Jerusalem the Mirage

{posted by Kelli}

The photo is of a Rodin sculpture at the Israel Museum, where we went to the (unrelated) bread exhibit and festival, learning about—and eating—breads of various communities in the country. We especially liked the loaves stamped with various Christian designs that looked like coats-of-arms. There was a video showing a Muslim tradition where a couple on their wedding day splats a small hunk of bread dough with plastic flowers stuck in it over the pre-moistened doorway of their house. If the dough falls off, their relationship is doomed. Orthodox Christian Ethiopians bake a large, round loaf for a wedding, then punch out the middle and hold the ring of bread up to frame the bride’s face. Then her new name is pronounced to her through the ring by everyone assembled, one by one. There was also a video showing the production of matzah (tasteless Passover cracker) that you’d swear was on fast-forward, with workers scrambling to make a finished product in less than 18 minutes. Any matzah that passes this deadline, from the moment water is added to flour until it is done baking, must be discarded.

A recent mailing from the Jerusalem municipality lists the various “happenings” (an English crossover word used to mean festivals and the like) planned for the city for the rest of the summer. The Hebrew title of the mailing is “Yerushalayim—ein od ir k’zo!” meaning “Jerusalem—there’s no other city like it!” When you turn the mailing over to the side translated into English, however, the title is printed as “Jerusalem—there’s no such city!”
Darn. Just when I was getting used to the place.

As much as I do like Jerusalem, I’m very, very antsy to get back to our pre-summer activity of exploring the country, and with the northern war over, we plan to resume road tripping. . . just as soon as this heat goes away, which should be about another month. Every day it’s in the 90s in Jerusalem, which, considering there’s no humidity, beats summers in DC, but still precludes much activity. We’ve been bearing it by continuing to spend the hot days inside where only a ceiling fan helps move the air around (no AC) and not going out until after sundown. We did finally break down and get a floor fan, which means fairly comfortable sleeping at night again.

Our first trip begins Tuesday with a week in Tel Aviv. I know—it will be humid there in addition to hot, but we had previously agreed to our landlord’s request to vacate the apartment the last week of August during their son’s bar mitzvah so that grandma can stay here. And since our visa extension appointment at the Ministry of Interior was a big success—we are cleared to stay another 3 months, which is more than enough to make it to the planned departure date of early November—we no longer have to leave the country in August in order to get new visas. And since we’ve spent almost no time in Tel Aviv this year, that’s where we’re headed, with a list of things to see and do that will probably go mostly ignored as we rediscover the wonder that is air conditioning.

There is much post-war fallout in Israel now—the discussion kind of turmoil, not the low-level bursts of violence that continue here and there in southern Lebanon and in Gaza and the West Bank. A loud clamor has risen from the Movement for Quality Government for a Supreme Court-led investigation into war missteps. Then there are the reservists who were called up to serve in Lebanon last month who are now calling for all the top dogs to resign over their shoddy handling of the war. Israel’s active army is quite small, so when something breaks out like it did in July, it’s mainly reservists who drop everything and join in when they get the (newly automated) phone call. Their complaints include that they were unprepared (lack of clear directions), ill-equipped (having to find food in Lebanese homes and stores), and unnecessarily placed in harm’s way (due to lack of overall planning by the top brass). Protesting daily outside the prime minister’s office, we now have both the Movement for Quality Government and, just down the sidewalk, the reservists’ group joined by families of soldiers who died.

The Kadima party’s plans for evacuating most of the West Bank have been pushed to the back burner so far that they’ve fallen behind the stove. Seeing as how that issue was what gave Kadima its big win in the spring election, no one knows where this plan—or this fledgling political party—is headed now. Many predict Olmert’s not going to last long. And then there are the recent charges, first of indecent assault against the justice minister, who stepped down, and now of sexual assault against the president. There’s a call from some in the Knesset to do away with the institution of the presidency all together (along with the president himself), as the position isn’t even significant enough to be called a figurehead. All these challenges, plus putting the north back together, are consuming Israelis these days.

Next post will be next week’s report on the “bubble” that is life in Tel Aviv.