessarily have to mean violence. but it
Mima: No, it could mean violence, but it’s really about people trying to take back their rights, people trying to reclaim their voice, people trying to say, no more,
Lani Lanchester: like
Mima: we won’t stand for this.
Lani Lanchester: I relate to that trying to find my own voice. That’s, That’s one of the reasons why I have a podcast and why I’m writing a book. It’s so important to have your own voice. And You know,
I hear different reactions to Intifada. I see what’s happening on the school campuses, and they use the word Intifada, but that was good.
This isn’t [00:14:00] violence. This is a rising up. This is saying, we’re going to speak up for some people who have no voice. And this is one of the reasons why I wanted to have the podcast, so that I could help Palestinians have a voice that is heard to a wide audience.
Mima: Thank you.
Lani Lanchester: Oh, thank you.
Mima: Yeah And so,
at this time that the first major uprising was occurring, my mom was trapped in the middle of all of this. And I don’t know specifically and exactly, how long my mom was waiting by the phone to get this phone call from this woman who worked as a flight agent at the Ben Gurion Airport.
I recall when we were talking about this story, that she said that she had her bags packed for weeks, and I don’t exactly know how long, weeks were, how many weeks, exactly. But one day, she did get a call, saying, I’ve got a spot for you on a flight. You got to come here right now. So, you know, At this time, you know, my mom is [00:15:00] wrangling my, older brother, who’s really only like a year and a half older than me. And she’s wrangling me. And she’s wrangling these bags. And she got one of the next door neighbors to give her a ride to the airport.
I think, we talked about this story, but as he was driving down this small alleyway, this really tight alleyway, all of a sudden, there is these plumes of smoke. And all of these people were running in their direction. And he puts his car in reverse and just starts backing out of this tiny alleyway space. And he’s just trying to get out there and just get her to the airport as fast as he can. There was active bombing and active artillery going on, at this time when he was trying to get her to the airport.
So he was able to make it in time and she was able to get on the flight. And we were able to go back to the U.S.
Lani Lanchester: She had to leave without your dad.
Mima: Yes. So, during that time, no one really knew where he was. No one could account [00:16:00] for his whereabouts. So she did end up leaving without my dad. And it was just her, myself and my brother.
Lani Lanchester: I see. You said that over time, you realized that you had carried a lot of trauma from this, time from when you were in Palestine. And your mother carried trauma from Palestine, as well. So, do you remember, when you were very young, when you came back and what that was like to the States?
Mima: Yeah. That’s kind of an interesting question and I’ll get into why that’s interesting. So, when we came back to the States, what I do remember is two things, stability and boring.
So I say that because my grandma and grandpa on my mom’s side assumed care of my brother and I. And so my mom would be working, and my grandparents took care of us pretty much, 95% of the time. We would sleep at my mom’s place and then it would just be this drop off at grandma and grandpa’s, and like do [00:17:00] the whole thing over again.
I say, stability and boring. Stability, which was wow, there’s nothing dangerous happening. And danger was what we knew. So we didn’t know any better. And I say boring because things were so predictable. We didn’t have to try to account for things that weren’t going to happen, that, or that were maybe going to happen and maybe didn’t happen.
If you know what I mean, that makes sense. So, I would say that life with my grandparents was really good, but we weren’t with them for very long. My grandfather ended up passing away, and then my mom ended up taking us and fully taking over, at that point.
But the other thing of why I said this is an interesting question is, from the point of my grandfather passing away and fast forward in time to my teenage years, I have very little memory of pretty much anything.
I have very little memory of milestones of like [00:18:00] achievements of being in first grade or second grade or whatever. It was really an auspicious moment that we had talked about in 2017, that kind of sparked my realization of, whoa, I don’t have almost any memories of a good majority and a good vastness of my childhood, and what is that and why?
Lani Lanchester: Oh yeah. Tell us that story. It’s an amazing story.
Mima: Yeah, at the tail end of 2016, the start of 2017, in that timeframe, I was at a friend’s store in the Haight Ashbury, district of San Francisco. And so, my friend owns a prominent crystal store. It’s still there and it’s a very cool place to be. But I had gone in that day, just to buy a couple of things. And as I was talking to her, she had gotten these big packages that were placed on her countertop and she was using an exacto knife to cut them open. And I said, Hey, what’s in the box? And she said, Oh, these are straight from [00:19:00] a private mine in Mexico. And I said, Oh, okay. I said, when you open that box, I’m going to reach my hand and I’m going to grab something.
Whatever I grab is the thing I’m going to buy. And she said, okay. And so, she opens this box and I reach in. And I pull out this crystal. And it was in a strange way, like anatomically shaped, like a human heart, with like with
the, valves coming out the sides in different angles. And like, there was a point that was kind of like an aorta. And I’m like, Oh my gosh, I was just like so intrigued with this crystal.
And I was like, this is mine. And a few feet away from us was this older gentleman, white hair, and the brightest blue eyes I’ve ever seen. He was a little bit on the thicker side. And he’s smiling in our direction. And he comes up to us. And he comes up to me and he said, Can I see that crystal?
And I was very hesitant because I didn’t know who this guy was. And in my mind, I [00:20:00] thought, is he trying to take this? But I said, Sure. And so I put the crystal in his hand. And he’s looking at it and he’s inspecting it for a couple moments. And then he goes, Yep. That’s for you. And I looked at him. And I was like, what do you mean?
How do you know? How do you know that? And he said, well, here, let’s do an experiment. And he said, I want you to hold out your left hand and I’m going to put the crystal in your left hand. And he said, I want you to hold out your right arm like this. And he said, I’m going to push down on your right arm. And I want you to resist.
I don’t want you to let me push your arm down. I said, okay. And so he’s putting all his weight on my arm and it’s not budging. It’s not doing anything. And he said, okay, now I want you to hand me the crystal, and I want you to put your right arm out again. And I want you to resist. Don’t let me push your arm down.
And so as he pushes, my arm goes straight down, very easily. And I was resisting with all of my strength. And I said, what was that? And he said, that means that the [00:21:00] crystals for you. And I said, tell me more. So it opened up like, as I’m telling this story, I don’t know if you can see,
Lani Lanchester: huh. I see him.
Mima: because every time I tell this story, it’s just, there’s such a charge to it for me.
I asked him like, tell me more, I need to know more, like what is going on? And then he looks me point blank. And he says, do you remember what happened to you You went when you were 12? And I took a moment, and then I realized, no, I don’t. And then he said, do you remember what your parents did to you when you were 12? And I said, no.
And then I started trailing back, okay, 11, 10, 9, 8, like just trailing back like, where do I remember? Where does this break start? Where does this break stop? And then I realized that the only instances that I could pinpoint were fragments of traumatic instances. And there wasn’t anything in between those.
There wasn’t happy moments or like milestones, like I mentioned. There wasn’t childhood memories of playing sports or like [00:22:00] nothing like that. It was like being in a hallway and all the lights are turned off. And you know, you’re there. You know, you’re in a space but you can’t see where the doorways are. You can’t see the window, like you can’t see anything.
And I looked at him and I said, Holy crap. And I said, do you know me? And I’m quoting him exactly. He said, even if you lose this crystal, you will still remember in time. And I said, okay. And so, I tried getting more information out of him.
And he was making his way to the door, so I would intercept him and block him. I asked him, can I get your email? He said, I don’t have an email. I said, okay, can I get your phone number? He said, I don’t have a phone. And so I said, okay, what is your name? And he took a moment and he took a step back, and he smiled and he looked at me and he said, Hey, they call me Tom.
And I was like, Oh, the goose bumps, Lani, because when he said that, I had this immediate, like a [00:23:00] whole bodily sensation of familiarity. Like when you recognize a person, like when you remember a person. And I didn’t know this person. And then the way he answered was, they call me Tom, not my name is Tom.
And so, when I had this bodily experience of remembering, I looked at him and he noticed and he smiled at me because he noticed that I was remembering something. And so it was just like the most auspicious moment. And I, call it that because it was that very moment in which it created an access in my life, of which I could pivot. And before then, I was just going straight forward, didn’t know what really my purpose was. I was grasping for a purpose. But this gave me so many angles at which I could go down and so many trajectories to explore. He did end up leaving. And I asked a shop owner, my friend. I was like, do [00:24:00] you know who that was? She’s, like, I have no idea what that was.
But because of him, I thought, okay, I have such a lapse in memory. I started fearing that maybe I had like early onset Alzheimer’s or something. So I started going to specialists. Nothing was wrong with my brain. Nothing was wrong with me. Medical wise that anyone could find, therapist, psychologist, nothing was, wrong that they could find, I should say.
And then, I was really wanting answers and really, really just wanting to remember. So I ended up going to a regression hypnotherapist, and even a shaman. I was desperate. And then, the regression hypnotherapist couldn’t get anywhere with me. And this wasn’t someone who was inexperienced. It was someone who was very experienced, came highly recommended. And the shaman and the hypnotherapist said the same thing, because they both tried to help me access these memories. And they both said, your psyche [00:25:00] or your body is blocking you from remembering this. And when it’s time for you to remember, you’ll remember, but now is not exactly the time. And me being a little bit hard headed, I didn’t want to accept that answer. So I was trying to think of any other way that would help me remember. And any kind of a way that would help me get there quickly, instead of you know, having to do years of therapy to unlock something.
So, around this time frame, I was invited by a colleague and a friend that I worked with to sit in an indigenous medicine ceremony. And I said, sure. And I had no idea what to expect. And as the ceremony was getting closer and closer, the week before I was supposed to sit in this ceremony, I had a medical event. And what had happened was, I started profusely bleeding in a way that was very abnormal. And I thought, Oh, you know what? It’s [00:26:00] just, something’s a little off, but nothing’s wrong. And then, it was almost a week. So, I was almost a whole week of feeling this. But then, you know, I was really pale, I was really lethargic, I was still bleeding profusely, and then I started experiencing debilitating pain.
And at that point, I was like, okay, something is happening and I should probably get this checked out. But it was so painful that I ended up deciding, I’m going to go to the ER. And I was crawling to the ER. At one point, there was no one there to receive, anyone to the ER. So I crawled into the ER and I said, I need to be seen. And I was there for a number of hours. They did scans and blood work and tests and all of the things.
And to give you a little bit of background, before coming to California, I was living in Florida and I was working in emergency medicine there. And so, so i, I knew that [00:27:00] Uh, but then the doctor, After a number of hours, the doctor came to me and said, okay, we’re going to discharge you, and you’re going to follow up with a specialist. And I looked at him and I said, okay, what’s the diagnosis? And they said, the specialist will talk to you about that. And I said, no,
no, what’s, what’s your diagnosis? And he said, it’s something that we’d like the specialist to talk to you about. So having worked in emergency medicine and having been in those scenarios, whenever the doctor said it that way to a patient, it almost always meant that they suspected someone had cancer. But they’ll never tell you in the ER.
Hey, we see you know, this cancer on your scans. So. I say, Oh, so it’s cancer. And the doctor was cut off guard and said, I can’t definitively say yes or no to that, but you’ll follow up with the specialist. So I’m like, okay, great. So I follow up with the specialist. And the specialist says, [00:28:00] okay, you have multiple tumors on your left ovary, and you have multiple tumors on your right ovary.
And we want to do surgery. And in the meantime, we suggest you do almost nothing. We don’t want you to do any physical activity. We don’t want you to do any strenuous, like jogging, lifting, nothing. And I was very athletic person. So that was really frustrating for me at that time.
Lani Lanchester: Were they going to remove the tumors from your ovaries, or would you have lost your ovaries for this?
so, What was reason why he was telling you not to do any strenuous anything is because the weight of those tumors with any kind of a strenuous activity, it could actually cause a very intorsion, where the fallopian tube twists on itself, and then it becomes a very serious situation. So he said, just don’t move pretty much. Don’t do anything.
Mima: And. I was very annoyed by this. Again, I’m very hard headed. So, I went and I got a second opinion. And [00:29:00] that person said, no, we’re not going to do surgery. We’re just going to watch what happens. And that’s, that was even more frustrating for me because if there’s an issue, you don’t just watch it grow. or, you know, It just it didn’t make sense to me. And so now, I had two opinions, and they’re both varying. right? And so I said, I’m going to get a third opinion.
This is happening over a series of weeks. It’s not just back to back. And so as this is happening, my friend and colleague comes to me again and says, hey, there’s another ceremony happening. You couldn’t make the last one, but do you feel well enough to go and sit in this one. And I said, yeah, I feel well enough to go and sit this time. And I would like to.
And I had no expectations. I didn’t have any research done. But I just went with an open heart and an open mind. And no real conceived ideas of, I expect X, Y, and Z to happen for me or expect healing or any of that.
So I’m sitting in the ceremony. And these particular ceremonies take place during the nighttime, so you’re awake all night. After they give you like a plant medicine and you [00:30:00] drink this plant medicine and then you sink into yourself and go within. When I started feeling like the medicine working, it was the way I can describe it is I felt this buzzing, like vibrating all through my body, especially through my neck and my throat and my head.
And then I just felt this abject grief, like this profound grief. And it was just so overcoming. And I sobbed and sobbed and cried and like, bald. And I did this for six hours straight. I was just crying and crying. crying and crying.
And it wasn’t, it was a private ceremony, but not private where it was just me. There were other people there, as well. So as I’m like sobbing, I can hear other people like being affected by what I’m going through. And it didn’t let up for six hours straight. About four hours into this [00:31:00] emotional outpour, I realized that it was no longer my own personal grief that I was letting out, but it was something that, was like, the best way I can describe it is a grief that was like a collective grief, that was coming from the outside of me, but coming through my heart space where I was feeling it in my body and in my heart, and I was just grieving for, I don’t know if it was like a collective or if it was like a lineage thing. But It was just so intense.
And so, once about six hours rolled around and I was crying for six hours. At some point, it just let up and I just went, .And when I did that, I heard the entire room, all the people in the room were like, Oh, God.
And when I heard that chain reaction, I started giggling. And as I’m giggling, people are a little confused and then they start giggling. And we’re all giggling, and we’re all [00:32:00] just like breathing and giggling. And it was intense and incredible at the same time. And I felt so light. I felt like a thousand pounds had been lifted off of me.
And even the next few days after sitting in that session, I felt like I was gliding, like my feet never were really touching the floor. It felt. I felt weightless. And I had people that came up to me after the ceremony concluded asking, what were you going through? What was happening? And all I could say was the most profound grief. I couldn’t explain anything other than that. And I walked away from that ceremony, thinking, what was that? Like, what, came out of me? What was that?
And so anyhow, fast forward, I am going to go get this third opinion from a new doctor. And the doctor gives me a little bit of attitude. She was like, who’d you go see? Like, Where’d you get these scans done? because she, she had her own scans done and she said, [00:33:00] these don’t even match. Did you have some kind of surgery? Did you have some kind of medical intervention? And I said, no, why? And she said, because you have no tumors on your left ovary. And the tumors on your right ovary have shrunk in size. So, what did you do?
And in that moment, biggest goosebumps right now. But I was like, Oh, the grief. And I was really sold after that. And I said, there’s something to this. And so it was became very dedicated to sitting with this particular medicine, and even a particular tribe, at some point in the Amazon.
And so, Yeah.
So, to bring this back around to the story of you know, my coming to this world and you know, being born in Palestine, being Palestinian, my goal was to remember, right? And so I started little by little remembering, things from childhood that once I remembered them, it was almost weird that I had forgotten them in the first place. It was almost as [00:34:00] if the memory was always there on the edge of my mind, but that there was like a curtain in front of it. And then, sitting with this plant medicine really helped me to understand, was my mother’s experience, being in Palestine and having a lot of compassion for her. And learning to step into the first steps of forgiveness towards her. So in almost every ceremony, after that first medicine ceremony that I had, this thing that people who are in the healing space would deem it would be the mother wound, where there’s a lot of trauma between you and your mom.
There’s a fracture in the relationship or many fractures in the relationship. Or even, you know, there’s mental illness that affects the relationship, anything like that, where you feel like you weren’t taking care of, your mother didn’t have your best interest at heart, like all of these things started coming up.
In ceremony for me, I had an interesting experience where [00:35:00] I didn’t realize what was happening at first in a ceremony. And then I realized, I was back in utero. Literally in utero, when my mom was carrying me. and just, it was showing me like, look, you have all of these things that you’re blaming your mother for, like, you didn’t take care of me, you didn’t give me the love I deserve, you didn’t do X, Y, and Z for me. But look at this from your mother’s perspective. And so what this medicine was doing was, it was taking me back to my mother being in Palestine and showing me her surroundings and saying, look what she had to deal with.
Like, Of course she wasn’t thinking about you, like she was trying to survive. you know, and it, it really changed my perspective. And it really made me realize, it’s not about me. There’s so much more than just me in this story. continue to tie this back around to the topic of Palestine and Palestinian voices, throughout my entire life, I always questioned, why was I born in Palestine?
My older brother was [00:36:00] born in the U.S. And I could have very easily been born in the U.S. So, I always knew that there was a reason why I was born there, and why I was connected to the land in that way, and why I was connected to the culture in that way, but I didn’t know if I would ever figure out why or what that reason was.
And so, the last time that I was sitting in the Amazon and sitting with this particular tribe with this plant medicine, that question came up. And I was really sitting with that question in ceremony. And I was in the Amazon for almost a month at that time, and I was finishing up like the final ceremonies.
And I started going through an experience where I realized that I’d been storing so much ancestral trauma in my womb space. And so I was really doing my work to get that out of the womb space, also because I was consciously seeking to conceive a child, as [00:37:00] well. And I did not want that to affect any life that I would bring into the world.
I didn’t want to pass that on. I didn’t want her to have to compete with that in my womb space, either in a spiritual or energetic sense.
This particular night, I had actually voice recorded the whole night. so, And I’ve gone back and I’ve listened to it a few times. But if you heard the recording, what you would hear is coughing, vomiting, moaning in agony. And I’m like, you really just hear the struggle. And then you hear footsteps coming up to me, and you hear someone start singing to me.
And so, to give you a little bit of background to make this story come full circle. So this particular tribe that I sit with, they work with indigenous plants that are native to the Amazon. and They regard these plants as allies and as ancestors. They believe that these plants teach them modalities and songs of healing if they’re able to work with this plant long enough to gain its trust [00:38:00] and create a relationship with this plant. So when a called a maestro or a maestra, really a medicine person that’s been training their whole lives to work with medicine in this way, sits in front of you, They scan your body in your energetic body, and they see where these blockages, traumas, or disconnections are happening in your energetic body, And then they say that the plants that they’ve worked with tell them what song to sing to you, to help bridge those gaps and to help clear out any stagnation or trauma in those spaces, so that you can let that out. And so These songs that the plants teach these medicine workers are called Icaro.
Anyhow, fast forward back to this night, you know, I’m really struggling to get like just all this ancestral stuff out of my womb. I’m trying to bring it up and I’m coughing, and vomiting, and all the stuff. And a facilitator walks up and he sits in front of me and he starts [00:39:00] singing an Icaro to me.
And as he’s singing this Icaro, I can feel things dislodging like, from my womb and coming up, and I’m vomiting them out. But in that moment, I’m having an experience, a very vivid experience. And I see that it’s an aerial view over Gaza, in Palestine. over Gaza, as you would say it with a Western accent, And it’s nighttime in this vision, and you can see like, all the lights of like, certain buildings and structures lit up. And for those who are listening that maybe don’t know, there is a call to prayer that happens. It’s projected out over the city and it’s called the Adhan and you can hear it for miles away. And it’s a call for you to stop what you’re doing. Drop what you’re doing and then get ready to go pray.
And so, in this vision that I’m having, as I’m letting all this stuff out, the event starts happening over this [00:40:00] aerial view of Gaza. But instead of the event, instead of being an Arabic, it is an Icaro that’s being sent out over the entirety of Gaza. And I’m sitting there in that moment, and I have the answer to this lifelong question.
Why Palestine? Like, Why was I born there? And when I asked for clarity in that moment, as I’m having that experience, the answer was, you needed to be removed from the chaos, to be able to work on the healing. You needed to be removed from there to be here in the Amazon at this moment to be able to start the healing, to be able to clear the ancestral line and the familial line.
And then it made total sense to me. It was like, okay.
Lani Lanchester: It’s the kind of trauma that you can understand his trauma, too.
Mima: yes.
Lani Lanchester: That’s amazing. I always believe that the God doesn’t waste any, hurt [00:41:00] that he will use it for good in some way. And I see this in you. I, just see this beautiful person who has this calling towards healing.
And this is amazing because I wanted to start this podcast on the right foot. I mean, We’re in the middle of horrible things happening right now. But I want to have hope. Otherwise, what’s point, right? And I do, I see so much hope in your story. And The Book of Forgiving, has, I gave you this book.
Did you get a chance to get into it at all?
Mima: Not yet, because I have been reading your book, and almost through your book,
Lani Lanchester: Oh, thank you.
Mima: I started with that first.
Lani Lanchester: Oh, wonderful.
Narrator: Like what you hear so far? Make sure you never miss an episode show by clicking the subscribe button now. Don’t forget to check out Lani’s book, Learning to Listen to Palestine. Now back to the show.
Lani Lanchester: well, I’m going to read you something that I found. really And I think that this is something that we, as human beings need to know. And it, [00:42:00] relates so much to what you’re saying, how we are all connected in some ways, even the plants, we are all connected. And I teach biology and I find out, and it’s very clinical you know, science, and all these individual facts.
But if you really look at it, you see that we are knit together. The plants, the animals, the environment. And what I do will eventually affect everything. And we want to be people who brings healing to each other. This was something Desmond Tutu wrote. He said, I would like to share with you two simple truths.
There is nothing that cannot be forgiven. There is no one undeserving of forgiveness. When you can see and understand that we are all bound to one another, whether by birth, by circumstance, or simply by shared humanity, then you will know this to be true. I have often said that in South Africa, there would have been no future without forgiveness. Our [00:43:00] rage and our quest for revenge would have been our destruction. This is true for us individually, as it is for us, globally.
So I’m so delighted to hear your story and what you have brought and taught us in this moment. And I can see that your path is, of healing and hope that you’re going to bring in, and I believe it’s going to be in Gaza. I believe that you have to teach me how to pronounce Gaza right properly at some point. Because it’s a different, it’s a different place. Where is that? It’s like, Is it back here?
Mima: Uh, It’s in the throat. Gaza.
Lani Lanchester: Gaza.
Mima: We’ll work on it.
Lani Lanchester: I need help. I need help with my Arabic. I can say my polite words pretty well, but it’s a challenge, for sure.
Mima: It can be a strange sound if you don’t practice it. like, If it’s not part of your speech when you’re young, I think. so,
Lani Lanchester: Something about it though, when somebody says Gaza properly, it’s really beautiful. But me, I say it, I I just sound awkward. [00:44:00] No. No.
No
Mima: Lani, do you know that the word gauze comes from Gaza, uh,
you know, to like wrap your wounds.
Lani Lanchester: No.
Mima: Comes from that name. So
Lani Lanchester: Oh, that’s interesting. How did that happen? Do you know the,
Mima: No, I don’t know.
Lani Lanchester: That’s an interesting thing to look up or to learn somehow, if we ask for it, the information will come to us right at this point. So, are there any books or films or anything that you would like to recommend for people to learn about Gaza, and to learn about Palestine?
Mima: Yes. There are a few. And I think what I’ll do is, I’ll categorize them in movies or documentaries you can watch, or actual books that you can buy. I’m going to send you um, a PDF for one of the books that you can distribute, free instead of buying the book. Personally, I like to have a physical copy in my hand, but some people [00:45:00] don’t.
So, one of the books that I highly recommend would be The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine, by Rashid.
This one is very popular. It’s easy to find. You won’t have an issue finding that one. The second one that I would highly recommend would be The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine by Ilan Pappe. Ilan is I L A N.
Just in case, whoever’s listening to this podcast might want to search with the name.
Lani Lanchester: That will be in the show notes. And actually, that is one of the, there are three pillars to my book. And it’s Desmond Tutu’s book, Ilan Pappe’s book, The Ethnic Cleansing, and there’s a third then. Go ahead.
Mima: The third resource that I want to give is, it’s called The Way to Spring. I believe, it’s The Way to Spring: Life and Death in Palestine, by I believe his first name is Ben. His last name is Ehrenreich. The other book that I want to call out is, it’s called [00:46:00] Justice for Some, by Noura Erakat. So Noura has been in the vouching for Palestinian space for as long as I can remember, and fighting for Palestinian rights for as long as I can remember. And the way that she writes is very clear and to the point. So I highly recommend that if you’re really getting into Palestine and learning about what’s going on.
And then, there is a book by Noam Chomsky and Ilan Pappe, both of them co-wrote the book. And I think it’s called On Palestine. And so that one’s also pretty popular book. And it’s, shorter, you know, compared to like the Hundred Year War, and all of that, it is a shorter book.
You won’t get as much information as you will from the first couple of recommendations, but I do recommend that one. If you’ve read through some of the, first few that I’ve mentioned, then you can go read that one.
In terms of documentaries and movies, there are so many documentaries, but I wanna nail it [00:47:00] down.
Now, there is one called, Five Broken Cameras.
Lani Lanchester: I was going to ask you, if you’ve seen Five Broken Cameras, that one made me cry. I had to watch twice. And it is available on Amazon, and Netflix, and YouTube. It’s available free in several places. Excellent movie. It was amazing to watch lives get saved with a camera.
Mima: Let me see. There’s one called Gaza Fights For Freedom. I’m not sure where you can watch that one. I don’t, know that it’s on Netflix. I can’t remember where I saw it. But You know, most people have Netflix nowadays. It’s not so much a documentary as it is, a depiction of someone’s life during the Nakba, which is Farha, F A R H A. And that one is on Netflix. you
Lani Lanchester: And can you tell people, most of the listeners don’t know what Nakba means?
Mima: yeah, Nakba means a [00:48:00] catastrophe. you know, In the late 1940s, there was the catastrophe where Palestinians were forcibly removed from their lands, and their homes, and their ancestral places. really,
Lani Lanchester: Most Americans have heard of it, but we know of it as different name. We know of as the Israeli war of independence, it is really just looking from a very narrow view. And what’s so interesting about Ilan Pappe’s book is, that Ilan Pappe is an Israeli citizen. And he grew up Israeli, and he grew up in Israeli schools, which as he explained later, they’re segregated.
So he didn’t grow up with any Palestinians. And he served in the IDF. He served in the 1973 war. But when he was older and he started studying history, and he looked at original documents from 1948, and started hearing the stories of the Nakba. He didn’t hear this, the word Nakba, until he was [00:49:00] in college and living in England, is, as I understand. Isn’t that amazing?
Yeah. So, There’s a lot that is buried information that’s really, you have to be intentional to learn to listen Palestine. And that’s one of the things that I want to bring out is, we have to seek out to know somebody, to talk to somebody. And Mima, I’m so, very grateful that you were willing to meet with me and to tell me your story.
And as soon as I met you, I realized, Oh, I have a friend. And I’m so grateful for that. And that’s what we need to do, is, build friendships, because we are all connected. We all do affect each other. And when somebody hurts, it hurts all of us in some way. we have to learn to listen to each other, in order to heal.
What message would you like to share with the global community about Palestine, and its people? That was the last question that we thought we wanted to ask. [00:50:00] Is there anything that you would want to share with the global community about Palestine, before we go?
Mima: Yeah, to preface what I would like to share would be, first want to say thank you. thank you to anyone who is listening for this long and has made it to the end of the podcast. Hopefully, my story was relatable in a way that you know, you can see parts of your life, or parts of who you are as a person in parts of my own story.
And with that being said, when we talk about Palestinians, a lot of people will think, Oh, you know, those are people who are so far removed. They’re in a completely different part of the world, that is nowhere close to me. you know, They have different mentalities,
Lani Lanchester: you know,
Mima: stereotypes and you know, all this stuff.
What I want to say is that, if you sat next to me on a bus, you know, or sat next to me in a cafe and we striked up a conversation, you would have no idea that I’m a Palestinian. And perhaps, I could become your best friend, right? And you would never know. And if I were [00:51:00] to mention, I’m Palestinian or from Palestine, how would that change your perspective? How would that change our dynamic? How would that change our relationship?
And I say that because Palestinians are not these people who are far removed you know, from you or from anyone. like We have the same hopes and the same dreams, we have same aspirations. So many of us want to be doctors, want to be nurses, want to be lawyers or going to school for PhDs.
We are your next door neighbors, we’re your co workers and colleagues, like we are your child’s classmate, and childhood friend. And so, when we think of the Palestinian person or Palestinians in general, these are people that are all around you. These are your best friends, your next door neighbors. These are people that you know, people that you run into on a daily basis. And so,
I am able to articulate my own stories. And the reason why I say that is, I [00:52:00] hope that you can see that I’m just a normal person like you, you know, whoever’s listening. And that we aren’t so far removed.
And what I’d also really love to say is that, with the atrocities that are happening and with everything that’s going on in Palestine, it’s so easy to look away. It’s so easy to put blinders on. It’s so easy to just log off and not have to look, or be a part of what’s happening, but I mean, as you mentioned, Lani, that really affects everyone.
Really, it’s a ripple is felt in an energetic sense. I guess what I would say is, if you have the privilege to be able to look away, to be able to just turn your face or turn a blind eye or whatever, I would say, please listen to us, please listen to Palestinians. But again, your next door neighbors, your colleagues, your friends, because we have stories, and we have wisdoms, and we have parts of us that we’d like to share, and it would be immensely helpful if we could all come [00:53:00] together, and call for a ceasefire now.
Lani Lanchester: And I think, that’s a great place to end it. We need to ceasefire now. Thank you, Mima. This is Learning To Listen To Palestine. I’m so grateful that you’re here and listened to Mima and me. And I. hope you will continue to join us and learn to listen to Palestine.
Narrator: Thank you for tuning in to this enriching episode of Learning to Listen to Palestine. I hope today’s stories and insights touched your heart and opened your mind. If you found value in our conversation, please subscribe, leave a review, and share this podcast with friends and family. Your support helps us reach more listeners and foster a global community committed to understanding and peace.
Don’t forget to explore our book, Learning to Listen to Palestine, for a deeper dive into these poignant narratives. And if you’re inspired to take action, join a local group or start one at your library to engage with Palestinian stories firsthand. See our [00:54:00] show notes for inspiration. We’ll be back next week with more profound stories and thoughtful discussions.
Until then, remember to listen, learn, and build bridges. Keep the conversation going and stay connected. Thank you for being part of this journey.
