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Foto Friday – A Walk Down Nachalat Binyamin

Every Tuesday and Friday, there’s a crafts fair on Tel Aviv’s Nachalat Binyamin Street.

There’s no end to the coverage about it, because it is a very good event that has managed to maintain high standards of quality for over a decade and a half — no mean feat, as so many other so-called crafts fairs start out in promising fashion, then sink quickly into a mire of cheap crap from India and China. But the TA municipality keeps close tabs the Nachalat Binyamin artisans and artists, many of whom staff their own booths.

Most visitors pay more attention to the products than the sellers, as is only natural when shopping. And that’s where the photographer’s eye comes in.

Photographer Jessica D. Korman, a recent new immigrant to Israel, took a stroll down Nachalat Binyamin and — aside from snapping shots of the wares for Tchochkes.com, where she is a regular contributor, she also took a look at what goes on around the booths.

Korman, who studied interior design, says she looks for architectural elements wherever she goes, “to present a different view of an object or event.”

“I like photographing everyday scenes,” Korman says, “always looking for a different angle or perspective to the mundane or even the ‘ugly’ side of things.”

A former picture editor for publications such as Scholastic, Star Magazine and Woman’s World Magazine, Korman now works as a Visual Communications Consultant in Jerusalem. “What I love about [photo editing] is that it is the marriage of written content with images. The proper choice of image will enable one’s work to have the greatest impact. Besides, what better job is there than getting to look at pictures all day?”

There’s inspiration everywhere. More of Korman’s work is available on her website, The F Stops Here.

Foto Friday – Sexy Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv nights are sultry and sexy. Or muggy or humid to the cynics. But for those who love summer in the city, going out clubbing on a Thursday night is just the right thing to do. After all, what’s a little sweat between friends?

Tel Aviv abounds with dance clubs, bars and night spots. According to the Gay Tel Aviv website, “For a great vacation, you’ve found the right place.”

The municipality also actively supports that view — and one expects no less from a city hall with a street number of 69! — and will host the annual gathering of the International Gay and Lesbian Travel Association this coming October. Given Tel Aviv’s gay-friendly status — and the fact that October in Israel has the loveliest weather — registration should be brisk.

This photo series was taken by citizen journalist/blogger David Shankbone, who wrote about Gay Tel Aviv, his night at the TLV club, and DJ Ofer Nissim (pictured), as follows: “One of the most excellent spectacles to behold in Israel was the amazing high energy of famous Israeli deejay Offer Nissim as several thousand men and women went insane. The entranced audience must have been what Jonestown looked like before the Kool-Aid…”

Click here for more about that night out on the town.

Nostalgia Sunday – Michal Negrin World

There’s something about Michal Negrin. Whether you love her retro n’ roses style or hate it — there seems to be no in-between — there’s no disputing that Negrin has tapped into a reservoir of emotion among women longing for a certain time that seems, at least on the face of it, to have been lovelier, more civilized, more sedate and possibly more fun.

Negrin has come a long way from her stand at the Nahlat Binyamin crafts fair and the little shop on Sheinkin Street, where Russian ladies used to painstakingly crochet, wrap, stitch and glue each encrusted earring, necklace and pin by hand. Today, she has die-hard fans and store locations around the world. And when those fans come from Paris or Palm Beach to Israel their mission is clear: get new Negrin pieces from the source.

The answer lies off the beaten track south of Tel Aviv in Bat Yam, at the accessories designer’s new central office, workshop and showroom. This is where the company’s 160 artisans carry out the delicate process of mounting and hand painting jewelry and decorative items, creating fashion, printing fabric, molding ceramics and more. It’s also a showcase for items created by Michal Negrin herself.

And now, there is the new visitor’s center, Michal Negrin World. This really is a world as Negrin would like to see it: a fantastic display of romantic roses and baby’s breath, lace, crystals and a just a hint of old-fashioned naughtiness.

The exhibit includes dollhouses, puppets and multilevel dioramas designed by Negrin and her husband Meir. There’s a cafe, and guided tours of the workshops and showroom. Negrin herself says, “I wanted to create a place that would be surprising… flooded with optimism and happiness, inviting visitors a peek into the worlds of my content and creativity.”

Some fun facts: Negrin wove a magical spell on the costume designers of “Harry Potter and the order of Phoenix”, when a ring and brooch were commissioned for actress Imelda Staunton, who played cat-obsessed senior undersecretary to the Minister of Magic Dolores Umbridge. Her celebrity fans, according to ISRAEL21c, include Demi Moore, Nicole Kidman, Britney Spears, Alicia Keys and Jane Seymour. And Negrin nostalgia has even extended to the sports arena; in 2008, she was commissioned by the Israel Olympic Committee to design the formal lapel pin for the Israeli team (pictured here).

Michal Negrin World is open to the public Sun-Thu, 9:00am-3:00pm. Tours must be booked in advance. Tel: 972-3-555-3326. Address: 7 Kaf Tet B’November St., Bat Yam.

Foto Friday – Yuval Nadel takes to the air

It’s Passover week. And that means the entire nation of Israel is sitting sweltering in traffic jams as the entire north of the country goes south and the entire south of the country heads north — all in the name of family fun. While they do that, let’s for a moment, take to the air with photographer Yuval Nadel.

Kinneret – Photo by Yuval Nadel

Wadi Ara – Photo by Yuval Nadel

Ramon Crater – Photo by Yuval Nadel

Hefer Valley – Photo by Yuval Nadel

Ramon Crater – Photo by Yuval Nadel

Dead Sea – Photo by Yuval Nadel

And so, we land…
Kilometer 101, Arava – Photo by Yuval Nadel

More photos are available at Yuval Nadel’s website.

Foto Friday – Visit Israel the Virtual Way

“Snob! Have you been to Tiberias yet?” The late great Israeli humorist Ephraim Kishon quipped that those words were scrawled across the Acropolis, chastising those Israelis who preferred to travel abroad rather than tour their own fair country. Today, fortunately, Israelis — and anyone else for that matter — can sit in the air-conditioned comfort of their Athens hotel and visit the sites of Israel in full color — thanks to a new feature on the Ministry of Tourism website: the Virtual Tour of Israel. The new multimedia experience includes 100 videos, 130 panoramic views and dozens of photographs. Here’s a classic:

Ten virtual, ten-day tours are available online, including: general interest itineraries, Jewish interest, Christian interest, Culture and History, Nature, Family, Archeology, Active interest, Mobility challenged and — last but certainly not least — Food and Wine.

Sites that can be visited include Caesarea… Jerusalem… Mitzpe Ramon… the Dead Sea…

The Bauhaus architecture of Tel Aviv …

Here’s Tiberias – we are not snobs!

The Haifa Port, where my running club, the Holyland Hash House Harriers, will be running this weekend with 40 sailors on shore leave!

By the way, the Ministry of Tourism website is available in 11 languages and is updated on an ongoing basis.

Beijing gets an Israeli tourist office

Israeli-style Falafel can be found in far-reaching places like Amsterdam and Mumbai, but that doesn’t mean that everyone the world over who’s enjoying a taste of Israel is interested in coming on over to check out the real thing.

And with the standard mechanisms for finding visitors to Israel running into trouble thanks to the global economic slowdown (foreign tourist hotel occupancy down by 13% during the final quarter of 2008, according to Haaretz), the Tourism Ministry is aggressively going after new sectors.

Last week, the Tourism Ministry opened its 15th office currently in operation outside of Israel, this time in Beijing (pictured). The office augments an active Israeli embassy in Beijing, which already serves as an active center for outreach to the Chinese, largely by co-sponsoring cultural events. But the Tourism Ministry outpost should have plenty to do as well, with projects including compiling and publishing tourism guidebooks to Israel in Chinese, assisting the Israeli private sector with marketing packages to Chinese audiences, liaising with Chinese wholesalers interested in selling Israel trips, and arranging introductory visits for Chinese tourism industry leaders and media types.

On the occasion of the opening, Tourism Minister Ruhama Avraham-Balila released a statement:

“During the last decade, China’s outgoing tourist market has demonstrated rapid growth and it is still considered to have significant growth potential. The Tourism Ministry has made plans to realize this potential once the global economic crisis has passed and global tourism industry has recovered – both in terms of marketing and in the removal of obstacles, receiving tourists and welcoming them in Israel.”

It’s all part of the new tourism partnership between China and Israel, formalized this past fall. As I wrote back then….

Officials at the Israeli Ministry of Tourism ought to be drooling over this potential, given that the Chinese populace is currently estimated to be numbered at well over 1.3 individuals. So far, 2008 has shown a 45% increase in Chinese tourist arrivals here, and Israeli officials are aiming for a grand total of 15,000 Chinese visitors by the end of December.

It’s estimated that about 50 million Chinese tour in Israel’s neck of the woods, but very few of these actually make it to Israel. “We need to prepare to absorb some of that,” Israeli Tourism Minister Ruhama Avraham-Balila announced at a press conference in China in early September.

The potential is being sought after further here in Israel as well, with last week also marking the launch of a Chinese-language course for Israeli tour guides, with 40 participants studying cultural idiosyncrasies and various dialects for over five months.

Image courtesy Jonas in China from Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

Foto Friday – Down at the Dead Sea with Shmuel Browns

Canadian-Israeli Shmuel Browns is a licensed tour-guide and artist who uses photography to share his love of nature. A recent exhibit, From the Lowest Place on Earth presented images of the Dead Sea, a miraculous body of salt water whose name belies its true nature.

The region – 420 meters below sea level – possesses unique geographical, biological and historical characteristics, and the sea itself is rich in minerals that, coupled with its stark beauty, have made it a center for spa tourism.

So much for the good news. The bad news is that the Dead Sea is dying or, more accurately put, being killed off. It is shrinking at a rate of 1 meter per year as both Israel and Jordan divert the waters flowing into it, leaving huge mud flats with hundreds of sinkholes that lie in the sun like open wounds crusted with salt.

In his artist’s statement, Browns writes: “Even as the world is rapidly changing, as humanity encroaches, these photographs capture nature in a serene moment. The exhibit explores contrast–between wet and dry, water and desert; the contrast between rock and vegetation, and between the broad horizontal expanse of the Dead Sea and the cliffs and mountains that rise vertically above it; the contrast between nature and human industry.”

This surreal moonscape is Dead Sea Works, a subsidiary of Israel Chemicals, a multibillion dollar industry and part of the lifeblood of Israel’s economy. Shutting it down isn’t an option for the immediate future but a comprehensive integrated development plan for the entire region has been proposed by Friends of the Earth Middle East (FoEME).

Last summer, Browns had the opportunity to show these images of the lowest place on earth in a Katmandu gallery, in the shadow of the highest mountains on earth. The exhibit can be found online on his Facebook page.

Israelis talk turkey in Turkey

Israelis love to travel abroad, but most Israelis don’t have alot of spare money – that’s why God created created Turkey. A short plane flight away, with beautiful beaches and hiking and affordable resorts, Antalya, on the south coast of Turkey, has become in the last decade or so a magnet for vacationing Israelis. In fact you can often hear more Hebrew there than at the Ramle shuk.

I’ve been there a couple times in the last seven years, and it’s the perfect vacation destination if you don’t want to travel too far from home, but still want an out-of-country experience. After all, how many times can you go to Eilat?

But since the Gaza war, and the agressively anti-Israel protests throughout the country as well as Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s vicious outbursts against the IDF actions, tourism to Turkey has dropped off drastically. Now, the Turks are trying to convince us that they’re still the nice folks we always thought they were.

According to Yediot Aharonot and Ynet, hotel managers and workers in Antalya called on Israelis this week not to cancel their vacations at the Turkish resorts,

“There are no security problems here and we have no connection to the political issues,” said Mr. Erdogan of the popular Spice Hotel. “You are welcome here anytime. As far as we’re concerned nothing has changed… Antalya is a safe place and Israelis are as welcome here as any other guest.

“We really miss the Israelis, you have nothing to fear from,” he added.

“The years-long relations between us and Israel must not end in one day, and certainly not over political statements,” said the manager of the Limak Limra Hotel in Antalya.

“We are not at war with Israel and we have been working together for so many years. Leave politics aside… what you see on television and hear on the news isn’t the reality here,” he stated.

According to the report, Israelis make up only 5% of tourism to Antalya but unlike European tourists – who usually vacation during the summer, Israelis visit the region all year-round, and therefore their absence is especially felt in wintertime.

That’s why the hotel operators in Antalya are offering amazing deals -like $199 for a flight and three nights at a number of all-inclusive resorts – and, of course, Israelis aren’t going to pass up a deal like that.

Evidently, hundreds of families booked their special discounted deals to Antalya since they were first published by various travel agencies less than 48 hours ago. Shai Dagoga of the Flying Carpet travel agency told Ynet that most of the packages have already been booked.

“This stems from the price, of course, and in the reality of 2009, cost is something that cannot be ignored. But the greater change is the result of the hotels’ willingness to show that they’re interested in the Israeli guests, and that their attitude towards us hasn’t changed – that they can be hospitable.”

Dagoga estimated that Israelis will continue visiting Turkey even after prices go up a bit. “People know that there’s no substitute for Turkey. The hatred that people say exists towards us there is no different than in other places… I don’t see this destination going to waste,” he stated.

Pragmatic or foolish? Or maybe it’s just part of returning to the surreal kind of normalcy we live in around here, where your neighbors are likely to be fair-weather friends.

Foto Friday – Tel Aviv Port

Conde Nast’s Concierge.com just named Tel Aviv tops on its “It List 2009” and about time too. Each year, Concierge “comb[s] the globe looking for the emerging places that will be on everybody’s lips two years from now”. So how great is it to already be in a place “that will make you feel all right about the world again”. Great indeed.

Photographer Hanoch Grizitzky has captured the Tel Aviv’s enchantment and energy in a series of images of the old port and its new boardwalk in the rain. The image above is of the walkway and, looming in the background, the Reading Power Plant — a historic Modernist building whose tower was once accurately described by an old boyfriend as “the phallus of Tel Aviv”. Reading is now garishly draped in colored lights because we are the party city.

Winter isn’t the most fashionable time to travel, but it has its advantages: the city air feels fresh, there aren’t a lot of tourists, and people are calmer, (relatively speaking – this is Israel, of course), in the absence of the summer swelter. The disadvantages are that it sometimes rains and gets dark very early, but these elements have their charms as well.

Grizitzky freelances for leading Israeli news publications such as Yediot Aharonot, Globes, women’s mag La-Isha, entertainment rag Pnai Plus and others, photographing objects of beauty – be they desert flowers or spokesmodels. “My starting point is love of photography and beautiful things come from there,” he says. “Like the hummus commercial says, ‘Do it out of love or don’t do it at all.’”

These small format images don’t begin to do justice to Grizitzky’s works, particularly this panoramic view. For a better look, visit his website and picture gallery.

Sino wave

Much is constantly being written about how tourism to Israel is on the rise, but nearly all of the hoopla focuses on the Western European and North American markets. East Asians in Israel are usually here as foreign laborers, but a recent report by China View cites a growing trend of Chinese tourists to Israel.

Officials at the Israeli Ministry of Tourism ought to be drooling over this potential, given that the Chinese populace is currently estimated to be numbered at well over 1.3 individuals. So far, 2008 has shown a 45% increase in Chinese tourist arrivals here, and Israeli officials are aiming for a grand total of 15,000 Chinese visitors by the end of December.

It’s estimated that about 50 million Chinese tour in Israel’s neck of the woods, but very few of these actually make it to Israel. “We need to prepare to absorb some of that,” Israeli Tourism Minister Ruhama Avraham-Balila announced at a press conference in China in early September.

The Chinese government has approved Israel as an acceptable destination for its citizens, paving the way for the first-ever organized Chinese tour group, of 80 people, to land later this week. China Air is also supposedly looking into the feasibility of launching a regular flight route between the two countries.

And the list of progress fronts on the bureaucratic level goes on….

The preparations to receive the Chinese tourist and adapt the tourism product to meet their particular needs include training Chinese-speaking tour guides, chefs in hotel restaurants, recruiting Chinese-speaking employees in the hotel and tourism industries, translating informational material, maps, brochures into Chinese, as well as providing courses to employees in the tourism industry on the unique aspects of Chinese culture.

Image courtesy Yuen-Ping aka YP from Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

 

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