Foto Friday – Yigal Pardo’s Dog (and Cat) Days
Filed under: A New Reality, education, Environment, Foto Friday, General, Life, Picture of the Week, Profiles, Sports, Travel
Photographer Yigal Pardo loves animals and has successfully parlayed that affection into a career.
Pardo studied photography at Hadassah College, Jerusalem, then worked in New York for a year, returning to Israel to open his pet photography business.
Pardo works with Israel’s pet food manufacturers, ad agencies, breeders, animal-related publications, professional and non-profit organizations as well as pet-lovers, shooting commercial studio work and portraits, and photographing animals in the great outdoors.
One organization that has benefited from his talents is Shaar HaGai Kennels, breeders of Israel’s national dog, the Canaan.
Pardo has documented kennel owner Myrna Shiboleth on her treks to seeks out new desert and Bedouin bloodlines so as to retain the natural characteristics of this “semi-feral” breed.
A previous post reported on Shaar HaGai’s current woes: the kennel — and with it its Canaan breeding program — is under threat of closure by the Israel Lands Administration (ILA). Shiboleth, a world champion dog breeder, dog show judge and the world authority on Canaan Dogs, is lobbying for public support via on an online petition. (50,000 signatures are needed and she’s up to 39,855, so if you support this cause, please sign and share the link).
Far from the wild, Pardo also photographs dog shows for the Israeli Kennel Club.
And cat shows, too!
A cat-owner himself, Pardo has stated that although his specialty is dogs, it is from cats that he’s learned the most about photographing animals.
“It is the dog’s nature to please his owner. When the owner brings them to a photographer, from the dog’s perspective, the photographer is an ally… The cat is not interested at all to please humans… but fortunately, he is also very curious and we can take advantage of this curiosity when we take the pictures.”
Great photos of animals of all kinds can be found on Yigal Pardo’s page at PetNet.co.il.
Foto Friday – Ein Gedi Botanical Garden
Filed under: A New Reality, Entertainment, Foto Friday, General, History and Culture, Life, Picture of the Week, Profiles, Religion, Travel
The biblical city of Ein Gedi was a desert oasis, known for its date palms, vines and perfumed balsam. Modern-day Kibbutz Ein Gedi, located a kilometer down from the springs, is no less of an oasis, known for its desert agriculture, hotel/guest house and a prize-winning Botanical Garden that is the only one in the world to be integrated with the residences of the surrounding community.
According to Botanic Gardens Conservation International, “It is the only international botanical garden to have a community resident in it, which is a tribute both to the gardening staff and to the population of Ein Gedi. In fact, the development of the botanical garden and Kibbutz Ein Gedi are inseparable.”
Over years of trial and error, Ein Gedi’s gardeners have cultivated a collection of over 900 species of rare plants from all over the world…
The plants flourish in the summer heat, mild winters, and the mineral-rich Dead Sea atmosphere that encourages quick plant growth, so much so that some parts of the garden resemble a lush jungle…
Typical regional plants – date palms, olive, pomegranate and fig trees – can be found alongside tropical ones…
The adjacent Cactus Park is a rare collection of 1,000 species of cactus and desert plants from around the world…
At the garden’s northern edge is an observation point with a view of the entire oasis. (Click here for a 3D tour). And yes if you stay at the Ein Gedi hotel, you’ll likely meet one of these fellows…
The botanical garden office is open every day from 8:30 a.m-4:30 p.m. and on Friday until 2:00 p.m. For more information, please call: 08-658-444 or visit their website.
Photos courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and the Ein Gedi Hotel. For more information, visit the hotel website and Facebook page.
Nostalgia Sunday – Canaan canines
Filed under: Environment, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Life, News, Nostalgia Sunday, Picture of the Week, Politics, Pop Culture, Profiles, Social Justice, Travel
Right off the winding road leading up to Jerusalem are the Shaar Hagai Kennels, home to the Canaan dog, a semi-feral dog that is Israel’s national breed. The history of these dogs and the modern State of Israel are intertwined as today’s Canaan was bred by request of the Haganah, the forerunner of today’s Israel Defense Forces.
According to an essay on the Shaar Hagai website, having decided to set up a canine unit, Haganah commanders turned to Dr. Professor Rudolphina Menzel, “a noted cynologist with a considerable reputation in her native Austria in the field of animal behavior… She quickly discovered that the European breeds with which she was accustomed to working, German Shepherds, Boxers, Dobermans, suffered greatly from the severe climate and difficult terrain and had a hard time functioning effectively.
“She began to observe the local pariah dogs living on the outskirts of settlements and with the Bedouin in desert and wilderness areas, and decided that this was a true breed of dog that had adapted to the conditions. She began a program of re-domestication, collecting puppies and adults from the pariah groups.”
“The Canaan Dog has survived for thousands of years on its own, living by its wits, and surviving in the wild and on the fringes of civilization by hunting and scavenging. Often puppies were captured, raised and used, especially by the Bedouin tribesmen, as guardians of the flocks and the tents. Like other wild or feral residents of the area, only the strongest, healthiest, cleverest, and most fit survived to breed and pass on their characteristics.”
Prof. Menzel called the breed the Canaan Dog after the Biblical Land of Canaan. Canaans have been part of the local landscape since time immemorial. The American Kennel Club history of the breed cites “Drawings found on the tombs at Beni-Hassan, dating from 2200 to 2000 B.C., depict[ing] dogs that show an unmistakable resemblance to the Canaan Dog of today.”
An essay posted by the Canaan Dog Club of America states, “As a breed the Canaan Dog proved highly intelligent and easily trainable, serving as sentry dogs, messengers, Red Cross helpers and land mine locators. During World War II, Dr. Menzel recruited and trained over 400 of the best dogs for the Middle East Forces as land mine detectors, and they proved superior to the mechanical detectors.”
“The Canaan is also one of the very few breeds known that has successfully adapted to a desert environment,” the Shaar Hagai essay notes. “Studies done at Tel Aviv University and Ben Gurion University of the Negev have shown an astonishing ability in this breed to adapt to extremes of temperature and lack of water. The breed has developed physiological adaptations to prevent waste of fluids and overheating.”
Prof. Menzel was responsible for gaining recognition for the breed; her breed standard was accepted by the La Fédération Cynologique Internationale (FCI) in 1966, where it is classified in FCI Group 5, a subgroup of primitive dogs. She exported the first Canaans to the US in 1965 and to Germany shortly after. (An interview with Prof. Menzel about her work by noted naturalist Dvora Ben Shaul makes for fascinating reading). In 1970, Shaar Hagai Kennels joined in the development and breeding of the dogs, carrying on Prof. Menzel’s work after her death in 1973.
Over the years, urbanization and cultivation have led to the gradual disappearance of the Canaan’s natural habitat and there is a danger that the wild dog, which is the original breeding stock, could disappear. Added to that is a new threat: after 42 years, the Shaar Hagai Kennels have received a notice of eviction by the Israel Lands Administration (ILA), which holds title to the property. Such a move could mean the end of their breeding program and consequently endanger the breed overall.
Myrna Shiboleth, who has run the Kennels for 42 years, now finds herself in an unusual plight and has been actively lobbying for public support. She has successfully recruited 38,505 signatures (so far) on an online petition that will be submitted to the ILA. 50,000 signatures are needed, so sign the petition, join the Facebook page, and pass the word on.
I should mention my personal interest in this story; when we adopted her two years ago, we couldn’t figure out our dog Nili until we learned about Canaan dogs. Then it all made sense: she may be part Canaan in breed (check out those giant ears) but she’s all Canaan in ‘tude: highly intelligent, very loyal but never blindly obedient. All in all, a true Israeli sabra.
Nostalgia Sunday – Lahiton and the Hit Parades
Filed under: Art, Business, Entertainment, General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Movies, Music, News, Nostalgia Sunday, Pop Culture, Profiles, tv
Where are the Israeli hit parades of yesteryear?, was the question that arose during the annual Passover post-lunch shmooze-fest. It’s indeed a subject for discussion, as song charts came to Israel many decades after being a standard part of Western pop music culture, and a tricky subject at that, as our early hit parades were based not on record sales but rather on postcards sent in by fans to the state-run radio networks and subject to the whims of the broadcasters at those networks.
An annual Hit Parade, based on the weekly ones, has been broadcast on Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, since 1963. There are actually two annual Hit Parades, one on Galei Zahal (GLZ), the army radio network and the other on the Israel Broadcast Authority (IBA). GLZ decided to split the charts into Hebrew-language songs and international songs in 1967; IBA followed suit two years later. IBA pop station Reshet Gimel began operations in 1973 and took over the hit parade responsibilities for the network.
So there were two hit parades, both based on the tastes of teenage girls with time on their hands (and postage stamps) and 30-year old DJs — the two groups that traditionally call the shots in pop music. But despite the demographics, these do not a real hit parade make because real charts reflect record sales. And in a country where the two main record companies, Hed Arzi and CBS, essentially had no competition (until Helicon came along in 1985), such information was not made public.
I’m not sure why but like so many other things in Israel, probably it wasn’t out of meanness but more likely out of lethargy (it’s very hot here), ignorance (What, record companies in America tell people about their business? Why?) and because no one ever got around to thinking of it (reserve duty, Jewish holidays, wars, food shopping, etc.).
Enter Lahiton. Founded and edited by Uri Aloni and David Paz as a bi-weekly magazine in September 1969, a year later, Lahiton became a weekly, presenting a kind of journalism previously unknown in Israel: news and gossip about music and performers, record reviews, lyrics, pictures, full-color posters that decorated the walls of children and teens across the country, and charts — not only Israeli but foreign ones, too.
Lahiton also initiated a Gold Record award whose first winners were Shlomo Artzi, Dorit Reuveni and Igal Bashan. Following Lahiton’s lead, Israel’s record companies also began awarding Gold Records to artists with albums selling over 20,000 copies, thus tacitly releasing sales information.
In 1976, Lahiton merged with movie magazine Olam HaKolnoa and began reporting on movies stars as well as singers. The magazine’s popularity began to wane in the early to mid-Eighties as its editors moved on to found new magazines and as Israelis became exposed to more sophisticated fare like Melody Maker, Rolling Stone and Billboard.
Lahiton folded in 1990. The archive is not online although some kind souls have taken to scanning and posting select pages, including some scans of the Hit Parade page.
Recently, a Facebook page launched, dedicated to all things Lahiton, with a very active community of people interested in sharing pictures and comments, with some also wondering where the old Hit Parades are at.
In fact, the IBA website has a search engine accessing all annual Hebrew-language Hit Parades dating back to 1969.
An extensive interview (in Hebrew) with Lahiton founding editors Aloni and Paz by pop culture researcher Eli Eshed can be found here.
For those interested in buying or selling vintage copies of Lahiton — or just looking at some really cool cover art — look no further than the BookSefer site with prices ranging from NIS 160 (Michael Jackson in his “Bad” phase) down to NIS 70 (Izhar Cohen in his Michael Jackson in his “Bad” phase).
And of course, there is an online alternative to take the place of the write-in postcard vote: Charts.co.il, which provides the latest chart information — of the many, many charts now available to us — and gives users the chance to rate their favorites, just like the old days.
Foto Friday – Assaf Pinchuk images Israel
Filed under: A New Reality, Business, design, Entertainment, Foto Friday, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Picture of the Week, Pop Culture, Profiles, Travel
It’s the morning of Erev Pessach, Passover eve, and the country is in its final involuntary shopping, cooking and cleaning spasm. This evening, a blessed quiet will fall over Israel and for a few moments, all will be clean, orderly and in place.
That sense of balance, of everything being as it should be — dare I say it, of seder — is present in these images by commercial photographer Assaf Pinchuk, who specializes in architectural and industrial subjects. In his work, Pinchuk gives us a glimpse of the Israel we aspire to be. Even the unruly building blocks and winding streets of an old Tel Aviv neighborhood fall into place…
A office building lobby becomes a composition of light, shadow, contrasting colors and structural elements…
The city’s famously dynamic night life is omnipresent in the saturated green of a rest room…
A Tel Aviv rooftop apartment glows against a darkening sky…
In daylight, through the windowshades, the harsh Mediterranean sun paints white walls with shadow…
As always, the best days end with sunset on the Tel Aviv beach.
Assaf Pinchuk studied photography at Hadassah College, Jerusalem, after which he interned and worked with Cologne-based photographer Hans-Georg Esch. Together with wife and business partner Miri, Pinchuk opened his own studio in 1998, with the goal of producing unique, dynamic, smart and inspiring images for a client list that includes some of Israel’s leading companies and institutions.
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