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Nostalgia Sunday – Shaare Zedek Hospital’s Schwester Selma

I didn’t know Schwester Selma but there is one time when perhaps our paths might have crossed. That would be in 1973, when my sisters and I were rushed to Jerusalem’s old Shaare Zedek hospital after a car accident (we came out with minor cuts, bruises, a few stitches in my sister’s forehead and a lifetime of self-enforced responsible driving ahead of us). Schwester Selma served from 1916 as head nurse and retired in 1973, so who knows?

The country’s first trained nurse, Schwester Selma was one of those legendary Jerusalem institutions from the pre-State era that people of my mother’s generation knew well, their children knew somewhat and their grandchildren know not at all. I encountered Schwester Selma’s biography while looking into the background of a series of photos documenting the old hospital building, which believe you me, was nothing like the new one – I can still remember the patchwork of floor tiles – but thank goodness the hospital was easy to reach and not in the middle of some out-of-the-way forest like some other Jerusalem hospitals I could mention if I cared to.

Here it is on Jaffa Road. The building now houses the Israel Broadcast Authority offices.

Then, as now, Shaare Zedek prided itself on being the only centrally located hospital in Jerusalem. There were the Misgav LaDach birthing hospital and general hospital Bikur Holim was under construction but Shaare Zedek was pretty much it during the World War I when Selma Meyer arrived to do her wartime service in Palestine (the Turkish Ottoman Empire was allied with Germany during the war).

Her autobiography includes a couple of juicy tidbits about illness and cure back in the so-called Good Old Days: “There were two epidemics right them. We were the only Jewish hospital in the new city. The old Bikur Cholim had also started building in the new city, which, however, could not be continued because of the war. Typhoid, typhus, and meningocael meningitis, all very severe cases, were hospitalized with us. Thousands of typhoid cases were passing through our hospital, probably caused by dirt; there was hardly any water. Additionally the people suffered terribly from hunger; there was hardly anything to eat.” Out of discretion to the reader, I’ve cut out the part about the lice bath.

It must have seemed like heaven for patients to come to a place like Shaare Zedek, which had a European-trained staff and clean sheets. There was no running water, but who had running water in those days?

After all, Jerusalem was no modern city. “There was still no transportation. The transportation of patients was therefore still very complicated. If somebody had to be brought it would have to be done by stretcher. We did not have enough personnel to send along and therefore the relatives had to help or hire two porters.”

During the global polio epidemic, Schwester Selma ran the country’s only isolation ward. “In those days the isolation department was even more primitive than the main house. The bathtub was made of tin, on wheels. It used to be filled with water that was brought in and then wheeled into the respective room. The toilets had no plumbing. Of course there was no heating system. In spite of all this I can maintain with a good conscience that we ran this department as a real isolation station even if this demanded many many efforts, which were well worth it in every respect.”

Schwester Selma founded the country’s first nursing school in 1934 over the objections of her hospital director who believed that too much theory and not enough practicum was a bad thing in a young nurse. But Selma, together with one father who wanted to make sure his daughter got a good education, prevailed. (Selma seated 2nd row, 3rd from left).

In recognition of her achievements, “Schwester” Selma Meyer was named a Worthy Citizen of Jerusalem (Yakir Yerushalim). She died in 1984 at the age of 100.

More amazing photos of Shaare Tzedek hospital and other Jerusalem landmarks, can be found at Photography in Jerusalem, an online archive sponsored by Hadassah College Jerusalem and educational website Snunit.

Nostalgia Sunday – Gil Gibli Investigates Past Crimes

Artist Gil Gibli is perhaps best known in Israel for the pen and ink cross-hatched portraits of Israel’s business elite that illustrate the pages of business daily Globes each evening. But Gibli is also a noted police forensic sketch artist — whose work has been cited in international professional literature — and when he looks back at the past, he often does so as an investigator into crimes whose trails have gone cold.

On his website, Gibli describes several cases where his forensic art brought the truth to light: reconstructing a portrait of Warsaw Ghetto uprising leader Pavel Frankel (pictured left) based solely on eye-witness accounts, bringing together two Yom Kippur War compatriots after 35 years, and the most chilling case: identifying a man, a nameless drifter, killed in a terror attack. The story – and Gibli’s uncanny ability to elicit details from eye-witnesses – was documented in the award-winning documentary No. 17 is Anonymous.

More of Gibli’s work may be found at his virtual gallery. He’s also a jazz aficionado and portraits include a series of jazz greats - more nostalgia, but of a cooler, gentler kind.

Gibl’s YouTube channel has several videos (in Hebrew) about his work.

Nostalgia Sunday – Lod Mosaic

It may be more historic than nostalgic, but the big news in archeology last week here was that the Israel Antiquities Authority made an interesting discovery while detaching a magnificent floor mosaic for transfer to the IAA conservation laboratories in Jerusalem. They found ancient footprints! Apparently, while working on the plaster bedding (done before laying down the mosaic) the artisans trod on it in sandals and in bare feet.

The floor is a story in itself. According to the IAA: “The 1,700 year old mosaic, which is one of the largest and most magnificent ever seen in Israel, was exposed in the city of Lod in 1996 and was covered again when no resources could be found for its conservation. Thirteen years after efforts were made to raise the large amount required to treat the unique artifact, the IAA received a contribution from the Leon Levy Foundation that is specifically earmarked for the purpose of conserving and developing the site, in cooperation with the Municipality of Lod. The mosaic was re-excavated, exhibited to the public and is now being removed from the area for treatment in the IAA conservation laboratories.”

“The mosaic, which constitutes a real archaeological gem that is extraordinarily well-preserved, is c. 180 sq m in size. It is composed of colorful carpets that depict in great detail mammals, birds, fish, floral species, and sailing and merchant vessels that were in use at the time. It is believed the mosaic floor was part of a villa that belonged to a wealthy man in the Roman period.”

Hopefully, the floor’s restoration holds the key — along with other innovative social welfare efforts reported on by ISRAEL21c — to turning Lod around from the center of drug-related crime to the tourist haven it ought to be. The IAA stated that, “The municipality, in cooperation with the Israel Antiquities Authority, plans to integrate it into a tourism circuit that will include a number of historic sites in the city.” Given the magnificence of the artifact, there is every chance that the plan could work.

Nostalgia Sunday – eBay Within Reach

The big dinner table discussion in recent weeks has been, “When is eBay actually coming to Israel”? And while we still await the long-promised opening of Israel’s second IKEA like the coming of the Messiah (it is taking that long) it looks like eBay could make Neiman’s Nostalgic Notions on the Net a reality in the near future.

And about time, too. Last April, Ynet reported that eBay had launched a Hebrew-language interface. But even before that, as one might well imagine, enterprising Israelis were buying and selling second- (and first-) hand wares over sites like Yad 2 — and eBay as well. (For more on that, read blogger Dudu Cohen’s article or watch this Channel 10 news item from last year. Both only in Hebrew, unfortunately).

The question in all cases: how to receive remuneration in the absence of a full-service electronic payment and fund transfer system. In other words, how does one get paid (Illuminea’s Miriam Shwab wrote an excellent blog posting at the time) and even more significantly, how does one pay the Israeli tax authorities their share? And don’t think they aren’t wondering the exact same thing.

Last month came big news when PayPal announced it was launching Israeli operations… er… more or less. According to Globes, “Although eBay has a Hebrew-language site eBay Israel with product prices listed in both dollars and shekels, as well as a search function for popular items, Israeli buyers have only limited options for paying through PayPal. They have to open an account using an international credit card, but they cannot withdraw money accumulated in the account because PayPal has no agreement with Israeli commercial banks.” Again, this will likely be resolved at least by the time that IKEA in Rishon LeZion opens its doors.

All this is simply a preface to the mind-blowing notion that we Israelis will finally be able to unload our old crap to make way for new crap, just like everyone else in the western world! Imagine how great it will be to be able to buy and sell the following:

A limited edition Coca Cola bottle with Hebrew lettering and a Star of David on the neck.

A decorative metal bowl manufactured by the PalBell company, which operated in Tel Aviv from 1939 to 1956 and set the standard for kitschy Judaica from the Holy Land.

Sheet music featuring lovely Seventies songstress Ilanit… hmmm…wonder how much I can get for my copy!

Or this lacquer wall plate etched with a picture of an Israeli dancer. I’m pretty sure my Aunt Sarah had two of these hanging in her rec room.

And I can’t wait to unload the boatload I’ve got of these things!

Oh, there is no end to the fun we’ll have, once we open up our little eBay store in dot-C-O-dot-I-L-land. But seriously, for those who are sincerely motivated and interested in learning more about eBay in Israel, go to the eBay global site, and select “Israel” under the “Country” drop-down menu. There’s a User Group as well. Any number of Israeli companies have sprung up to give courses and sell books about how to make money on eBay but its probably best — and cheapest — to start with this series of YouTube videos, again in Hebrew only.

Nostalgia Sunday – Mercedes Sosa

Amidst all today’s Sukkot holiday hoopla came the sad news that folksinger Mercedes Sosa, “The Voice of Latin America”, was dead. Sosa, who for over four decades, influenced singers from Joan Baez to Shakira, was a champion for social justice and a great friend to Israel.

She was a great friend to Israeli singers, too. Her last tour here was just a year ago, in October 2008, when David Broza took the stage with her during those performances.

She also collaborated with Argentinian-born singer-songwriter Shlomo Idov, who spoke movingly about her on Israel Radio today, as well as Aviv Geffen.

Last year, Israel’s Channel 2 ran an item about the long-standing relationship between Sosa and Israel. The video (in Hebrew only) can be viewed here.

The Argentinian community in Israel is planning a memorial celebration of the life of Mercedes Sosa on at 8:00o pm on Tuesday, October 6, and invites people to bring guitars and other instruments, food and friends to Park Herzliya (near the Seven Stars Mall). They, as do we all, will always remember Sosa in her heyday, performing one of her best-known songs, “Gracias a la Vida” (”Thanks to Life”).

Nostalgia Sunday – Old/New Cards for the New Year

Israelis love their nostalgia and nowhere is that more evident than the Jewish New Year.

There’s something about starting a new year that brings out the child in us…

Perhaps our wishes for health, prosperity and peace will not be in vain and will this year be granted…

…as we look forward… and never backwards…

…in the hopeful belief that this time, this year, things will be different!

That last image – new and nostalgia-inspired rather than actually old — was created by graphic designer Yael Bar, a member of the Israeli Community of Designers who this past Friday held a New Year’s greeting card event at the Israel Cartoon Museum in Holon. More images from that event — and of their work — can be found here.

Nostalgia Sunday – 9-11

In five days, it will have been eight years since September 11, 2001 and it looks like this year’s 9/11 anniversary is going to pass without much media fanfare. (Unless something happens, of course, and you know what I mean by “something”). So I thought I would finally share the story of what happened to me that day and how I ended up in a refugee camp in Amsterdam.

Yes, the International Red Cross runs — or ran, at least — four refugee camps in Amsterdam but for the life of me, I cannot tell you where exactly I was sent to stay from Schiphol Airport. That is because 9/11 was, as we Israelis say, a big “balagan”. I can tell you that when I landed there at about 1:30 on a stopover en route back to Israel, the airport was functioning normally. I can tell you that at about 2:15pm, I saw a bunch of people over at the airport lounge staring, transfixed, at the bank of TV screens. I traipsed over in my high-heeled boots to see all the screens, save one, tuned to CNN’s coverage as the first tower was hit. That last screen was broadcasting a bike race. This was Holland, after all.

My initial reaction was, “I’d better buy a pair of comfortable shoes because I think I’m going to be here awhile.” So I trundled off to the Timberland store and purchased a pair of slides, during which time the second tower was hit. I went back to the lounge and watched as news of the Pentagon attack came in. That damn bike race kept on going. Then Schiphol, in the first of a number of panicked moves, announced that it was shutting down the televisions — ostensibly to keep people from panicking.

News began circulating among passengers that airspace around the world was shutting down, and people began rushing towards the various airline counters, trying to find out what was happening to their flights. “You’ve got to get organized,” I said to the KLM counter attendant who was busily shooing the Israelis away from her space. She looked at me and said something completely un-Israeli. “I don’t have to get organized,” she said. It was my first encounter with the concept known as the Dutch Uncle.

On a grander scale, Schiphol decided to do the exact same thing. They decided they didn’t have to get organized. The airport announced that it was shutting down, that all passengers had to vacate the premises, and take their luggage with them. And then, Schiphol proceeded to unload all the suitcases, all at once, from all of the planes. 18 baggage carousels began disgorging bags, one after another, without any rhyme or reason. People were crawling all around through a maze of suitcases. Six hours later, I found my stuff.

For me it was an eye-opener as to how quickly systems can break down. Imagine if Schiphol had been an attack target, as management apparently feared. Someone, however, was astute enough to call in the Red Cross — and that is when things did, indeed, get organized. Red Cross staffers came in with bottled water, soft drinks and potato chips. Also, as the hotels in town were now completely full, they had arranged for transport to take us to a place where, they promised, KLM would be able to see to our flights and where there was a place to sleep. And so, with suitcases in tow, my new, comfortable shoes, and visions of Anne Frank in my head, I boarded a bus full of strangers and rode out into the cold, wet, dark night.

And ended up in an enormous refugee camp on the outskirts of Amsterdam where I handed over my passport, was registered, and in return issued a tan fleece blanket, a KLM washkit and some supplies produced for the Red Cross by a company called De Ridder B.V. These included a toothbrush pre-embedded with toothpaste…shampoo packets… and paper underwear, pairs of which the KLM staffers — sensitive as always — had jokingly put on their heads.

The name “de Ridder”, is Middle Dutch for ‘knight’, ‘rider’, ‘horseman’. The Crusader aspect of the name was lost neither on the company, whose logo at the time was a knight in armor on a horse, brandishing a sword and shield with a red cross on it, nor on myself. (The logo has since been downsized to a knight with a sword and shield but no horse). I stood there in the communal washroom, looking down at the shampoo packet, and realized that the Crusades were still going on. I knew the attackers knew they were fighting a holy war, and I also knew that the attacked didn’t know this.

I couldn’t find any Israelis till I ran into Mira from Rehovot who told me she’d heard that all the Israelis had banded together immediately and gone en masse to another camp. “I don’t feel comfortable here,” she said. “There aren’t any other Israelis. I’m going back to the airport. I heard they’ll put you on a plane if you go there.” And there went my only homeland connection.

I spent the first two days and nights in my refugee camp, as I’ve come to call think of it, in a haze of jet-lagged confusion, wrapped in a blanket, watching the endless hours of wreckage, feeling like the end of the world had come, eating junk food (the Red Cross kept us well-supplied with kuchen and krispen), and watching a group of Sudanese boys playing on the two foosball tables. I asked one of them what the letters on his sweatshirt stood for and he spelled out the name of an international relief agency, explaining that he and his friends were on their way to be resettled in the US. Oh, it suddenly hit me. These were real refugees.

So I snapped out of my funk. Chatted with people who kept on coming in and heard their stories: one couple’s flight had been turned back an hour out of Chicago, another rerouted to the Nova Scotia airport in only their summer clothes. Stuck to the KLM staffers like the proverbial white on rice and on the third day they called my name over the camp loudspeaker and told me El Al had arranged a flight back to Israel. KLM were pretty complimentary about El Al’s functioning — apparently there were other airlines that didn’t get organized.

At the airport I ran into my pal Mira who — despite her best efforts — had made no more progress than I. “They’re all Antisemites here,” she said. “We’ve been sleeping on the floor. They didn’t even give us a blanket.” She stomped off to try her luck at the El Al counter while I was hustled onto an ISSTA charter flight to Ben Gurion Airport. Granted, it was my worst travel nightmare come true: flying with a planeful of unwashed, guitar-playing post-IDF grads after their year in the Far East but at least I was on my way home.

So here’s how I would rate the whole experience:

Nostalgia Sunday – Mike Brant

It would be an understatement to say that the American influence in Israel is huge. TV shows, movies, music, fashion, fast-food and retail chains… let’s face it: all that’s missing is Target and WalMart. And Cosco. But back in olden times – the 1950s, 60s and 70s – Europe held far more sway over Israeli cultural tastes.

One Israeli pop singer who truly made it in terms of international success was Mike Brant. Who?, you ask, and I answer: Shame on you for not knowing about one of Israel’s most famous exports of all time! A sex-on-legs power balladeer, Brant achieved international fame in the early 70’s, mainly in France, which is why folks from the US never heard of him. But Quebecers did – take a look at this crowd of Canadians as they sit, transfixed, while their idol sings his biggest hit from 1970 “Laisse-moi t’aimer” (”Let me love you”).

Can you believe those pipes as he hits the high notes. Unbelievable. And he makes it looks so easy. No wonder that when French actress Sylvie Vartan caught Brant’s act in a Teheran night club (yes, that Teheran), she immediately invited him to come and meet French producer Jean Renard, who had made Johnny Halliday into a star. And if you don’t know who Johnny Halliday is, then again, shame on you and click here.

Brant’s string of hits included “Qui Saura”, a French version of “Que Sera” that José Feliciano had performed at the San Remo Music Festival. And if you don’t know what the San Remo Music Festival is, I have no words. How have you managed to evade these major cultural milestones till now? Just click here.

Play that song for any Israeli woman aged 45 and over, and she’ll begin singing and weeping at the same time. Why cry? Because Brant’s life ended tragically, rock star style, with a descent into drugs and a purported suicide in 1975 at the age of 28 when fell or jumped from a Paris hotel room window. Supposedly, his Haifa grave is a site for fan pilgrimages. I don’t know, I haven’t been. What is for certain is that he is greatly revered by Israelis of a certain age who recall the European cachet that Moshe “Mike Brant” Brand imparted to us. So close your eyes, lean back, clear your mind of all previous prejudices and repeat after me: “I love Europop… I love Europop,” and enjoy.

A long biography of Brant, written in pidgin English but with great photos, can be found here.

Nostalgia Monday

Israelis drive nearly as many gas guzzlers as the rest of the world (although I am seeing more Prius’ on the road these days), but they also have an abiding love for certain antique cars, particularly the smaller, European compacts that were so prevalent in these parts years ago. The Volkswagen Beetle is completely common on the Israeli street, and I’m not talking about the new version, but the trunk-in-front, engine-in-back model of the 1970s. The original bug, as well as its sister, the Volkswagen van, can often be seen on the Israeli street, offering the opportunity for an impromptu game of Punch buggy.

There’s also a slew of ancient Fiats, Volvo stationwagons and Sabra Sussita’s, the short-lived Israel-manufactured automobile. I often think that while they’re classified as collector’s items, they’re really just that proof of that yekke tendency to care for something very well, and not admit to the comforts of driving a newer version. Here’s a selection of some cars from my neighborhood:

Nostalgia Sunday – Young Judaea Year Course 1978-9

Here’s where I’m not. I am not in New York City this weekend, at the big Young Judaea Year Course 1978-9 reunion. As much as I reconciled myself to that fact months ago, I still feel a pang of regret at not meeting up with people from that first, most formative and important year of my post-high school life.

Here’s the end-of-year photo of Year Course Section 3. What you see is a group of hormone-addled teens relieved to have made it to the end without killing one another, and bewildered by the thought of starting college after a year of “real life in Israel”.

Whereas the other Year Course groups, Sections 1 and 2, spent most of the year studying in Jerusalem and toga-partying on kibbutz, Section 3 had a unique module that placed us for four months as para-social workers in development towns, in our case, Dimona and Mizpe Ramon. And so, while living in these “Turn Left at the End Of the World” places gave us a more than slightly skewed notion of “real life in Israel” — and our contributions to the field of social work were minimal– we did have our own apartments! Which is pretty heady stuff when you are 18 years old and just out of the house. No wonder I felt compelled to document the Dimona digs. Here’s our kitchen, complete with the ubiquitous Armenian pottery mugs from the Old City…

And our fab apartment block!

Prior to development town, we lived on Kibbutz Neot Mordechai, on moshavim (agricultural towns) and in Jerusalem. Like all other groups, we toured the Golan and Galil. Here’s the Good Fence between Israel and Lebanon — probably a lot smaller than you imagined.

And the Negev, Arava and Sinai, where we made like Bedouin trackers, but with little sense of direction and even less sense of style.

Like all other groups of young people in Israel at that time, Israeli and non, we happily wrecked our tailbones for life on that mode of transportation known as a “Tiyulit”, a sort of tin box on wheels, the interior lined with long hard wooden benches.

What can I say? We were a geeky bunch. Plus, we didn’t get haircuts for months at a time. (Yes, that is me in that image below, on the far right, under that mop).

One place our section didn’t get to spend much time, regrettably, was the youth movement’s Kibbutz Ketura. The Spielberg Jewish Film Archive has an amazing movie from 1976 , called Arava, that documents the founding of the kibbutz — an inspiring miracle in the sand that is still making the desert bloom to this very day with algae farming, exotic plants and solar power.

Kids, there were no cell phones (I probably spoke to my family three times that year, mostly because I couldn’t be bothered to wait in line for the public phone), we barely had any cash (certainly no credit cards), parental visits were not encouraged and you only flew home to the States if you were kicked off the program. Ah, those were the days…

A good number of the members of Young Judaea Year Course 1978-9, from all sections, live in Israel and while few of us could be at the real-life reunion, Facebook has provided a platform for a virtual one. Feel free to take a peek.

 

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