Israelis help ease the headaches during Ramadan

August 24, 2011 by · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, coexistence, General, health, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Medical Breakthroughs 

Observers of Ramadan can get to the goodies without debilitating headaches thanks to Israeli researchers.

The month-long Ramadan period is in full swing, and from our home, we can see the nightly bright lights of our neighboring Muslim village, as the residents gather nightly to end their day-long fast with a culinary celebration.

For an entire month at the height of the oppressive summer heat, the observant Muslim population fasts from dawn to dusk, an effort that goes far past our 24 hour fasts for Yom Kippur, Tisha Be’av and the other lesser Jewish fast days during the annual holiday cycle. So we Jewish Israelis can certainly identify with the trials of our Muslim neighbors, as they abstain from eating for a whole month: so much so, that Israeli researchers have conducted a study on how to help Muslims avoid incapacitating headaches during Ramadan.

According to a study published in the journal Headache, about four of every 10 Ramadan observers get headaches. However, a pill produced by US pharmaceutical giant Merck called Arcoxia, may prevent the headaches from taking shape. The pill, made from the drug etoricoxib, had already been shown to be effective in a study that revealed that Jews fasting for Yom Kippur who took Arcoxia got fewer headaches than those that didn’t take the pill.

Reuters Health reported that in the new study, Michael Drescher, from Hartford Hospital in Connecticut, along with a group of Israeli colleagues, assigned 222 Muslim adults planning to fast in 2010 to either take the drug or an inactive placebo pill just before the start of fasting each day. All participants recorded how often they had a headache, and how severe it was.

After a week they switched treatments. During the first day of fasting, when headaches are thought to be most common, 21 percent of people taking Arcoxia reported having a headache, compared to 46 percent of those who took the placebo pill.

The Arcoxia group also reported fewer total headaches during that first week, the researchers wrote. And when they did have headaches, they rated them as less severe than participants taking the placebo.

Arcoxia isn’t currently approved for use in the US because the FDA decided it was too similar to another Merck drug called Vioxx, which was pulled from the market in 2004 when it was linked to a higher risk of heart attack. But Arcoxia is available in Israel, as well as other countries.

And as far as any Jewish or Muslim religious opposition to taking a pill to prevent headaches during their respective fasts, Drescher told Reuters Health that none of the Muslim participants expressed any objections, and that rabbis who were consulted pointed out that not having a headache could allow people to be “freer spiritually.”

“The religious edict to fast really is not a command to suffer,” Drescher added.

So from one fasting people to another, Ramadan Kareem!

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Riding the (light) rails in Jerusalem

August 22, 2011 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Israeliness, Life, Travel 

The Jerusalem light rail - before it got crowded.

On my last day of a short vacation, my 10-year-old son and decided to take our maiden journey on the new Jerusalem light rail which began carrying passengers on a trial basis last Friday.

Years in the making, and the object of much derision from Jerusalem residents and shop owners annoyed at the upheaval the construction of the tracks caused, the trains are actually up and running. And it’s actually very nice. Sleek, smooth and modern, the trains provide a jarring juxtaposition as they travel their route along the ancient Old City walls and by the old world Mahane Yehuda market.

But while we may have been expecting a leisurely, pleasant ride through Jerusalem with a few other passengers, we weren’t prepared for the human onslaught. Apparently, the decision to not charge a fee to ride the train in the initial stages until all the chinks have been worked out have made it a prime late summer attraction.

When we got aboard, on Road 1 near the National Police headquarters, it was already standing room only. Families, many of them haredi with a half-dozen children, were ‘enjoying’ the free ride to Mount Herzl. The downside is that the noise level was deafening, the waits at intersections and at the stations sometimes took up to three or four minutes, and it took more than an hour to arrive at the end of the line, a journey that would take maybe 20 minutes by car. The upside is that we made it in once piece, the ride was luxuriously smooth, there were no traffic jams, and we got to ride over the Strings Bridge at the entrance to Jerusalem.

After alighting at Mount Herzl and visiting the highly recommended Herzl Musuem (after a planned visit to Yad Vashem was mutually nixed), we made the return ride back to the city center. However, after another standing room, noisy crowd, we decided to get off the train at the central bus station and take a bus the rest of the way. There, we both got seats, there were no kids screaming in our ears, and we made it back home in 25 minutes.

I’m sure I’ll ride the train again, it’s going to replace many of the bus lines in the coming months. But I may wait until they start charging , the crowds thin out, the intersections get in synch, and I have a free hour.

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A tranquil calm in the North, war in the South

August 21, 2011 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, coexistence, General, Israeliness, Life, News, War 

Wading in the Zaki River in the Golan while rockets rain down on the South.

It wouldn’t be summer without a military skirmish in Israel. And this one looks like it could blossom into a doozy.

Funny thing is, that while one part of the country is under siege with rockets raining down, and buses being shot up, other areas are full of tranquility. We had just started a four-day vacation in the North on Thursday, just east of the Kinneret in a beautiful bed & breakfast chalet inside a Golan moshav. Late in the afternoon, we got a call from a friend just checking if our daughter (serving in the IDF along the Egyptian border) was alright.

A little perplexed, I thanked the friend for his concern, then asked why he was interested. He then explained about the terror attacks near Eilat, which we were oblivious to. We quickly got off the call and tried to contact our daughter, but only got her voice mail.

Nothing to get alarmed about, we said, she’s usually on exercises in areas that don’t get cell phone reception. Meanwhile, we tuned into the news on the radio, detailing the awful events of Thursday, getting brought up to date during a time we were supposed to be getting away from it all.

A couple hours later, soldier daughter called to say she was fine, nowhere’s near the violence and leading her recruits in various exercises. We spent the next few days – while the rockets were landing on Beersheva, and other southern points, rafting in the Jordan River, take a jeep trip through the trails and rivers of the Golan and chilling at the amazing pool of Moshav Ramot, with a breathtaking view of the Kinneret and surrounding mountains.

Unless you deliberately tuned into the news, you wouldn’t have known that people were losing their lives a couple hundred kilometers away. That’s Israel for you.

I’m not sure how what’s unfolding down south is being portrayed in the world media ( likely something like “Both Israel and Palestinian actions are escalating the situation along the Israeli borders with Gaza and Egypt”), but anyone with half a mind should and does realize that there’s no equivalency here – moral or otherwise.

Terrorists started this thing all by themselves with no provocation (other than Israel’s existence) and Israel is only doing what any sovereign country would do to protect its citizens. But for some reason, we always end up sharing half – if not more – of the blame for the violence. Returning from the Golan to the reality of another war-filled August in Israel, it was a stark wake up call that the vacation was over.

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Love and solar power in the Negev

August 18, 2011 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, Business, Environment, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Technology 

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This week, Israel celebrated Tu Be’Av – which in the days of the Temple, marked the beginning of the grape harvest – but which today has morphed into ‘chag ha’ahava’ or the ‘festival of love.’ It’s a prime time for weddings, and legend has it that it’s not a bad day for matchmaking.

I’m not exactly sure what the connection to our own Valentines Day is with solar energy, but Israeli solar energy group, The Arava Power Company, which is has built the first commercial solar panel field in Israel, apparently sees some parallels there.

They decided to use the holiday and the current social justice protests as a backdrop to lobby the government to allow more solar power fields to be built. Filmed at their headquarters at the Ketura Sun solar field at Kibbutz Ketura, 50 km. north of Eilat. the video uses some loving couples to highlight that electricity bills would be lower if government decided to allow the building of additional solar facilities more quickly.

I think I’m beginning to get the connection now – after all, when two people get together in a loving way, they can sure make some heat.

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Foto Friday – Tent city re-evolution with Elyssa Frank

August 12, 2011 by · 3 Comments
Filed under: A New Reality, Art, education, Foto Friday, General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Life, News, Picture of the Week, Politics, Profiles, Social Justice 

Photographer Elyssa Frank has a unique way of seeing Israel…

Unique, perhaps, because she says that she wants the world to see the side of Israel that the international media does not usually portray. “The beauty, the smiles on the faces of children, kids dancing en masse, the gorgeous landscapes, and the wonderful ceremonies, like a new Sefer Torah being marched throughout the streets of Tel Aviv city. The world needed to see the signs of the living, not the fighting and the chaos; the strength and courage of a nation to re-build and to be built.”

Her latest portfolio, TLV tent city revolution, documents the current protest for social justice as she tries, she says, “to understand the mass and power of the people!”

As always, Frank has her own perspective on things. “I’m trying to show the ‘life’ side. . the beauty of the country through this all. And just strolling the streets and trying to be at EVERY protest… no matter what time!”

“For me, its the peacefulness… its the smiles on policemen’s faces… Only in Israel!”

As someone who loves Tel Aviv, Frank also knows that no protest rally would be complete without a late-night dip in the sea.

Frank has a new website for a work in progress, MADEiniSRAEL, where she uploads a new photo each week. The MADEiniSRAEL collection — an 11-year labor of love — is intended for eventual publication as a book “showing the side of Israel the media does not portray.” You can learn more about the origins of the project by reading her bio and you can support it by “liking” her Facebook page where there are lots more photos — lots to like!

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