Farm land

February 22, 2011 - 12:07 PM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: Business, Food, General, History and Culture, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life 

Kfar Vitkin in the 'old days'

I did recently mention my brother-in-law, Michael is his name (pronounced Meecha-el in Hebrew by my family, but called Mike by his Israeli brother and friends), in my last post, but he’s popping again in this one.

At the entrance...

It’s because of him that my sister and I — not the one he’s married to — recently ended up in Kfar Vitkin, a moshav near Netanya that is essentially adjacent to the small seaside village in which he grew up, Hofit, which I’ve also written about before. Michael spent his childhood in this very bucolic, charming place, running across the sand dunes of what is now the Coastal Highway to the beach, and working on the farms of Kfar Vitkin, taking care of what he calls ‘his cows.’

We were in the area checking out some sites for future articles — to come later — and stopped in at a farmstand that we’d read about in Kfar Vitkin called Emek Hefer Mushrooms, named for the region in which Kfar Vitkin is located. By the way, Kfar Vitkin, or Vitkin Village, was the first Jewish settlement in the Emek Hefer Valley. It was founded in 1930 by a group of 20 people who lived communally in one stone house, and was named after Yosef Vitkin, an educator and leader of the Labor Movement.

Anyway, Kfar Vitkin, Hofit and Beit Herut, another village, all blend into one another, and have this wonderful old-fashioned feeling, if you can ignore some of the mansions that have been built in the area. We called the mushroom farm to get directions, and they gave us fairly vague ones that took us to the town’s cemetery which is right next to the local pool. And there is the farm.

We, city slickers that we appeared to be, called a couple of times to ask where exactly the farmstand was located, and I think I used the term farmer’s market, which must have seemed somewhat grand to the person answering the phone, because she laughed and said, “Sure, you can call us a farmer’s market. We’re farmers.”

My tree slice

Once we realized that the farm really was located right next to the pool, we wandered in, perhaps expecting a wooden cart, the kind that you see on country lanes in the Berkshires, loaded with fresh tomatoes, cucumbers and apples. We got all that, but housed in a funny kind of warehouse whose walls are lined with shelves filled with old paintings; dusty and worthless, but quirky. But the bounty was real; all kinds of mushrooms, citrus fruits — pomelos, clementines and grapefruits from their trees, tiny peppers for snacking, all kinds of herbs and lettuces, dried fruit made from their fruit trees and a great display of tree slabs that can be used as trays, trivets, what have you.

We loaded up on the goods – I was thinking ahead to it being pizza night and using oyster mushrooms and fresh arugula (known as ‘rocket’ in Israel), on the some of the ‘zas I’d be making.

The market is open Thursday through the weekend, and the village is worth a visit, as there’s lots to do in the area, including anemone- and strawberry-picking in season, a local winery, the pool and beach in the summer, and the turtles of the Alexander River just down the road.

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Rebuilding Ikea

February 15, 2011 - 1:54 PM by · 3 Comments
Filed under: Business, design, General, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness 

Both Rachel and David made their own comments about the Ikea fire in Netanya, but this cartoon commentary by The Wall, a self-proclaimed new media Tel Aviv advertising firm, really says it all.

First, the title: Natanya2011 How to Build Ikea Again; I’m not sure if the name Netanya was misspelled on purpose, as Israeli spelling in English — given that it’s not their first language — tends toward incorrections.


As for the rest of the piece: We have the obvious and necessary method of poking fun at Ikea instructions, as well as the obvious and necessary ways of poking fun at Israeli society. There are the four million wooden pegs, more than 2 million screws and just one Ikea Allen wrench. There are the 15 Solel Boneh trucks — Solel Boneh being one of the largest construction companies in Israel — the 40 Manofei Avi cranes, just your random crane company, the 1500 fire extinguishers, natch, and recognizable by the Arabic writing on their shirts and kaffiyehs on their heads, the 100 Arab construction workers necessary to rebuild the place, a comment on who does the building and construction in these parts.

By the way, it seems the fire was caused by a short circuit in the store’s electrical system. Plans are to rebuild within the year.

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Following the Lider

October 8, 2010 - 11:24 AM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Israeliness, Life, Music, Pop Culture 

Ivry Lider with a young man celebrating his 10th birthday.

One of the intriguing aspects of attending weddings in Israel is the likelihood of rubbing shoulders with celebrities.

That likelihood didn’t really exist when I lived in the US, because who did we really know that was related to Billy Joel? But here, someone’s always friends, neighbors or a cousin of a governnment minister, a super model or a TV personality.

And the cool thing is that the other wedding guests don’t gush or make a big deal about the big name in the house, generally leaving them alone to enjoy the festivities.

Last night’s spirited Moroccan roll and Henna wedding bash of Jeremy and Vera at a picturesque sunset, beachside restaurant ceremony north of Netanya, had its shares of local stars.

Ivri Lider, one of the country’s most accomplished singer/songwriters, unobtrusively joined the celebrants, ate his meal, and then got up on the stage and graciously played and sang the newlyweds first slow dance. A little later, all eyes turned when singer/actress Ninet Tayeb arrived to join the festivities.

However, neither Lider nor Tayeb overshadowed the main event of the evening, joining us ordinary folk in wishing Jeremy and Vera a joyous life together.

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Vacation diary

April 7, 2010 - 9:06 AM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: education, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life, Religion, Travel 

A view of Hanaton

So here’s an overview of things seen and done over the Pesach vacation, which, sadly, is over. True, it’s good to get back to the routine of mundane life, but vacation has its pluses.

We spent one very pleasant afternoon at Utopia, a tropical rainforest transplanted, literally, on the grounds of Kibbutz Bahan near Netanya. Besides the thousands of orchids planted throughout the recreated tropical rainforest, there’s a fun chicken area for admiring fabulous roosters and hens, a butterfly den, deer, barbary sheep, turtles and many other forms of wildlife, flora and fauna. Plus, it does work for a range of ages, something we had in our group, with 1.5-year-olds, toddlers, schoolkids, high schoolers, middle-aged folks and a couple of 80-year-olds.

There was also fun to be had at Gan Garoo, aka Kangaroo, an animal park focused on Aussie animals, in Gan Hashelosha near Beit Shean. Perhaps better known for its proximity to Sachne, the popular water hole, Gan Garoo does have a decent animal showing, including a couple of cute koalas, (which, btw, are not bears, and they’re low energy marsupials because their entire diet consists of eucalyptus leaves, which don’t give them a whole load of protein. Interesting, no?) kangaroos, goats, sheep, birds, etc. Thanks to Bank Hapoalim for underwriting all entrance fees to this park and others for the entire Passover holiday.

Then we stayed for a few nights at Kibbutz Hanaton, the Conservative movement kibbutz that has seen good times and bad, and has been in the press a bit of late because of a new garin of families who are trying to rejuvenate the place. We were there with my husband’s TRY high school group, and then some of our friends and family joined us as well. And I gotta say, the place is looking good. The rooms in their educational center are simple but clean and comfortable (if you can, stay in their new couples’ room), and the food, as it has always been, is tasty and plentiful. The pool wasn’t open yet, but there are great playgrounds, and ample grassy areas for lounging around and contemplating the blue skies. Plus, there is a now a mikveh if you’d like to rejuvenate yourself, run by Rabbi Haviva Ner-David, an old friend whose family also moved to Hanaton from Jerusalem. A great place to stay if you need a temporary home in the Galilee.

Hope everyone had a good holiday, and now we’re onto the national holidays. TK.

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Never too old to paraglide

July 8, 2009 - 9:21 AM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: General, Life, Sports 

YouTube Preview ImageHere’s a great news item. Trudy Bibring, 89 years old and a native Austrian who has been living in Israel for 30 years, paraglides to raise funds for 600 children at risk in childrens’ homes throughout Israel.

Her paragliding adventures began when Bibring, who lives in Netanya, would watch from her apartment window the paragliders jumping off the Netanya cliffs nearby. Netanya is considered the home of paragliding in Israel, as the city’s moderate cliffs plus a stiff offshore breeze provide the right environment for gliders, who are often seen cruising high above the beach, just along the cliff line.

Bibring thought to herself, hmm, that’d be a great stunt for raising money. Given that she’s a proper Austrian lady, she may not have said it just like that, but that was the gist of the idea.

Her friends, say Bibring, are proud and a little bit envious. And she’s still doing it, as seen in this YouTube video taken June 17, just a few weeks ago, from a cliff near Netanya’s Carmel Hotel.

89!

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