And you may be wondering... How did Taishya end up in Palestine this May??
Well, it all started in January 2024 when Taishya was appointed to serve as the Nablus, Palestine Sister City Representative. Taishya first met with Boulder Nablus Sister City leadership then hosting dinner for Palestinian visitors at my home that spring.
Then in September, 2024 when Taishya gathered with the Boulder Nablus Sister City Project and met Hatem who shared their music, dance, culture and lived experiences in and around the Askar Refugee Camp in Nablus, Palestine. Hatem also encouraged me to join the delegation in May 2025 to meet his family, friends, and community members.
Taishya understood the courage and strength it takes to build bridges as violence escalated in his West Bank community. Across Nablus and the Askar Refugee Camp. A camp that is supposed to be a safe zone for civilians including men, women, trans people, two spirits, and children. A ‘home’ to 16,000 people that has streets the size of sidewalks and minimal human rights.
As a descendent of enslaved Africans, displaced from her own motherland, Taishya empathized deeply with the intergenerational displacement, dispossession, exploitation, and efforts to erase Hatem’s community and the broader Palestinian people. Seeing parallels between the forced removal of Indigenous peoples in the Americas as well as the no so great migration of 6 million African Americans from the South. Taishya quickly recognized the patterns of oppression.
CALL TO ACTION:
During this meeting, the Boulder Nablus Sister City members, Hatem, and I identified meaningful ways to deepen the program through cultural events, social gatherings, and fundraising for equipment for the new health center and ambulance. In 2025, the Sister City purchased the ambulance. The organization is now fundraising to replace their fire truck from 1972!
You can make a donation today to support their work! The residents of Nablus continue to experience escalated violence including increased fires and wildfires. Please consider volunteering for this BNSC organization to deepen relations and expand support for our Palestinian kin.
REGISTER FOR PUBLIC PREVIEW – 12/20/25 IN BOULDER:
The Uprooting Qahr inaugural public preview is scheduled on Saturday, December 20th at 3:30 pm in Boulder, Colorado at Junkyard Social. Traveling from the Colorado Rockies to West Asia to the Deep South, we navigate the promise of democracy, the spread of colonialism, and reclaim pathways to liberty and justice for all.
Through film, music, and narratives, this work unpacks QAHR: sadness, frustration, anger caused by displacement, dispossession and discrimination while also shining a light of hope towards collective liberation.
Register Here
