As you may know, yesterday was Yom Ha'Zikaron (Israel's Memorial Day) and today is Yom Ha'Atzmaut (Independence Day, i.e. Israel's 62nd Birthday). The placement of the two days one after the other has symbolic significance, and the idea is to commemorate all of Israel's fallen soldiers and civilians, and then celebrate what they were fighting for, that being the State of Israel.
I should probably start by explaining that Yom Ha'Zikaron is a deeply personal holiday for all Israelis. Virtually everyone in the country knows or served with someone who has died in the conflict. It's a very heavy day - not like American Memorial Day with its barbecues and parades. That said, it all started at eight o'clock Sunday night with a siren that went off to announce the beginning of Yom Ha'Zikaron. Produced by the dreaded air-raid siren, I wasn't sure what it was at first. Thinking that it might be another test, I called Lermie:
Me: Lermie?
Lermie: Yom Ha'Zikaron.
Me: Ahh
When the siren goes off, you're supposed to stop what you're doing and stand for a minute of silence, which we did.
The next morning, there was another siren scheduled to go off at eleven, so we walked to the excessively huge pedestrian bridge just next to our house and watched as everyone stopped what they were doing when the siren went off. People driving parked their cars in order to get out and stand for the minute. The men doing construction on the new train tracks got out of their vehicles and stood silently. Cyclists dismounted in order to pay their respects. In the newspaper the next day, there were pictures of people standing on the train in order to commemorate the fallen. Literally the entire country stood still for a minute. To be honest, it kind of gave me goose bumps. Then, when the sirens stopped, everyone got back into their cars and construction vehicles, mounted their bicycles, took their seats, and carried on their way.
Then, when the sun goes down on Yom Ha'Zikaron, it means that it's time to celebrate Israeli independence. For those of us trying to be critical of Israel and struggling with their Zionist identity, Yom Ha'Atzmaut can be a complicated holiday. However, we came to the conclusion that we are critical of Israel 364 days a year - we can take a day off to celebrate it. This means free concerts and carnivals in every corner of the country, barbecuing, parades, loud music, and, in general, partying in the way that only Israel can. For us, this meant Kobi Peretz: King of the Arsim.
We met our Golden God at the festival that was being held at Akko's City Hall. They closed off a bunch of streets around the City Hall, which is located pretty much in downtown Akko, and the streets were filled with vendors selling cotton candy, balloons, light-up toys, shawarma, hot corn, salted Ful beans, and big blowup hammers covered in Israeli flag motifs. There were kids walking around dressed in full costume as dogs and cows, and, of course, loads and loads of babies. The stage was a fenced off area located on the steps of the City Hall, and the show included lots of youth choirs and dance groups from Akko, as well as a speech from the mayor and the rabbi, before finally getting to the main event: Kobi Peretz.
The most famous mizrachi singer in the country, he regularly performs in Tel Aviv and the surrounding wealthy suburbs. None of us were really sure why he decided to come to Akko, and the other shows went on for so long that at one point we thought that maybe it was all a big scam and he wasn't actually coming. But then around 10:15, they started setting up for what seemed to be a big act. Having already sat through the opening acts for over two hours, we promised each other that we would leave if Kobi Peretz wasn't the next one on stage.
The setup crew was experiencing some technical difficulties, and around 10:45, the man himself finally took the stage. It was worth the wait (absolutely no irony here). Clad in white slacks, a half unbuttoned shirt, platinum blond hair and a goatee to match, he performed four or five numbers (which were all fairly long) in his smooth mizrachi voice. He was actually pretty good, and the population of Akko was very appreciative. Men and women, young and old alike, sang along with fervor. If you're interested in checking him out (which I would recommend) you can click here.
We left at about 11:15, a little before the conclusion of the show. Somehow we had managed to get spots pretty near to the front, and as we filed out, others flooded in to replace us. As we were walking across the pedestrian bridge that led back to our house, we saw fireworks go off above downtown Akko marking the end of the show.
As today is a national holiday and almost all Israeli schools are closed (except for Arab schools) we didn't have messima so instead we took the opportunity to have a massive barbecue, Fourth of July style. Some of the boys stripped an old shower, filled it with coals, and covered it with spare oven grates to make a makeshift grill, and we grilled up enough chicken, veggie dogs, and vegetables to eat for at least a few days. We bought loads of pickles and olives, and entertainment was provided by Simon and Leya alternately jamming on the guitar (Leya's really good at the Oregon Trail theme song, and Simon likes to perform covers of Tenacious D).
Around five o'clock, many people slipped into food comas, and, sitting on the coach alone eating chips, I decided that I would rather write a blog post than work on scholarship applications. (Do you think they award scholarships to people who write blogs? That could be two birds with one stone.)
Anyhow, that's the latest news from Akko. Happy Israeli Independence Day; tomorrow I'll go back to being critical.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Stakeouts, Flash Mobs, and a Workshop Spring Break
I feel like I need to offer some sort of explanation for my rather spotty posting, as I know my readership has been dying for a new one for quite some time. That excuse being the fact that I actually have a readership. You see, this whole thing started as a funny idea at two o'clock in the morning and I thought maybe, just maybe, my mother would read it. Now that I know that people who I have no blood relation to also read it, I can't just post any old crap. So not that I'm asking you to stop reading my blog, I'm simply offering this as a way of explanation. That and the fact that things have been a bit busy around here lately. What have we been up to on Workshop 59, you may ask? Well well, you'll just have to keep reading to find out.
Starting at the beginning, the excitement all began at about 11:00 on a Wednesday morning a few weeks ago. Our messima was canceled due to some rioting in the Arab villages - Habonim didn't really think it would be dangerous, just that no kids would come to the ken - so we were at home sleeping in. The sun was shining, the wind was whistling through the trees, and I was just debating whether or not to get out of bed and do something useful (like blog, perhaps) when an air raid warning began to sound. Have you ever heard an air raid warning? If the answer is no, you should hope to keep it that way. It's scary as hell. Anyhow, that made the question of whether or not to get out of bed much easier, and now the question I was grappling with was whether or not to put on pants before I ran outside and to the nearest bomb shelter. I ran out of my room, and met a few of my half-dressed housemates who were grappling with the very same question.
Pants on, we ran outside and... everyone was going about their business. Our neighbors were hanging their laundry on the lines, people were walking their dogs down the street, men were hard at work constructing a new set of tracks for the train that runs right past our house. Needless to say, we were confused. After some frantic phone calls to our madrichim, we were told that it was "just a test," and it had been announced on the radio a few days before. I guess it's a good thing that a) we have a radio, and b) we didn't run out of our house like morons ready to sprint to the nearest fall-out shelter. At least now we know that the thing works, I suppose.
But the excitement didn't end there. On the evening of the same action-packed Wednesday, I was hanging around the house with Dan and Simon waiting for everyone else to return from messima, when we hear a knock on the door and in walk three big Israeli men. Though they're wearing street clothes, they tell us they're cops, and they need to use our rooftop balcony in order to set up surveillance on the parking lot located just across the tracks from our house. Though the entire interaction was in Hebrew, they made some hand gestures which seemed to mean that some sketchy dealings were being made in that parking lot. The guys knew English, so Simon and I tried to communicate in Abu-Dubi (for those of you who used to watch Zoom, I hope that means something to you).
"Are these guys really cops?" He didn't know.
"Did they show you a badge when they came in?"
"Uh no... should we ask?"
"I guess so, I mean, what if they're here to case the house?"
"Uhh..."
We asked the guys to wait a few minutes while we called to check with our madrichim. The guys said that they had been in the house the previous year to set up surveillance, but they couldn't remember who they had spoken with. We called our Israeli madrich Tamir, who spoke on the phone with them for a few minutes and asked them to show us their police IDs. They complied, and then handed my phone back to me so I could tell Tamir that we had seen their IDs.
Tamir: "Do they look real?"
Me: "I mean, I've never seen an Israeli police ID before, but I guess so..."
Tamir: "Well just spread out and keep an eye on things while they're here. A few years ago the same thing happened to a Hanoar Haoved group in Haifa and they got robbed."
Me: "Well..."
Tamir: "And take some pictures. Discretely."
Me: "Are you serious?"
Tamir: "Yeah, don't you want souvenirs?"
Me: "No..."
As people started arriving home from messima, we stationed them around the house to keep an eye out, and we "read" or "watched movies" until the policemen finally left, some five hours later.
After the policemen left we were hanging out on the balcony, when we saw a car drive into the parking lot that the policemen were watching. It parked and flashed its lights. A second car, which had been parked for a little while, flashed its lights in a response. Then a man got out of the first car and transferred something from the trunk of the first car into the second car. Then both cars drove off. I wish I could make this stuff up. From our positions up on our darkened balcony, we remarked to each other that the cops must have been there just a little too early.
That was about all the excitement we got until the beginning of chofesh (break) when we were called upon to participate in a Hanoar Haoved Flash Mob in Tel Aviv to promote the Hanoar Haoved May Day rally. In case you haven't heard of the phenomenon, flash mobs are when a bunch of people go to a public place and, put simply, do something that you're not supposed to do. Not something illegal, just something that upsets the norms. This could mean staging a musical in a mall food court, having lots of people fall asleep on beds and chairs in a furniture store, freezing for five minutes in Grand Central Station, or having 200 people all bust out a dance together for no apparent reason, and then carry on their way. We chose the latter option, which we performed in the square in front of Shuk HaCarmel, on of the busiest spots in Tel Aviv. This involved meeting up about three hours beforehand at a school in Tel Aviv to learn the dance, and then finding our way to Shuk HaCarmel, and at 12:48 the whole thing began. We wore red (for the blood of the workers) and danced to a medley of songs about labor and freedom. Here's the link to the video if you're interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfVlR6rmToQ.
Continuing on, from Tel Aviv I went down to Be'er Sheva with Noah and Alex on our way to the desert to hike, but to get there we took the craziest bus I've ever been on. Usually the 370 and 380 run direct service from Be'er Sheva to Tel Aviv, which is about a one hour and fifteen minute bus ride. However by the time we got to the bus station, the direct lines had stopped running hours ago, and instead we had to take the 369, aka NOT direct service. This two hour bus was Tel Aviv to Be'er Sheva by way of Lebanon (not actually but it seemed like it. If this doesn't make sense to you, refer to a map of Israel). We were on four separate highways, and zigzagged our way back and forth across the country until we finally arrived at our destination at roughly 1:00 in the morning. But that's not all. We also had the pleasure of spending those two beautiful hours with a gigantic (and loud) family of Haredi Jews. Baruch Hashem.
In Be'er Sheva we spent a little time cleaning Alex's house, and then packed up and headed out to Sde Boker, a kibbutz/field school/guest house/hiking spot in the desert and home of David Ben Gurion's grave (he was quite the desert enthusiast). Noah's mom met us there, and we stayed in the guest house for two nights and spent our days hiking to the beautiful springs that are scattered around that area of the desert. The first day we hiked to Ein Aqev, which has a nice swimming hole and lots of shade (and lots of Israelis and their babies), then back. Though the hike was probably about 14k total and included a monster hill, Noah's mom decided that she needed another 10k and a mountain to tire her out. So we went back and ate ice cream while she ascended another peak. The next day we hiked only a few kilometers to Ein Avedat and then up a series of steps that monks had carved into the cliff side. This brought us to another swimming hole (also full of babies) where we sat, ate lunch, made tea, and swam for a few hours, before finding our way back. Again, Noah's mom added significantly more mileage to her hike while we sat and got our tan on (don't worry Mom, I was wearing sunscreen).
After leaving the desert, we headed north back to Akko to celebrate Lauren and Tali's birthday (both born on April 3rd, though Lauren was born a few minutes earlier, as she pointed out many times) and then down to Haifa for a day. Here are my picks for my favorite city in Israel:
Bahai Gardens: Obviously first on the list as they're probably Haifa's largest tourist attraction. Located right above the German Colony, the second most holy site of the Bahai religion (the first and lesser known site is in Akko, thank you very much) is gorgeous lit up at night. However, since I'd already been in the gardens three times previously, we didn't bother on this trip.
Haifa Zoo: No on seems to know that there's a zoo in Haifa, but there is. And a pretty huge one at that. The entrance is hidden in Carmel Centre in Gan HaEm, and the zoo itself stretches across the top of the Carmel mountain. Though the camals, baboons, and otters (and of course lions, tigers, and bears) are all cool, the best is the snake exhibit. It's sort of hard to find, but you seriously shouldn't miss it. Though rather sad and disturbing, the exhibit is an extremely educational tool for those learning about the food chain, and we had the privilege of seeing several mice, guinea pigs, hamsters, and a rabbit meet their end in the snake exhibit. Another plus is that just adjacent to the snake exhibit is a petting zoo with lots of mice, guinea pigs, hamsters, and rabbits...
Wadi Nisnas: A well known Arab community located in the center of Haifa. The cobblestone roads and small winding streets feature many mosaics and other public works of art, in addition to some very good falafel and knaffe. The best falafel in Wadi Nisnas can be found at the very edge of the neighborhood if you walk down the main street. You'll know you've found the right place if, the minute you enter, the owner offers you a falafel ball to taste. (He does it every time without fail, so if you're not offered falafel the moment you step through the door, you haven't found it and you should keep looking.
Eli's Pub: A bit of a whole-in-the-wall located near the port on Derech Yaffo, this place sometimes has jam sessions (mostly jazz and blues) where musicians rotate after every song.
That was Haifa, then on to Olga then Tel Aviv for a night where I stayed with my friend's family friends. Unfortunately I caught a bit of a stomach virus there (yala balagan) and we spent most of our time watching a pirated version of "The Holiday" (the audio switched into Russion about every twenty minutes or so) and MTV.
The last weekend of chofesh I spent on Kibbutz Gezer, the best place on earth. This trip was sweetened by the opportunity to see a bilingual baseball game - you could alternately hear chants of "Od out echad!", "Yalla yalla! Play the field!", and "Yofi! Way to hustle!" Gezer obviously tore up Beit Shemesh (I could pitch better than their pitcher, and that's a very harsh criticism if you've ever seen me "play" baseball). We also had the pleasure of hearing all about Sue's trip to Egypt ("The place is fucking rife with pyramids!"), and the rest of the weekend was spent reveling in our inner old person. Then finally back to Akko, and business as usual, on Saturday night.
Only five more weeks left of this, so I'll do my best to post as much as possible until we leave. Coming up, we have a May Day seminar with the Euros as well as Habo Australia and Habo South Africa (these are new ones from last time since the southern hemisphere shnat goes February through November), a tour of the separation wall, and then lots and lots of sikkuming (concluding, pretty much) - Messima, Kaveret, and then all of Workshop.
One last update: Kvutsat TnT has chosen a new name and will henceforth be known as Kvutsat Ratzif (meaning platform, and also has lots of connotations of something that continues and builds upon itself). Kvutsat Ratzif has also adopted a dog! Unofficially of course. He's a cute little mutt who follows us everywhere; he even tried to come with us on the train. We're still trying to figure out what his name is, but the only thing he seems to respond to is "Fish." Which is weird.
Until next time! I promise that won't be too far off.
Starting at the beginning, the excitement all began at about 11:00 on a Wednesday morning a few weeks ago. Our messima was canceled due to some rioting in the Arab villages - Habonim didn't really think it would be dangerous, just that no kids would come to the ken - so we were at home sleeping in. The sun was shining, the wind was whistling through the trees, and I was just debating whether or not to get out of bed and do something useful (like blog, perhaps) when an air raid warning began to sound. Have you ever heard an air raid warning? If the answer is no, you should hope to keep it that way. It's scary as hell. Anyhow, that made the question of whether or not to get out of bed much easier, and now the question I was grappling with was whether or not to put on pants before I ran outside and to the nearest bomb shelter. I ran out of my room, and met a few of my half-dressed housemates who were grappling with the very same question.
Pants on, we ran outside and... everyone was going about their business. Our neighbors were hanging their laundry on the lines, people were walking their dogs down the street, men were hard at work constructing a new set of tracks for the train that runs right past our house. Needless to say, we were confused. After some frantic phone calls to our madrichim, we were told that it was "just a test," and it had been announced on the radio a few days before. I guess it's a good thing that a) we have a radio, and b) we didn't run out of our house like morons ready to sprint to the nearest fall-out shelter. At least now we know that the thing works, I suppose.
But the excitement didn't end there. On the evening of the same action-packed Wednesday, I was hanging around the house with Dan and Simon waiting for everyone else to return from messima, when we hear a knock on the door and in walk three big Israeli men. Though they're wearing street clothes, they tell us they're cops, and they need to use our rooftop balcony in order to set up surveillance on the parking lot located just across the tracks from our house. Though the entire interaction was in Hebrew, they made some hand gestures which seemed to mean that some sketchy dealings were being made in that parking lot. The guys knew English, so Simon and I tried to communicate in Abu-Dubi (for those of you who used to watch Zoom, I hope that means something to you).
"Are these guys really cops?" He didn't know.
"Did they show you a badge when they came in?"
"Uh no... should we ask?"
"I guess so, I mean, what if they're here to case the house?"
"Uhh..."
We asked the guys to wait a few minutes while we called to check with our madrichim. The guys said that they had been in the house the previous year to set up surveillance, but they couldn't remember who they had spoken with. We called our Israeli madrich Tamir, who spoke on the phone with them for a few minutes and asked them to show us their police IDs. They complied, and then handed my phone back to me so I could tell Tamir that we had seen their IDs.
Tamir: "Do they look real?"
Me: "I mean, I've never seen an Israeli police ID before, but I guess so..."
Tamir: "Well just spread out and keep an eye on things while they're here. A few years ago the same thing happened to a Hanoar Haoved group in Haifa and they got robbed."
Me: "Well..."
Tamir: "And take some pictures. Discretely."
Me: "Are you serious?"
Tamir: "Yeah, don't you want souvenirs?"
Me: "No..."
As people started arriving home from messima, we stationed them around the house to keep an eye out, and we "read" or "watched movies" until the policemen finally left, some five hours later.
After the policemen left we were hanging out on the balcony, when we saw a car drive into the parking lot that the policemen were watching. It parked and flashed its lights. A second car, which had been parked for a little while, flashed its lights in a response. Then a man got out of the first car and transferred something from the trunk of the first car into the second car. Then both cars drove off. I wish I could make this stuff up. From our positions up on our darkened balcony, we remarked to each other that the cops must have been there just a little too early.
That was about all the excitement we got until the beginning of chofesh (break) when we were called upon to participate in a Hanoar Haoved Flash Mob in Tel Aviv to promote the Hanoar Haoved May Day rally. In case you haven't heard of the phenomenon, flash mobs are when a bunch of people go to a public place and, put simply, do something that you're not supposed to do. Not something illegal, just something that upsets the norms. This could mean staging a musical in a mall food court, having lots of people fall asleep on beds and chairs in a furniture store, freezing for five minutes in Grand Central Station, or having 200 people all bust out a dance together for no apparent reason, and then carry on their way. We chose the latter option, which we performed in the square in front of Shuk HaCarmel, on of the busiest spots in Tel Aviv. This involved meeting up about three hours beforehand at a school in Tel Aviv to learn the dance, and then finding our way to Shuk HaCarmel, and at 12:48 the whole thing began. We wore red (for the blood of the workers) and danced to a medley of songs about labor and freedom. Here's the link to the video if you're interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfVlR6rmToQ.
Continuing on, from Tel Aviv I went down to Be'er Sheva with Noah and Alex on our way to the desert to hike, but to get there we took the craziest bus I've ever been on. Usually the 370 and 380 run direct service from Be'er Sheva to Tel Aviv, which is about a one hour and fifteen minute bus ride. However by the time we got to the bus station, the direct lines had stopped running hours ago, and instead we had to take the 369, aka NOT direct service. This two hour bus was Tel Aviv to Be'er Sheva by way of Lebanon (not actually but it seemed like it. If this doesn't make sense to you, refer to a map of Israel). We were on four separate highways, and zigzagged our way back and forth across the country until we finally arrived at our destination at roughly 1:00 in the morning. But that's not all. We also had the pleasure of spending those two beautiful hours with a gigantic (and loud) family of Haredi Jews. Baruch Hashem.
In Be'er Sheva we spent a little time cleaning Alex's house, and then packed up and headed out to Sde Boker, a kibbutz/field school/guest house/hiking spot in the desert and home of David Ben Gurion's grave (he was quite the desert enthusiast). Noah's mom met us there, and we stayed in the guest house for two nights and spent our days hiking to the beautiful springs that are scattered around that area of the desert. The first day we hiked to Ein Aqev, which has a nice swimming hole and lots of shade (and lots of Israelis and their babies), then back. Though the hike was probably about 14k total and included a monster hill, Noah's mom decided that she needed another 10k and a mountain to tire her out. So we went back and ate ice cream while she ascended another peak. The next day we hiked only a few kilometers to Ein Avedat and then up a series of steps that monks had carved into the cliff side. This brought us to another swimming hole (also full of babies) where we sat, ate lunch, made tea, and swam for a few hours, before finding our way back. Again, Noah's mom added significantly more mileage to her hike while we sat and got our tan on (don't worry Mom, I was wearing sunscreen).
After leaving the desert, we headed north back to Akko to celebrate Lauren and Tali's birthday (both born on April 3rd, though Lauren was born a few minutes earlier, as she pointed out many times) and then down to Haifa for a day. Here are my picks for my favorite city in Israel:
Bahai Gardens: Obviously first on the list as they're probably Haifa's largest tourist attraction. Located right above the German Colony, the second most holy site of the Bahai religion (the first and lesser known site is in Akko, thank you very much) is gorgeous lit up at night. However, since I'd already been in the gardens three times previously, we didn't bother on this trip.
Haifa Zoo: No on seems to know that there's a zoo in Haifa, but there is. And a pretty huge one at that. The entrance is hidden in Carmel Centre in Gan HaEm, and the zoo itself stretches across the top of the Carmel mountain. Though the camals, baboons, and otters (and of course lions, tigers, and bears) are all cool, the best is the snake exhibit. It's sort of hard to find, but you seriously shouldn't miss it. Though rather sad and disturbing, the exhibit is an extremely educational tool for those learning about the food chain, and we had the privilege of seeing several mice, guinea pigs, hamsters, and a rabbit meet their end in the snake exhibit. Another plus is that just adjacent to the snake exhibit is a petting zoo with lots of mice, guinea pigs, hamsters, and rabbits...
Wadi Nisnas: A well known Arab community located in the center of Haifa. The cobblestone roads and small winding streets feature many mosaics and other public works of art, in addition to some very good falafel and knaffe. The best falafel in Wadi Nisnas can be found at the very edge of the neighborhood if you walk down the main street. You'll know you've found the right place if, the minute you enter, the owner offers you a falafel ball to taste. (He does it every time without fail, so if you're not offered falafel the moment you step through the door, you haven't found it and you should keep looking.
Eli's Pub: A bit of a whole-in-the-wall located near the port on Derech Yaffo, this place sometimes has jam sessions (mostly jazz and blues) where musicians rotate after every song.
That was Haifa, then on to Olga then Tel Aviv for a night where I stayed with my friend's family friends. Unfortunately I caught a bit of a stomach virus there (yala balagan) and we spent most of our time watching a pirated version of "The Holiday" (the audio switched into Russion about every twenty minutes or so) and MTV.
The last weekend of chofesh I spent on Kibbutz Gezer, the best place on earth. This trip was sweetened by the opportunity to see a bilingual baseball game - you could alternately hear chants of "Od out echad!", "Yalla yalla! Play the field!", and "Yofi! Way to hustle!" Gezer obviously tore up Beit Shemesh (I could pitch better than their pitcher, and that's a very harsh criticism if you've ever seen me "play" baseball). We also had the pleasure of hearing all about Sue's trip to Egypt ("The place is fucking rife with pyramids!"), and the rest of the weekend was spent reveling in our inner old person. Then finally back to Akko, and business as usual, on Saturday night.
Only five more weeks left of this, so I'll do my best to post as much as possible until we leave. Coming up, we have a May Day seminar with the Euros as well as Habo Australia and Habo South Africa (these are new ones from last time since the southern hemisphere shnat goes February through November), a tour of the separation wall, and then lots and lots of sikkuming (concluding, pretty much) - Messima, Kaveret, and then all of Workshop.
One last update: Kvutsat TnT has chosen a new name and will henceforth be known as Kvutsat Ratzif (meaning platform, and also has lots of connotations of something that continues and builds upon itself). Kvutsat Ratzif has also adopted a dog! Unofficially of course. He's a cute little mutt who follows us everywhere; he even tried to come with us on the train. We're still trying to figure out what his name is, but the only thing he seems to respond to is "Fish." Which is weird.
Until next time! I promise that won't be too far off.
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