off again

chicago barcelona madrid porto lisbon sevilla fez marrakesh madrid urim tel aviv chicago madison

Sorry for the late last post - I've been on planes. And in airports, and on buses, and in cars, and also sort of in shock. But I'm back in Madison now, where I'll be staying for the next ten days or so, then visiting my grandmother on Long Island, then back to Chicago where I guess I'll figure out what to do with the rest of my life / get a job. I guess.

My last day in Israel, Noa and I took a long meandering northward walk through Tel Aviv, past hideous-dress-stores (of which there are many) strange statues and various other things, ending up at the port area.

It was a gorgeous day but we were the only ones there except for a couple groups doing photoshoots. One was a bride and groom with their wedding photographer. One of their poses was the groom on the ground doing a push-up while the bride crouched awkwardly next to him (?) The other group was a model and about 20 photographers, shooting an ad for something, I suppose. I can understand why they all picked this location - it definitely was photogenic.

In fact Noa and I did a small photoshoot of our own...

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Raya met us for dinner, which was really fun, also tasty. Here's one wonderful thing about Israel: delicious vegetarian food everywhere, nasty piles of ham nowhere. Seriously all the fruit and vegetables taste soooo good. I could eat salad all day. (Well, I could do that anyway, I suppose, but I would enjoy it more in Israel.)

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Then after a frantic few hours of packing and a quick nap, Eyahl very kindly gave me a three am ride to the airport. There was a lot of boring airport drama and canceled flights and angry mobs but eventually I managed to shove my way onto a 13 hour flight to Newark, on which I barely slept although exhausted. Partially because it was bright, bright daylight the whole way. Partially because I didn't want to be on that flight at all, and I didn't want to be going home.

Even when I've been enjoying traveling, I've always felt happy coming home, a feeling of relief at landing back in the US, like letting out a breath I've been holding a long time. I didn't feel it this time, not going through passport control at Newark and the stamp-stamp "welcome home," not at the long familiar walk through O'Hare, not even walking back into my apartment and hugging my roommates and eating freshly baked cookies and drinking gin and tonics and catching up on Obama news. It wasn't until yesterday, in Madison, that the feeling of being home kicked in.

People keep asking me how my trip was, and the only good answer I can come up with is, "too short." More accurately, too short in Israel. Not that I couldn't have enjoyed more time in Spain and Portugal and Morocco, because I could have, and there were plenty of places there I wanted to see which I didn't get a chance to - but those weren't the countries I wasn't ready to leave.

So here I am back in Wisconsin in February, where I am constantly informed that it is very warm, "like spring." Last night I almost wiped out on the ice at least 3 times, not to mention the foot-deep snow. Note to confused Wisconsinites who have forgotten what spring is due to permanent brainfreeze. THIS AIN'T IT. In spring, it actually goes above freezing! And there are green plants instead of glaciers and icicles everywhere! And you don't have to wear snow boots! I know you can hardly imagine such a thing, but I promise, IT HAPPENS.

On the other hand, I would also like to point out to confused Israelis that when it is 75 degrees and sunny out, you can go to the beach, even if it's "winter." It is still nice. Really.

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next to last

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Today Noa and Asaf and I went to Jerusalem. You may have heard of it.

Actually the first stop was...this other place...OK, I didn't quite catch the name. It was on the outskirts of the city with a spring and churches and landscape views. So quiet you felt like it was the middle of nowhere, it was just us, one tour group, and a couple of monks hanging around.

After that we hit the museum of the history of the city, which was cool, although more for the views from the tower and the location than for the exhibits - or the extremely light on info video explaining everything in 15 minutes with pictures of cartoon people fighting, which basically went as follows: "First some people were here, then King David, then Alexander the Great, then some other stuff happened, and Romans, then Christians and Muslims a bunch of times, then World War I, Jerusalem is awesome, the end!" (There may have been a few more facts than I just mentioned, but not many. And it did end at WWI.)

We went to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where they stuck Jesus, although depending who you ask he may not have stayed put there. The highlight was while waiting in line to get into the actual tomb, the following overheard convo.

fellow tourist: What is this the line for?

priest (I think) who had just been making weird misogynistic jokes: The tomb.

fellow tourist: Of who?

Anyway, that was enough Christianity, so next we went to the western wall. Which was really interesting. The women's side is naturally tiny and crowded, with this line of women all in black right up front praying and touching the wall, some of their prayer books and foreheads smashed up against it, all swaying back and forth but not in unison. The white in all the cracks is thousands of scraps of paper with prayers written on them. I felt like Noa and I were the least religious people there, like aliens, and strange about it. Some people were crying. Although I have felt like crying many times on this trip so far, this was not one of them. I felt very disconnected. I felt such a distance between myself and those women that it put a distance between me and the wall also - I didn't actually go up and touch it.

More markets, although I refused to bargain today.

Then it was time for some well-earned coffee and pastries.

Well, back in Tel Aviv suburbs, what could top that great adventure? Raya and Tamir and I decided on an expedition to the lousy supermarket. (I was told ahead of time how lousy it was, I didn't make that value judgement.) While we were there, Raya, who was devastated that Julia had beat her to giving me a Krembo, was determined to find a fancier Krembo to get for me. But there weren't any. Tamir explained that this was because the motto of the lousy supermarket is, "If it's nice, we don't have it."

Tomorrow is my last day in Israel, and the last real day of my trip. Wow, that snuck up fast. I'm so not ready to go home yet - where do I apply for an extension? Please don't make me go back to the midwest...I hear it's really cold there and the tomatoes don't taste like anything...please??

a new direction for the blog

I accomplished two things today:

a) exchanging the two crappy English books I've been carrying around, and which I picked up for free in Morocco for the sole reason that they were the only books in English, for some better ones at a used bookstore in Tel Aviv. Which should make my flight back on Thursday a lot more bearable.

b) had a BRUSH WITH FAME. Yes...Raya and I ate dinner at a restaurant tonight, in the presence of greatness. We were sitting next to two famous Israelis who I have never heard of! Their names are Keren Mor and Menashe Noy and they are actors who have been on TV and in movies. I did not realize this until we left the restaurant, because they were sitting really close and Raya couldn't exactly tell me til we were out of earshot.

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But anyway, this has helped me figure something out. You know, since I'm going to be back in the US on Thursday, I wasn't sure exactly what to do with the blog - just put it on hold again until I take another trip? Or keep writing? Now I realize that I should turn it into a celebrity blog, stalking the rich and famous! I will have to study up though to make sure I recognize them next time.

all over the place

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On Saturday I went with my aunt and uncle to Masada. The weather was really bad - you could hardly see 10 feet in front of you - so I didn't get much of a view from the top or anything, but it was still really interesting.

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One thing I realized on this trip which I had never actually noticed before is that the Masada story is really freaking weird and awful. (Quick version: Jewish rebels hide out on this mountaintop fortress under siege by Romans, realize Romans are gonna win, so they choose by lots 10 guys to kill everyone up there and then each other so when the Romans finally bust in they just find a big pile of bodies. Um. Yes. Great.)

 Then a stop at the Dead Sea - didn't swim just looked. The thick white salt formations on the rocks look like some kind of crazy frosting.

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After that we went to a kibbutz nearby, Ein Gedi, which runs a botanical garden walk through the kibbutz itself. Essentially they just planted a bunch of cool stuff and then charge you to walk through it, but it's kept up really well and the kibbutz as well as being pretty inside is in a very dramatic location - right up against the mountains and next to the dead sea - amazing views.

 And then they randomly gave us free coffee and cake at this guesthouse! No complaints!

Yesterday I came back by train to Tel Aviv area, where Raya and Tamir and I went to lunch and a couple of bookstores and saw the movie Slumdog Millionaire. At one point the two of them were at a store with a 6-books-for-100-shekels deal, but could only find 5 they wanted, so they had me pick out a sixth book in hebrew based entirely on cover illustration since I am illiterate. Let's see how that turns out...

cave people

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Today I was at Beit Guvrin national park, where there are many kinds of caves. There are caves from hundreds of years BCE, with hundreds of carved out niches to attract pigeons to fatten up and eat for dinner.

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There are huge multilevel systems of caves from the same era used for water cisterns and olive presses, with curving stone staircases winding endlessly down and down.

There are later caves which are for tombs, and later caves which are actually bell-shaped quarries, cut from the hole in the top.

All of this is almost invisible from above ground, except for the fenced-off entrances and archeological dig tents you'd never know anything was here except cows grazing.

These cows were total scaredy cats, by the way, they kept running off as soon as we'd get remotely close. I've never seen a cow run away before. Don't they normally just stand there chewing their cud etc?

Exciting event #2 of the day: After much buildup, I finally ate a Krembo, apparently the highlight of any trip to Israel! This is a very thin chocolate shell covering a strange-textured, sort of marshmallowey but not really, creamy filling. They are wrapped by hand since it's too delicate for a machine, and are only seen in the winter. Maybe this trip was good timing after all?

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cave people

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Today I was at Beit Guvrin national park, where there are many kinds of caves. There are caves from hundreds of years BCE, with hundreds of carved out niches to attract pigeons to fatten up and eat for dinner.

IMGP5197

There are huge multilevel systems of caves from the same era used for water cisterns and olive presses, with curving stone staircases winding endlessly down and down.

There are later caves which are for tombs, and later caves which are actually bell-shaped quarries, cut from the hole in the top.

All of this is almost invisible from above ground, except for the fenced-off entrances and archeological dig tents you'd never know anything was here except cows grazing.

These cows were total scaredy cats, by the way, they kept running off as soon as we'd get remotely close. I've never seen a cow run away before. Don't they normally just stand there chewing their cud etc?

Exciting event #2 of the day: After much buildup, I finally ate a Krembo, apparently the highlight of any trip to Israel! This is a very thin chocolate shell covering a strange-textured, sort of marshmallowey but not really, creamy filling. They are wrapped by hand since it's too delicate for a machine, and are only seen in the winter. Maybe this trip was good timing after all?

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blue sky, blue sea

Today I was finally given permission by the Israel Meteorological Description Authority to say that it is "warm" here. Before, apparently, it was "cool." "Cool" = a nice June day in Wisconsin. "Warm" = freaking August in Wisconsin, or in my book, HOT.

In the morning Noa and I went to Jaffa and walked around markets and the restored old city area, where 100% of the businesses are expensive jewelry and arty gift shops. The sun was shining and the water was freakishly blue. It was all very paradisey actually.

In the afternoon I got to hang out and watch while a Spanish news crew interviewed my aunt Julia about her peace work and what it's like living on the kibbutz trying not to get hit by rockets all the time. This is for a program they're doing on the effect of the war on people here. Tomorrow they're going to try to go into Gaza. So, uh, watch out for that on your local TV I guess, if you happen to live in Barcelona, which no one who reads this blog does.

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Tomorrow I am apparently going to see some caves. Which sounds good to me. Man it's nice not to have to plan anything but just go where people tell me!

lightning round

OK, so, a quick recap. A few days ago I flew with my mom from Marrakesh to Madrid, where she got on a flight back home and I caught one to Tel Aviv. Before splitting up, though, we had a day in Madrid, went downtown, found a veggie restaurant and then wandered the streets. We accidently ran into a big anti-Israel demonstration there, which was more upsetting to me than I expected. More and more as this trip has gone on I feel like I can't think about anything but what's been going on in Israel and Gaza - and that's before I got here. Anyway. 

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The flights all went fine, blah blah. Because of the cease-fire I was able to go stay with my aunt and uncle on the kibbutz for a few days. It's in the Negev within rocket range so it was not always clear that that would be possible, and I feel very lucky that it was...since I flew in the morning after the cease fire people keep saying "couldn't you have come three weeks ago?"

The kibbutz is so small, peaceful and quiet. I wasn't there when there were rocket alarms and everyone had to go run to their safe room, of course. It's strange to be in a place that's in some ways so much calmer than anywhere else I've been yet and in other ways a thousand times more tense. It's great to be staying with family and real people again instead of bouncing from one rented bed to another. But it's also very hard to be here right now. Or maybe ever, I don't know. This is my first trip to Israel as an adult, and I had no idea how I would feel being here or how I would see it. I still don't know - I have been so emotional but I can't even interpret my own reactions.

The next day, after a nice tour of the kibbutz and its factory, my aunt Julia drove me all around on a zionist negev tour. First stop Revivim, one of the first kibbutzim in the Negev, which has the original settlement from the 1940s preserved and set up so you can tour it from its original stage as an agricultural research station, first basically just a cave, then some shacks and trenches and a stone lookout tower.

Posters - what's inside a grenade, and how to throw one.

This cave was where the original settlers lived, then became a makeshift hospital.

In case guns in caves don't do it for you, this place also has 2 airplanes and some creepy statues with clothes falling off.

To think that anyone came to this place and thought it was a good spot for agricultural experiments is completely insane in the first place - and then it worked??

After that we saw Ben Gurion's desert home (simple) and panoramic desert lookout (gorgeous.)

The final stop on the tour was this amazing house belonging to Julia's friend Tal and her family. Tal's husband Rodney is an architect and he designed and built this place completely with his own two hands out of found materials from the local area. I've never seen a house like it. It's built out in the middle of nowhere between two nature reserves, and they have wireless internet, but they don't have running water.

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After that I came back to Tel Aviv and have been hanging out with a few of my many lovely cousins.

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And, you know. Walking around downtown Tel Aviv. Watching the inaugeration. Talking about politics and life stuff. Watching the speech again. Sitting around by the beach some more, soaking up the sun and half-assedly trying to take pictures and think of how to blog this as a regular travel destination which is not what it feels like at all.

I don't want to get political here and I don't know if I could even organize my thoughts enough to do so if I tried, anyway, but the war and everything else has really been consuming my mind and making it hard for me to think of what I can write instead. I guess all I can say right now is that it seems different from here than it does on TV. And I'm learning a lot, and I'm glad that I'm here.