Networking

We are currently working on networking with women's centers in order to make joint events and general frienships. The short term goal is focused on having a joint event for the upcoming teacher's visit. Women centers here are plenty and diverse and we would love to engage in different centers that have different objectives. It would be especially great for the female teachers who are coming from Palestine. We are hoping we will have a successful event with plenty of culutral exchange and personal friendships made!

Women's visit TO PALESTINE agreed!!

CADFA women's meeting this evening 6pm at CADFA office, bell 8, 293-299 Kentish Town Road NW5 2JT. Big news is women's visit to Palestine, but much else too, hope you can come ‪#‎CADFA‬ ‪#‎womenslinkswithpalestine‬ ‪#‎twinninginaction‬

الى الصديقات العزيزات في أبوديس

الى الصديقات العزيزات في أبوديس (من اللجنة النسوية لجمعية صداقة كامدن أبوديس لندن)

لقد سررنا بسماع أخبار عن لقاءكم القادم اليوم متأملين أن نسمع منكن قريبا عن فحواه.

باعتقادكن ما هي الأمور التي سارت بشكل جيد / أو واجهت تعثر في تواصل القطاع النسوي بين كامدن وأبوديس؟

كذلك رأيكن فيما يتعلق بالزيارات التي قامت الجمعية بتنظيمها خلال الفترة الماضية؟

وما رأيكن بالتواصل بين النساء في كامدن وابوديس

ماذا تردن من اللجنة النسوية في كامن أن تعمل؟ 

من طرفنا نحن نأمل في أن يكون هناك تواصل فعال ............. ونود منكن أن تضعن أي مواضيع او أخبار على المدونه الالكترونية

نود أن نحصل على الدوام على صور وكتابات

كان في السابق توجه نحو عمل كتيب عن الطبخ والوصفات الفلسطينية هل من الممكن أن نحصل على ما انجز الى الآن.

كذلك نود منكن أن تضعونا بصورة مستجدات أو أمور مهمة في حياة النساء في فلسطين تحديان او ثلاث تحديات تودن منا العمل عليها وإخبار الناس في كامدن عنها.

Message to Dar Assadaqa women from Camden women's links London

Dear friends in Abu Dis 

We are excited to hear that you are meeting today and hope that you will tell us how it went!

What do you think has been good/ not so good about women's links so far?
about the women's visits we have organised?
about the communication we have had?

What do you want women's links with Britain to do?

From our end, we are interested in...

COMMUNICATION ... can you put something on this blog?

PHOTOS ... and WRITING...

RECIPES if you would like to send them to us (shall we finish that recipe book we keep starting and not finishing?

and please tell us two or three things about women's lives in Palestine now that you want us to think about/ work on/ tell people about...

Hope to stay in touch with you

(from Camden women's links)

The Roles of Men and Women

This week we started discussing the different things a man may contribute to his family, his society and possibly, to the world. The group of women had many ideas about what men do (and of course, the things they don’t do!). One thing that was really interesting were the ideas of patriarchy. 

More details will follow soon!

Next week we will continue the discussion and think about women in Palestinian society. 

Palestinian Dresses

Last week we were very kindly invited to attend a Henna party. It was our first invite to something celebratory like this and we couldn’t deny it; we were very excited. Completely aware that we would be underdressed, we walked with Najah into the venue, music from inside booming for miles around. 

When inside I couldn’t help but notice the beautiful dresses and more specifically, the varying styles of dresses worn by young children, to young mothers and the older generation. The glitter and party dresses were not something I was expecting. Neither was the almost four hour danceathon that we unknowingly walked into. 

When we were sat down in our seats (the bride was on her second outfit change) I noticed two young girls dancing. They were wearing Palestinian dresses. I didn’t think anyone was but I was very happy to see the familiar stitching and gentle sway of the black dress. 

Palestinian embroidery has a very long history. It is a traditional craft practiced by village women. They meet after completing housework to talk and embroidery dresses. Each village has its own design and it is possible to know where a woman comes from by looking at her dress. Each area has a different style of embroidery such as butterfly, palm and canaan star. The embroidery styles are passed on from mother to daughter. Dresses are used at different times of life. For example, there are different dresses for the young wife, for the pregnant woman and for the older women. The dresses are covered in embroidery and use many different colours. The colours too mean different things. Green is for growth. Yellow stands for harvest. In the recent years Palestinians have strengthened their culture and tradition. Never embroidery workshop have opened they kept the traditional designs but have introduced more styles and designs such as scarves bags, accessories, and add it to the house furniture. It is a beautiful part of the Palestinian tradition and helps others to recognise the culture.

There are great things about change and progress. Likewise tradition is pretty great too. It was lovely to see the two merging at this party. 

freekeh

That's green wheat isn't it, freekeh? (in the soup)
Thanks for the recipes... yum...
we'll do some for you...

Recipe for Soup

Ingredients:

1 onion

1 potato

3 handfuls frozen peas

3 carrots

3 handfuls of wheat

2 handfuls broken noodle

3 tbsp oil

1 dessert spoon salt

1 dessert spoon pepper

Instructions:

1. Dice onions and heat in large pan with oil.

2. Add peas.

3. Peel and dice potato and carrots, add to pan.

4. Add wheat.

5. Add enough water to cover the vegetables twice over.

6. Add salt and pepper.

7. Leave to simmer for 40 minutes.

8. Add broken noodles, stir, leave for 10 minutes.

9. Serve with bread.

Recipe for Fattoush

Ingredients:

4 tomatoes

4 cucumber

1 lettuce

2 lemons

Small amount of mint

Small cup olive oil

2 cloves of garlic

1 onion

Bread                      

Salt

Instructions:

1. Dry the bread in the oven and break into pieces.

2. Dice the vegetable and mix together with salt

3. Put the bread on top of the salad, and eat!

Seria, sehel! Quick and easy!

Women's Group Meeting

Women's group activity with the health society in Abu Dis. 

CADFA women's links - bringing Palestinian and British women together

Melanie: I believe it's a brilliant idea to make women's links between the UK and Palestine because it educates people.  Most people in the UK don't know what's happening in Palestine - the media don't tell us, we don't get the whole idea, we don't get the truth 

 

Najah :     ,

جددتكوين صديقات جدد من ثقافات مختلفة- الاضطلاع على تجارب اخرى-التعرف على نساء 

التعرف على معاناة نساء فلسطين

 

Sarah: I believe it's important to connect two parts of the world to see the truth and to learn more by sharing knowledge

 

Anwar : We can connect both sides by sharing their traditions and by sharing their ideas . 

Rowan : There is a depth to the connections women can make together and we discover our strength in solidarity.

Hana : Surely the greatest empowerment of women comes from engaging other with other powerful women.

Nandita: We've just had a very good women's visit from Palestine to Britain. We've had one every year since 2006  and I hope we'll have another next year. In between I hope that more of the links between women in Camden and Abu Dis are written down so that others can see them and can join in.

more pictures ...

They are coming soon !!!

Hey everyone,

The women's visit will be soon and I cant wait to meet them all. I am so happy to meet my friends Lama and Noor, who I got to know during the last leaders visit in December, but I am also very exited to see new faces. We will spend a really good time in Wales and in London. CADFA always says, that the participants of the women's visit don't have to be good singers...BUT I don't know, because I am a REALLY bad singer. I think I will try to sing very quietly. 

Dunja xx

Lama and me having fun in the lake District

Noor, Lama, me and Rana
The girls of the Leaders visit in front of the Big Bang
I miss you so so much!!!!

Stories from our Mothers

 Just watched the video about the women's visit !!!

It gives you a perfect view about the women's visit and  Palestinian live and culture.
After this video I really wanted to go to Palestine.

Dunja

Women's exchange March 2015

First info about the women's visit on this link here...

Greetings from Camden to our friends in Abu Dis...

Greetings from Camden women's links group - only some of us today - to our friends in Abu Dis women's links. Today we discussed the leaders' visit that has just happened and made plans for the women's visit that is coming up -  15 women from Palestine and 15 women from the UK meeting in Wales and England in March (lots of interesting visits planned) 

and ate some delicious biscuits that Rosie had made... There weren't many left by the time we took the photograph...