In January 2003, Annemarie Jacir and I with the help of a small group of friends organized a major Palestinian film festival here in New York. We invited Edward Said to give the opening remarks of our festival. The following September he passed away. Upon his passing there was a question whether he would be buried in Jerusalem where he was born or in Brummana, a small town in the Matn District of the Mount Lebanon near Beirut, where his widow's family resides. Following his own and his family's wishes he was buried in Brummana. In February 2004, I went to Palestine where Annemarie and I extended our festival and screened a selection of our films in five Palestinian cities. On my way back from Palestine, I went to an old cemetery by al-Aqsa Mosque on Haram al-Sharif and took a fistful of dust from the Prophet's companions' graves, placed it in a plastic bag and brought it back with me to New York, where in the following March we had the official memorial for Edward. The following summer in July I went to Beirut and with a few Palestinian and Lebanese friends traveled through Palestinian refugee camps where we showed a few features from our festival--while I was in Beirut I went to Brumanah, went to Edward's grave and placed the soil I had brought with me from Palestine and placed it on his grave . . . if Muhammad does not go to the mountain, as it were, well, I thought the mountain goes to Muhammad. The following is my first Palestinian travelogue, describing this story. I have published one more account of my travels in Palestine, that one from Jerusalem to Nablus. I have a couple of other accounts that I have not published yet--hopefully soon-- tonight when I saw images of Palestinian revolt in Ramallah and Jerusalem I thought of sharing this travelogue--hope you will like it--here is the link to: "For a Fistful of Dust: A Passage to Palestine" (Al-Ahram, 23 - 29 September 2004): http://
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