I was sick with a nasty combination of a migraine and a jetlag, a pitiful and annoying combination--- but we still walked in the Old City, definitely (if you ask me) SANS the muslim quarter, bright and still emerging Mamila, and Yemin Moshe, a beautiful neighborhood, named after Sir Moses Montefiore, built in the late 19th century, the first city neighborhood outside of the walls of Jerusalem, with the windmill (from the late 19th century), and quiet alleys climbing up or going down, two-storey stone houses on both sides. Since I was loaded with advil, I walked there even cheerfully, ignoring signs of migraine, taking in the feel and beauty. but the whole Shabbat I was sick in bed. Very sick, indeed.
Then things gradually improved and we covered many places that we like in the city, often led by our schoolmate from college days, I only knew him marginally, V. had had no contacts since graduation, and here he was, Sergey, a new Yerushalmi, in love with the city. A very nice discovery.
Met with our cousin Sopha (who was very good to us when we were struggling to get out of Russia) and her son Dima - remembered our summer in Kiev when Olya was three...
One episode that Sopha reminded me of: We are on a street car, Little Olya, blond curls, big eyes, shorts and a T-shirt is holding my hand. No seats available in the car, but it is not exactly packed, those who are standing still enjoy a fare amount of space around them. An older Ukrainian man is sitting and gazing at Olya who stands next to his seat. Then he asks her a question, "And who are you?" Olya hesitates for a few moments, her eyes become even bigger, she steps back, away from the man, clutches my hand tightly and breathes out, "I'm a Jewess..." (Ya Evreika) Terrified Sopha pulls me and Olya to the end of the street car, and luckily it slows down approaching a stop, we get off, it resumes its movement. "He probably meant, are you a girl or a boy, since she wears shorts," Sopha tells me.
On Monday, in the late afternoon, I went to a the apartment where Jonathan, the son of my friend Judith, lives with his family in Ramat Shlomo where many young religious families with many little kids live in not so large apartments.
From there we drove to Netania (on the sea) to Judith's place. and early in the morning on Tuesday, my first Tiyul (excursion) with Judith F. - started: Golan, Galil, Hermon mountain, a place in Jordan valley where migrating birds stop ( both ways), around Lake Kineret... and everything is so green, and bright flowers (mostly bold LEGO colors) here and there. streams and waterfalls. ancient ruins: of a fortress in Kochav Hayarden , of underground passages and the palace of Agrippa II in the Roman era city, the 11th century synagogue, a water-powered flour mill (one pair of grinding stone is still in operation)... you get the picture.
got to the top of Hermon using the ski lift.
got down also using the ski lift
Three villages of Druzes service the mountain, the ski lifts and eateries, and all. They make money during the ski season, They are Syrian Druzes , and they live well in Israel on Golan Heights. But they are worried about their relatives in Syria, and so once a year, on Israel's Independance Day, they stage riots, posing for international packs of modern days journalists. After that and for the rest of the year they enjoy free education, excellent medical care, and other Israeli goodies.
My winter coat was a blessing on the ski lift and the top of Hermon mountain, other then that, it is 80 degrees. Hamsin, the wind from the desert, brought the heat, the sky had been low and the air kind of heavy with suspended sand, a bit like a fog, if one can imagine the fog dry and sandy... Anyway, for the most of our stay, it's 80F plus instead of 40-50-60F... my winter coat is a burden. i only have one sweater that is somewhat light - and this is all i can wear. Eventually I bought a light cotton sweater, the new season color, banana yellow, it was cute, and promised a relief, and actually delivered the above mentioned relief, as the air miraculously cooled off shortly after I'd made my purchase, and now I have a brand new, cute banana sweater for this coming spring and summer...
On this tiyul we stayed over night in the hotel in the " 'northern finger of the gallil', ('etzpa hagallil'), which protrudes up alongside lebanon,"(thanks, Judith!) north of Kiriyt Shmona, the guest house of Kibbutz Kfar Gilady. As we are approaching the Kibbutz, we pass by the Tel Hai cemetery, 200 meters from the kibbutz's entrance. This was a gathering spot where on Sunday afternoon August 5th, 2007 (during the summer lebanon war) twelve reservists were killed by a rocket hit... Other rockets hit the town of Kiryat Shmona, damaged a synagogue and started a series of fires, Rockets also landed in Haifa and the surrounding bay area, Nahariya, Karmiel, Rosh Pina, the Golan Heights, Ma'alot and Tzfat. When muslims are pounding Jewish cities, the world is ALWAYS silent. when Arabs skillfully and notoriously STAGE "killing by IDF" and gullible (or Jew-hating) useful idiots broadcast the show all over the world, the world is loud blaming Jews who have this unbelievable insolence, this stabborn audacity of being alive on this Earth...
We returned to Netania, and the next morning I took a very efficient Israeli train to Haifa. We stayed in Dan Carmel. where all people from that Technion conference stayed, a great location, amazing Israeli breakfasts in the morning,
- we met with Aba and Ida Taratuta from our refusnik years, spent hours remembering
and filling the 32 year gap.
- attended reception at the Technion where I had a lot to say re: my journey to
Golan, Galil, and Jordan Valley. A French mathematician who works in Zurich, was
very interested as he too was planning some travel. His plan was to drive from
Jerusalem to Kineret along Jordan River. I mentioned that such route would most
probably result in my intimely death. I didn't mention, that he too could be easily
mistaken for a Jew by a blood-thirsty and 72-virgins-desiring poorpalestinian, and be brutally killed if he chose to drive
that route...
As we were on the bus taking the conference crowd back to the hotel, a phone call came about the Israeli Arab gunning down Jewish boys studying in the library of their school in Jerusalem.
Of course the media is going to equate
- the deliberate targeting of students by barbaric poorPalestinian followed by the gleeful celebration among poorpalestinians
- with the accidental death of poorPalestinian children whom barbaric poorPalestinian adults deliberately use as human shields
for Shabbat we went to Netania and spent it wonderfully with the Judith and Ed. I stayed indoors as it was the hottest day of all.
the second tiyul - a day with (my friend) Colette's family -on Yom Rishon - Sunday - was also wonderful. Colette's brother and his family live on a moshav near Afula. Colette's sister picked me up in Haifa,and we came to the moshav in Jezreel Valley. Then: Gilboa, Yordan valley, Kineret, we checked all the places where different flowers are now - just for this week: irises in one, anemone of four different colors in the other, a place where the first tulips just opened up, etc. I went to Beit Alpha at the foot of Gilboa, where the mosaic floor of the synsgogue was discovered (6th century) Of course on Gilboa we checked out both Shmuels' (the two books of Samuel) spots. Such family excursions are a very common Israeli pasttime. Knowing and loving the land, and truly enjoing it is very Israeli. Busloads of schoolchildren, other groups arrive at this or that of the many Israeli Nature Reserves and park and everybody is immediately off the bus, and seems to move aroung with grace of a mountain goat, regardless of age and physical condition... I was surprised to see a busload of muslim women wrapped in their garb and moving slowly. They too are brought out on an excursion which is heavily (totally?) susbsidized by the Israeli government. Supposedly, this is to make the Jews believe that Arabs love the land too...
We ate in Pagoda - a fancy place overlooking Kineret... When i returned to Haifa, we went out for dinner with our old friends Nira and Shaul. The next day i walked with Nira in the scuplture garden and we walked in all pretty places then picked up V. at the Technion and went to Nira's house. from there - on a train and to Rehovot.
The next day i managed a three hour journey to Arad (a train to Lod, then to Beer Sheva, then a bus to Arad) and came back to Rehovot at 9pm (three hours back) having spent six hours with my cousin Susanna and her daughter Tanya and Tanya's daughter Limor. In Arad I also met Uncle Isaak's (my father's brother who was 20 years older than Father) daughter Tata and her daughter Inna
the campus of Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot is beautiful.
We spent half a day in Rishon LeZion with our friends, the Gefens. Then came to Tel Aviv, dropped our stuff at the apartment where my niece Anna live, and walked along the seashore to a restaurant where we met my friend Ayala for dinner.
After that the plan had been to stay overnight at Anna's and then return to Yerushalaim for the last three days.
can you believe this, we got to Tel Aviv, and loved the sea, and i was so tired of packing and unpacking our bursting suitcases and we had a very nice dinner with anna (susanna's daughter) and Ayala my very good friend, and Anna and Ayala really liked each other(!), and we slept so well in anna's apartment, and Tel Aviv reminded me of Upper West Side - lively and lively and "diaspora style" Jewish: there are kosher places, but you have to go looking for them, which is very annoying if you think, wait a minute, this IS Israel, but so very familiar for a diaspora jew,) and so V. said, let's just stay here and do nothing as we enjoyed doing in New York in December and I was surprised, but I liked the fact that he was so relaxed (just like he was in NYC in December) and smiled, and joked around, And i wanted more of this, and so we ended up staying put in Northern Tel Aviv, two blockes away from the sea. V. had had a packed schedule - work meetings, talks to give, discussions, etc, and all my scheduling of seeing everybody went on top of it, and here in Tel Aviv he looked like he had just dropped all the burden and felt free. Anna is fun, and loving, and was happy to be with us when she had time, but she is busy with work and plans, so we were a two-some a lot too. her apartment is somewhat run-down but in the best possible location, -- we do like LOCATION, don't we? and she made us feel very welcome.
and i had hoped to see my friend Z. again. we spent several hours with him and his parents and then we went to get his wife T. and walked along the shore in Tel Aviv, and it was very good. we had a really good ice cream... Z. had finished his chemo several weeks ago and seemed to be rid of the chemo poison, so he didn't look sick at all, but a very big operation is scheduled for the 25th of march. this is a huge battle, and all this is so sad. His mother is making a heroic effort to look like she is holding up well, but i can see right through her... She has written a story of her life - in Russian, and i am going to translate it into English, and then Z.'s son will translate from English into Hebrew. This is a project we have been discussing for years. how it is my turn to work on it. T. is also a brave little soldier who lets the world only see her brave face. it is so much pain barely hidden, and fear, and a huge effort to keep going. so i had hoped that they might want to come for another stroll along the seashore on yom shabbat, and we would spend more time together. That didn't work out. And so we spent hours enjoying the sea, walking along the beach, the New wooden Promenade in the Old Port, and the stone Promenade between the Old port and almost Yaffa. We went to the Diaspora Museum to see Aba Taratuta's baby, a large exhibit "Jews of Struggle" - about refusniks and Prisoners of Zion in the USSR. We also walked to Habima - oops, under reconstruction, Rothschild Boulevard, Kikar Dizengof with a fountain that used to change colors, have a fire in the center, and play music, it doesn'r seem to do any of that any more... We still were busy sightseeing on Sunday and in the evening went to Lod and flew back home.