Areas of recent repair were pointed out to us and their histories explained. Israeli policy when entering Aida, and probably modus operandi for all the refugee camps, is to avoid walking down the tiny snaking streets and alleys. They often tunnel through buildings and homes with explosives, creating their own paths through the crowd of structures. It just occurred to me that it really is not very different than their current policy of Israeli-only roads, ever expanding throughout the West Bank. Our guide told us of his daily dash for home through an area of the camp exposed to Israeli snipers during the Second Intifada and how the rush of fear and adrenaline never lessened during the crisis. The sense of relief he felt walking through unexposed alleys giving way to dread and terror the closer he came to his home was almost palpable as he relieved it with us. It made me wonder how he retells it, what must be many times, to visitors like us. I wondered if the experience had caused him to consider moving further into the cluttered interior of the camp and of how many groceries he dropped and ruined as he tried zigzagging at breakneck speed across the uneven, jutting pavement.

Life was ruinous and difficult to imagine during the imposed martial law of the Second Intifada - but that was before the Wall. Now the Separation Wall runs along one entire side of the camp, never less than a few dozen meters from outermost line of homes and completely detaching the olive grove that used to serve the camp as one of a scarce few local sources of income and recreation. Every so many meters there is a guard tower, and in truth there is only a handful along the stretch of thin, reinforced concrete dissecting Aida, but these towers lose something in only printed words. They look archaic, medieval. In the twenty-first century, I might be forgiven for expecting something sleek, high tech, maybe with a gleaming chrome finish. This is the future I and so many before me grew up looking forward to with so much hope for so many things. Space exploration, cures of diseases, global cultural exchange and connectedness where mostly what I expected more of as a kid. I never gave much through to military occupations or security walls, but at least they could look sterile. In reality, they are dirty syringes sticking needle up out of the ground, stained and grungy. Debris, trash and litter, ever a constant in Palestine on the unseen side of walls, line the road between life and the wall. Residents would rather see a wall of trash than the wall and its diseased spikes, but it will take many more years of refuse to stack high enough to eclipse 8meters of shortened horizon.

My second experience in Aida took place just as the sun was setting. The view of the camp minaret beside a crescent moon on a cloudless blue and orange sky was simply out of place with its beauty. The mosques here are the finest structures in either Deheishe or Aida. They are the antithesis of the Wall. Minarets are archaic, even pre-medieval structures and yet they are clean, geometric and organic -  and in Aida camp the minaret stands opposed to the guard towers outnumbered and refined. From the roof we stood upon, you could not see them together. You would actually find one of the most pleasant views of Bethlehem’s urban sprawl from that rooftop, particular with the tiled minaret in the foreground. To see the tattooed Wall, the lost olive grove and encroaching Israeli settlements, you have to turn your back on both – the minaret and Bethlehem. It is a dark vision during the day, and all the more so at night.