Israel gets its newest celebrity visitor

November 9, 2009 - 11:25 AM by Nicky

We get a lot of celebrity visitors to Israel. Bill Clinton, George Bush, the Dalai Lama, Madonna
, Leonardo DiCaprio, Grover from Sesame Street – you name it, the great and glorious come here. It’s a field day for the press, who follow their every move in Israel, trying to get that one great shot of Madonna at the Western Wall, or the Dalai Lama at Temple Mount.

The newest celebrity visitor to our shores, however, crept in without the slightest bit of press hoo ha, making surprise visits to a number of top Israeli hot spots without causing any kind of media stir or even extra security. It’s Alpha Rex, the Lego Mindstorms robot. Yes, you heard it here first.

lego ww c As part of Lego’s 10th anniversary for its Mindstorms robot line, the company sent out two of its Alpha Rex humanoid robots to cross the globe.

The sturdy little robots left the FIRST World Championship in Atlanta in the US in April 2008 and have been travelling every since. One headed off to tour the US, and the other – clearly more adventurous – headed west to Japan, taking in Europe, Australia, Canada, Egypt, India, China, the South Pole, New Zealand, the Philippines, Thailand, Iceland etc. etc. etc. along the way.

They aren’t alone of course. Lego employees, fans and business associates have guided them on their long, difficult and sometimes lonely journeys, taking snaps of them at their destinations.

lego gal c Now it’s the turn of Israel, where Alpha Rex along with his human guide, David Schilling, got to visit Jerusalem, Bethlehem and the Sea of Galilee, enjoying some occasionally autumnal weather on the way

It’s not the end of Alpha Rex’s global endeavor. He’s still got quite a few countries to go – including Greece, Turkey, Saudi Arabia (hope the Israeli authorities didn’t stamp his passport), and Argentina to name a few.

At the end of it, the Lego team plan to make a screensaver showing all the places he visited. They should also consider setting it to music and putting it on Youtube. It worked for Matt Harding after all.

So what did Alpha Rex think of Israel? Wasn’t it the best place he visited? Does he plan to come here again? He declined to answer.

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