In a trance on the beach
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Travel, coexistence
When Israelis go camping, they tend to keep things as close to home life as possible. Meaning they’re right on top of you.
I try to go camping on the beach with my kids at least once a year, and last weekend we packed up the tent and mangal and headed to Palmachim beach, just south of Rishon Leziyon with two other dads and kids (for an inexplicable reason, some wives prefer to stay in the solitude of a lone house rather than with their family in a cramped tent).
Palmachim is an ideal destination because there’s a spacious grass/dirt area just a few yards away from the beach, enabling you to pitch a tent and cook without sand getting everywhere, but still close to run right in the Mediterranean whenever you want. As a bonus, the entrance fee is only NIS 20 per car (about $5 for a weekend in the sun).
One of the families with us knew the drill from previous excursions, but the other family, veterans of numerous camping trips in their native US, were making their first foray into the sport of Israeli camping. There are differences.
First of all, you need to have certain expectations, or more specifically, lack of them. Don’t expect to get any sleep – if you think you’re going to have a restful night, stay at home.
There are no ‘norms’ about shutting off the music and turning in at midnight. There are parties all night, and it’s not just boom boxes.
Israelis bring sound systems on their camping trips, booming PAs that can simulate a high speed drill or a jackhammer. On the plus side, you can look at it as a sociological experience. Camping in Israel provides a microcosm into Israeli society like no other.
Down on the beach, there was typical rave, with droning, pounding noise disguised as music, and a dozen ecstatic 20-somethings undoubtedly spurred on by some ‘ecstacy’ of their own. Unfortunately, they didn’t pass any around to the rest of us.
But no matter, because over 30 yards or so in the grove of trees near the public bathrooms was a group of also 20-something Ethiopian Israelis camping and they were playing native music at equally ear splitting levels and dancing in an exotic, sensual manner – men and women inches from each other in a hypnotizing form of chicken dance. We couldn’t take our eyes off them. That is, until a group of boisterous campers from Georgia (the country, not the US state) began doing their own ethnic dances and songs.
By around 2 am, our third family couldn’t take it any more and packed their stuff and went home. The dad had enough of the noise, the smoke from other grills wafting into his tent, the proximity of the other campers – in short the Israeli camping experience.
But I wasn’t perturbed at all by the shenanigans around me. I had gone for a moonlight midnight swim in the balmy sea with my children. We laughed, jumped on each other, and hugged, untethered by schedules, computers, TV, work and school. I didn’t hear a thing.
The white holiday
Filed under: Food, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Israeliness
Shavuot is approaching, and what I like about this holiday in Israel is that you can celebrate it from a variety of approaches. If you’re observant, there’s the standard ‘yontif‘ handling of the holiday, which means food, prayers, something white to wear, and heading to a tikkun on Shavuot eve to learn all or part of the night.
But as one of the three pilgrimage festivals — Sukkot and Passover are the other two — Shavuot ranks up there in Israel, with all kinds of alternative and traditional festivities that appeal to even the most secular of Israeli Jews. There are the kibbutz celebrations, which include small children dressed in white, arms akimbo in order to hold baskets of recently picked fruit and vegetables to mark Shavuot’s stance as an agricultural festival. There are the usual family gatherings, as Israelis so love to do, including tables groaning with all kinds of homemade dairy fare, since this is considered to be the ‘dairy’ holiday. (See this great JTA article about alternatives to dairy on Shavuot.)
And since Israelis also love their dairy — we have more types of yogurt drinks per capita than any other country — one of the local dairy companies, Tnuva, puts out a Shavuot magazine each year, as an insert in the local newspapers, with dairy recipes from the kitchens of their employees. Nicely done, and, I have to say, it has been the source of more than one good recipe that’s come out of my kitchen.
There are also the learning celebrations, given Shavuot’s source as the holiday celebrating the giving of the Torah, and that has led to the traditional tikkun, all-night learning that takes place on the night of the holiday. In my city of Jerusalem, a city of much learning, there are hundreds of tikkunim to choose from, held at every synagogue, yeshiva, school and place of learning. But what I’ve loved in years past is to head to Tel Aviv, where the streets are full of people dressed in white heading to all-night lectures of the more alternative type. Those can include poetry readings, yoga and Torah, discussions about the place of Torah in a secular society, or, for the more party-oriented, all-night clubbing in honor of Shavuot. For that matter, since Tel Aviv is considered the white city for its collection of Bauhaus architecture, you could celebrate Shavuot by doing a midnight tour of Bauhaus structures.
I will be making cheesecake, but I won’t be heading out for some all-night (not that I ever did) learning this year. But if you’re in J-town, I did notice some great options for the Tikkun, including an Israeli singdown and a 12:30 am walk around the Old City, hosted by the Tower of David Museum.
Happy learning and eating.
Jazzy Jay and other esoteria
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Music, Pop Culture
Just because the Israeli concert-going market can’t support more than one or two performances from A-list-ers like Paul McCartney each summer, doesn’t mean that we need to deal with washed-up international talents like Deep Purple the rest of the time.
The best of the not-quite-mainstream pop talent whose art is uncompromised, esoteric and less disposable have been entertaining us here more and more often, whether it’s Devendra Bernhardt, Low, Blonde Redhead, Lee “Scratch” Perry or Morrissey. Thankfully, more and more performers along these lines have been making their way to Israeli stages in recent years.
And despite the ongoing violence in the south of the country in recent weeks, the show must go on. No notices announcing a cancellation of this Friday’s Urbanology Festival have reached this cultural correspondent’s desk so far, which means that old-school talent DJ Jazzy Jay is still expected to hit the decks this weekend at the Cult Club at Herzl St. 154, Tel Aviv (tickets available at 057-777-4422).
Jazzy Jay is one of the founding fathers of hip hop. A scratch turntablism pioneer, he spun at street parties in the Bronx in the late Seventies and in downtown Manhattan clubs in the early Eighties. Part of Afrika Bambaataa’s Universal Zulu Nation collective, Jay was also a co-founder of the influential Def Jam Recordings. His “It’s Yours” single was the label’s first-ever release, and he helped broker the partnership between notorious trailblazing rap moguls Rick Rubin and Russell Simmons. His own Jazzy Jay’s Studio was an early home to luminaries like A Tribe Called Quest Brand Nubian.
Jay comes to Israel for the Cult Club’s Urbanology party, branded as a celebration of everything associated with old-school hip hop culture – rap, breakdancing, graffiti and more. Events like these have been taking place at venues across Israel for years, but none with a marquee performer of this stature. Other participants include local talents like the disco funk-fixated DJ Alarm, DJ Mesh, local old-schoolers Quami and Kottage, the Tachlis Band and alt-rappers Peled and Ortega.
Fusion and ethno-preservation at the International Oud Festival
Jerusalem’s annual International Oud Festival is undoubtedly one of the highlights on the country’s cultural calendar. When it comes to Israeli performance art, often, the name of the game is “East meets West” (largely thanks to our country’s location and international alignments), and the Oud Festival is perhaps the finest example of what this theme has to offer.
Over the years, the festival has presented amazing fusion experiments, with elements thrown into the mix including the cantorial music of Syria, ancient Persian folk sounds, the contemporary folk-rock of Meir Banai, the para-liturgical poetry of the Ben Ish Chai, Egyptian post-war pop songs, Orphaned Land’s acoustic metal, the Greek blues, medieval Moroccan Sabbath table hymns, Dutchmen with laptops outputting layers of white noise, the sublime rhythmic textures of Zohar Fresco and guitar heroics courtesy of Turkish-bred rock god Berry Sakharof. The shows don’t always directly include the music of the Arabian fat-bellied lute we love to call the oud, but they are always spiritually grounded in an artistic landscape embodied symbolically by the namesake instrument.
In a trajectory that is arguably parallel to the growing popularity of ethnic music and para-liturgical poetry traditions (known collectively as the canon of piyut), over the past nine years, the Oud Festival has grown from a modest few shows held in a small auditorium each fall into a major two-week event, drawing sell-out crowds from all over the country, from all ages and from all walks of life.
This year, the festival was slightly less experimental and fusion-oriented, with an emphasis placed more on covering authentic ethnic territories new to the proceedings. This trend culminated at the end of last week with a performance by Divana (pictured), an ensemble hailing from the northwestern Indian state of Rajasthan.
Divana draws from the ancient traditions of the Manghaniyar and Langa tribes, who historically served as bards to the local Rajasthani Brahmin and Rajput aristocracy, purveying sublime chants on the subjects of love, war and mysticism. The contemporary ensemble is among the last remaining descendents of this tradition, and hearing them play was a major treat. The six-piece included two string players, two vocalists and two percussionists – one of whom flailed his arms about wildly while rapidly flicking mini wooden planks together with his fingers (the outcome more than slightly reminiscent of the old-time spoonmen.
The Divana show served as the closing performance of the 2008 Oud Festival, an ecstatic and poignant summing up of Israel’s status in the international cultural scene. Festival Artistic Director Effie Benaya was visibly moved as spoke about the bureaucratic struggles to obtain visas for the band’s personnel just days after the terror attacks in Bombay, and he apologized to the audience for the absence of Navtej Singh Sarna, the Indian ambassador to Israel, who had planned on attending but was regrettably stuck in traffic.
Do You Know Where Your Kids Are?
While Israeli kids are as much a part of the global “mall culture” (where kids hang out a the mall for endless hours) as any place else, kids still join youth groups in droves here. By “youth groups,” I mean groups of younger kids getting together at a clubhouse once or twice a week, where (some) educational and (mostly) fun activities are led by an older (16-17 year old) teenager. It’s informal education – actually, socialization – at its best, giving kids something to do other than watch TV and IM each other. 
There’s a “flavor” of youth group for everyone’s taste, from the generally Zionist Tzofim (Scouts) to the Labor/kibbutz affiliated No’ar Oved Velomed , the socialist Shomer Hatza’ir, and the modern-Orthodox Bnei Akiva. Bnei Akiva (which my kids belong to) this past weekend celebrated the culmination of a month long frenzy of play, song and dance production (”Chodesh Irgun”), in preparation for Saturday night’s presentations, which parents and graduates around the country came to see. Because it was such an intensive weekend – following an intensive month – most state religious elementary and high schools gave the kids a day off on Sunday.
Nearly all the youth groups (except for the Scouts, for the most part) are affiliated with a political movement that kids are expected to graduate into, and those movements are of course affiliated with political parties. Even though there are major differences between these movements, it’s easy to get confused, because on paper, all espouse very similar ideologies, activities, programs, and ideals. For example, the decidedly non-religious Shomer Hatza’ir prominently features on its web site a commentary on the Weekly Portion read in synagogue. All the groups sponsor trips and hikes around Israel, with kosher food for all the kids, and the Sabbath is generally commemorated by each group in its own way. As an Orthodox group, Bnei Akiva adheres to Halacha, with the major difference between it and the others being that most activities are not co-ed. All the youth groups are eligible for public funds, and membership is encouraged, with Scouts organizing inside state high schools, and Bnei Akiva holding activities in state religious schools.
Cynics (there are always going to be some!) would attribute Israel’s encouraging of youth groups – with “troops” organized around a “leader,” who answers to a “secretary” – as preparing kids for Army life. There is definitely a bigger push to “belong” here than there is among kids in the U.S., but preparation for the IDF it ain’t – it’s more about finding a place in society, meeting new kids (which you get to do on major hikes and activities that include kids from around the country), and just feeling comfortable with others their own age. Not that I have anything against the mall, but this is a lot cheaper – and healthier!
Barkat where he belongs
Filed under: A New Reality, Israeliness, Life, Politics
Municipal elections were held across Israel yesterday, with leadership positions up for grabs in 159 regional councils and cities. In Tel Aviv the race was extremely close, making for high drama into the night, as ballots were counted. However, the mayoral race in Jerusalem was arguably the most dramatic of all, with the very soul of the city up for grabs.
Outgoing Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski was elected five years ago by the city’s ultra-Orthodox sector, who knew that as mayor, he would fight hard for their agendas. Disillusioned by the then-outgoing Olmert administration, Jerusalem’s non-Orthodox populace largely sat out the election, paving the way for the city’s first ultra-Orthodox mayor. The biggest loser in that election – aside from all hopes for a pluralist, commerce-friendly, tourist-welcoming and culturally vibrant Jerusalem – was candidate Nir Barkat.
A high-tech entrepreneur and a champion of culture, Barkat went on to serve as an effective opposition leader in the city council, but when the ultra-Orthodox parties banded together and named Knesset member Meir Porush their 2008 candidate for mayor of Jerusalem, many feared a repeat of 2003’s results. And even if one believed that Barkat’s popularity exceeded Porush’s, one had to wonder about wildcards like the candidacy of oligarch-playboy Arcadi Gaydamak and Green Leaf leader Dan Birron, who had the potential to at least split the secular vote.
As a result of this situation, Barkat’s 2008 campaign featured some right-wing posturing moves that made some wonder if perhaps they’d be better off with Porush after all. But in the end, these efforts paid off, with many of the city’s National Religious elements supporting Barkat as someone who had their back. Ultimately, Barkat received over half of the votes, no small feat on a crowded ballot.
Democracy and change have been so thick in the air lately that perhaps a global reconnecting with the voting process also helped turn the tides. If apathy is what put Lupolianski in City Hall, a hearty can-do spirit is what has given us Barkat. And like that other high-profile candidate billed as the agent of progress, he certainly has his work cut out for him.
This Year I’m a Voter…The Next Mayor Election Vote for Me, Your Deputy Mayor
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Life, Politics
Did you know that Jerusalem has six deputy mayors? And each one gets paid NIS 35,000 a month. So now you are thinking, how do I become a deputy mayor? Me too. But it’s too late for us because the election for mayor and city council are just two days away and we’re not on any of the party lists so chances are that we’re not making a career change any time soon. But for those of us voting it is important to understand that we actually get two votes, one for mayor and the other for city council. It is on the city council that these deputy mayors will sit as part of the 30-something coalition and make the crucial decisions affecting me and you.
It is also important to know that while the deputy mayors are making the big bucks, the rest of the city council is doing volunteer work–that is, they are not making a penny, or shekel, if you will. As Shira at The Big Felafel informs us:
“While the two highest elected municipality positions, mayor and deputy mayor, are paid positions, the other 29 seats on the council are volunteer positions. The mayor’s salary comes from your taxes, has his/her hand most tightly around the budget and has the best chance of passing his/her policy decisions. But the council members are either a part of the mayor’s coalition, thus helping the mayor pass policy and allocate money, or they are a part of the opposition, with a unique opportunity of exposing the improprieties of the coalition to the public and leading a strong opposing stance to the ruling force. So both votes are extremely important.”
Like Shira points out, both of your votes are crucial and with just a few days before the elections these “volunteers” are campaigning down to the wire trying to get you to vote for them. This past Thursday Hitorerut-Yerushalmim (Wake up Jerusalem) and Jerusalem Will Succeed made one of their last hits on the campaign trail in an English forum hoping to inform Anglo voters and make them vote for their team.
The head of Wake up Jerusalem’s list, Rachel Azaria, stressed the fact that their party does not answer to anyone. They are the people and they answer to the people and no one else. This list is dedicated only to the residents of Jerusalem and therefore does not have an adjacent party in the Knesset that they must take their cues from. They are young and most of them come from careers in social change.
And while youth can mean a fresh start for the city, Naomi Tsur of Jerusalem Will Succeed holds that against them, for the usual reason of inexperience. Tsur, former head of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Jerusalem decided to make the switch to government after her long battle with creating a sustainable Jerusalem. She explained that their party comes with mayoral candidate Nir Barkat. And if he is elected he will need the support of his coalition to help him implement his policies, thus he will need people from his own party to be a part of the coalition since they already agree with everything he stands for. As far as the young and fresh thing goes, Tsur said they have a young person on their list, as well as other representatives, like a native Russian speaker, French speaker, two pensioners and an Ethiopian.
So as you head to the startup capital of the world’s technologically advanced polling system – placing a paper in an envelope inside a cardboard box – remember to vote for mayor and city council. You can find a list of all the city council choices on The Big Felafel.
Jerusalem Election Diary: Haaretz gets it so wrong
I don’t usually write about the same topic two weeks in a row, but, with less than a week to go, the upcoming Jerusalem mayoral elections is so important that I feel compelled to post again.
Last Friday, Haaretz published an editorial slamming mayoral candidate Nir Barkat and endorsing “a responsible haredi” (a code word for Meir Porush, the only ultra Orthodox candidate running for the position). Many Jerusalemites like me were outraged.
The reason for Haaretz’s position is that Barkat has come out in support of building a Jewish neighborhood near the Arab village of Anata, at the foot of the Jerusalem neighborhood of French Hill. The area has long been a thorn in the Palestinian’s side: building there would help connect Jerusalem to the satellite city of Ma’aleh Adumim in the West Bank, but it would also have the effect of preventing territorial contiguity for a new Palestinian state.
Barkat says that building this new Jewish neighborhood will help solve the city’s “shortage of housing for students and young people.” But it’s also a clear ploy to help win over Jerusalem’s “swing vote” – the Modern Orthodox residents who, according to recent polls, are split between Barkat and rival Porush. Given that most of the city’s voters, whether religious or secular, tend to be right wing, it’s not a bad campaign tactic.
Whether you agree or disagree with Barkat’s position, Haaretz – by coming out against the current front-runner in the race – is saying something far more disturbing about Israel’s attitude towards Jerusalem.
Haaretz is, in effect, giving up on Jerusalem. Or perhaps they already have. In the eyes of the Tel Aviv-based newspaper, Jerusalem is already all religious; there’s nothing to do here; no nightlife; it’s too far away; too dangerous; too tense; and ultimately not even worth a visit. The Western Wall, the Old City, the quaint alleyways and gourmet restaurants, the cool summer air, the unique architecture, the spirituality, the Knesset and center of government – all of these are unimportant to the enlightened readers of Haaretz where the heaviness and tension that are part and parcel of Israel’s capital might, God forbid, impede the never ending pursuit of next party.
Indeed, to Haaretz, Jerusalem is not a city at all. It’s a metaphor, a bargaining chip on the geo-political stage to be divided in an eventual peace. Anything getting in the way of that end must be resisted, fought, denigrated. Haaretz couldn’t care less about the problems the city faces, from transportation gridlock to cleanliness and jobs, reverse emigration, religiously-mandated unemployment, and a rapidly deteriorating education system, all areas for which Barkat – in contrast to the other mayoral hopefuls – has clear, step-by-step plans for rapid execution. The quality of life in Jerusalem can go to hell, Haaretz is saying, as long as the next mayor doesn’t stoop to interfere with the inevitable outcome of Oslo and Annapolis.
Tel Aviv, Shmel Aviv
Sure, I’m just as happy as the next guy that Tel Aviv got a fantastic write up in the New York Times. My problem with the piece is that it recycles the same information available in every other article written about Tel Aviv. Yes, I know, Madonna ate at Manta Ray (maybe because it was directly across the street from her hotel?), yes, Brasserie and Coffee Bar are indeed hip (but is it about the food or being seen?), the Bauhaus architecture, the fancy shmancy luxury apartments, Neve Tzedek, etc, etc…..all the rich stuff. The piece made me sad. It made Tel Aviv (often referred to as “Hell Aviv” by my Jerusalem loyalist friends) seem like the most pretentious place on earth. Hell yeah it’s got pretension, but it is not lurking in every corner. Especially not at Levontine 7…
…This impermanence can be an intensifier. I think of the hour I spent at a club called Levontine 7. Started by three musicians (including Ilan Volkov, the Israeli-born conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra), the dark and underdecorated two-level club is in Gan Ha Hashmal, Tel Aviv’s former unofficial red-light district, which is sprouting those kinds of hyper-groovy stores — one was selling a lamp made out of forks and spoons — that fascinate but baffle. For the recent national basketball finals, Levontine 7 hired two groups of six musicians who each improvised music to go with one team’s movements, in the manner of a silent movie.
Agreed, improvising Jazz to a live basketball game is a bit much, but that is not at all what Levontine 7 is all about. It is one of the only venues in the city that fosters indie musicians of all disciplines.
I’m also a bit miffed that the journalist spent a full week in Tel Aviv, but just eight hours in Jerusalem.
And while the memories I developed during the course of my weeklong, first-ever trip to Tel Aviv are pleasant and strong, the ones I concurrently made during my eight-hour-long, first-ever trip to Jerusalem are permanently scarred into my brain.You don’t have to be devout, or even a believer, to be moved to tears by a visit to Jesus’ Stations of the Cross or to the Holocaust Museum of Yad Vashem. At the latter, the Children’s Memorial is a single room in which five candles are reflected in 500 mirrors, creating the impression of an infinity of candles; meanwhile a voice slowly intones the individual names and nationalities of the 1.5 million Jewish children murdered by Nazis. The effect is bone-chilling.
I am not going to fault the writer for his heavy experience in Jerusalem. It can be quite a heady city, but to completely ignore the myriad of cultural offerings in Jerusalem is nothing less than a crime. But hey, why experience the awesomeness of Jerusalem when you can eat where Madonna ate?
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