For most tourists and pilgrims, Uttarkashi is a stopover town on the way to one of the four sources of the Ganga River. We ended up staying there for two nights, mostly because I couldn't decide what to do next (yes, the indecision of being a Libra has followed me to India) and because Uri wanted to buy some essentials before going off on a week-long trek. I decided to join Uri on the trek to Dodi Tal, which according to Indian mythology, is the lake where Shiva cut off Ganesha's head and replaced it with that of an elephant.
Orian headed off to Srinigar, Rachel stayed in Uttarkashi, and Uri and I took the 8:45 local bus (which left at 9:20) to a small town called Sagnam Chatti, about one hour northwest of Uttarkashi. The bus was crowded, as usual, with people piled three to a two-seater, four to a three-seater, and scores more hanging in the aisle. When we arrived in Sagnam Chatti, at the end of the line, we were met with the usual, "Hello, you want guide?" We didn't, so we crossed the short bridge to the foot of the trail, where I traded my sandals for trekking shoes. A European couple walked by us, their backs straight and tall, wearing hard-core hiking boots and carrying obviously well-packed bags. I continued to tie my shoes.
On many of these treks in the western Himalaya, the beginning is often the steepest part. Uttarkashi is about 1880 meteres high, and according to the map, we would have reached 3000 meters by the time we arrived at Dodi Tal. Up, up we walked, past the brushes of stinging nettle and cannabis, into the dense forest.
About half an hour into the hike, we heard a voice calling to us. We looked up and saw nothing. There it was again, the voice. We looked up again, and saw, behind a rock, a face. The face also had a hand, which summoned us. We looked at each other, and decided to go. The voice, the face and the hand also had a body, that of a toothless woman lounging behind the rock, next to another woman, a young girl, an older man and a teenaged boy. "Chocolate?" they requested, holding out their hands. "No chocolate," we said, but we did have a few packages of Parle-G biscuits, one of which we gave to the toothless woman to keep. We opened another package and shared it with them. They were from the village of Agora, 8 km up the trail, and had come down to cut branches to bring back to their village.
After the snack, we continued on the trail, which was so unlike the trail to Gomuk. To begin with, the ascent was much easier on my lungs. Maybe this was because my body was more acclimatized, or maybe because there is so much more oxyegn in the forest than in the desert-like atmosphere of the way to Gomuk. Also, there were no chai shops on the way up the trail. There was, however, a sign for a guest house in Agora boasting "a homely stay in a beautiful natural location." I hope they meant homey.
Agora, which we reached about two hours later, was in fact a beautiful natural location, but seeing how early in the day it was, we decided to continue on to the next village, Bebra, to spend shabbat. We did stop in Agora long enough to eat lunch and watch the rainclouds gather above us.
By the time we arrived in Bebra, the daily rain had poured, lightly. We paid the 10 rupees to the forest guard, who then accompanied us to the nearest dhaba / chai shop. The dhaba owner asked us to stay in his guest house, which, upon closer inspection, was as unappetizing as it appeared at first sight. "Is there another guest house here?" I asked. The dhaba owner and the forest guard both vehemently shook their heads at me. Uri gave me a disappointed look. "Wrong queston," he told me.
We continued on, about 100 meters, where we found another guest house, this one much more homey and much less homley than the last. The European couple, who turned out to be as Swiss as they looked, had already set up their tent on the grass behind the stone house. We took a room, and then joined the couple (Peter and Miriam), who were trying out their Indian camping stove for the first time in an attempt to make lemon ginger tea. Chandara Lal (the guest house owner) and his "woman" Bindra joined us for tea, and asked us when we wanted to eat dinner.
The rest of the afternoon we lounged and wrote, looking out at the forest and the stream, as buffalo and cows and horses and children strolled by us. Agora is a small village. Bebra is a very, very, very small village. As night fell, I went off down the trail to sing kabbalat shabbat. For the first time I began to feel deeply the peace and quiet I have been looking for since I arrived in India. It is an amazing place to let go, to really rest.
Sunday morning, we continued our trek to Dodi Tal, which is only about 16 kilometers from Bebra. On the way, we passed through another small village called Mahji, bigger than Bebra but smaller than Agora and much less developed than either. We stopped for chai, looking at the clouds above us. "It won't last," I said, now an expert on Uttaranchal weather. "It'll rain for a couple of hours and then clear."
Well, the rain began as we began the hardest ascent to Dodi Tal. By rain, of course, I mean hail. And by hail, I mean hail.
When we arrived in Dodi Tal we were soaking wet and freezing. The Europeans, Swiss as they are, were in much better shape than we were. My shoes were entirely soaked through, as were my pants. We crowded around a fire where about 10 Indians sat warming their hands. The majority of said Indians, we learned, were managers and factory operators from India's largest company, Tata. They were in Dodi Tal for adventure-training / team-building, and they were very funny. I don't know how else to characterize them. One of them, a skinny man with a disproportionately small head, asked us to pose with his colleagues for a picture, so we did.
Uri and I ended up spending the night in a dhaba run by a 17-year-old boy named Moskesh and his 14-year-old brother Bipin, who made us dinner and fed us chai, and set up warm blankets for us on the floor.
The next morning we awoke at quarter to 6 with the Tata adventure-trainers and climbed up to Darwa pass with them. Well, not really with them, since they are all much older than we are and much slower. We began the ascent with them (1,000 meters over 6 kilometers) and met them again on the way down. By the time we arrived at the pass, after walking on snow up a slippery slope, we found ourselves literally inside the day's raincloud. Peter and Miriam, the Swiss mountaineers, scurried up to the summit in their state-of-the-art hiking boots, but I didn't really feel the need. I was standing in the middle of a cloud, 4,000 meters high. That was good enough for me.
We were back in Dodi Tal by noon, exhausted from the already full day. I went to sit by the lake, to sort out the many thoughts and realizations I had reached while slipping down the wet trail.
We spent the night with Mokesh and Bipin in their dhaba again. This time, though, as we set to sleep at around 9 P.M., we found ourselves in the midst of a Hindi sing-along. About 20 loud friends from Delhi had crowded into the dhaba for a late dinner, and paid no mind to our attempt to sleep. "If this had happened an hour ago, it would have been great," Uri said. "It's still great," I said, and fell asleep.
The next morning, at around 5:30, Uri went back up to Darwa pass, where he planned to continue on to another town, two days down then trail, and then to Yamnotri, one of the char dham (sources of the Ganga.) Peter and Miriam came in for a chai about half an hour later, and then continued after Uri. At about quarter to 7, I gathered my things and began my trail back down to Bebra.
Before I left Dodi Tal, Mokesh asked where I was going to stay in Bebra. "My grandfather has a guest house there," he told me. "Well, I stayed at Chandara's before," I told him. Mokesh wrinkled his nose. "Chandara Lal? No good."
"Why no good?" I said, laughing. "You mean good, but not your grandfather?"
"No," he said, seriously. "He is very low civil caste."
I didn't really know how to respond. The caste system is not something I truly understand, and it is not my way of determining who is good or not.
I said goodbye to Mokesh and Bipin, and all of the other Dodi Tal friends, and found myself back on the trail, this time alone. The night before I had realized that, as wonderful as the friends I have made are, and as enjoyable as it has been to share these experiences, I needed to spend time by myself, to have the alone time I have been craving for so long.
At first, as I found myself inside of the dense forest, I was a little scared (mostly of whether or not to tell my mother. Hi Mom.) There I was, alone, on a trail in the forest, with only my thoughts to accompany me. It was then, amid deep thoughts and vivid scenery, that I realized. I was not alone. There on the trail with me were millions and trillions of living organisms, trees and plants and herbs and bugs and animals, all experiencing the early dawn with me.
I was like Dorothy, but without a tin man, or a lion, or a scarecrow. And no Toto. Obstacles arose and I met them, crossing rocks over streams, difficult ascents, slippery paths, the whole while looking around me and within me.
As I walked on, I saw something in front of me, long and slim, slithering on what looked like a big white rock. My heart jumped. A snake? How would Dorothy deal with this situation? How would Jack Kerouac? I walked slower, and then noticed that it wasn't a snake at all, it was a tail, a long graceful tail belonging to a lazy cow.
I stopped for a water and biscuit break along the way, on a rock near a stream. It was there the bees came out, one at first, and then two, and then I stood up and heard them buzzing all around me, either in mind or in reality. Two of them nestled onto my backpack, which I had slung on a rock. I paced, unsure of what to do, as the bees buzzed on bag. Finally I dumped my water bottle onto the bag, and the bees flew away. I grabbed my bag and continued down the trail.
On I went, through Mahji with its beautiful children, down the trail, through the forest. I ran out of water about 5 km away from Bebra. About two kilometers later I heard the giggling voics of wood nymphs, who turnd out to be three young women, under 30, all beautiful, all missing multiple teeth. One of them stuck out their hand and said, "toffee?" 'Toffee?' I thought, and shook my head. "Pani?" they said, arms still outstretched. I showed them my empty water bottle, and gave them what was left of my biscuits. They insisted on posing for a photo with the biscuits in their hands, perched in front of their toothless mouths.
I stopped at the first water spout I saw, just outside Bebra, and stuck my head under the flowing water. The women from the trail passed by me as I sat there, their baskets filled with the branches and leaves they had collected along the way.
I arrived in Bebra a little while later. Chandara and his son were in their dhaba, and seemed glad to see me. They offered me chai and food, and I sat around with them for hours, helping with their wood carvings and relaxing. The food they served me was just what we'd had on shabbat: rice, dahl and fern, which is quite possibly the strangest vegetable I have ever had. A fly died in my chai, more than once, but I just spilled it out each time and graciously accepted another.
The Tata team, who left Dodi Tal half an hour after I did and arrived in Bebra two and a half hours after I did, were staying at Mokesh's granfather's guest house for the night. The team leaders had organized a night of Garhwali song and dance for them, which was really an amazing experience. I sat next to Jasmila, Chandara's young daughter with whom I had developed a special relationship despite our complete lack of shared language. Looking around me, I realized I was the only foreigner there. It was a nice feeling. Later on, I got some advice on good treks in Himachal Pradesh from one of the guides, a Nepali whose father climbed Everest twice without oxygen and "expired" on his third attempt.
The next morning, early, I headed back down to Sagnam Chatti, taking my time to complete the 10 km. The Tata crew left at around the same time as me, and we were accompanied by the children of Agora, who walk up and down the trail to school every day.
I reached Sagnam Chatti about an hour and a half (and a total of 60 km) later, just in time to catch the bus back to Uttarkashi. I spent a few hours by the Ganga and then got on a bus, planning to go to Dehra Dun. I decided to get off in Rishikesh instead, where I am now. Tomorrow, Dharamsala.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
a stroll through uttarkashi market
Before leaving Uttarkashi for another trek, this time to Dodi Tal, I decided to buy antiseptic cream, considering that the tube my grandmother lovingly gave me before I left expired in 1996.
The market in Uttarkashi is lined with pharamacies, so I figured the whole mission would take about 10 minutes. Into the market I went, where I located the first pharmacy (Parvati Memorial Clinic) and walked up the stairs.
"Namaste," I said. "You have antiseptic cream?"
The pharmacist stared at me.
"For cuts and scrapes?" I tried again.
He stared at me again, then turned to his assistant and said something in Garhwali. The assistant went over to a drawer and pulled out a tube for me.
"Oh, good," I said, turning the tube over to read the indications. "Oh, this expires in June 2007," I said, pointing to the expiration date. "Do you have one that will last longer?"
The assistant put the tube back in the drawer, and pulled out another one. "10/08," he said, pointing.
"Thanks," I said again, looking it over. And there it was, not even in small print: 'This drug has proven carcinogenic in rats and mice. Use in moderation.'
I handed the tube back to the assistant and thanked him. Back into the market I went and up the stairs into another pharmacy.
"Namaste," I said to the pharmacist, who sat behind the counter, sweating henna from his balding head. "You have antiseptic cream?"
"No," he said, shaking his orange-stained scalp.
"For cuts and scrapes?" I asked again.
"No," he said.
"You know what I am asking for?"
"No," he said. And that was that.
Back into market, this time to an ayurvedic pharmacy, where I should have gone from the beginning.
"Hello," I said to the man at the counter, who was talking to a his friend with a big smile.
"Hello," he said back. His friend smiled at me.
"You have natural antiseptic cream?" I asked. "Yes," he said, and handed me a tube. Sixteen rupees and no indications of carcinogens. Perfect.
As I pulled out my wallet to pay, the pharmacist's friend said to me, "which country belongs to you?"
Now it's fairly normal in India for a local person to say, within minutes of meeting a foreigner, "which country?" Sometimes they say it under their as they pass by a foreigner, without even saying hello first. But "which country belongs" to me?
"Well, no country belongs to me, yet," I said. "But I live in Israel."
"Very good, many Israeli live India," the man said.
"Yes," I agreed.
"Have a sweet," the man said, pulling out a ginger-flavored Halls throat candy and handing me my change.
The market in Uttarkashi is lined with pharamacies, so I figured the whole mission would take about 10 minutes. Into the market I went, where I located the first pharmacy (Parvati Memorial Clinic) and walked up the stairs.
"Namaste," I said. "You have antiseptic cream?"
The pharmacist stared at me.
"For cuts and scrapes?" I tried again.
He stared at me again, then turned to his assistant and said something in Garhwali. The assistant went over to a drawer and pulled out a tube for me.
"Oh, good," I said, turning the tube over to read the indications. "Oh, this expires in June 2007," I said, pointing to the expiration date. "Do you have one that will last longer?"
The assistant put the tube back in the drawer, and pulled out another one. "10/08," he said, pointing.
"Thanks," I said again, looking it over. And there it was, not even in small print: 'This drug has proven carcinogenic in rats and mice. Use in moderation.'
I handed the tube back to the assistant and thanked him. Back into the market I went and up the stairs into another pharmacy.
"Namaste," I said to the pharmacist, who sat behind the counter, sweating henna from his balding head. "You have antiseptic cream?"
"No," he said, shaking his orange-stained scalp.
"For cuts and scrapes?" I asked again.
"No," he said.
"You know what I am asking for?"
"No," he said. And that was that.
Back into market, this time to an ayurvedic pharmacy, where I should have gone from the beginning.
"Hello," I said to the man at the counter, who was talking to a his friend with a big smile.
"Hello," he said back. His friend smiled at me.
"You have natural antiseptic cream?" I asked. "Yes," he said, and handed me a tube. Sixteen rupees and no indications of carcinogens. Perfect.
As I pulled out my wallet to pay, the pharmacist's friend said to me, "which country belongs to you?"
Now it's fairly normal in India for a local person to say, within minutes of meeting a foreigner, "which country?" Sometimes they say it under their as they pass by a foreigner, without even saying hello first. But "which country belongs" to me?
"Well, no country belongs to me, yet," I said. "But I live in Israel."
"Very good, many Israeli live India," the man said.
"Yes," I agreed.
"Have a sweet," the man said, pulling out a ginger-flavored Halls throat candy and handing me my change.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
hello? hello? hello, you want room?
About a week and a half ago, I left Rishikesh in all its heat and splendor, and headed northeast then slightly west then up, up, with my friend Liran to Gangotri, one of the four sources of the Ganga River. The season was just opening there, which meant it was cold and more cold, and also meant that each day a new restaurant and tourist pull was being built before our eyes.
I'll start 11 days ago, when I arrived in Uttarkashi, the passing town where I am sitting at this very moment. Since my first transportation experience in India was the relatively calm, pre-booked tourist bus from Delhi to Rishikesh, I only learned about the gem that is Indian transport when I attempted to leave Uttarkashi for Gangotri. Liran and I, dutiful westerners that we are, woke up early, ate a nice breakfast of champions, and arrived at the station at 10 A.M. sharp, awaiting our bus. No bus in sight. When we asked the station manager when the next bus was scheduled to leave for Gangotri, he told us 12:30. He then told us 2 P.M. He then told us 1:00. We then left the station and wandered around the market, ducking into a back alley where we met a beautiful baby, his parents, his grandmother, and a deaf uncle with wild white hair. I took family portraits, which they loved and which I'll post as soon as I download my photos.
At 11 A.M., we returned to the bus station. No bus, but it would be there by 3, the station manager promised. So, we sat at the station and talked to a group of babas and their protege, an 11-year-old boy with beautiful dimples wearing only an orange scarf around his waist, who we later met wandering around Gangotri.
The bus arrived at 1 P.M., and we eagerly got on. A smiling man with an unfortunately cracked yellow tooth saved us a seat and took it upon himself to be our translator and personal adviser. About 20 minutes after we left Uttarkashi, the bus driver stopped, and the Man with the Yellow Tooth smilingly urged us to get off the bus and drink chai at one of the roadside dabas. I didn't really want chai, considering that the last time I'd used the toilet was after breakfast. So I left Liran to drink the powdered milk and sugar while I went off in search of a toilet, or at least something resembling one. I wandered through the gates behind the daba and found myself overlooking a giant dam. I started to take out my camera, and immediately put it away when an officer motioned to me to put it away. The Man with the Yellow Tooth told me, "no camera." Got it. I went up to the officer and asked him if there was a toilet nearby. He motioned somewhere away from where we were standing, and said, "No camera." Yes, I understood. No camera. It also turned out there was no toilet.
After returning from the futile urination attempt, I also learned that there was no bus. "Poonture," the Man with the Yellow Tooth told us, smiling as was his way, though it looked like the bus driver was fiddling with the engine, not the tire. "Another bus at 3," the Man said, showing us his watch, which read 2:30.
A jeep/taxi pulled up about 20 minutes later, and Liran, The Man with the Yellow Tooth and I jumped aboard. The jeep was going to Darali, about 25 km from Gangotri, which meant we would have to get another taxi from there. And so the ride began, a slow uphill climb through the mountains on roads built only for one, and certainly not for the massive trucks that tried to chicken us around the bends. I've got to hand it to our driver, who successfully maneuvered us around some trying curves. We stopped about 5 times along the way, at various dabas, where we got out to pee and stretch, and at a blasting zone, where we stayed in the car with the windows rolled up.
When we arrived in Hermsil, about 2.5 km from Darali, the jeep driver said "challo" and the Man with the Yellow Tooth explained, this is where you get out." And so we did. Liran and I were joined by Shiva, a mountain guide who really seemed to want to be our guide, and Sergei, a giant Russian who told us he had lived in Israel for five months with his Jewish wife in 1991. He also told us he had recently returned from Jammu Kashmir which "vasn't danger" except for "few moment" when snipers shot at his bus after some sort of kidnapping attempt.
Sergei, Shiva, Liran and I walked along to Darali, already high in the mountains. Waterfalls flowed over the highway in cold currents, which I ran across barefoot to avoid soaking my leather sandals. An overly packed jeep came by and offered to take us to Darali for 40 rupees. We declined. Less than a kilometer later we arrived in Darali. "Excuse me, you sit," said Shiva, who really wanted to be our guide. "No, it's ok," we said, "why don't we get on this jeep to Gangotri?"
As the jeep crawled to Gangotri, night fell, though luckily none of our luggage precariously strapped to the roof did. We arrived in Gangotri at around 8 P.M. I let out one foot, and then another, and within seconds was swarmed by 15 boys shouting, "hello? hello? you want room?" I did, but not like that. The gang followed us down the street, repeating their mantra, which was echoed uncountable times from every corner. Little did I know that we had arrived on what was ostensibly the first day of the Gangotri season.
We found a place for 120 rupees (including a bucket of hot water for a shower), and went out to eat, trying to tune out the shouts of "hello, want room?" I am not exaggerating, not even a little. I wish I had recorded it.
The next day, Liran and I headed out on a three-day return trip to Goumukh, a glacier over 4,000 meters high. Gangotri is about 3,000 meters (these are not exact measurements), so the hike was 36 km round trip at an incline of about 1,000 meters. We arrived at the entrance to the park and payed 150 rupees to get in. Indians pay 40. On the sign it says Pony - 25, so I guess even horses have to pay. Babas get in for free.
The first few hours were difficult, not for my legs or my back, which were handling the walk well, but for my poor sweet lungs, which have barely experienced such high altitudes. My face beat bright red as we walked up the hill, through melting snow patches, a view of giant mountains over 6,000 and 7,000 meters high visible in the distance.
On the way up, we were passed by young guys in ripped shoes and flip-flops carrying generators and bags of something unidentifiable, which we soon learned were to stock the chai shops. On the first day of the trek, there were only three chai shops scattered along the trail. On the way back there were about nine. For some reason, these shops were built in clusters right next to each other, each cluster at least 5 or 7 km away from the next.
We met a nice Japanese duo walking up, who kept stopping to smoke chillums along the way. My lungs cried out to these Japanese guys, but they seemed fine. Aside from the incline, which got easier, the hardest part of the trail was avoiding the kilometer of sliding rocks, about three kilometers away from where we were to be spending the night. Oh, and the rain.
The walk up should take most western-bred white people between five to seven hours. By the end of the sixth hour, my western-bred white self was tired. We were supposed to be sleeping at an ashram at a pass called Bhojbasa, but I was beginning to believe there was no ashram. As we turned a corner, my foot hit a metal object, which I realized was a horse shoe. Now, I'm not so superstitious, but it was a nice sign. It meant that there had been life on this trail before. My optimism returned, and soon enough, we saw below us Bhojbasa pass.
First, we went to a cluster of tents which we mistakingly believed to be the ashram. The manager showed us one tent, where an Indian man was tucked into bed. "250 rupees per person," he said. We stared at him. "Ashram is there," he pointed.
Down we went to the ashram, which was run by a nice baba named Raju, who told us food and board were included in the 160 rupee price. I went with him to fill out the guest form, tired and hungry, and oh, so cold (it was approaching about 2 degrees up there). When I got to the question about "purpose of my visit," I turned to Raju and said, "what is the purpose of my visit?" "To meet me," he said, looking at me half-seriously, half-mockingly. So I wrote in the slot, "to meet me." Raju jabbed me in the ribs.
Darkness fell, wrapping the mountains which I can only describe as glorious, and we went inside for the evening prayer (arti), which consists of bells and chants, and ends with the leader of the prayer bringing around a flame, water and a sweet to each person in the room. After the prayer, we went into the dining hall. The room was set with three rows of narrow cloth, in front of which were placed a metal plate and cup. We sat down, two of the rows filled with babas in their orange cloths, blankets, some wearing sandals, some barefoot, none in shoes. The travelers, which numbered to about 10, sat in the third row, all of us layered and freezing.
Raju stood at the front of the room and said, "you may eat as much as you wish, we will come by to fill your plate again and again. But please, do not take more than you can eat and do not leave food on your plate." He began chanting, "Shri Ram, Jai Ram, Jai Jai Ram," as the babas sang along.
Then came the food, which, true to Raju's word, did not seem to end. "More chapati?" I nodded. "More sabji?" I nodded. "Rice?" Yes. "Dal?" Of course. "Chapati?" No... well, okay. "Sabji?" Well, it is really good. "Dal?" Okay. "Rice?" Uhhh... But on my plate it went, and try as I might, I did not finish my food. So I scooped it up and put it on Liran's plate. One of the kitchen workers laughed. Throughout the meal, which was delicious, which was filling, which was warm, I couldn't stop saying or feeling, "this is amazing."
Liran and I shared our room, which consisted of a giant thin mattress on the floor, with an Israeli guy named Uri (not the same as the one I met in Rishikesh), who had recently returned from Tapovan, a higher peak above the Goumukh glacier. We all passed out at around 9 P.M.
We woke up at 9 A.M., but I don't think I slept more than five hours, partially because of the cold, partially because the bed was not very comfortable, and partially because of the very odd dreams that kept sliding through my brain.
We woke up too late for breakfast, but Raju gave me a pot of hot water to clean my face and teeth. We then headed up to Goumukh, which is only about 5 km from Bhojbasa. Despite the rain, the walk was beautiful, and the glacier astounding. Rachel, a British woman who we met at the ashram, and who I later would spend the good part of a week with, told me that she had seen a sign next to the chai shop (about 1.5 km from the glacier) which was marked '66 - apparently signifying the recession of the glacier since 1966.
There were a couple of officers at the glacier when we arrived, who told us "duty, no go glacier." Ice was falling from the glacier, in the rain, so it apparently wasn't the best time to get close. "50 rupees," the officer told us. "No way," I said, and went to sit on a rock to look at the glacier, leaving Liran to bargain. "No," Liran said. "20?" the officer suggested. No-go, go-go.
We stayed another night at Bhojbasa, this time without Uri, who went back to Gangotri in the morning. There were at least three times the number of travelers staying there, and half the number of babas, who all seemed to have gone up to Tapovan that morning.
The next morning I woke up early enough to drink three huge chais and eat a bowl of chickpeas, and to talk to some of the other travelers staying at the ashram. We headed down the mountain at about 10 A.M., lazily wandering. The decline was so much easier than the incline, I could practically run it (which I did, when we passed the kilometer of the landslides).
When we arrived back in Gangotri, we were exhausted. We went to our previous guest house to retrieve our belongings, which we'd left locked in a room at a high price of 50 rupees. The owner of the guest house was nowhere in sight, and when he finally arrived he was very sad (I'm using the term "sad" lightly, to describe his fury) that we were not going to stay there another night.
We went to the Krishna ashram, a place mainly for travelers. Liran left the next morning for Rishikesh, and I ended up moving in with Uri, who was also staying there. We stayed that for two nights, and were promptly kicked out into the rain on the third for having "violated" the "rules" of the ashram. The "rule" we "violated" was returning past 10 P.M. the night before, when we'd gone into the forest with about 10 friends to make a bonfire. I apologized for my violation, though this rule was not written anywhere (there actually was a very extensive list of rules posted in our rooms, and this was not on it). The swami, who I will call here Swami Ego, said to me, "sorry? didn't know? I do not forget and I do not excuse." Our German friend Anne, who had been at the ashram for 2 weeks helping out, was also booted for this violation.
So Uri and I went back to pack, as the rain started to fall in bursts. When it cleared for a few minutes we took our stuff and went to sit in a cafe, where we sat for about six hours at a huge table with just about every traveler in Gangotri (remember, this was still the beginning of the season, so there weren't very many). We found a room, and moved on to another restaurant, where met our friends again. It was a very lazy, beautiful day.
The next morning I left with Uri, Rachel and an American named David to Gangnani, a small village housing pools of hot springs. We went for breakfast before catching the bus. My banana porridge had not yet arrived when David spilled my chai on my lap, soaking me through. I jumped up and started looking for another pair of pants in my bag, when I realized that I'd left my laundry, and with it all my pants, in the guest house. It turned out to be a very good thing to have had my chai spilled on me. On the bus I kept hitting my head on a piece of metal above me. I haven't figured out the significance of that yet.
In Gangnani we relaxed for three night and three days, in a really nice wooden guest house/chalet set above the hill. Anne joined us for a night, and then David left. We had two rooms between us, so we figured Uri would need a roommate. That's when Orian came by, completing our crew. Most of the other travelers from Gangotri were also there, in the same wooden cabins as us, so it really felt like Camp India for Adults. On the first day we strolled up to the nearby village, which with its lush setting and slate thatched roofs really looked like a fairy tale. The little creatures running around playing (beautiful children who I will post pictures of soon) made it seem all the more so like a fairy tale. The rest of the time we lazed around, going into the pools at night, eating and relaxing.
Except for Rachel and a Dutch guy named Mark, all of the campers at Camp India for Adults headed out in a jeep for Uttarkashi, where I am now, staying with Uri and Orian. Still undecided about tomorrow's journey, but I think I see a lake in the distance.
I'll start 11 days ago, when I arrived in Uttarkashi, the passing town where I am sitting at this very moment. Since my first transportation experience in India was the relatively calm, pre-booked tourist bus from Delhi to Rishikesh, I only learned about the gem that is Indian transport when I attempted to leave Uttarkashi for Gangotri. Liran and I, dutiful westerners that we are, woke up early, ate a nice breakfast of champions, and arrived at the station at 10 A.M. sharp, awaiting our bus. No bus in sight. When we asked the station manager when the next bus was scheduled to leave for Gangotri, he told us 12:30. He then told us 2 P.M. He then told us 1:00. We then left the station and wandered around the market, ducking into a back alley where we met a beautiful baby, his parents, his grandmother, and a deaf uncle with wild white hair. I took family portraits, which they loved and which I'll post as soon as I download my photos.
At 11 A.M., we returned to the bus station. No bus, but it would be there by 3, the station manager promised. So, we sat at the station and talked to a group of babas and their protege, an 11-year-old boy with beautiful dimples wearing only an orange scarf around his waist, who we later met wandering around Gangotri.
The bus arrived at 1 P.M., and we eagerly got on. A smiling man with an unfortunately cracked yellow tooth saved us a seat and took it upon himself to be our translator and personal adviser. About 20 minutes after we left Uttarkashi, the bus driver stopped, and the Man with the Yellow Tooth smilingly urged us to get off the bus and drink chai at one of the roadside dabas. I didn't really want chai, considering that the last time I'd used the toilet was after breakfast. So I left Liran to drink the powdered milk and sugar while I went off in search of a toilet, or at least something resembling one. I wandered through the gates behind the daba and found myself overlooking a giant dam. I started to take out my camera, and immediately put it away when an officer motioned to me to put it away. The Man with the Yellow Tooth told me, "no camera." Got it. I went up to the officer and asked him if there was a toilet nearby. He motioned somewhere away from where we were standing, and said, "No camera." Yes, I understood. No camera. It also turned out there was no toilet.
After returning from the futile urination attempt, I also learned that there was no bus. "Poonture," the Man with the Yellow Tooth told us, smiling as was his way, though it looked like the bus driver was fiddling with the engine, not the tire. "Another bus at 3," the Man said, showing us his watch, which read 2:30.
A jeep/taxi pulled up about 20 minutes later, and Liran, The Man with the Yellow Tooth and I jumped aboard. The jeep was going to Darali, about 25 km from Gangotri, which meant we would have to get another taxi from there. And so the ride began, a slow uphill climb through the mountains on roads built only for one, and certainly not for the massive trucks that tried to chicken us around the bends. I've got to hand it to our driver, who successfully maneuvered us around some trying curves. We stopped about 5 times along the way, at various dabas, where we got out to pee and stretch, and at a blasting zone, where we stayed in the car with the windows rolled up.
When we arrived in Hermsil, about 2.5 km from Darali, the jeep driver said "challo" and the Man with the Yellow Tooth explained, this is where you get out." And so we did. Liran and I were joined by Shiva, a mountain guide who really seemed to want to be our guide, and Sergei, a giant Russian who told us he had lived in Israel for five months with his Jewish wife in 1991. He also told us he had recently returned from Jammu Kashmir which "vasn't danger" except for "few moment" when snipers shot at his bus after some sort of kidnapping attempt.
Sergei, Shiva, Liran and I walked along to Darali, already high in the mountains. Waterfalls flowed over the highway in cold currents, which I ran across barefoot to avoid soaking my leather sandals. An overly packed jeep came by and offered to take us to Darali for 40 rupees. We declined. Less than a kilometer later we arrived in Darali. "Excuse me, you sit," said Shiva, who really wanted to be our guide. "No, it's ok," we said, "why don't we get on this jeep to Gangotri?"
As the jeep crawled to Gangotri, night fell, though luckily none of our luggage precariously strapped to the roof did. We arrived in Gangotri at around 8 P.M. I let out one foot, and then another, and within seconds was swarmed by 15 boys shouting, "hello? hello? you want room?" I did, but not like that. The gang followed us down the street, repeating their mantra, which was echoed uncountable times from every corner. Little did I know that we had arrived on what was ostensibly the first day of the Gangotri season.
We found a place for 120 rupees (including a bucket of hot water for a shower), and went out to eat, trying to tune out the shouts of "hello, want room?" I am not exaggerating, not even a little. I wish I had recorded it.
The next day, Liran and I headed out on a three-day return trip to Goumukh, a glacier over 4,000 meters high. Gangotri is about 3,000 meters (these are not exact measurements), so the hike was 36 km round trip at an incline of about 1,000 meters. We arrived at the entrance to the park and payed 150 rupees to get in. Indians pay 40. On the sign it says Pony - 25, so I guess even horses have to pay. Babas get in for free.
The first few hours were difficult, not for my legs or my back, which were handling the walk well, but for my poor sweet lungs, which have barely experienced such high altitudes. My face beat bright red as we walked up the hill, through melting snow patches, a view of giant mountains over 6,000 and 7,000 meters high visible in the distance.
On the way up, we were passed by young guys in ripped shoes and flip-flops carrying generators and bags of something unidentifiable, which we soon learned were to stock the chai shops. On the first day of the trek, there were only three chai shops scattered along the trail. On the way back there were about nine. For some reason, these shops were built in clusters right next to each other, each cluster at least 5 or 7 km away from the next.
We met a nice Japanese duo walking up, who kept stopping to smoke chillums along the way. My lungs cried out to these Japanese guys, but they seemed fine. Aside from the incline, which got easier, the hardest part of the trail was avoiding the kilometer of sliding rocks, about three kilometers away from where we were to be spending the night. Oh, and the rain.
The walk up should take most western-bred white people between five to seven hours. By the end of the sixth hour, my western-bred white self was tired. We were supposed to be sleeping at an ashram at a pass called Bhojbasa, but I was beginning to believe there was no ashram. As we turned a corner, my foot hit a metal object, which I realized was a horse shoe. Now, I'm not so superstitious, but it was a nice sign. It meant that there had been life on this trail before. My optimism returned, and soon enough, we saw below us Bhojbasa pass.
First, we went to a cluster of tents which we mistakingly believed to be the ashram. The manager showed us one tent, where an Indian man was tucked into bed. "250 rupees per person," he said. We stared at him. "Ashram is there," he pointed.
Down we went to the ashram, which was run by a nice baba named Raju, who told us food and board were included in the 160 rupee price. I went with him to fill out the guest form, tired and hungry, and oh, so cold (it was approaching about 2 degrees up there). When I got to the question about "purpose of my visit," I turned to Raju and said, "what is the purpose of my visit?" "To meet me," he said, looking at me half-seriously, half-mockingly. So I wrote in the slot, "to meet me." Raju jabbed me in the ribs.
Darkness fell, wrapping the mountains which I can only describe as glorious, and we went inside for the evening prayer (arti), which consists of bells and chants, and ends with the leader of the prayer bringing around a flame, water and a sweet to each person in the room. After the prayer, we went into the dining hall. The room was set with three rows of narrow cloth, in front of which were placed a metal plate and cup. We sat down, two of the rows filled with babas in their orange cloths, blankets, some wearing sandals, some barefoot, none in shoes. The travelers, which numbered to about 10, sat in the third row, all of us layered and freezing.
Raju stood at the front of the room and said, "you may eat as much as you wish, we will come by to fill your plate again and again. But please, do not take more than you can eat and do not leave food on your plate." He began chanting, "Shri Ram, Jai Ram, Jai Jai Ram," as the babas sang along.
Then came the food, which, true to Raju's word, did not seem to end. "More chapati?" I nodded. "More sabji?" I nodded. "Rice?" Yes. "Dal?" Of course. "Chapati?" No... well, okay. "Sabji?" Well, it is really good. "Dal?" Okay. "Rice?" Uhhh... But on my plate it went, and try as I might, I did not finish my food. So I scooped it up and put it on Liran's plate. One of the kitchen workers laughed. Throughout the meal, which was delicious, which was filling, which was warm, I couldn't stop saying or feeling, "this is amazing."
Liran and I shared our room, which consisted of a giant thin mattress on the floor, with an Israeli guy named Uri (not the same as the one I met in Rishikesh), who had recently returned from Tapovan, a higher peak above the Goumukh glacier. We all passed out at around 9 P.M.
We woke up at 9 A.M., but I don't think I slept more than five hours, partially because of the cold, partially because the bed was not very comfortable, and partially because of the very odd dreams that kept sliding through my brain.
We woke up too late for breakfast, but Raju gave me a pot of hot water to clean my face and teeth. We then headed up to Goumukh, which is only about 5 km from Bhojbasa. Despite the rain, the walk was beautiful, and the glacier astounding. Rachel, a British woman who we met at the ashram, and who I later would spend the good part of a week with, told me that she had seen a sign next to the chai shop (about 1.5 km from the glacier) which was marked '66 - apparently signifying the recession of the glacier since 1966.
There were a couple of officers at the glacier when we arrived, who told us "duty, no go glacier." Ice was falling from the glacier, in the rain, so it apparently wasn't the best time to get close. "50 rupees," the officer told us. "No way," I said, and went to sit on a rock to look at the glacier, leaving Liran to bargain. "No," Liran said. "20?" the officer suggested. No-go, go-go.
We stayed another night at Bhojbasa, this time without Uri, who went back to Gangotri in the morning. There were at least three times the number of travelers staying there, and half the number of babas, who all seemed to have gone up to Tapovan that morning.
The next morning I woke up early enough to drink three huge chais and eat a bowl of chickpeas, and to talk to some of the other travelers staying at the ashram. We headed down the mountain at about 10 A.M., lazily wandering. The decline was so much easier than the incline, I could practically run it (which I did, when we passed the kilometer of the landslides).
When we arrived back in Gangotri, we were exhausted. We went to our previous guest house to retrieve our belongings, which we'd left locked in a room at a high price of 50 rupees. The owner of the guest house was nowhere in sight, and when he finally arrived he was very sad (I'm using the term "sad" lightly, to describe his fury) that we were not going to stay there another night.
We went to the Krishna ashram, a place mainly for travelers. Liran left the next morning for Rishikesh, and I ended up moving in with Uri, who was also staying there. We stayed that for two nights, and were promptly kicked out into the rain on the third for having "violated" the "rules" of the ashram. The "rule" we "violated" was returning past 10 P.M. the night before, when we'd gone into the forest with about 10 friends to make a bonfire. I apologized for my violation, though this rule was not written anywhere (there actually was a very extensive list of rules posted in our rooms, and this was not on it). The swami, who I will call here Swami Ego, said to me, "sorry? didn't know? I do not forget and I do not excuse." Our German friend Anne, who had been at the ashram for 2 weeks helping out, was also booted for this violation.
So Uri and I went back to pack, as the rain started to fall in bursts. When it cleared for a few minutes we took our stuff and went to sit in a cafe, where we sat for about six hours at a huge table with just about every traveler in Gangotri (remember, this was still the beginning of the season, so there weren't very many). We found a room, and moved on to another restaurant, where met our friends again. It was a very lazy, beautiful day.
The next morning I left with Uri, Rachel and an American named David to Gangnani, a small village housing pools of hot springs. We went for breakfast before catching the bus. My banana porridge had not yet arrived when David spilled my chai on my lap, soaking me through. I jumped up and started looking for another pair of pants in my bag, when I realized that I'd left my laundry, and with it all my pants, in the guest house. It turned out to be a very good thing to have had my chai spilled on me. On the bus I kept hitting my head on a piece of metal above me. I haven't figured out the significance of that yet.
In Gangnani we relaxed for three night and three days, in a really nice wooden guest house/chalet set above the hill. Anne joined us for a night, and then David left. We had two rooms between us, so we figured Uri would need a roommate. That's when Orian came by, completing our crew. Most of the other travelers from Gangotri were also there, in the same wooden cabins as us, so it really felt like Camp India for Adults. On the first day we strolled up to the nearby village, which with its lush setting and slate thatched roofs really looked like a fairy tale. The little creatures running around playing (beautiful children who I will post pictures of soon) made it seem all the more so like a fairy tale. The rest of the time we lazed around, going into the pools at night, eating and relaxing.
Except for Rachel and a Dutch guy named Mark, all of the campers at Camp India for Adults headed out in a jeep for Uttarkashi, where I am now, staying with Uri and Orian. Still undecided about tomorrow's journey, but I think I see a lake in the distance.
Saturday, April 28, 2007
some more pictures...
And more to come...
making sugar cane juice in Prakash's village
prakash and danny designing instruments
himanzu laughing at the om shanti cafe
danny and himanzu
Laxman Jhula at night
making sugar cane juice in Prakash's village
prakash and danny designing instruments
himanzu laughing at the om shanti cafe
danny and himanzu 
Laxman Jhula at night
some pictures...
danny reading tehilim when asked to buy monkey chapati
the ghat at svarg ashram
across laxman jhula
wedding in rishikesh 
mazal tov!
the after party with satlan and danny
Friday, April 27, 2007
plantation
Generally, there are two official methods of driving, the British way (on the right side of the road) and the other way (on the left side of the road). India, in its innovative glory, has discovered a third method: the middle way.
Prakash, who celebrated his 26th birthday yesterday, took me to his village about 12 km away from Rishikesh after we ate lunch, so he could pick up a letter from the village head enabling him to get a passport. He is a very good driver, so even though nearly all other vehicles on the road tend to straddle the divider lane rather than choosing a side, I feel safe with him. We left the bustle of the city and its roadside vendors, and found ourselves in the trees, on dirt paths, and soon enough, in his village, where Prakash was treated somewhat like a celebrity, with people waving from each side of the road, some stopping to talk to us.
Earlier in the week, Dani went with Prakash to his village to check out the wood he uses to make didjeridoos, and had told me that his house was little more than a shack. When we arrived, I saw that he hadn't been exaggerating. The house is made of crumbling cement with a thatched roof, and comprises three small bucket rooms swarming with flies, so different from the clean, marble-floored flat in Rishikesh Prakash has been renting for the last half year. It is the house Prakash grew up in, before his mother died of cancer and his father moved to Mussorie to do construction work. The place now belongs to his older brother, his wife and their children, who shyly stared at me, though I wasn't the first traveler to have come visit. The village itself is beautiful, a vibrant green collection of trees and fields, so quiet and peaceful.
We stayed for about half an hour, during which I managed to lose my already beaten sandal in a swampy march, soaking my pants in mud. Well, I wouldn't be a proper foreigner if I hadn't manage to do something embarassing like that, so I consider it a job well done.
I was planning to leave Rishikesh yesterday, but Dani and I decided to continue separately on our ways, so I think I will stay until Sunday, and then head up to Gangrotri with a few friends I've met here. But somewhere up there, down here, and all around, God is laughing at these silly plans of mine, so I'll keep you posted as things change (which they are bound to do).
Prakash, who celebrated his 26th birthday yesterday, took me to his village about 12 km away from Rishikesh after we ate lunch, so he could pick up a letter from the village head enabling him to get a passport. He is a very good driver, so even though nearly all other vehicles on the road tend to straddle the divider lane rather than choosing a side, I feel safe with him. We left the bustle of the city and its roadside vendors, and found ourselves in the trees, on dirt paths, and soon enough, in his village, where Prakash was treated somewhat like a celebrity, with people waving from each side of the road, some stopping to talk to us.
Earlier in the week, Dani went with Prakash to his village to check out the wood he uses to make didjeridoos, and had told me that his house was little more than a shack. When we arrived, I saw that he hadn't been exaggerating. The house is made of crumbling cement with a thatched roof, and comprises three small bucket rooms swarming with flies, so different from the clean, marble-floored flat in Rishikesh Prakash has been renting for the last half year. It is the house Prakash grew up in, before his mother died of cancer and his father moved to Mussorie to do construction work. The place now belongs to his older brother, his wife and their children, who shyly stared at me, though I wasn't the first traveler to have come visit. The village itself is beautiful, a vibrant green collection of trees and fields, so quiet and peaceful.
We stayed for about half an hour, during which I managed to lose my already beaten sandal in a swampy march, soaking my pants in mud. Well, I wouldn't be a proper foreigner if I hadn't manage to do something embarassing like that, so I consider it a job well done.
I was planning to leave Rishikesh yesterday, but Dani and I decided to continue separately on our ways, so I think I will stay until Sunday, and then head up to Gangrotri with a few friends I've met here. But somewhere up there, down here, and all around, God is laughing at these silly plans of mine, so I'll keep you posted as things change (which they are bound to do).
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
the adventures of israeli sandals in rishikesh
Shai and Adam, a couple we met at the yom ha'atzmaut party, told us about a Hindu musical jam at the Center of Light yoga center, so we picked up Prakash, his dijeridoo and my drum and went to play. It turned out be not so much a jam as a concert, which started off seeming pretty dodgy with a western duo who studied in Pakistan playing tabla and sitar while the 4-year-old daughter of a couple of Hare Krishna devotees danced in strange poses next to them only half-covered in a red and white sheet. The jam ended about 3 hours later with an Australian dude in a jodhpur beatboxing and singing reggae in loops while the whole room danced.
Afterward, Dani and I piled on to Prakash's bike, who asked us to come back to his place to sleep. It was such a treat, because of his fan that actually works and his cool marble floors. I was exhausted, having nearly passed out at the concert, and went right to bed.
My sandals, which I had fixed in Jerusalem before I left, broke again, so the next morning after dropping some stuff back off at the guest house, Prakash and I went into town to find a sandler. It is an unbelievable feeling to ride on the back of a motorcycle in the mountain air, and Prakash is a very good driver. The sandlers in India I am a little less impressed with. The first one we went to was a little thin man sitting barefoot and cross-legged on the side of the road hammering rusty nails into my shoe.
Via Prakash, I tried to tell the sandler that while he had done a fine job crudely sewing black leather on my light brown shoes, I really didn't want to step on rusty nails. Prakash told me that these were the nails everyone used. I told him that all rusty nails were once silver and there must be some fresh ones somewhere in Rishikesh. Out when the rusty nails, and in went the black thread which if left alone could last maybe a week. Five rupees to the nice man, and off to another sandler. This one had a few silver nails in his lump, but did not understand what to do with the broken leather. Prakash reasoned with him, explaining to me that he was teaching him how to fix the sandal. To no avail, so we went to the next stall over. This sandler just shook his head and handed me back my sandal. They're pretty crudely fixed now, and may break soon, but there is no real shoe selection in Rishikesh (all plastic) so I'll wait until I get to Dehra Dun in a few days.
I am treated differently by people in Rishikesh when I ride around with Prakash. Many people have made comments to him, in Hindi, which I can't understand, but I know are about me since they are all said with a gesture in my direction. I assume they have something to do with me being white and a foreigner. I've also noticed that when Indian women ride behind a man on the back of a motorcycle, they sit perpindicular to the driver, with their legs swinging over the side, not right behind the way I do. I don't really know what people think about an Indian guy riding around with a white girl, but considering that Prakash has told me that his father will pick out his wife for him when the time is right, I imagine local people may think our friendship is strange.
Afterward, Dani and I piled on to Prakash's bike, who asked us to come back to his place to sleep. It was such a treat, because of his fan that actually works and his cool marble floors. I was exhausted, having nearly passed out at the concert, and went right to bed.
My sandals, which I had fixed in Jerusalem before I left, broke again, so the next morning after dropping some stuff back off at the guest house, Prakash and I went into town to find a sandler. It is an unbelievable feeling to ride on the back of a motorcycle in the mountain air, and Prakash is a very good driver. The sandlers in India I am a little less impressed with. The first one we went to was a little thin man sitting barefoot and cross-legged on the side of the road hammering rusty nails into my shoe.
Via Prakash, I tried to tell the sandler that while he had done a fine job crudely sewing black leather on my light brown shoes, I really didn't want to step on rusty nails. Prakash told me that these were the nails everyone used. I told him that all rusty nails were once silver and there must be some fresh ones somewhere in Rishikesh. Out when the rusty nails, and in went the black thread which if left alone could last maybe a week. Five rupees to the nice man, and off to another sandler. This one had a few silver nails in his lump, but did not understand what to do with the broken leather. Prakash reasoned with him, explaining to me that he was teaching him how to fix the sandal. To no avail, so we went to the next stall over. This sandler just shook his head and handed me back my sandal. They're pretty crudely fixed now, and may break soon, but there is no real shoe selection in Rishikesh (all plastic) so I'll wait until I get to Dehra Dun in a few days.
I am treated differently by people in Rishikesh when I ride around with Prakash. Many people have made comments to him, in Hindi, which I can't understand, but I know are about me since they are all said with a gesture in my direction. I assume they have something to do with me being white and a foreigner. I've also noticed that when Indian women ride behind a man on the back of a motorcycle, they sit perpindicular to the driver, with their legs swinging over the side, not right behind the way I do. I don't really know what people think about an Indian guy riding around with a white girl, but considering that Prakash has told me that his father will pick out his wife for him when the time is right, I imagine local people may think our friendship is strange.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
if monkeys could talk
After we moved into Mama G's, Rishikesh started to feel more like home. That night (Sunday) Dani and I went back to Om Shanti cafe to hang out with Prakas and Himanzu and friends, but ended up haing one of those revelatory conversations in Hebrew between the two us that can only be held over chai in a land far, far away. How lucky we were that the conditions were right. The conversation, which I don't really want to get in to, basically stemmed from Dani's question, "do you know what made you the kind of woman that you are," meaning I guess independent and firey, and whatever else characterizes women that are not so dainty and like to do things like travel to India by themselves. From that question, we both went spiralling into our past, on the roof of the Om Shanti cafe, me digging up truths I'd known about but forgotten, he digging up answers he had recently begun to tap into but hadn't yet fully developed.
Monday was kind of a slow day that started late and was spent mostly wandering around the city. I'd packed lightly, really lightly, and only had one pair of pants, which until yesterday had experienced India with me to the fullest. I decided it was time to buy a new pair, which should be easy considering how cheap everything is. But I'm small and those cute little yoga pants that every tourist here wears makes me look like I'm the star of a carnival, which would be fun if I were, but I'm not. I finally found a good pair of pants, and bought two, and then ran off to my tabla lesson.
My teacher's name is Bhuwan, and I need to take pictures of him so you can understand the extent of my tabla experience. He is about 35 and tall and lanky, and has one of those funky mustaches that only and Indian man in the prime of his life can still pull off. He wears his hair greasy and slicked back to a curl on the bottom, and likes to brush it back every once in a while in a nervous gesture.
But enough about that. On the tabla, he is not nervous, and depsite the language barrier (our lessons usually sounds something like this: "no, position, very bad. yes, good. not this. this. no this. yes this. finger, no pfufff, bling. yes this,") he is a very good teacher. In my two lessons so far, I've learned nine different sounds and about 5 different patterns, which, when I learn to play them fast and correctly, will sound like songs. It is so different from the congas and the jembe and all other instruments I pretend to play, and it's very tiring, but addictive to learn.
Wandering home for dinner, which mama cooks and feeds to all her sons and daughters on the patio, an Israeli stopped us and told us about a Yom Ha'atzmaut party that night on the other side of Lakshman Jula. It was one of those parties that reminded me not to spend to much time in Kasol, the Parvati village which has become overrun by Israelis. The party was nice but cost as much as a night in a guest house, with lots of food I was to full to eat and drinks which I was too tired to imbibe, and lots of Israeli energy, which I am never really able to handle. We met some nice people though, which is always a good thing, and left after a few hours.
We went to bed late, Dani on the roof and me inside our sweltering room. I tried to sleep on the roof also, but the mosquitos attacked me, and I still don't want malaria. Dominique, a French Canadian Montrealer staying at Mama's, woke me up at 6 A.M. and we did an hour and a half yoga session, which released some of the tension that sleeping under a fan all week had shoved into my neck.
After yoga, and the post-yoga chai (there was also a pre-yoga chai, of course), and the post-yoga-post-yoga-chai-breakfast, Dani and I did laundry and then went wandering through the forest, getting ourselves mentally prepared for the Gangotri glacier, where we're trekking later this week. Later on, a little boy name Seeba latched onto us at on the Jhula and then wandered around with us, silly tourists that we are, for a few hours. He didn't say much (well, aside from "what is your name" and "seeba" he only really said "yes," even when it wasn't the obvious answer), but I love Indian kids, and he loved laughing and eating the chips we shared with him.
It's been a really long day, and I'm exhausted, but every day am loving India more and loving Rishikesh more.
Monday was kind of a slow day that started late and was spent mostly wandering around the city. I'd packed lightly, really lightly, and only had one pair of pants, which until yesterday had experienced India with me to the fullest. I decided it was time to buy a new pair, which should be easy considering how cheap everything is. But I'm small and those cute little yoga pants that every tourist here wears makes me look like I'm the star of a carnival, which would be fun if I were, but I'm not. I finally found a good pair of pants, and bought two, and then ran off to my tabla lesson.
My teacher's name is Bhuwan, and I need to take pictures of him so you can understand the extent of my tabla experience. He is about 35 and tall and lanky, and has one of those funky mustaches that only and Indian man in the prime of his life can still pull off. He wears his hair greasy and slicked back to a curl on the bottom, and likes to brush it back every once in a while in a nervous gesture.
But enough about that. On the tabla, he is not nervous, and depsite the language barrier (our lessons usually sounds something like this: "no, position, very bad. yes, good. not this. this. no this. yes this. finger, no pfufff, bling. yes this,") he is a very good teacher. In my two lessons so far, I've learned nine different sounds and about 5 different patterns, which, when I learn to play them fast and correctly, will sound like songs. It is so different from the congas and the jembe and all other instruments I pretend to play, and it's very tiring, but addictive to learn.
Wandering home for dinner, which mama cooks and feeds to all her sons and daughters on the patio, an Israeli stopped us and told us about a Yom Ha'atzmaut party that night on the other side of Lakshman Jula. It was one of those parties that reminded me not to spend to much time in Kasol, the Parvati village which has become overrun by Israelis. The party was nice but cost as much as a night in a guest house, with lots of food I was to full to eat and drinks which I was too tired to imbibe, and lots of Israeli energy, which I am never really able to handle. We met some nice people though, which is always a good thing, and left after a few hours.
We went to bed late, Dani on the roof and me inside our sweltering room. I tried to sleep on the roof also, but the mosquitos attacked me, and I still don't want malaria. Dominique, a French Canadian Montrealer staying at Mama's, woke me up at 6 A.M. and we did an hour and a half yoga session, which released some of the tension that sleeping under a fan all week had shoved into my neck.
After yoga, and the post-yoga chai (there was also a pre-yoga chai, of course), and the post-yoga-post-yoga-chai-breakfast, Dani and I did laundry and then went wandering through the forest, getting ourselves mentally prepared for the Gangotri glacier, where we're trekking later this week. Later on, a little boy name Seeba latched onto us at on the Jhula and then wandered around with us, silly tourists that we are, for a few hours. He didn't say much (well, aside from "what is your name" and "seeba" he only really said "yes," even when it wasn't the obvious answer), but I love Indian kids, and he loved laughing and eating the chips we shared with him.
It's been a really long day, and I'm exhausted, but every day am loving India more and loving Rishikesh more.
I love...
I love that in India, men hold hands when they walk down the street.
I love that in India, it's okay - no, it's encouraged - to believe that all is one.
I love how in India, the cows walk like the royalty they are treated as.
I love how in India, people paint "blow horn" on the back of trucks and cars, and use said horn instead of turn signals.
I love how Rishikesh bustles during the day, how its poor are saints and its children are so, so beautiful.
I love how at night, Rishikesh is suddenly so quiet and so clean it is astounding and makes you wonder if you were zapped into a different universe.
I don't love the dogs, which come out at night and nibble on people. I like the monkeys, because I've never really rubbed elbows with them before, but I don't like the way they jump without warning and sometimes make beautiful little Indian babies cry.
I love the tabla, but it is very, very hard.
I love that Rishikesh, in less than a week, has become so comfortable to me despite the fact that so much about it is so different than anything I've ever experienced.
I love that in India, it's okay - no, it's encouraged - to believe that all is one.
I love how in India, the cows walk like the royalty they are treated as.
I love how in India, people paint "blow horn" on the back of trucks and cars, and use said horn instead of turn signals.
I love how Rishikesh bustles during the day, how its poor are saints and its children are so, so beautiful.
I love how at night, Rishikesh is suddenly so quiet and so clean it is astounding and makes you wonder if you were zapped into a different universe.
I don't love the dogs, which come out at night and nibble on people. I like the monkeys, because I've never really rubbed elbows with them before, but I don't like the way they jump without warning and sometimes make beautiful little Indian babies cry.
I love the tabla, but it is very, very hard.
I love that Rishikesh, in less than a week, has become so comfortable to me despite the fact that so much about it is so different than anything I've ever experienced.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
yes, no problem
It is very hard to find Indian food in Rishikesh, but there is a lot of falafel and sabich. Last night, after spending the day walking up and down Ram Jhula and looking for Svarg Ashram (the "best vibes in town" according to lonely planet) we realized we had been in svarg ashram the whole day (really very good vibes) and were hungry. We lost Eyal and Uri somewhere along the way, so it was just Dani and I that caught the rickshaw back up to Lakshman Jhula. At the Third Eye, which came highly recommended by my Israeli friends, they had a Hebrew menu, but no tali. So we left, passing all of the Israeli cuisines along the way in what seemed to be a futile search for Indian food.
Not so futile, it turns out. We ended up at Om Shanti musical cafe ("you have tali?" we asked. "Yes yes, no problem, madam," they said, though that could mean any number of things here.) But yes, no problem, Om Shanti musical cafe had a very good tali, and it turns out, an even better vibe than Svarg Ashram (take that, lonely planet).
When we walked in, we were the only customers. The owner made Dani chow mein, which he finished before my tali arrived. And when it did, it was unbelievable. Three different hot dishes, rice, chai, 3 chapatis, all for 35 rupees, which is about 3.5 shekels or 70 cents. I couldn't finish it, it was too big, so I told the owner and his friends to eat with me. At first they were reluctant, but then they did, and for the first time, we made Indian friends and caught the Indian vibe. They were all about my age, and such nice guys. We sat with them for hours, playing music and talking and drinking chai. When we first got there they had been playing a guitar with strings that buzzed painfully, so Dani fixed it for them as best he could, and then twirled out jazz chords throughout the night.
One of the guys, Prakas, told us, "I have friend from Israel who play didjeridoo, his name Iftach." Now, I know a few people named Yiftach who play didj, but it turns out that this friend was a Yiftach who has a band, "is called the giraffes," Prakas told us. "They are very famous," I told Prakas, who knows quite a few Hebrew words and makes didjeridoos himself. He invited us to come to his shop to make instruments, which is what Dani is doing right now. Dani made a funky protoype in Israel, a guitar/drum combination that sounds something like a string instrument being played underwater, and now he is trying to improve it, so he and Prakas drove off on his motorbike to a carpenter about 12 km away.
This is really the first time that I've had to be myself, and to walk around since I left Israel. I'd forgotten that I was even traveling alone. It's been great traveling with Dani, and with the other guys, but I don't want to get caught up in this group as my be-all-end-all traveling partners, and it's starting to feel like a good time to reduce our group size, because with four people things can get a little stressful. Until today we stayed at the Nigah guest house, run by a 28-year-old feeble looking stoner named Satpal whose entire vocabularly consists of "chillum, joint and boom boom. ("Satlan," we call him, to which he answers with a great big laugh, "yes, satlan, sababa.") It's been hard to convince him that not all Israelis come to India to rip their heads open with chillums, but toward the end of our stay there, he started to catch on.
We moved on this morning to Mama G's guest house, near the Bandhari Swiss Cottage. This cluster of about 5 guest houses is the most popular in the area, because it is built in the forest, and it's possible to rent a double room for 150 rupees a night (15 shekels or 4 dollars.)
There was only one room open in the whole neighborhood, which I jumped on quickly. Mama G was very nice, and said to me, "I save this room for you daughter, come back in few hour." So I paid, even though it meant we only had one new room between the four of us. At first we told ourselves (in that Hindi accent that has permeated our speech subconsciously (mostly because Indian won't understand me if I speak in my normal accent) and will certainly embarass me if it stays with me when I leave India) "no problem, we'll take it and we find another one, then fine, and if not, not." Then Dani said (after we'd already paid) "why move and share a room when we have such big separate rooms in town?" Good point Dani. So I went to Mama and said, "Mama, we are too many people, we change our mind." This did not make Mama happy. She came back with 100 rupees and said, "you get rest when room is full." Dani came back just then and said, "let's take this room and tell Eyal and Uri to do their own thing." So I told Mama, "Okay, we stay." The smile returned, and because I never signed anything or gave my passport, I needed some sort of confirmation from her. "You give me hug?" I asked. Mama forgve me, and I got my hug.
Not so futile, it turns out. We ended up at Om Shanti musical cafe ("you have tali?" we asked. "Yes yes, no problem, madam," they said, though that could mean any number of things here.) But yes, no problem, Om Shanti musical cafe had a very good tali, and it turns out, an even better vibe than Svarg Ashram (take that, lonely planet).
When we walked in, we were the only customers. The owner made Dani chow mein, which he finished before my tali arrived. And when it did, it was unbelievable. Three different hot dishes, rice, chai, 3 chapatis, all for 35 rupees, which is about 3.5 shekels or 70 cents. I couldn't finish it, it was too big, so I told the owner and his friends to eat with me. At first they were reluctant, but then they did, and for the first time, we made Indian friends and caught the Indian vibe. They were all about my age, and such nice guys. We sat with them for hours, playing music and talking and drinking chai. When we first got there they had been playing a guitar with strings that buzzed painfully, so Dani fixed it for them as best he could, and then twirled out jazz chords throughout the night.
One of the guys, Prakas, told us, "I have friend from Israel who play didjeridoo, his name Iftach." Now, I know a few people named Yiftach who play didj, but it turns out that this friend was a Yiftach who has a band, "is called the giraffes," Prakas told us. "They are very famous," I told Prakas, who knows quite a few Hebrew words and makes didjeridoos himself. He invited us to come to his shop to make instruments, which is what Dani is doing right now. Dani made a funky protoype in Israel, a guitar/drum combination that sounds something like a string instrument being played underwater, and now he is trying to improve it, so he and Prakas drove off on his motorbike to a carpenter about 12 km away.
This is really the first time that I've had to be myself, and to walk around since I left Israel. I'd forgotten that I was even traveling alone. It's been great traveling with Dani, and with the other guys, but I don't want to get caught up in this group as my be-all-end-all traveling partners, and it's starting to feel like a good time to reduce our group size, because with four people things can get a little stressful. Until today we stayed at the Nigah guest house, run by a 28-year-old feeble looking stoner named Satpal whose entire vocabularly consists of "chillum, joint and boom boom. ("Satlan," we call him, to which he answers with a great big laugh, "yes, satlan, sababa.") It's been hard to convince him that not all Israelis come to India to rip their heads open with chillums, but toward the end of our stay there, he started to catch on.
We moved on this morning to Mama G's guest house, near the Bandhari Swiss Cottage. This cluster of about 5 guest houses is the most popular in the area, because it is built in the forest, and it's possible to rent a double room for 150 rupees a night (15 shekels or 4 dollars.)
There was only one room open in the whole neighborhood, which I jumped on quickly. Mama G was very nice, and said to me, "I save this room for you daughter, come back in few hour." So I paid, even though it meant we only had one new room between the four of us. At first we told ourselves (in that Hindi accent that has permeated our speech subconsciously (mostly because Indian won't understand me if I speak in my normal accent) and will certainly embarass me if it stays with me when I leave India) "no problem, we'll take it and we find another one, then fine, and if not, not." Then Dani said (after we'd already paid) "why move and share a room when we have such big separate rooms in town?" Good point Dani. So I went to Mama and said, "Mama, we are too many people, we change our mind." This did not make Mama happy. She came back with 100 rupees and said, "you get rest when room is full." Dani came back just then and said, "let's take this room and tell Eyal and Uri to do their own thing." So I told Mama, "Okay, we stay." The smile returned, and because I never signed anything or gave my passport, I needed some sort of confirmation from her. "You give me hug?" I asked. Mama forgve me, and I got my hug.
Friday, April 20, 2007
um, toto, where's Kansas?
Sitting at breakfast this morning in Rishikesh, it finally hit me that I'm in India, far away from work and Israeli politics and my family and my friends and responsibility and my apartment. It's true that there are cows in the streets and monkeys on the bridges and it's true that the smells of India range between the sweetest incense and the most foul, unidentifiable scents I have ever experienced. The view from Rishikesh, however, of green mountains overlooking the Ganges River, is as beautiful as I expected it to be, and I can only imagine what it will look like when I start trekking in the hills.
I haven't been alone since I got to the gate at Ben Gurion, and saw Dani, an old friend of my cousin's who I've known for years. Somehow, the two men that were sitting in my three-seater with me wanted to move, so Dani and I sat together, and over the course of the next day and a half met at least a dozen other Israelis. Eyal joined us on the flight from Bombay to Delhi, and Uri, who never told me his name, walked with us from the base of Rishikesh where the bus dropped us off up to Laksman Juhla, the highest neighborhood in town. We got to our guest house at around 7 AM and are renting two really nice rooms (except that there is only a hole, no toilet, in mine) and each paying something like three dollars a night.
I slept for really the first time since I left Israel this morning, after breakfast. I'd closed my eyes for a few hours on the plane to Delhi, but by the time we got to Delhi I was exhausted. I knew, before I even left Israel, that I didn't want to start my trip in Delhi. Delhi is like Tel Aviv on crack and so far from what I came to India to experience. The men treat women like crap, the vendors will fall you around literally for an hour until you finally agree to buy something, and yes, the cows and their excrement freely roam the streets. I spent most of my Delhi day on Pahar Ganj, the tourist street, a place I'll be sure to avoid next time I'm in the city.
The bus ride to Rishikesh, which should take about five hours, was an excruciating eight hours. Excruciating because I have never smelt such smells, have never felt such bumps, and have never had as hard of a time falling asleep on an overnight ride. The first four hours, which started at 9 PM and included a two hour "tour" of Delhi, was my real introduction to India. The streets of Old Delhi are home to hundreds of people, lying visibly on mattresses or sitting round fires and food pots. They are not lying there to get money from passing tourists. This is simply how they live. And that particular scene extends even beyond the city parameters, I'm sure to an extent I can't even imagine.
Despite the slight discomforts and the fact that I've barely seen anything, let me just say, India is amazing.
I haven't been alone since I got to the gate at Ben Gurion, and saw Dani, an old friend of my cousin's who I've known for years. Somehow, the two men that were sitting in my three-seater with me wanted to move, so Dani and I sat together, and over the course of the next day and a half met at least a dozen other Israelis. Eyal joined us on the flight from Bombay to Delhi, and Uri, who never told me his name, walked with us from the base of Rishikesh where the bus dropped us off up to Laksman Juhla, the highest neighborhood in town. We got to our guest house at around 7 AM and are renting two really nice rooms (except that there is only a hole, no toilet, in mine) and each paying something like three dollars a night.
I slept for really the first time since I left Israel this morning, after breakfast. I'd closed my eyes for a few hours on the plane to Delhi, but by the time we got to Delhi I was exhausted. I knew, before I even left Israel, that I didn't want to start my trip in Delhi. Delhi is like Tel Aviv on crack and so far from what I came to India to experience. The men treat women like crap, the vendors will fall you around literally for an hour until you finally agree to buy something, and yes, the cows and their excrement freely roam the streets. I spent most of my Delhi day on Pahar Ganj, the tourist street, a place I'll be sure to avoid next time I'm in the city.
The bus ride to Rishikesh, which should take about five hours, was an excruciating eight hours. Excruciating because I have never smelt such smells, have never felt such bumps, and have never had as hard of a time falling asleep on an overnight ride. The first four hours, which started at 9 PM and included a two hour "tour" of Delhi, was my real introduction to India. The streets of Old Delhi are home to hundreds of people, lying visibly on mattresses or sitting round fires and food pots. They are not lying there to get money from passing tourists. This is simply how they live. And that particular scene extends even beyond the city parameters, I'm sure to an extent I can't even imagine.
Despite the slight discomforts and the fact that I've barely seen anything, let me just say, India is amazing.
Thursday, April 12, 2007
planning for a planless plan
For the last few weeks, people have been asking me whether I'm scared or nervous or exicited about going to India alone. My half-hearted response, in that unfortunate monotone I haven't yet succeeded in altering, has for the most part been, "excited. No, really, I'm excited."
And I am, I'm really excited. I've been planning to take this trip for at least five years, but then I had to finish school, and then I started working at Haaretz, and then I met and became close to so many amazing people, and then got so comfortable and happy to be near my family after so long, that I had to delay my eventual date of departure. People are so skeptical of five-year plans, but just because they didn't work for Stalin doesn't mean they're not valid.
I'm a big fan of five-year plans. Some of my best plans are five-year plans. They're much more exciting than planning for this coming afternoon, and much less nerve-racking. Because now that my five-year plan lands in Delhi next Thursday, I have to admit, I'm getting a little nervous. Not about being in India, because that's still a week away, and still very exciting. No, I'm nervous about everything I have to do before I leave.
I still have to clean my room and store all my stuff, to pack my bag and to buy the right sandals, camera and vitamins, I still have to resign my lease and sublet it right over to Pucho, my new roommate's friend. I still have to have a party in Tel Aviv and a party in Jerusalem, and I have to spend time with my mom and my grandmother and my sister and brother-in-law, and my cousins and aunts and uncles and friends. I still have to see if the university has approved the creative writing program's recommendation to accept me, and to make sure the government of Israel hasn't forgotten its promise to give me free tuition.
Let the five-year plans continue. Shanti, shanti, know what I want to do and move forward, slowly, slowly. Embrace each plan, and when it goes well, go with it, and when it goes wrong, follow along with a new idea, a new plan.
I spent the weekend with about 20 amazing people at a house in the Judean Hills Shira and Ben have been taking care of this month, and got some really great advice from some friends who have traveled by themselves to India. Sitting at the table, surrounded by friends, Chani turned to Chana and said, "what advice can you give Ali about India?" Unsolicited, but so, so appreciated, I sat there and soaked up names of places and streets and bus ticket vendors, and lessons about money and people.
I'm not at all ready, but I'm getting there. Slowly, slowly. My seven-day plan starts in the morning.
And I am, I'm really excited. I've been planning to take this trip for at least five years, but then I had to finish school, and then I started working at Haaretz, and then I met and became close to so many amazing people, and then got so comfortable and happy to be near my family after so long, that I had to delay my eventual date of departure. People are so skeptical of five-year plans, but just because they didn't work for Stalin doesn't mean they're not valid.
I'm a big fan of five-year plans. Some of my best plans are five-year plans. They're much more exciting than planning for this coming afternoon, and much less nerve-racking. Because now that my five-year plan lands in Delhi next Thursday, I have to admit, I'm getting a little nervous. Not about being in India, because that's still a week away, and still very exciting. No, I'm nervous about everything I have to do before I leave.
I still have to clean my room and store all my stuff, to pack my bag and to buy the right sandals, camera and vitamins, I still have to resign my lease and sublet it right over to Pucho, my new roommate's friend. I still have to have a party in Tel Aviv and a party in Jerusalem, and I have to spend time with my mom and my grandmother and my sister and brother-in-law, and my cousins and aunts and uncles and friends. I still have to see if the university has approved the creative writing program's recommendation to accept me, and to make sure the government of Israel hasn't forgotten its promise to give me free tuition.
Let the five-year plans continue. Shanti, shanti, know what I want to do and move forward, slowly, slowly. Embrace each plan, and when it goes well, go with it, and when it goes wrong, follow along with a new idea, a new plan.
I spent the weekend with about 20 amazing people at a house in the Judean Hills Shira and Ben have been taking care of this month, and got some really great advice from some friends who have traveled by themselves to India. Sitting at the table, surrounded by friends, Chani turned to Chana and said, "what advice can you give Ali about India?" Unsolicited, but so, so appreciated, I sat there and soaked up names of places and streets and bus ticket vendors, and lessons about money and people.
I'm not at all ready, but I'm getting there. Slowly, slowly. My seven-day plan starts in the morning.
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Note: If you have only one leg, don't try to steal an ATM machine
Pomono, California (AP) - A man who authorities say tried to steal a 1,500 pound bank ATM machine was captured on Tuesday after his prosthetic leg fell off during the getaway.
******
And then of course, there was Piglet and Piglette's unfortunately inbred offspring, with his two snouts and three eyes, forlornly posing between mirrors at a farm in Xi'an, China.
(AP)
******
And then of course, there was Piglet and Piglette's unfortunately inbred offspring, with his two snouts and three eyes, forlornly posing between mirrors at a farm in Xi'an, China.
(AP)
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
kiss of
In a country milked by war and soaked in corruption, certain limits should be set. For example, a president should not be allowed to rape an intern or an employee. They can get down and dirty, using the American model, but no forcible sex allowed. Simple rule. No forcible sex. Bad Mr. President. Now get off the stage.
A few more examples of limits that should be set. A member of parliament should not be allowed to finance personal vacations using government money. A candidate for prime minister should not be allowed to make deals with a businessman friend to work out illegally robust campaign expenses. A cabinet minister should not be allowed to sway the tender in the sale of a bank to help a close personal associate.
Get off the stage, we shout. But no, free they walk, these state leaders, with criminal probes on their heels, down a long path of unfinished allegations. Our fearless leaders.
The former justice minister, whose career nearly ended this summer and almost certainly ended today, has been convicted of forcing a 21-year-old IDF soldier to kiss him. It happened, by chance, the day Hezbollah went to war with Israel, the same day Israel went to war with Hezbollah. The soldier was finishing her service and wanted a picture with the justice minister before she left. So, they posed, he bearish and sheepish, one hand in his pocket,the other around her back. Her head nestled in his armpit, her arms wrapped around his generous middle.
Snap. Picture taken. Now what are they thinking? She smiles at him, itching to get out of his embrace. 'He's gross,' she thinks. 'Do I kiss her?' he wonders. He goes for it. Hell, it's her last day.
Bad move, Haim, right into the trap. Six months later, you are walking out of the court, a convicted sex criminal. What kind of justice minister are you? What kind of country is this? Congratulations, Haim, our misguided friend, you are now the first of our illustrious leaders to be convicted of a crime in 2007.
The irony of a justice system which convicts its justice minister first. Now that he has been found guilty, and faces up to three years in prison and a lifetime of shame, who is next? The president? The prime minister? The comatose prime minister? In this country, we may see Ariel Sharon convicted before Moshe Katsav.
Three years in jail and that whole lifetime of shame thing is quite a hefty price to pay for forcing someone to kiss you. If Katsav is convicted, he gets 16 years. That makes more sense. You force someone to have sex with you, the president of this honorable nation, then you must suffer the consequences. Especially when there are seven other allegations against you, four of them nullified because of a statute of limitations.
Katsav is a criminal. He is sick. His address to the country was pathetic. For nearly one hour, he babbled about his innocence and shouted at reporters, and generally made Israel cringe.
Haim Ramon, our 56-year-old former justice minister, is probably as scumbag as they come. What he did was offensive and inappropriate, and to top it off he lied about it, shaming the victim and attempting to exonerate himself in a pathetic and certainly unjust way.
Forcing someone to kiss you is wrong, and in many cases should be considered a crime. It is manipulative and it is invasive and it is condescending, as is touching anybody anywhere they do not want to be touched.
In this case, an employer - who happened to be an elected government minister - kissed an employee - who was, incidentally, also a soldier - who did not want to be kissed. It was a completely inappropriate situation, but was it a crime?
They were both adults. Nothing in the brief bit I have read of the indictment describes any sort of violence. It describes him inserting his tongue into her mouth and her being very upset afterward. It quotes him saying she flirted with him and her calling his bluff.
Are all unwanted kisses sex crimes, even those in which the most violently described act was that of a tongue sticking itself in an unwanting mouth? Is it a crime that should be punishable by three years in prison? The judges certainly must know more than we do.
Ramon's crime was not that he forced the young woman to kiss him, though that was the conviction. His crimes were forcing her to kiss him, while justice minister, then lying about it, while justice minister. He admitted that he kissed her, but said she wanted it. She didn't want it. He knows that now.
Seems reasonable of the court, then. Set these leaders to a higher standard and show them that if they want to exploit their positions of power, they are going to have to pay.
So that would mean that all of the other criminal leaders, elected to set an example for us Israelis, will also be convicted harshly due to their high positions, right? Maybe not. The Israeli justice system, like so many other things Israeli, is upside down and backwards.
That being said, I know nothing about justice.
A few more examples of limits that should be set. A member of parliament should not be allowed to finance personal vacations using government money. A candidate for prime minister should not be allowed to make deals with a businessman friend to work out illegally robust campaign expenses. A cabinet minister should not be allowed to sway the tender in the sale of a bank to help a close personal associate.
Get off the stage, we shout. But no, free they walk, these state leaders, with criminal probes on their heels, down a long path of unfinished allegations. Our fearless leaders.
The former justice minister, whose career nearly ended this summer and almost certainly ended today, has been convicted of forcing a 21-year-old IDF soldier to kiss him. It happened, by chance, the day Hezbollah went to war with Israel, the same day Israel went to war with Hezbollah. The soldier was finishing her service and wanted a picture with the justice minister before she left. So, they posed, he bearish and sheepish, one hand in his pocket,the other around her back. Her head nestled in his armpit, her arms wrapped around his generous middle.
Snap. Picture taken. Now what are they thinking? She smiles at him, itching to get out of his embrace. 'He's gross,' she thinks. 'Do I kiss her?' he wonders. He goes for it. Hell, it's her last day.
Bad move, Haim, right into the trap. Six months later, you are walking out of the court, a convicted sex criminal. What kind of justice minister are you? What kind of country is this? Congratulations, Haim, our misguided friend, you are now the first of our illustrious leaders to be convicted of a crime in 2007.
The irony of a justice system which convicts its justice minister first. Now that he has been found guilty, and faces up to three years in prison and a lifetime of shame, who is next? The president? The prime minister? The comatose prime minister? In this country, we may see Ariel Sharon convicted before Moshe Katsav.
Three years in jail and that whole lifetime of shame thing is quite a hefty price to pay for forcing someone to kiss you. If Katsav is convicted, he gets 16 years. That makes more sense. You force someone to have sex with you, the president of this honorable nation, then you must suffer the consequences. Especially when there are seven other allegations against you, four of them nullified because of a statute of limitations.
Katsav is a criminal. He is sick. His address to the country was pathetic. For nearly one hour, he babbled about his innocence and shouted at reporters, and generally made Israel cringe.
Haim Ramon, our 56-year-old former justice minister, is probably as scumbag as they come. What he did was offensive and inappropriate, and to top it off he lied about it, shaming the victim and attempting to exonerate himself in a pathetic and certainly unjust way.
Forcing someone to kiss you is wrong, and in many cases should be considered a crime. It is manipulative and it is invasive and it is condescending, as is touching anybody anywhere they do not want to be touched.
In this case, an employer - who happened to be an elected government minister - kissed an employee - who was, incidentally, also a soldier - who did not want to be kissed. It was a completely inappropriate situation, but was it a crime?
They were both adults. Nothing in the brief bit I have read of the indictment describes any sort of violence. It describes him inserting his tongue into her mouth and her being very upset afterward. It quotes him saying she flirted with him and her calling his bluff.
Are all unwanted kisses sex crimes, even those in which the most violently described act was that of a tongue sticking itself in an unwanting mouth? Is it a crime that should be punishable by three years in prison? The judges certainly must know more than we do.
Ramon's crime was not that he forced the young woman to kiss him, though that was the conviction. His crimes were forcing her to kiss him, while justice minister, then lying about it, while justice minister. He admitted that he kissed her, but said she wanted it. She didn't want it. He knows that now.
Seems reasonable of the court, then. Set these leaders to a higher standard and show them that if they want to exploit their positions of power, they are going to have to pay.
So that would mean that all of the other criminal leaders, elected to set an example for us Israelis, will also be convicted harshly due to their high positions, right? Maybe not. The Israeli justice system, like so many other things Israeli, is upside down and backwards.
That being said, I know nothing about justice.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
eid mubarak
My friend Mahdi invited me and Hannah to his village, Arabe, to spend Eid al-Fitr with him and his family. I'm used to driving past the Arab villages on my way up north on Highway 6 and through Wadi Ara, but I haven't been further inside than the roadside ceramic shops in at least 10 years, and certainly not since the Intifada began and returned to hiatus. One of the two words I could use best to express my experience is a very common Jewish feeling: guilt. The other is perhaps less particularly Jewish, but another necessary emotion of humanity: humbling.
The guilt is easy to understand. There's not much Jews don't feel guilty about, and in Israel, there's even more of a reason to feel it. Never does one feel the Arabian quality of Israel than in these villages, where nearly all the signs are in Hebrew, but only a handful, mostly students and professionals, speak fluently, and where the traditional Muslim culture flourishes. Hannah and I took a train to Haifa, and then caught a bus into the Arab "triangle" - Arabe, the famous soccer town Sakhnin, and Deir Hana. The bus was practically empty, aside from an old woman who talked to us incessantly about how she couldn't figure out what bus to take to Haifa and how she has to pay 80 shekels a day to take a cab to the city for her medical check-ups. She got off just before the turn into the triangle, and then it was just us and a Muslim woman about our age.
Mahdi and his cousin picked us up at the entrance to the city, and we drove across town to his family's land on the outskirts. We stopped to get beer for his uncles, which surprised us, considering that we were going to a celebration to mark the end of Ramadan. But Mahdi told us that only his mother and a couple sisters fasted this year, and besides, it wasn't so odd for some Muslims to drink beer. We tried to understand this according to the Jewish separation of religious and secular, but Mahdi told us it wasn't like that. They were Muslims, and Muslim is Muslim, whether one fasts or drinks alcohol. He wouldn't be allowed to drink himself until he got married, he told us - tradition is tradition.
He sat us down at a table outside the front door of an absolutely illuminating house set on a cliff above both his uncle's homes. His dad was the oldest brother, and therefore entitled to the best piece of land. Mahdi's four sisters came out, one after the other, bringing us dried fruit, and candies, and nuts and cola. Mahdi spoke to them very authoritatively, in a tone resembling a father's or employer's, which made me feel uncomfortble, not just because of the gender factor, which was obvious, but because of my own inability to say anything to them except shukran, making me feel like an snobby guest, or a mute imbecile.
That feeling grew even stronger when we went down to his uncle's yard to join the meal. The barbecue was still going strong, but the eaters were slowing down. One of his aunts jumped up to stuff Mahdi's hands full of shish kebobs, and mine and Hannah's plates with grilled onions and tomotoes and chips and salads. Again and again. They thought it was funny that we weren't eating meat, and funnier that I don't speak Arabic. My best form of communication was smiling and leaning toward Hannah for the right phrases. One of his aunts and an uncle spoke to us in Hebrew and everyone else chattered to us in Arabic, anyway, looking expectantly at me after each sentence. I just kept smiling and saying shukran.
I actually enjoyed the limited communication, in a certain way, because it gave me a chance to abandon the normal guest routine of answering questions and talking about myself, and experience Mahdi and his family. It would have been nice to understand what they were saying, but just sitting around and feeling warm with a friend's family, in a place I've never been before, was really comfortable and humbling. This was clearly an Arab world, however, and my inability to speak to them only heightened my feeling of being a Jewish immigrant, and of course, the neverending feeling of Jewish guilt.
When we finally got the courage to tell his aunts we were full, Mahdi took us on a stroll through town. The streets were packed with young people, some playing on giant air-filled giraffes and most others walking aimlessly in groups. Mahdi told us he was taking us to the one cafe in town where women were allowed in, but warned us that this might only be the second time a woman had been inside, the other time being Hannah's last visit. He told us women never went out in Arabe, at least not without their male relatives. The waiter did shoot us a questioning glance when we came in, but didn't say anything, except asking what we wanted to drink. Mahdi told us he couldn't drink alcohol at a cafe in his town, but we could if we wanted. I definitely didn't feel like drinking a beer in a place where woman aren't usually allowed.
Since we ate dinner so early, it was only 7 pm when we left the cafe. I was happy to go back to Mahdi's house to relax, but he seemed a little embarassed that there wasn't much of a night life for us to see. We sat on low mattreses and watched TV with his little brother Hamudi and their mother, who the minute we sat down threw her blanket over our legs and brought us tea and fruit and nuts. She did the same thing when Mahdi's and Hannah's friend Farid, came over. The three of them worked together last year in sadaka reut - literally friendship friendship in Arabic and Hebrew - a non-profit organization that educates Arab and Jewish kids on coexistence. They're all really comfortable with each other, and comfortable to be around, but I kept feeling nagged by the fact that we were sitting with two Arabs, in an Arab village, speaking in Hebrew. The guilt stemmed from the knowledge that no matter how far back their families were tied to the land, it was still longer than my immediate family, yet we were speaking my language, in a state that was clearly more concerned with my welfare than with theirs. And at the same time, they were Israeli citizens, but self identify as Palestinian Arabs. They would never want to be transferred to the West Bank or Gaza, as our new minister of strategic threats, Avigdor Lieberman, has suggested, but they don't really want to remain second class citizens here either.
The clear divisions between our worlds made me realize that when Jews in Israel work on coexistence, we are doing it of guilt for what we have done and what we are doing. When Arabs do it they are also doing it out of guilt, in a certain sense, but in a much less direct way. They are doing it more because of the realization that if they don't, they will remain on the fringes of a society that fears them and is at best only tolerating them as citizens. Their guilt is sometimes for what their neighbors have done, or their Palestinian brothers, but on the whole, they are considering the best course of action for the future. Many Jews feel that way too, knowing that it is only moral and secure to be at ease with our non-Jewish neighbors, but I don't think it is possible to extract the factor of guilt from the equation. Especially considering that Israel was designed to be a Jewish state, and plainly speaking, Muslims are not Jewish, no matter how much we work at coexisting.
I felt even more guilty as I sank into one of the three beds in the girls' room, while they slept somewhere else, and when we sat around eating a gloriously huge breakfast together, chewing silently for lack of shared language and of politeness. And as part of that guilt, and in part from humilty, I reminded myself to learn Arabic before I came up again for another visit.
The guilt is easy to understand. There's not much Jews don't feel guilty about, and in Israel, there's even more of a reason to feel it. Never does one feel the Arabian quality of Israel than in these villages, where nearly all the signs are in Hebrew, but only a handful, mostly students and professionals, speak fluently, and where the traditional Muslim culture flourishes. Hannah and I took a train to Haifa, and then caught a bus into the Arab "triangle" - Arabe, the famous soccer town Sakhnin, and Deir Hana. The bus was practically empty, aside from an old woman who talked to us incessantly about how she couldn't figure out what bus to take to Haifa and how she has to pay 80 shekels a day to take a cab to the city for her medical check-ups. She got off just before the turn into the triangle, and then it was just us and a Muslim woman about our age.
Mahdi and his cousin picked us up at the entrance to the city, and we drove across town to his family's land on the outskirts. We stopped to get beer for his uncles, which surprised us, considering that we were going to a celebration to mark the end of Ramadan. But Mahdi told us that only his mother and a couple sisters fasted this year, and besides, it wasn't so odd for some Muslims to drink beer. We tried to understand this according to the Jewish separation of religious and secular, but Mahdi told us it wasn't like that. They were Muslims, and Muslim is Muslim, whether one fasts or drinks alcohol. He wouldn't be allowed to drink himself until he got married, he told us - tradition is tradition.
He sat us down at a table outside the front door of an absolutely illuminating house set on a cliff above both his uncle's homes. His dad was the oldest brother, and therefore entitled to the best piece of land. Mahdi's four sisters came out, one after the other, bringing us dried fruit, and candies, and nuts and cola. Mahdi spoke to them very authoritatively, in a tone resembling a father's or employer's, which made me feel uncomfortble, not just because of the gender factor, which was obvious, but because of my own inability to say anything to them except shukran, making me feel like an snobby guest, or a mute imbecile.
That feeling grew even stronger when we went down to his uncle's yard to join the meal. The barbecue was still going strong, but the eaters were slowing down. One of his aunts jumped up to stuff Mahdi's hands full of shish kebobs, and mine and Hannah's plates with grilled onions and tomotoes and chips and salads. Again and again. They thought it was funny that we weren't eating meat, and funnier that I don't speak Arabic. My best form of communication was smiling and leaning toward Hannah for the right phrases. One of his aunts and an uncle spoke to us in Hebrew and everyone else chattered to us in Arabic, anyway, looking expectantly at me after each sentence. I just kept smiling and saying shukran.
I actually enjoyed the limited communication, in a certain way, because it gave me a chance to abandon the normal guest routine of answering questions and talking about myself, and experience Mahdi and his family. It would have been nice to understand what they were saying, but just sitting around and feeling warm with a friend's family, in a place I've never been before, was really comfortable and humbling. This was clearly an Arab world, however, and my inability to speak to them only heightened my feeling of being a Jewish immigrant, and of course, the neverending feeling of Jewish guilt.
When we finally got the courage to tell his aunts we were full, Mahdi took us on a stroll through town. The streets were packed with young people, some playing on giant air-filled giraffes and most others walking aimlessly in groups. Mahdi told us he was taking us to the one cafe in town where women were allowed in, but warned us that this might only be the second time a woman had been inside, the other time being Hannah's last visit. He told us women never went out in Arabe, at least not without their male relatives. The waiter did shoot us a questioning glance when we came in, but didn't say anything, except asking what we wanted to drink. Mahdi told us he couldn't drink alcohol at a cafe in his town, but we could if we wanted. I definitely didn't feel like drinking a beer in a place where woman aren't usually allowed.
Since we ate dinner so early, it was only 7 pm when we left the cafe. I was happy to go back to Mahdi's house to relax, but he seemed a little embarassed that there wasn't much of a night life for us to see. We sat on low mattreses and watched TV with his little brother Hamudi and their mother, who the minute we sat down threw her blanket over our legs and brought us tea and fruit and nuts. She did the same thing when Mahdi's and Hannah's friend Farid, came over. The three of them worked together last year in sadaka reut - literally friendship friendship in Arabic and Hebrew - a non-profit organization that educates Arab and Jewish kids on coexistence. They're all really comfortable with each other, and comfortable to be around, but I kept feeling nagged by the fact that we were sitting with two Arabs, in an Arab village, speaking in Hebrew. The guilt stemmed from the knowledge that no matter how far back their families were tied to the land, it was still longer than my immediate family, yet we were speaking my language, in a state that was clearly more concerned with my welfare than with theirs. And at the same time, they were Israeli citizens, but self identify as Palestinian Arabs. They would never want to be transferred to the West Bank or Gaza, as our new minister of strategic threats, Avigdor Lieberman, has suggested, but they don't really want to remain second class citizens here either.
The clear divisions between our worlds made me realize that when Jews in Israel work on coexistence, we are doing it of guilt for what we have done and what we are doing. When Arabs do it they are also doing it out of guilt, in a certain sense, but in a much less direct way. They are doing it more because of the realization that if they don't, they will remain on the fringes of a society that fears them and is at best only tolerating them as citizens. Their guilt is sometimes for what their neighbors have done, or their Palestinian brothers, but on the whole, they are considering the best course of action for the future. Many Jews feel that way too, knowing that it is only moral and secure to be at ease with our non-Jewish neighbors, but I don't think it is possible to extract the factor of guilt from the equation. Especially considering that Israel was designed to be a Jewish state, and plainly speaking, Muslims are not Jewish, no matter how much we work at coexisting.
I felt even more guilty as I sank into one of the three beds in the girls' room, while they slept somewhere else, and when we sat around eating a gloriously huge breakfast together, chewing silently for lack of shared language and of politeness. And as part of that guilt, and in part from humilty, I reminded myself to learn Arabic before I came up again for another visit.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
atonements
Okay, so I skipped the exciting sequal to part I of my Europe adventures. What with all the morbidness and corruption that charactizes Israel, you may have thought I got sucked into an uncomfortable black hole, or worse, Israel's current leadership, but no, I've just been lazy. In the spirit of the season, I apologize.
I will post my Amsterdam litany as soon as I stop being lazy. I promise. In the spirit of the season, though, let me be fair and admit that I still have almost a year to break this vow.
Since it's been a month since I last posted, I'll start by saying that my laziness hasn't been due to inactivity, but rather the result of returning to work, and of my recent sumbergence into one of the most intense holiday periods in my memory, and an equally revelatory birthday.
I've let my lazy inclinations override my ability to express my vivid inclinations mostly because it's much easier to blurt emotional decriments of immoral wars and political snafus than it is to lie on a couch and blabber about my insecurities or over-confidences. There, I said it.
In the midst of a particular insecurity involving a remarkable set of coincidences, someone asked me, "what are you so afraid of?" Details don't matter here, precisely because I've realized that it is details that I am afraid of. Our lives are so composed of details that it has become virtually impossible to disentangle ourselves from the figures that identify us.
By ascribing ourselves to certain definitions, we lose sight of our purpose in life. By clinging to past memories and self-assessments we hinder our own growth as much as those who file us away in their aging perceptions of us.
On my 24th birthday I realized that despite all my confidence in the work and experience that has made me the well-adjusted person I am today, I am not actually such a well-adjusted person. On Yom Kippur I realized that I had sinned more this year than ever before, if only because before this year I did not believe in the concept of a sin. It contradicted my understanding of the non-duality as the only "the."
I don't know what changed this year. Maybe it was when the concept of regret, which I had stuffed deep into the recesses of my mind, not to be used but to be remembered, finally poked out of its hiding spot and hit me in the heart. I hit my heart also, to atone for my sins, but that was largely symbolic. Maybe I'm getting old, Maybe it's the constant flux of friendships that has defined the last year of my own sedentary living among a group of wanderers. Maybe it's the way I treat my parents, or my sister. Maybe it's my fear of confrontation. Maybe it my own self-judgements.
On Sunday, after an exhausting birthday and the party my sister and I threw in her Sukkah, I sat with my friend Amy and asked her to do a birthday exercise with me. It was a heart-to-heart that followed at least two and a half others over the course of the night, and I was feeling vulnerable, but enlightened. I told Amy that what I'd learned most in recent weeks is the need to be self-critical without being self-abusing, and aware of my achievements without indulging judgements of others.
Then I asked her to close her eyes, and bring herself back to age six. We sat there with our eyes closed, still as a pair of discombobulated statues. My first grade school portrait, the one where I'm staring intensely into the camera with only the slightest hint of a smile, appears in my head, and brings me to Mrs. Powell's classroom, where one of my classmates asks me if I'm Chinese and where my boyfriend SamShmuel and I hold hands and kiss each other on the cheeks. Suddenly Sam and I are in his basement, facing each other with a set of hockey goals behind us, ready to show each other ours in exchange for a peek at the other's. I walk around the old Hillel playground, and then I am bitten by a snake, or at least I tell the office ladies that I am. I am wisked into a recurring dream of that tooth fairy period of my life, when standing on the walk leading up to my old house on Cromwell Ct., my sister's eyeball falls out of her head, and I scramble around looking for it. That leads me into another recurring dream, of a later period, but I pull myself back to first grade.
Amy and I open our eyes, for a moment, and return again to our past, this time to ten years old. My oval face plumps out and I am standing in shorts, a matching t-shirt and a Charlotte Hornet's cap on the banks of the Dan River with my parents and a distant kibbutznik cousin. I take the image from a picture in my dad's living room drawer, prompting me to tell Amy we should try to get away from viewing ourselves externally.
I find myself playing with my friend Bene, baseball, and then at her house for a sleepover. We walk upstairs, where I see her mother's wig. Her mother lies in bed, a few years before dying of cancer. Amy and I are twelve, suddenly, and I am in a classroom, where I ask a long-time classmate for a piece of gum, and where she answers, "No," firing off, "because I don't like you" when I insipidly ask her why. I'm wearing a freshjive t-shirt, and smoking my first cigarette Friday night at an NCSY shabbaton with my two cool older friends, Meatball is playing in the background and then I am back in Hillel, where I see Amy. I try to catch her eye, but the hallway is too wavy, and she just keeps smiling that frozen smile borrowed from an old yearbook, as I open my mouth on my 24th birthday in my sister's sukkah and ask her to look at me. I tell her we are in the hallway, surrounded by lockers, one of which is adorned with a Happy Birthday Ali sign autographed by everyone who has walked by and felt like leaving me a memento. She laughs, and I try to catch her eye again, but everything is still moving. With my 12-year-old hands I grab her shoulders, and look at her in the eye. She is looking back at me. In my sister's sukkah we sit completely still, not moving or touching, our eyes closed. I grasp her with my mind's arms and tell her, "I'll see you in 12 years." She doesn't hear me. I say it again.
My sister comes out to the porch, and shuts off the music. I open my eyes. So does Amy. She tells me she was looking right at me, but she didn't hear me say anything. Maybe I didn't.
I will post my Amsterdam litany as soon as I stop being lazy. I promise. In the spirit of the season, though, let me be fair and admit that I still have almost a year to break this vow.
Since it's been a month since I last posted, I'll start by saying that my laziness hasn't been due to inactivity, but rather the result of returning to work, and of my recent sumbergence into one of the most intense holiday periods in my memory, and an equally revelatory birthday.
I've let my lazy inclinations override my ability to express my vivid inclinations mostly because it's much easier to blurt emotional decriments of immoral wars and political snafus than it is to lie on a couch and blabber about my insecurities or over-confidences. There, I said it.
In the midst of a particular insecurity involving a remarkable set of coincidences, someone asked me, "what are you so afraid of?" Details don't matter here, precisely because I've realized that it is details that I am afraid of. Our lives are so composed of details that it has become virtually impossible to disentangle ourselves from the figures that identify us.
By ascribing ourselves to certain definitions, we lose sight of our purpose in life. By clinging to past memories and self-assessments we hinder our own growth as much as those who file us away in their aging perceptions of us.
On my 24th birthday I realized that despite all my confidence in the work and experience that has made me the well-adjusted person I am today, I am not actually such a well-adjusted person. On Yom Kippur I realized that I had sinned more this year than ever before, if only because before this year I did not believe in the concept of a sin. It contradicted my understanding of the non-duality as the only "the."
I don't know what changed this year. Maybe it was when the concept of regret, which I had stuffed deep into the recesses of my mind, not to be used but to be remembered, finally poked out of its hiding spot and hit me in the heart. I hit my heart also, to atone for my sins, but that was largely symbolic. Maybe I'm getting old, Maybe it's the constant flux of friendships that has defined the last year of my own sedentary living among a group of wanderers. Maybe it's the way I treat my parents, or my sister. Maybe it's my fear of confrontation. Maybe it my own self-judgements.
On Sunday, after an exhausting birthday and the party my sister and I threw in her Sukkah, I sat with my friend Amy and asked her to do a birthday exercise with me. It was a heart-to-heart that followed at least two and a half others over the course of the night, and I was feeling vulnerable, but enlightened. I told Amy that what I'd learned most in recent weeks is the need to be self-critical without being self-abusing, and aware of my achievements without indulging judgements of others.
Then I asked her to close her eyes, and bring herself back to age six. We sat there with our eyes closed, still as a pair of discombobulated statues. My first grade school portrait, the one where I'm staring intensely into the camera with only the slightest hint of a smile, appears in my head, and brings me to Mrs. Powell's classroom, where one of my classmates asks me if I'm Chinese and where my boyfriend SamShmuel and I hold hands and kiss each other on the cheeks. Suddenly Sam and I are in his basement, facing each other with a set of hockey goals behind us, ready to show each other ours in exchange for a peek at the other's. I walk around the old Hillel playground, and then I am bitten by a snake, or at least I tell the office ladies that I am. I am wisked into a recurring dream of that tooth fairy period of my life, when standing on the walk leading up to my old house on Cromwell Ct., my sister's eyeball falls out of her head, and I scramble around looking for it. That leads me into another recurring dream, of a later period, but I pull myself back to first grade.
Amy and I open our eyes, for a moment, and return again to our past, this time to ten years old. My oval face plumps out and I am standing in shorts, a matching t-shirt and a Charlotte Hornet's cap on the banks of the Dan River with my parents and a distant kibbutznik cousin. I take the image from a picture in my dad's living room drawer, prompting me to tell Amy we should try to get away from viewing ourselves externally.
I find myself playing with my friend Bene, baseball, and then at her house for a sleepover. We walk upstairs, where I see her mother's wig. Her mother lies in bed, a few years before dying of cancer. Amy and I are twelve, suddenly, and I am in a classroom, where I ask a long-time classmate for a piece of gum, and where she answers, "No," firing off, "because I don't like you" when I insipidly ask her why. I'm wearing a freshjive t-shirt, and smoking my first cigarette Friday night at an NCSY shabbaton with my two cool older friends, Meatball is playing in the background and then I am back in Hillel, where I see Amy. I try to catch her eye, but the hallway is too wavy, and she just keeps smiling that frozen smile borrowed from an old yearbook, as I open my mouth on my 24th birthday in my sister's sukkah and ask her to look at me. I tell her we are in the hallway, surrounded by lockers, one of which is adorned with a Happy Birthday Ali sign autographed by everyone who has walked by and felt like leaving me a memento. She laughs, and I try to catch her eye again, but everything is still moving. With my 12-year-old hands I grab her shoulders, and look at her in the eye. She is looking back at me. In my sister's sukkah we sit completely still, not moving or touching, our eyes closed. I grasp her with my mind's arms and tell her, "I'll see you in 12 years." She doesn't hear me. I say it again.
My sister comes out to the porch, and shuts off the music. I open my eyes. So does Amy. She tells me she was looking right at me, but she didn't hear me say anything. Maybe I didn't.
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
italia and the dam, part I
I got back from Europe almost two weeks ago, and celebrated my labor holiday by heading straight to work for eight consecutive days. My trip was whirlwind, as they always seem to be. I landed in Rome at 8 am, and caught a train downtown, hit suddenly with the realization that I'd crossed the rainbow. I met up with Shlomo and Elisha, who'd arrived in the north of the country 10 days earlier. They'd just finished what was supposed to be the highlight of my trip, venice and the rained-out alps. We wandered around sweaty Rome, an ancient-modern metropolis comprising the dirtiest and holiest aspects of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv in one. We played drums on the street with some Czech guys we met near the Colosseum, inhaled pizza and beer, and found ourselves on a slow train to Napoli. Somehow I'd already spent 20 euros.
Napoli was a whim. Shlomo wanted to go to Lecce, a beach town in southeast Italy, the Italian Jamaica, he told us, though admitted he had heard conflicting reports. It was a nine hour train ride and we had to be in Pisa for a flight to Amsterdam three days later. We asked around for some place closer and picked Napoli after someone in their Rome hostel told us she had needed at least another couple of days there to fully absorb it.
One thing I thought I learned in that last few years is not to judge a place by its bus or train station. Elisha and I were skeptical. Shlomo walked across the street to find a hotel. I hung back. I didn't want to leave, but I didn't want to stay there. We kept walking toward the beach, on the side of a never-ending urban highway, and through the winding alleys. The streets and buildings of Napoli are incredible architecture, but not equipped for tourists. We walked back to our roadside resort on the highway and sat down. Elisha suggested turning back - the first twinges of a theme. Shlomo was at a different pace - twinges of another. We looked through a book and caught a cab to the one recommended hostel on the outskirts of town.
It was the least expensive place we'd stay in for the rest of the trip. The shekel has nothing on the euro, except unique pictures of Israeli heros. I went up to my room, which was stuffed with bunkbeds and a disporportionately large bathroom. My Venezuelan roommate greeted me, climbing into bed. The other roommate came out of the bathroom with a wave and a toothbrush and said, "I'm deaf."
We told each other about ourselves with notes and elementary sign language. I still remembered the alphabet that I'd taught myself in 6th grade when I used to skip morning prayers and read whatever I found laying around. As soon as it became clear to me half an hour later that her name was Alex and not Anna, we were able to understand each other almost perfectly. She was a wild woman, traveling solo around Europe after a few months of trekking with two other deaf friends. When I told her we wanted to go to Pompei to see the preserved molten expressions of fear, she slapped the bed and told me that she was going the next day.
She nixed her sleep plan and came out for beers. Alisdair introduced himself in the lounge by signing hello to Alex and apologizing for his Australian hand-language. He was a big guy with a blond ponytail and creative piercings. He drank coke and ate gnocci with melted cheese with us while we drained beers. We sat at an outdoor table sewing a conversation of Italian, English, Hebrew and sign-language with each other and the giddy waiters.
It was hot and rainy when we arrived in Pompei after trying to navigate our way through the Italian train system. The piazza was rumbling with people. When we got to the cashier, Alex tried to explain that she was deaf and entitled to a discount from the discriminatory propretiers of the historical relic. After Alex showed her the code on her Missouri driver's license, the cashier wrote back that she could only give a discount to someone with valid European permission, was Alex by any chance from the United Kingdom?
Alex said yes and pointed me out as a fellow deaf Briton. The cashier asked Shlomo if he was also from the U.K. Shlomo said "yes," in a clear American accent. The cashier handed us our free entrance passes. Elisha paid the full 10 euros. Shlomo sailed through the ticket stubber at the entrance, who then stopped Alex and me and asked us why we should get in for free. Alex said, "because we're deaf and fwe're rom the U.K."
Pompei was a huge city, almost the size of old Jerusalem. The buildings were made of ancient stone stained by the amazing colors left behind by the volcano that consumed the city 1927 years ago. It's amazing how much is intact. The whole city was unearthed in nearly perfect condition due to the preserving effects of lava. We let ourselves get lost on the stone roads, watching Mount Vesuvius try to boil. It felt alive. The eeriest relics are the magma encapsulted corpses of some poorer citizens of Pompei who were caught in a submergence of molten rock that fateful day at work after all of their wealthier neighbors had heard the forecast and evacuated the city.
It started to rain, and everyone took cover next to abandoned shops. Alex pulled out a blue poncho in a Mary Poppins sort of way, and skipped on down the street, oblivious to the rain.
We had agreed to go on to Firenze together that night, where Alex promised a couple of free beds from a friend she'd met on couchsurfers. Shlomo and Elisha didn't want to go back after already having spent two days there, but it sounded like a great idea to me. A few hours later we found ourselves on a platform for a train to Firenze that was supposed to have left 20 minutes before. Alex and Alisdair had caught the train just before that, having more decisively evaluated their budgetary options and used their ticket-buying skills. Elisha and Shlomo and I decided after a tense hour to go to Rome. I still wanted to go north after that, so we agreed if there was still a train to Firenze when we arrived in Rome, we'd go there, even if it was 3 in the morning. No matter that we'd vetoed a ticket via Pisa from Napoli that would have brought us into Firenze at 3:30 anyway.
The Rome train station was emptier than we'd seen it and the next train to Firenze was at 6 in the morning. Elisha checked the time, We had 6 and a half hours to kill. There was a train leaving for Lecce in 15 minutes.
We stood next to the platform for a few minutes, then silently filed our way to the street. We stopped in at one hostel, then another. Twenty-eight, 30 euros, we were told after walking up four stories, but only if we had booked a bed in advance. We hadn't. Back down the stairs. Into another hotel, up as many floors as the last, but this time in a rickety old elevator large enough for two slim Italians and an operator. Reasonably priced, so we gave him our passports and paid. He showed us our room, next to his desk, with two single beds, and told us we would have to go to sleep right away as there was no extra key to the building. Back into the elevator. Elisha and I waited on the corner while Shlomo went in to a hotel to ask if they had room. I saw another hotel on the ground floor on the corner, so I went in to ask. Twenty euros and we could use the internet, the manager told us in Italian. Fanan.
We collapsed onto our beds, three floors of tall stairs above ground. Shlomo drank a coke, and then took a beer after Elisha and I counted the ethics of drinking from a minibar. I took the other beer, and Shlomo drank two fruit juices.
I was ready to go to Firenze right away in the morning, as we planned, but Shlomo decided it would take only ten minutes to get to the station, and stayed in bed until I had already gone down to use the internet. He came down 10 minutes later, and paid for the minibar. We got to the train station after the time I thought the train was leaving, but with 15 minutes to spare before its actual departure.
When we got to Firenze, we discovered the art of buying tuna fish, bread and cheese at the supermarket. Elisha discovered the art of boxed wine for a euro. He bought four.
We stayed in Firenze long enough to have lunch, and then got back on the train to go to Livorno. We didn't know anything about Livorno, but we could get there for five euros and then take a short train to Pisa in the morning. The book told us that we could camp on the beach.
An hour and a half later, exhausted by the train, we arrived in Livorno. I got flashbacks of Napoli's loneliness. We pointed to a map and said "mare" to numerous passersby once we got of the train, but nobody seemed to know. I wanted to go back to Firenze. Shlomo said he was staying and was going to go out on the town. I tried to convince Elisha to come with me. Neither of us had very much money on us and I knew that if I spent money on a room for a third night in a row that I would have a very boring time in Amsterdam.
The train to Firenze was leaving at 8:45. It was 8:30. Alisdair called me on Elisha's phone and said there was an extra bed for me at Alex's couch-surfing friend's house, but no room for Elisha or Shlomo. They wanted to stay. I told them they could probably sleep on the floor there. They didn't want to spend another hour and a half on the train. Neither did I. 8:42. We left the station.
On the other side of the tracks, in the exit behind us, Livorno was a very clean Italian suburb. I stopped someone on a moped and asked him where the mare was. He pointed down the road, trenta kilometers. I put my hands together under my cocked head and asked if we could sleep there. He said si.
We walked toward the beach, even though the map told us there was no beach, only a marina. Shlomo went into a hotel to ask about prices. Elisha and I had decided we were either going to sleep on whatever version of a beach or meet some friendly dreadlocked Italians at a bar. I wandered off to find the internet. I discovered that in Italy, police officers eat ice-cream instead of doughnuts. When I came back, Elisha was carrying my backpack and Shlomo was telling me he got a very good deal on a room and Elisha and I could each have a free bed if we wanted.
We wanted. We made spaghetti with cream of mushroom soup and drank boxed wine, then conquered Livorno. Well, we walked to the beach and saw that it was a marina with an enchanting old fortress, and found a cobblestone alley with a bar and our dreadlocked Italians, and then Shlomo went back to the hotel while Elisha and I drank wine on a ledge one hundred meters above a canal.
The next morning we went to aeroporto Pisa, to catch our flight to Eindhoven. The airport was the size of a small town bus station, with security just as lax. Shlomo consumed everything he didn't want to take on the plane with him, and we went to wait by one of the three flight gates.
I'll save Amsterdam for part II. (Don't be fooled by the first line of the previous post.)
Napoli was a whim. Shlomo wanted to go to Lecce, a beach town in southeast Italy, the Italian Jamaica, he told us, though admitted he had heard conflicting reports. It was a nine hour train ride and we had to be in Pisa for a flight to Amsterdam three days later. We asked around for some place closer and picked Napoli after someone in their Rome hostel told us she had needed at least another couple of days there to fully absorb it.
One thing I thought I learned in that last few years is not to judge a place by its bus or train station. Elisha and I were skeptical. Shlomo walked across the street to find a hotel. I hung back. I didn't want to leave, but I didn't want to stay there. We kept walking toward the beach, on the side of a never-ending urban highway, and through the winding alleys. The streets and buildings of Napoli are incredible architecture, but not equipped for tourists. We walked back to our roadside resort on the highway and sat down. Elisha suggested turning back - the first twinges of a theme. Shlomo was at a different pace - twinges of another. We looked through a book and caught a cab to the one recommended hostel on the outskirts of town.
It was the least expensive place we'd stay in for the rest of the trip. The shekel has nothing on the euro, except unique pictures of Israeli heros. I went up to my room, which was stuffed with bunkbeds and a disporportionately large bathroom. My Venezuelan roommate greeted me, climbing into bed. The other roommate came out of the bathroom with a wave and a toothbrush and said, "I'm deaf."
We told each other about ourselves with notes and elementary sign language. I still remembered the alphabet that I'd taught myself in 6th grade when I used to skip morning prayers and read whatever I found laying around. As soon as it became clear to me half an hour later that her name was Alex and not Anna, we were able to understand each other almost perfectly. She was a wild woman, traveling solo around Europe after a few months of trekking with two other deaf friends. When I told her we wanted to go to Pompei to see the preserved molten expressions of fear, she slapped the bed and told me that she was going the next day.
She nixed her sleep plan and came out for beers. Alisdair introduced himself in the lounge by signing hello to Alex and apologizing for his Australian hand-language. He was a big guy with a blond ponytail and creative piercings. He drank coke and ate gnocci with melted cheese with us while we drained beers. We sat at an outdoor table sewing a conversation of Italian, English, Hebrew and sign-language with each other and the giddy waiters.
It was hot and rainy when we arrived in Pompei after trying to navigate our way through the Italian train system. The piazza was rumbling with people. When we got to the cashier, Alex tried to explain that she was deaf and entitled to a discount from the discriminatory propretiers of the historical relic. After Alex showed her the code on her Missouri driver's license, the cashier wrote back that she could only give a discount to someone with valid European permission, was Alex by any chance from the United Kingdom?
Alex said yes and pointed me out as a fellow deaf Briton. The cashier asked Shlomo if he was also from the U.K. Shlomo said "yes," in a clear American accent. The cashier handed us our free entrance passes. Elisha paid the full 10 euros. Shlomo sailed through the ticket stubber at the entrance, who then stopped Alex and me and asked us why we should get in for free. Alex said, "because we're deaf and fwe're rom the U.K."
Pompei was a huge city, almost the size of old Jerusalem. The buildings were made of ancient stone stained by the amazing colors left behind by the volcano that consumed the city 1927 years ago. It's amazing how much is intact. The whole city was unearthed in nearly perfect condition due to the preserving effects of lava. We let ourselves get lost on the stone roads, watching Mount Vesuvius try to boil. It felt alive. The eeriest relics are the magma encapsulted corpses of some poorer citizens of Pompei who were caught in a submergence of molten rock that fateful day at work after all of their wealthier neighbors had heard the forecast and evacuated the city.
It started to rain, and everyone took cover next to abandoned shops. Alex pulled out a blue poncho in a Mary Poppins sort of way, and skipped on down the street, oblivious to the rain.
We had agreed to go on to Firenze together that night, where Alex promised a couple of free beds from a friend she'd met on couchsurfers. Shlomo and Elisha didn't want to go back after already having spent two days there, but it sounded like a great idea to me. A few hours later we found ourselves on a platform for a train to Firenze that was supposed to have left 20 minutes before. Alex and Alisdair had caught the train just before that, having more decisively evaluated their budgetary options and used their ticket-buying skills. Elisha and Shlomo and I decided after a tense hour to go to Rome. I still wanted to go north after that, so we agreed if there was still a train to Firenze when we arrived in Rome, we'd go there, even if it was 3 in the morning. No matter that we'd vetoed a ticket via Pisa from Napoli that would have brought us into Firenze at 3:30 anyway.
The Rome train station was emptier than we'd seen it and the next train to Firenze was at 6 in the morning. Elisha checked the time, We had 6 and a half hours to kill. There was a train leaving for Lecce in 15 minutes.
We stood next to the platform for a few minutes, then silently filed our way to the street. We stopped in at one hostel, then another. Twenty-eight, 30 euros, we were told after walking up four stories, but only if we had booked a bed in advance. We hadn't. Back down the stairs. Into another hotel, up as many floors as the last, but this time in a rickety old elevator large enough for two slim Italians and an operator. Reasonably priced, so we gave him our passports and paid. He showed us our room, next to his desk, with two single beds, and told us we would have to go to sleep right away as there was no extra key to the building. Back into the elevator. Elisha and I waited on the corner while Shlomo went in to a hotel to ask if they had room. I saw another hotel on the ground floor on the corner, so I went in to ask. Twenty euros and we could use the internet, the manager told us in Italian. Fanan.
We collapsed onto our beds, three floors of tall stairs above ground. Shlomo drank a coke, and then took a beer after Elisha and I counted the ethics of drinking from a minibar. I took the other beer, and Shlomo drank two fruit juices.
I was ready to go to Firenze right away in the morning, as we planned, but Shlomo decided it would take only ten minutes to get to the station, and stayed in bed until I had already gone down to use the internet. He came down 10 minutes later, and paid for the minibar. We got to the train station after the time I thought the train was leaving, but with 15 minutes to spare before its actual departure.
When we got to Firenze, we discovered the art of buying tuna fish, bread and cheese at the supermarket. Elisha discovered the art of boxed wine for a euro. He bought four.
We stayed in Firenze long enough to have lunch, and then got back on the train to go to Livorno. We didn't know anything about Livorno, but we could get there for five euros and then take a short train to Pisa in the morning. The book told us that we could camp on the beach.
An hour and a half later, exhausted by the train, we arrived in Livorno. I got flashbacks of Napoli's loneliness. We pointed to a map and said "mare" to numerous passersby once we got of the train, but nobody seemed to know. I wanted to go back to Firenze. Shlomo said he was staying and was going to go out on the town. I tried to convince Elisha to come with me. Neither of us had very much money on us and I knew that if I spent money on a room for a third night in a row that I would have a very boring time in Amsterdam.
The train to Firenze was leaving at 8:45. It was 8:30. Alisdair called me on Elisha's phone and said there was an extra bed for me at Alex's couch-surfing friend's house, but no room for Elisha or Shlomo. They wanted to stay. I told them they could probably sleep on the floor there. They didn't want to spend another hour and a half on the train. Neither did I. 8:42. We left the station.
On the other side of the tracks, in the exit behind us, Livorno was a very clean Italian suburb. I stopped someone on a moped and asked him where the mare was. He pointed down the road, trenta kilometers. I put my hands together under my cocked head and asked if we could sleep there. He said si.
We walked toward the beach, even though the map told us there was no beach, only a marina. Shlomo went into a hotel to ask about prices. Elisha and I had decided we were either going to sleep on whatever version of a beach or meet some friendly dreadlocked Italians at a bar. I wandered off to find the internet. I discovered that in Italy, police officers eat ice-cream instead of doughnuts. When I came back, Elisha was carrying my backpack and Shlomo was telling me he got a very good deal on a room and Elisha and I could each have a free bed if we wanted.
We wanted. We made spaghetti with cream of mushroom soup and drank boxed wine, then conquered Livorno. Well, we walked to the beach and saw that it was a marina with an enchanting old fortress, and found a cobblestone alley with a bar and our dreadlocked Italians, and then Shlomo went back to the hotel while Elisha and I drank wine on a ledge one hundred meters above a canal.
The next morning we went to aeroporto Pisa, to catch our flight to Eindhoven. The airport was the size of a small town bus station, with security just as lax. Shlomo consumed everything he didn't want to take on the plane with him, and we went to wait by one of the three flight gates.
I'll save Amsterdam for part II. (Don't be fooled by the first line of the previous post.)
Friday, August 25, 2006
truckin
I'm in Amsterdam right now on a semi-spontaneous trip to Europe. I was supposed to leave for Italy early last week, but because of wars and all, I was told to cancel my trip. The day after the cease-fire, my boss told me to get a ticket. So I did, and a day and a half later I was in Rome.
I met up with two friends in Italy, and we traveled around the south and center of the country for half a week, and then flew to Amsterdam, where we'll be till early next week. We've met and traveled with an amazing deaf woman traveling around Europe by herself, an Australian cop who speaks Italian and has numerous facial piercings, a repented Newark gangster, and a couple from Argentina who perform circus acts across Europe.
I'll write more about it later, just posting to let everyone know where I am.
I met up with two friends in Italy, and we traveled around the south and center of the country for half a week, and then flew to Amsterdam, where we'll be till early next week. We've met and traveled with an amazing deaf woman traveling around Europe by herself, an Australian cop who speaks Italian and has numerous facial piercings, a repented Newark gangster, and a couple from Argentina who perform circus acts across Europe.
I'll write more about it later, just posting to let everyone know where I am.
Monday, August 14, 2006
operation, war, or quagmire
I've become an experienced obituary writer this month, and war savant, and political adviser. I've become a real Israeli this month, tied to the news and expecting the worst. I've become an old woman scared for our boys who will never be men, and scared for the children, and our parents, and our animals, and of a government of inexperienced leaders I know I can do nothing to stop.
113 soldiers died this month. Most were civilians called to duty, not by choice, as all Israeli men between the ages of 18 and basically 40 are required to do. We hear about soldiers' deaths usually eight hours before we are allowed to tell the world, to make sure the families get to hear first. We say 25 people were wounded "in various conditions" when we mean 15 people killed and 10 moderately to seriously wounded. I hear about missiles falling on air force bases just meters from my mother's house, and while I call her to scare her, I write that a rocket fell somewhere in the vicinity of her region.
Every time the names of the soldiers are released, I see pictures of them on our photowire, and write a short blurb about their short lives and post it on the site for the next 12 hours, until the next batch of soldiers. I look up and down the list quickly, looking for my friend, my friend's little brother, my friend's friend, my cousin's former classmate. Sometimes I find them.
Sometimes I see a picture of a guy my age who I never met and wonder if I was supposed to marry him. I think of his families who are so real, literally like almost every family in Israel, who have spent the last day, week, month, or 20 years, worrying about their son who, in his role as dutiful Israeli citizen, male protector of the Jewish nation, was putting his life on the line somewhere in a hostile country. Their son, but a soldier. Their son, now another collection of photos and a short video played at memorial day services with tearful music and testimonies of good servitude in the Israel Defense Forces. Their son, a war statistic, pushed into the quagmire. Their son, a pawn pushed forth by a country fighting blindly.
As Uri Misgav so eloquently writes in Haaretz,
The last Israel Defense Forces soldier to die before the cease-fire goes into effect will not know that he is the last. Nevertheless, it is possible that, in the split second that his life ends, he may just manage to feel some kind of vague, surprising discomfort.
Contrary to literary traditions, he will not particularly resemble the hero of Eric Maria Remarque's novel "All Quiet on the Western Front," who was killed a few hours before the cease-fire was declared, ending World War I. Remarque's hero at least died without knowing that an agreement on the end of hostilities was being cobbled together behind his back. The last soldier to be die before the cease-fire goes into effect will die when the timing and conditions of the cessation of hostilities are already known to all.
This war was called hastily, but it was never called a war. Our defense minister and our chief of staff called an operation of soldiers to wipe out the Hezbollah. They must have really believed this was possible. We haven't exactly been winning with the Palestinians, but we certainly haven't been losing. One month later, and thousands of lost futures and destroyed families and lives later, the IDF is still carrying out "an operation." An operation to remove the cancer from Lebanon and our northern front. An operation performed by interns, not doctors. We have all lost tremendously.
This is the longest battle-themed war in Israel's history, they say. For some reason, the Intifada, and Nablus, and Jenin, and the Gaza Strip don't count, maybe because there it was the IDF aggressing against a relatively unarmed population. Hezbollah, a guerilla organization, has buffed itself up since we last visited Lebanon, building a 9,000-strong force armed with thousands of long-range missiles supplied by Iran, a supposedly nuclear power backed by the Khomeini Revolutionary Guard, and by Syria, sovereign Lebanon's enemy/mistress.
No more. I got into an argument with a friend the other day, trying to convince her of the conclusion I reached 32 days into the most updated war, and 13th most updated month, of my life. I told her we should withdraw from Lebanon. I told her we had no right to conquer Lebanon. This war is with Hezbollah, a portion of Lebanon, but not with Lebanon itself, a sovereign state filled with civilians who did nothing to us and did nothing to deserve this fate. I told her the Lebanese army needs to deploy to regain control of the south, along with an international force until things tide over. I told her Israel should do all its negotiating through the UN instead of making unilateral decisions on the fate of millions of people.
She told me Israel needs to fight because this can't keep happening. She told me we were a nation that had been persecuted for centuries, and could under no circumstances weaken ourselves to the brute of anyone. She told me Israel should conquer south Lebanon until Lebanese no longer want to live there, to wipe out the Hezbollah once and for all.
My friend is a very reasonable person. She doesn't want to wipe out Lebanon. She just wants to protect Israel. She was born into war.
I went to work right after that conversation, and saw that a UN resolution had been reached, that a cease-fire was called for Monday morning, and that Lebanon planned to deploy its troops in south Lebanon along with an international force. Lebanon had already agreed to the cease-fire. So had Nasrallah, grudgingly. Olmert was going to talk to the security cabinet the next day.
Then Kofi Annan came out and said he'd spoken to Olmert, he'd spoken to Siniora, everything was all worked out. The cease-fire would begin at 8 A.M. Monday. IDF troops would withdraw as international forces moved in. Cease-fire? Cessation of hostilities? Armistice?
About an hour ago, the IDF called for its forces to begin withdrawing, effective immediately, except in cases of self defense.
Earlier in the day, Hezbollah forced the Lebanese cabinet to cancel its meeting on the cease-fire, saying it was not willing to discuss disarmament. It is hard to believe that this cease-fire will last even days, but it's nice to have some sort of respite. Does this mean I'll stop thinking tonight is the night for the Zelzal to hit Tel Aviv?
152 Israelis have been killed among them 39 civilians. Over 1,000 Lebanese have died. And yes, we are still bombing Gaza, but let's talk about that later.
113 soldiers died this month. Most were civilians called to duty, not by choice, as all Israeli men between the ages of 18 and basically 40 are required to do. We hear about soldiers' deaths usually eight hours before we are allowed to tell the world, to make sure the families get to hear first. We say 25 people were wounded "in various conditions" when we mean 15 people killed and 10 moderately to seriously wounded. I hear about missiles falling on air force bases just meters from my mother's house, and while I call her to scare her, I write that a rocket fell somewhere in the vicinity of her region.
Every time the names of the soldiers are released, I see pictures of them on our photowire, and write a short blurb about their short lives and post it on the site for the next 12 hours, until the next batch of soldiers. I look up and down the list quickly, looking for my friend, my friend's little brother, my friend's friend, my cousin's former classmate. Sometimes I find them.
Sometimes I see a picture of a guy my age who I never met and wonder if I was supposed to marry him. I think of his families who are so real, literally like almost every family in Israel, who have spent the last day, week, month, or 20 years, worrying about their son who, in his role as dutiful Israeli citizen, male protector of the Jewish nation, was putting his life on the line somewhere in a hostile country. Their son, but a soldier. Their son, now another collection of photos and a short video played at memorial day services with tearful music and testimonies of good servitude in the Israel Defense Forces. Their son, a war statistic, pushed into the quagmire. Their son, a pawn pushed forth by a country fighting blindly.
As Uri Misgav so eloquently writes in Haaretz,
The last Israel Defense Forces soldier to die before the cease-fire goes into effect will not know that he is the last. Nevertheless, it is possible that, in the split second that his life ends, he may just manage to feel some kind of vague, surprising discomfort.
Contrary to literary traditions, he will not particularly resemble the hero of Eric Maria Remarque's novel "All Quiet on the Western Front," who was killed a few hours before the cease-fire was declared, ending World War I. Remarque's hero at least died without knowing that an agreement on the end of hostilities was being cobbled together behind his back. The last soldier to be die before the cease-fire goes into effect will die when the timing and conditions of the cessation of hostilities are already known to all.
This war was called hastily, but it was never called a war. Our defense minister and our chief of staff called an operation of soldiers to wipe out the Hezbollah. They must have really believed this was possible. We haven't exactly been winning with the Palestinians, but we certainly haven't been losing. One month later, and thousands of lost futures and destroyed families and lives later, the IDF is still carrying out "an operation." An operation to remove the cancer from Lebanon and our northern front. An operation performed by interns, not doctors. We have all lost tremendously.
This is the longest battle-themed war in Israel's history, they say. For some reason, the Intifada, and Nablus, and Jenin, and the Gaza Strip don't count, maybe because there it was the IDF aggressing against a relatively unarmed population. Hezbollah, a guerilla organization, has buffed itself up since we last visited Lebanon, building a 9,000-strong force armed with thousands of long-range missiles supplied by Iran, a supposedly nuclear power backed by the Khomeini Revolutionary Guard, and by Syria, sovereign Lebanon's enemy/mistress.
No more. I got into an argument with a friend the other day, trying to convince her of the conclusion I reached 32 days into the most updated war, and 13th most updated month, of my life. I told her we should withdraw from Lebanon. I told her we had no right to conquer Lebanon. This war is with Hezbollah, a portion of Lebanon, but not with Lebanon itself, a sovereign state filled with civilians who did nothing to us and did nothing to deserve this fate. I told her the Lebanese army needs to deploy to regain control of the south, along with an international force until things tide over. I told her Israel should do all its negotiating through the UN instead of making unilateral decisions on the fate of millions of people.
She told me Israel needs to fight because this can't keep happening. She told me we were a nation that had been persecuted for centuries, and could under no circumstances weaken ourselves to the brute of anyone. She told me Israel should conquer south Lebanon until Lebanese no longer want to live there, to wipe out the Hezbollah once and for all.
My friend is a very reasonable person. She doesn't want to wipe out Lebanon. She just wants to protect Israel. She was born into war.
I went to work right after that conversation, and saw that a UN resolution had been reached, that a cease-fire was called for Monday morning, and that Lebanon planned to deploy its troops in south Lebanon along with an international force. Lebanon had already agreed to the cease-fire. So had Nasrallah, grudgingly. Olmert was going to talk to the security cabinet the next day.
Then Kofi Annan came out and said he'd spoken to Olmert, he'd spoken to Siniora, everything was all worked out. The cease-fire would begin at 8 A.M. Monday. IDF troops would withdraw as international forces moved in. Cease-fire? Cessation of hostilities? Armistice?
About an hour ago, the IDF called for its forces to begin withdrawing, effective immediately, except in cases of self defense.
Earlier in the day, Hezbollah forced the Lebanese cabinet to cancel its meeting on the cease-fire, saying it was not willing to discuss disarmament. It is hard to believe that this cease-fire will last even days, but it's nice to have some sort of respite. Does this mean I'll stop thinking tonight is the night for the Zelzal to hit Tel Aviv?
152 Israelis have been killed among them 39 civilians. Over 1,000 Lebanese have died. And yes, we are still bombing Gaza, but let's talk about that later.
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