sarha

Arabic: سرحة (sarḥa), from the verb سرح (saraḥa) — to let cattle out to pasture early in the morning, leaving them to wander and graze at liberty. As a noun, it means a roaming walk with no particular destination — young men would go on a sarḥa into the open hills, disappearing for a day, sometimes weeks. To go on a sarḥa was to move freely, at will, without restraint. The word comes from Raja Shehadeh's *Palestinian Walks*, where he uses it to describe his walks through the landscape of the West Bank.