Tuesday, June 30, 2009
30/06/2009 - Day 1 in Cairo
My hostel. The rest of the building's kind of dark and nasty, but the hostel's quite nice.
30/06/2009 - Day 1 in Cairo
THE PYRAMIDS. They're really huge.
30/06/2009 - Day 1 in Cairo
More Pyramids! I cannot explain, except with more exclamation points, how exciting and impressive they are to see in person! (!!!!!!!!)
30/06/2009 - Day 1 in Cairo
A strange shop display. Silver mannequins, unclothed before their cashier-baron.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Escape from Tel Aviv Airport! (or, how I spent 13 hours with Ben Gurion)
So, despite much planning and getting to the airport with lots and lots of time, I ended up spending more than 12 hours in the Tel Aviv Ben Gurion airport.
My flight was due to leave at 8:15am. I had been told, by good sources, that it's best to actually leave 3 full hours for check-in there, as Israeli airport security is rigorous.
And it was true. It took me about an hour to get through the first half of airport security, the first of two times I went through it.
After getting through that part (where they remove most items from your checked bag, swipe everything with a wand that has some kind of lint-free cloth on the end, which is then sniffed by a machine that, I assume, detects traces of explosives and the like),
I walked over to the check-in counter for Royal Jordanian.
And, after several minutes and much pensive poking of a keyboard, the counter-fellow called his supervisor. My ticket appeared, in their system at least, to have been canceled the same day it was booked (May 20th). While he confirmed that as the case, I called my travel-insurance's 24-hour number.
The tag-team action of my travel-insurance person and my travel-agency person discovered that, on their end, my ticket looked fine and ready to be used.
Long story short: I couldn't get on that flight, and the reasons why aren't entirely clear.
The worse news: After more waiting around, talking to several people from Royal Jordanian, including their ticketing agent and a representative from their Tel Aviv branch,
there didn't seem to be another flight that day that would work.
After even more waiting around, and more calls to RJ's Tel Aviv reps, I got a flight
that day.
The new bad news: It was, at that time, around 11:30am. The flight wasn't until 5:45.
It takes about 1/2 hour to get to or from the airport, and costs about 130 shekels ($30ish) at least by taxi each way.
Leaving a 3 full hours before the flight meant being back by 2:45, leaving me only a realistic 2ish hours in the city.
And nowhere to put my giant bag.
So I spent the day in the airport instead.
It wasn't so bad. Israel has amazing frozen yogurt.
and honey made from(with? near?) dates, which I highly recommend.
I also wrote a few blog posts and the like.
When it was finally time to start the check-in process, I went through security again. Same bag check, but a bit quicker this time.
And check-in this time was fine.
And the flight from Tel Aviv to Amman was fine - moved into the empty window-seat beside me, and, as per usual, stared out the window like an excited puppy.
The flight from Amman to Cairo, on the other hand, was ridiculous.
Nay, the flight itself was fine. The fellow next to me was friendly, too. The obese young man between our two seats was nice too, though he spoke little if any english.
The other occupants were mostly families, many with very young children who spent the flight screaming, crying, or both at once.
And people were switching seats all around, and there was much chaos before the flight took off.
Sunset from the sky looks different in the middle east. The yellow/orange is more intense, and the blue is pale.
We landed in Cairo, went through a Swine Flu quarantine questionaire, and passport-control.
I worried that my bag had been lost during the flights, but it hadn't.
And, after the most harrowing taxi ride ever (I'm trying to get video of one, but those I've taken since have approached neither the same velocity nor a comparable white-knuckle factor), and some wandering down a very crowded city street, as the only anglo there, with a very large bag ( I ducked and bobbed and walked with a wobble sometimes, so if anyone was trying to open my zipper they'd have a hard time being subtle about it. This A: was probably unnecessary, and B: made me look ridiculous. I'd had very little sleep and spent most of the day in an airport, gimme a break.)
I found the hostel.
I have AC, and three beds all to myself. It's pretty cushy.
30/06/2009 - Escape from Tel Aviv!
I went and saw a movie while in Tel Aviv. They had some odd figures around the theatre, such as Napoleon here.
30/06/2009 - Escape from Tel Aviv!
30/06/2009 - Escape from Tel Aviv!
This is the mall/theatre entrance/exit. These marines were lining both sides of the path. They have Israeli flags on their other arm.
30/06/2009 - Escape from Tel Aviv!
And this is a random guy from the airport. His shirt reminded me of breakup camo used on ships in WWI.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Flying a Kite at the End of the World
On my last full day staying in Jerusalem, I went to Tel Megiddo. The site is about an hour and forty minutes north and west of Jerusalem, and just a bit south and west of the Sea of Galilee.
In biblical times, it was known as Har-Megiddon, later truncated to Armageddon You might have heard of it.
I'd wanted to go there in the morning, and down to the Dead Sea in the afternoon. Alas, the buses stop during Shabbat, and I didn't particularly want to be stuck at the Dead Sea overnight.
So I only got to Megiddo.
Some fun facts:
- The site itself is ancient, and extensive digs in the early/middle 20th century showed several layers of ruins.
- Tel Megiddo was basically uninhabited for many centuries, since fairly ancient times. More recently, there's a sizable kibbutz nearby, and the mountain (hill?) is a national park.
- There's a prison nearby, which seems oddly appropriate.
- The scenery surrounding Megiddo is absolutely beautiful, with open plains bordered by distant mountains. I took plenty of pictures.
In addition to going up there to see such an eschatological relic, I really wanted to fly a kite there. Nay, I'd really wanted to fly a kite for a few days. The evening wind is perfect for it, and it seemed like an appropriately meditative way to pass some time.
Furthermore, how many people can say they've flown a kite where the Final Battle is prophecized to take place?
Lessons:
1: A 2-shekel (about $0.50) kite that was made in China isn't up to the winds of a desert mountain. All the kites here are gigantic for a reason, whose name is stability.
2: If you're going to do something weird, have a cover story.
Despite a sincere instability, leading to a brevity punctuated by some epic nose-dives, the kite-flying was a lot of fun.
A few tourist groups passed through- the first was a gaggle of what I took to be archaeologist academics, discussing things and taking pictures. The other groups were definitely bible tour-groups, who seemed a bit off-put or at least confused by my kite.
If they asked, I decided, I would tell them I was doing field research for my thesis on the theological significance of air-currents at sites described in the Book of Revelations.
I thought it sounded pretty neat. They didn't ask. I tried to look academic and thoughtful nonetheless, which is no easy task when drenched in sweat and flying a rainbow-colored kite that keeps crashing.
Before busting out the kite, I sat for a bit on the mountaintop, thinking about all these ancient sites in all these holy stories. It's strange and powerful, experiencing them not as abstract, far-away locations from pictures but as tangible, touchable, places.
Eventually, I discarded the kite, descended from the ruins, and then had cold lemonade and a Twix bar from the Armageddon Restaurant (it wasn't actually called this, unfortunately. For the most part, they downplayed the end-times aspect of the site)
Did I mention walking from the bus stop to there, and back? In the middle of the day? It was hot, sweaty, at least a mile if not more, and I got my boots all dusty in the best kind of way.
I got back to Jerusalem on the 2nd or 3rd to last bus before they shut down for Shabbat.
Jerusalem.
A close friend described Jerusalem as 'heavy;' the term fits extremely well.
It's hard to sum up my time in Jerusalem. Ranging from a Fez-like experience ('come into my shop and have tea' swiftly becoming 'sit here while I show you carpets you don't want.' This time, with a worse exchange rate.) to the reverance of the Western Wall, there's too much to sum up easily.
So let me summarize those few, incredible days into just the most interesting parts.
My first day there, I wandered into the Old City, the place where the Western Wall, the Dome of the Rock, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre are all located. I wasn't even through the Jaffa gate before some older storekeep came up, acted like an honest gentleman offering hospitality, and proceeded to take me to his shop. The tea was okay, and the carpets were gorgeous but pricey. I apparently looked more mercantile than I intended to that day.
From there, I walked all around the Old City, weighing my feelings about going to see the Western Wall on my first day there. My feet decided that I would see it, and it was.
Striking.
In a way that doesn't capture well in pictures, since, objectively, it's just a big ol' wall of stone. The atmosphere, the feel of ancient stone on one's hands, isn't something so easily snapped up as a picture.
That night, I unwound with some folks from the hostel. One was a woman from Costa Rica who, until just days ago, had been living and working in Jordan. She had flown from a husband who, in her words, confirmed by her bruises, had tried to kill her.
Another was an interesting Catalan artist from Barcelona. I'll see if I can post some of his work in another post - it's quite good, with a street-art kind of style.
The next day, I walked north of the city, up to Ammunition Hill. You can see the post about that for more details. Long story short: A powerful, personal take on a war-memorial, and a good place to tease at ghosts of cultural memory.
Later that day, I went on a walk with Aleix, the aforementioned artist. We saw a bit of the nearby city and later got some decent pasta.
Along the way, I heard my name yelled from a cab. The one who yelled it was a friend from college, who I'd not known was in Israel at all. Hooray for chance encounters. He and I caught up later in the week.
That night, I hung out with the hostel folks again. The three of us were joined by two newcomers, Bez and Rose, a young couple from the NYC area. It was the Costa Rican woman's last night in Israel before returning home to Costa Rica. She told us her story, and we listened, moved.
The next day, Aleix, Bez, Rose, and I went to the Rockefeller Museum. It's a building from the 19th century, which houses a vast array of artifacts ranging from deep pre-history to the early era of moden Jerusalem. There was a lovely courtyard in the middle, which brought to mind the glory-days of British imperialism. Despite such flights of fancy, nobody brought us tea.
It was also probably the hottest day out of the entire week in Israel; a good day to spend a bit of inside a dusty museum.
That afternoon, Aleix was on his way back to Tel Aviv and Bez and Rose returned to their family's place in Ashkelon.
The day after that, I took a bus up to Tel Megiddo, a little old hill that you might know better as 'Armageddon.' This trip gets a post to itself, when I get the chance.
That night, Shabbat began. I'd read that everything closed from around 15:00-16:00 on Friday until around 20:00 on Saturday. When they said everything, they meant it pretty literally.
The pedestrian square across the street from the hostel had been loud and crowded all the other nights. On Friday evening, it was all but completely deserted.
I had an interesting discussion on the ethics of legislating cultural integration among Muslim/Arab populations in Western Europe with a stoned Hollander. It was fun. I, perhaps too optimistically, think I swung him from a position of 'This is what the A-rabs do' to 'this is a social problem in parts of Europe and it's tragically complex.'
Early the next morning, I caught a Sherut, or group-taxi (basically a VW Eurovan full of tourists) to Tel Aviv. The driver was one of those rare taxi-drivers who, either previously or in a former life, had been a fighter-pilot, and handled highway traffic like some kind of high-speed dogfight.
It was great.
It's hard to sum up my time in Jerusalem. Ranging from a Fez-like experience ('come into my shop and have tea' swiftly becoming 'sit here while I show you carpets you don't want.' This time, with a worse exchange rate.) to the reverance of the Western Wall, there's too much to sum up easily.
So let me summarize those few, incredible days into just the most interesting parts.
My first day there, I wandered into the Old City, the place where the Western Wall, the Dome of the Rock, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre are all located. I wasn't even through the Jaffa gate before some older storekeep came up, acted like an honest gentleman offering hospitality, and proceeded to take me to his shop. The tea was okay, and the carpets were gorgeous but pricey. I apparently looked more mercantile than I intended to that day.
From there, I walked all around the Old City, weighing my feelings about going to see the Western Wall on my first day there. My feet decided that I would see it, and it was.
Striking.
In a way that doesn't capture well in pictures, since, objectively, it's just a big ol' wall of stone. The atmosphere, the feel of ancient stone on one's hands, isn't something so easily snapped up as a picture.
That night, I unwound with some folks from the hostel. One was a woman from Costa Rica who, until just days ago, had been living and working in Jordan. She had flown from a husband who, in her words, confirmed by her bruises, had tried to kill her.
Another was an interesting Catalan artist from Barcelona. I'll see if I can post some of his work in another post - it's quite good, with a street-art kind of style.
The next day, I walked north of the city, up to Ammunition Hill. You can see the post about that for more details. Long story short: A powerful, personal take on a war-memorial, and a good place to tease at ghosts of cultural memory.
Later that day, I went on a walk with Aleix, the aforementioned artist. We saw a bit of the nearby city and later got some decent pasta.
Along the way, I heard my name yelled from a cab. The one who yelled it was a friend from college, who I'd not known was in Israel at all. Hooray for chance encounters. He and I caught up later in the week.
That night, I hung out with the hostel folks again. The three of us were joined by two newcomers, Bez and Rose, a young couple from the NYC area. It was the Costa Rican woman's last night in Israel before returning home to Costa Rica. She told us her story, and we listened, moved.
The next day, Aleix, Bez, Rose, and I went to the Rockefeller Museum. It's a building from the 19th century, which houses a vast array of artifacts ranging from deep pre-history to the early era of moden Jerusalem. There was a lovely courtyard in the middle, which brought to mind the glory-days of British imperialism. Despite such flights of fancy, nobody brought us tea.
It was also probably the hottest day out of the entire week in Israel; a good day to spend a bit of inside a dusty museum.
That afternoon, Aleix was on his way back to Tel Aviv and Bez and Rose returned to their family's place in Ashkelon.
The day after that, I took a bus up to Tel Megiddo, a little old hill that you might know better as 'Armageddon.' This trip gets a post to itself, when I get the chance.
That night, Shabbat began. I'd read that everything closed from around 15:00-16:00 on Friday until around 20:00 on Saturday. When they said everything, they meant it pretty literally.
The pedestrian square across the street from the hostel had been loud and crowded all the other nights. On Friday evening, it was all but completely deserted.
I had an interesting discussion on the ethics of legislating cultural integration among Muslim/Arab populations in Western Europe with a stoned Hollander. It was fun. I, perhaps too optimistically, think I swung him from a position of 'This is what the A-rabs do' to 'this is a social problem in parts of Europe and it's tragically complex.'
Early the next morning, I caught a Sherut, or group-taxi (basically a VW Eurovan full of tourists) to Tel Aviv. The driver was one of those rare taxi-drivers who, either previously or in a former life, had been a fighter-pilot, and handled highway traffic like some kind of high-speed dogfight.
It was great.
27/06/2009 - Just in case you're not sick of the graffiti posts.
Either "Drink that which makes you small love" or "Dr. in that which makes you small love"
27/06/2009 - Just in case you're not sick of the graffiti posts.
27/06/2009 - Just in case you're not sick of the graffiti posts.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
25/06/2009 - more Jerusalem graffiti
Sad Robot Inc.
25/06/2009 - more Jerusalem graffiti
The Little Prince, I think
25/06/2009 - Glasses for Angry Communists
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
The Ammunition Hill Song.
I forgot to mention, on of the most surreal parts of the Ammunition Hill memorial & museum was the song.
There's an official IDF song about Ammunition Hill. Here's a video: Dailymotion.com
I don't know if that one has lyrics, but it's all about how horrible a battle it is. The tune was way, way too cheery for the lyrics.
There's an official IDF song about Ammunition Hill. Here's a video: Dailymotion.com
I don't know if that one has lyrics, but it's all about how horrible a battle it is. The tune was way, way too cheery for the lyrics.
A Different Sort of Pilgrimage
Today I took a trip up to Ammunition Hill. It was a long trek, physically and emotionally.
I was looking for military museums to go see, because I really don't think you can experience this land while ignoring the spectres of conflict that saturate the land.
With some help from the @israelconsulate on twitter, I figured out that Ammunition Hill isn't just, well, a hill that has something to do with materiel, but just such a military museum. Specifically, it focuses on the 6 Day War in June, 1967.
During that war, Ammunition Hill was a Jordanian emplacement, heavily fortified. It housed a great deal of fuel and ammunition for use by the Jordanian forces (who, at the start of the war, held that area of Jerusalem).
I'm fairly certain, but not positive, that this is the first time I've been to or seen a musem/memorial that is built on and in the battlefield it's commemorating. I've been to the fields at Lexington and Concord, where the American Revolution started, but there wasn't much actually-there other than the fields themselves, and that battle was so long ago the memory isn't as fresh as it was here.
After paying admission, I walked through an open lobby. On the other side of it was the hill itself, outside. There were pine trees and olive trees growing (more on that later). There were also the trenches from the battle (I don't know if they were as original or restored- I'd assume the latter), and a big old Sherman M4 tank, of the kind that the Israeli forces used in the battle, parked on the hillside (more on that later too). Further up the hill were several bunkers, and a large bunker-esque building that housed the museum. It was a very striking scene.
Before writing anything more, let me disclaim myself: I'm not any sort of expert on Middle East conflicts, nor on anything relating to Israeli military engagements. What I'm writing is entirely based on what little background knowledge I have, and what the exhibits in the museum said. If I get anything glaringly wrong, please pipe up and let me know.
The Conflict:
The 1967 Six Day War (wikipedia article) was fought between Israel on one side, and Egypt, Jordan, and Syria on the other (roughly in that order of involvement/strength, I think). Before this war, administration of the city of Jerusalem, including parts of the Old City, was split between Israel and Jordan. Significantly, the Israeli controlled section of Jerusalem was a peninsular border, with Jordanian controlled territory on the north and south sides. Geopolitically, this made Israel nervous for obvious reasons. The start of the war itself didn't have anything, officially, to do with Syria or Jordan, although tensions had been high between both of those states and Israel for a few years before 1967 (summary: water rights and state-sponsored terrorism, see wiki article for more). Egypt kicked all the UN PKFs out of the Sinai area, where they'd been since 1957 (because of the Suez Canal crisis). Egypt then amassed fighters and forces on the Egypt-Israel border, and, seeing the threat of immediate attack, Israel struck first.There's a whole Just War Theory debate on pre-emptive attacks, of which that part of the Six Day War is a textbook example. I'll not get into that here, for the sake of brevity.
I'm going through the wikipedia article (what, are there more reputable sources I should consult?) as I write this, and it's interesting to see what was and wasn't mentioned in the museum at Ammunition Hill.
For example, there was a short film in part of the museum. It discussed the battles in and around the Jerusalem area, primarily. The way the film put it, Jordanian tanks just started shelling the Israeli part of Jerusalem for funsies. The way wikipedia puts it, the IDF had staged an attack on a West Bank town called Es Samu, in retaliation for a landmine-incident (a mine thought to have been placed by Jordanian militants (non-state) killed a number of IDF troops on a border-patrol) which, due to a diplomatic screwup, hadn't been officially apologized for (I know it sounds weird, but, in matters of national pride, an official apology can go a long way).
I shan't bore you all with the (incredibly interesting) details of what else may or may not have differed. Long story short: the general tone was akin to that of an American monument about the Revolutionary War, especially the more memorial-style plaques in the 'battlefield' area of Ammunition Hill. The big differences were that there was a more religious tone to the battles for Jerusalem, and, obviously, a much more recent-memory feel to all of it.
It was very strange, almost surreal, to walk around the battlefield and see the trenches, the bunkers still riddled with bullet craters. I went inside one of them, and looked around others. On another corner of the hill, there were the rusted remains of a recoilless gun.
Inside the museum (which I sort of went through backwards, which made things occasionally surreal), there were a great deal of exhibits, ranging from a memorial-area with a large wall of names in Hebrew and an eternal flame, to biographies and letters of some of the fallen soldiers (some very personal, and all strikingly, painfully human), to an exhibit on some of the armaments used, to a guestbook where people could sign their names or, more often than not, leave a note of thanks or blessing.
I took a ton of pictures, which I'll post with notes when I take them off the camera and put them up on Flickr.
Two interesting bits of trivia that I thought were interesting in a conflict-studies sort of way:
1 - Although the IDF brought a few tanks to the battle, they weren't particularly useful in a kinetic sense. They couldn't navigate the difficult terrain well, nor could they lower their barrels sufficiently to fire on the Jordanian forces on the hill. They were, however, gigantic tanks, and served to intimidate the Jordanian forces quite a bit. The way the plaque put it, this was an important factor. I hadn't thought about tanks as a psych-warfare weapon in that sense.
2: One of the difficulties with the partitioning of Jerusalem were large 'No-Man's Land' areas between the Israeli and Jordanian sides of the city. These had been drawn up on a 1:20,000 scale map during the initial agreement, with a wax pencil.
The wax pencil left marks 2-3mm wide, which, at that scale, became something like 40-60 meters on the ground. To make matters worse, the wax marks expanded over time, because, well, it's hot in the Middle East and wax melts.
So No-Man's Land grew slightly over time.
Because the areas were under no country's control, nobody was allowed into these areas. 40-60 meters, along an entire border, is a LOT of space. Just one more tension-point leading up to the conflict.
24/06/2009 - some random shots in Jerusalem
Late lunch, day 1 in Jerusalem. Falafel, Arabic coffee (also known as Turkish coffee), and a map.
24/06/2009 - some random shots in Jerusalem
Trogdor on his pilgrimage to the Holy Land.
24/06/2009 - some random shots in Jerusalem
24/06/2009 - some random shots in Jerusalem
Max Brenner, what are you doing in Jerusalem?
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
23/06/2009 - Tel Aviv graffiti 2
Dorkiest. Tag. Ever. I love it.
23/06/2009 - Tel Aviv graffiti 2
23/06/2009 - Tel Aviv graffiti 2
Face the World.
23/06/2009 - Tel Aviv graffiti 2
23/06/2009 - Tel Aviv graffiti 2
No idea what this says, but I'll guess it's political?
23/06/2009 - Tel Aviv graffiti 2
Banksy 2
23/06/2009 - Tel Aviv graffiti 2
I think this is a "beware of dog" sign, not graffiti. Had to post it anyway. Beware the tiny-hatted bulldog!
Day "1" - Part 3: Hotel and Evening 1 in Tel Aviv
After checking into the hotel and getting to my room, I unpacked & settled in a bit, and then took a very lengthy shower.
There are really very few feelings as good as a long and thoroughly-needed shower.
After debating whether to sleep for a while, or to go back out and start exploring, I eventually opted for the latter. I'd already been up for a long time, but I thought it would be better for getting over the jetlag if I stayed up until a normal hour in local time.
That's not to imply I did anything but not-move for about 2 hours after the shower.
Eventually I hit the town to see what was around, and to find some dinner. I walked all around, took a bunch of pictures, and poked my head into a few stores (but by that hour, most everything was closed)
I ended up having dinner at this wonderful place right on the beach. They had tables and chairs set up right on the sand, and a pretty broad menu.
I had some sort of fish (St. Peter's Fish? Something like that. It looked like bass but tasted a bit like salmon.) and a cocktail with Arak, a local alcohol that's like Ouzo, if Ouzo were made with cardamom. Here's the wikipedia entry )
A bit more wandering, and then to bed. Slept like a log for a good 4 hours, and some fiendish internal clock kept me from getting back to sleep after that.
There are really very few feelings as good as a long and thoroughly-needed shower.
After debating whether to sleep for a while, or to go back out and start exploring, I eventually opted for the latter. I'd already been up for a long time, but I thought it would be better for getting over the jetlag if I stayed up until a normal hour in local time.
That's not to imply I did anything but not-move for about 2 hours after the shower.
Eventually I hit the town to see what was around, and to find some dinner. I walked all around, took a bunch of pictures, and poked my head into a few stores (but by that hour, most everything was closed)
I ended up having dinner at this wonderful place right on the beach. They had tables and chairs set up right on the sand, and a pretty broad menu.
I had some sort of fish (St. Peter's Fish? Something like that. It looked like bass but tasted a bit like salmon.) and a cocktail with Arak, a local alcohol that's like Ouzo, if Ouzo were made with cardamom. Here's the wikipedia entry )
A bit more wandering, and then to bed. Slept like a log for a good 4 hours, and some fiendish internal clock kept me from getting back to sleep after that.
23/06/2009 - Wandering Tel Aviv
23/06/2009 - Wandering Tel Aviv
23/06/2009 - Wandering Tel Aviv
23/06/2009 - Wandering Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv has a lot of these memorial-posts around, mostly commemorating sites relating to the Haganah and the creation of Israel.
23/06/2009 - Wandering Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv City Hall, and a big ol' park in front of it.
Reminders of Where I Am
Tel Aviv is split up, roughly, into two general neighborhoods. The north end, to run with the New York City analogy*, is a lot like uptown Manhattan; lots of stores, most fairly upscale, and hip little cafes and the like. Residential areas are nice, in good repair, and usually have at least 2 late-model cars in the driveway.
The south end is like downtown/East Village Manhattan; the residential areas are in a bit more disrepair, the stores are more funky than froofy, there are a few open-air markets, and the crowd is generally younger than in the north end.
The hotel I stayed in for the first two nights here was in the southern-center, western part of the city, literally a block or two from the beach. So, I spent basically all of yesterday exploring the southern part of the city.
I went through a big open-air market (got batteries for my reading light! It works now!), walked along the beach promenade down to the Old City (Yaffa or Jaffa, depending who's romanizing), where I wandered about for some time among the ancient architecture. There's a port down there too, which I explored thoroughly.
Towards the start of the evening I was wandering through a pedestrian (aka people, bikes, and an endless deluge of scooter traffic) area, full of hip little places. Feeling rather hungry, I stumbled upon a neat looking little cafe where I ended up stopping for dinner.
I got a double-espresso and the chicken hummus, and was happily munching away, when all of a sudden an older woman starts yelling loudly in Hebrew, and a youth is running quickly away. Other people yell and point as well. I startle a bit, look around, and come to the conclusion that she probably had her purse snatched. Terrible, but not entirely shocking in any city.
I guess the people behind me had a better look at what was going on. Here's what I gleaned from a combination of deduction, observation, and overhearing the folks behind me, at least one of whom spoke both Hebrew and English: The person running away had a knife in at least one hand if not both, the woman, I think, was a shopkeeper, and another young man who had been involved had what was a very bloody, quite likely broken, nose.
Before describing the scene further, I want to clear up a couple things: First, this is by no means representative of my time here thusfar - on the contrary, I've felt extremely safe here, despite the language barrier; Second, this did not affect that overall feeling of safety here. As an isolated incedent, I can only assume that it happened for a reason, whether it's something tangible and rational, or sheer bad luck on someone's part.
It made me think about how people are more hesitant to fly when there's been a plane accident recently - the actual likelihood of a crash isn't affected by when a crash takes place, but we tend to think of it that way. Same deal here.
The biggest affect it had, I think, was to remind me that yes, this is an unfamiliar and new place. Sometimes, at least in Tel Aviv, it's easy to forget that this is a very, very different place than the U.S. - because in so many ways this is a very Western place, and it really does feel a lot like a smaller, hotter Manhattan where everyone usually speaks Hebrew.
Hence the title of this post. A reminder is precisely how that event felt: A reminder that, indeed, this is a foreign and, as a shopkeeper I talked to today put it, difficult place to live. Past all the window-dressing, there's a lot of people here for whom life is tough, and sometimes that leads to violence.
Despite all the music and dancing, all the delicious eateries and stunning galleries, this is very much Israel, with all the social and political tensions that go with it, small and large.
It was a good reminder, and I spent some time later that night thinking about the difference between feeling unsafe and feeling vulnerable.
*: That Tel Aviv is, in fact, a lot like a smaller, cleaner, hotter New York, where people actually stop for pedestrians.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Sunday, June 21, 2009
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
America still wins the 'number of flags flying per square mile' contest, but it's a very close call.
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
There's a casual militarism here, and it manifests in curious ways. I think it correlates to universal military service and Israel's particular geopolitical situation. Either way, sometimes it shows with such gems as 'Guns n Moses.'
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
This was in a crazy little antique store. Any idea what it is? 300 bonus points if you know. Electro-shock device? Medical sterilizer? Those pieces in the top are made of thin glass, and the thingy in the bottom is connected to the box, which has voltage-adjustment knobs.
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
Also from the crazy antique store. It's a camera-stock, (just?) like the kind war-journalists used during Vietnam. It lets you take a stable shot easily, even when on the move, but makes the camera look a bit weapon-like, to say the least.
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
I made a wish here! It's in the old city, Yaffa/Jaffa, at the top of the hill - It had the signs of the zodiac engraved on bronze cylinders along the length of the bridge. It also had a wonderful view of the sea and of Tel Aviv.
21/06/2009 - Scenes from Tel Aviv
O?RLY?
Day "1" - Part 2: Flights and Airports
Part 2 of 3
In order to keep this entry from stretching on forever, I've split it up into three parts. If it helps, you can think of them as Pre-Airport, Airport & Flights, and Arrival in Tel Aviv.
I arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare. This was a relief, as I can think of few worse ways to start a trip than missing one's flight.
The downside was I had, in my rush to get there, totally forgotten to deposit a check that I'd been carrying around. Oops.
I got all checked in, left my giant-bag to be checked and kept my carry-bag. After a few "Hey, I got to the airport just fine!" phone-calls and a last-meal-in-America, I boarded the flight for Zurich. (The flights went NYC - Zurich, Zurich - Tel Aviv)
Boarding the plane felt, I imagine, a bit like jumping off a cliff, or leaping out of an airplane. The undeniable beginning of this trip.
As for the flight itself, it could have been worse.
I started off by sitting in the wrong seat, where I almost-had a wonderful seat-neighbor. I reseated a row further back, next to a very old lady who I'm fairly sure was not-all-there.
She left her overhead-light on all night (I think because she couldn't figure out how to turn it off? I wanted to help, but there's no polite way to say "Do you want to turn off that light?" at 3 in the morning.)
I didn't sleep much, if any, on that flight. My seat was also in the middle of the middle-row of seats, so any view out the window was restricted to neck-straining glimpses. This was also the case for the flight from Zurich to Tel-Aviv.
On the plus side, Swiss Air is delightful. They gave everyone quite a few meals, several refreshment-runs, and a piece of chocolate at the end of each flight! (Three cheers for free Swiss chocolate!) Also, all the blankets and pillows and headphones came in plastic cases that looked like something from the Ikea stockroom.
Arriving in Tel Aviv was a trip. I was, after about 16 hours either in the air or in airports, no sleep, clothes that I'd been wearing since Thursday morning, and a stomach with nothing but airline food in it, in a decidedly altered state.
The passport-control officer heard my request that he stamp something other than my passport, but I had been under the impression that they would stamp a piece of paper I kept. This was not the case, and I felt a bit silly having handed him a piece of paper. He stamped this entry-pass thingy, which they took after i walked through the passport-area. (The reason for not having them stamp my passport is that other Middle Eastern countries, including the other two I'll be visiting, Egypt and Dubai, may take an Israel visa-stamp as a good reason to hassle you. I don't really feel like having to bribe / being detained by Egyptian or Emirate airport security, thus, separate piece of paper.)
I got minimally screwed by the taxi driver for the ride from airport to hotel (travel tip: With very, very few exceptions, taxi drivers are essentially con-artists with a map and a car and an unbridled desire to take your money)
and got all checked-in to the hotel.
What appears to be a Cobra attack-helicopter just flew overhead. More on Tel Aviv later.
In order to keep this entry from stretching on forever, I've split it up into three parts. If it helps, you can think of them as Pre-Airport, Airport & Flights, and Arrival in Tel Aviv.
I arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare. This was a relief, as I can think of few worse ways to start a trip than missing one's flight.
The downside was I had, in my rush to get there, totally forgotten to deposit a check that I'd been carrying around. Oops.
I got all checked in, left my giant-bag to be checked and kept my carry-bag. After a few "Hey, I got to the airport just fine!" phone-calls and a last-meal-in-America, I boarded the flight for Zurich. (The flights went NYC - Zurich, Zurich - Tel Aviv)
Boarding the plane felt, I imagine, a bit like jumping off a cliff, or leaping out of an airplane. The undeniable beginning of this trip.
As for the flight itself, it could have been worse.
I started off by sitting in the wrong seat, where I almost-had a wonderful seat-neighbor. I reseated a row further back, next to a very old lady who I'm fairly sure was not-all-there.
She left her overhead-light on all night (I think because she couldn't figure out how to turn it off? I wanted to help, but there's no polite way to say "Do you want to turn off that light?" at 3 in the morning.)
I didn't sleep much, if any, on that flight. My seat was also in the middle of the middle-row of seats, so any view out the window was restricted to neck-straining glimpses. This was also the case for the flight from Zurich to Tel-Aviv.
On the plus side, Swiss Air is delightful. They gave everyone quite a few meals, several refreshment-runs, and a piece of chocolate at the end of each flight! (Three cheers for free Swiss chocolate!) Also, all the blankets and pillows and headphones came in plastic cases that looked like something from the Ikea stockroom.
Arriving in Tel Aviv was a trip. I was, after about 16 hours either in the air or in airports, no sleep, clothes that I'd been wearing since Thursday morning, and a stomach with nothing but airline food in it, in a decidedly altered state.
The passport-control officer heard my request that he stamp something other than my passport, but I had been under the impression that they would stamp a piece of paper I kept. This was not the case, and I felt a bit silly having handed him a piece of paper. He stamped this entry-pass thingy, which they took after i walked through the passport-area. (The reason for not having them stamp my passport is that other Middle Eastern countries, including the other two I'll be visiting, Egypt and Dubai, may take an Israel visa-stamp as a good reason to hassle you. I don't really feel like having to bribe / being detained by Egyptian or Emirate airport security, thus, separate piece of paper.)
I got minimally screwed by the taxi driver for the ride from airport to hotel (travel tip: With very, very few exceptions, taxi drivers are essentially con-artists with a map and a car and an unbridled desire to take your money)
and got all checked-in to the hotel.
What appears to be a Cobra attack-helicopter just flew overhead. More on Tel Aviv later.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Day "1" - Airports, Flights, and Tel Aviv arrival
Part 1 of 3
In order to keep this entry from stretching on forever, I've split it up into three parts. If it helps, you can think of them as Pre-Airport, Airport & Flights, and Arrival in Tel Aviv.
{The blog client I'm using ate this post 2 or 3 times. Argh argh argh.}
The trip down to the airport was interesting, and one of the longest I've ever had. See, I live a bit north of Boston, MA, but my flight left out of JFK, in New York. This meant getting down there a day early or so. This apparent inconvenience was, indeed, intentional.
It was as nice as I'd hoped it would be having a day between the experience of "Hey, I'm packed and ready to go!" and the experience of "Hey, I'm getting on an airplane and shan't return for nigh on two months!"
To boot, it gave me the opportunity to run some last minute "I forgot to bring ____!"-type errands.
It also meant I got to spend some time with my old and dear friend Annie (who's also done a good bit more travelling than I, so had plenty of useful advice), whose fold-out couch I occupied that night.
The weather in New York was nasty. Overcast and rainy, and I timed my exeunt from the subway to perfectly coincide with the heaviest of the day's rain.
Good news: my poncho works and my bag is mostly waterproof.
Eventually got to the apartment. Took off my bag (which was of much fascination to the two cats), hung up my poncho, and set to (slowly, sleepily) fixing myself some food and making some last-minute web-updates before departure.
Later that night, after running a last-minute errand at EMS, I went to see a play that Annie'd done the set for. It was a powerful play, dealing with substance abuse and death, and most parts were played by actors who had struggled sincerely with the former.
After that, we met up with another friend and enjoyed some festivities, with live music and dancing well into the evening.
My excuse for being out way too late is that it helped with the jetlag (which I think it actually did, a bit)
The next day, I threw some things for the flight into my carry-bag (a lovely little thing from North Face that folds up into its own pocket when not needed, and has 4 compartments: 1 large, 2 medium sized, and 1 pouch) and Annie made a delicious send-off breakfast. After that, I hopped on a subway and headed for JFK Airport.
In order to keep this entry from stretching on forever, I've split it up into three parts. If it helps, you can think of them as Pre-Airport, Airport & Flights, and Arrival in Tel Aviv.
{The blog client I'm using ate this post 2 or 3 times. Argh argh argh.}
The trip down to the airport was interesting, and one of the longest I've ever had. See, I live a bit north of Boston, MA, but my flight left out of JFK, in New York. This meant getting down there a day early or so. This apparent inconvenience was, indeed, intentional.
It was as nice as I'd hoped it would be having a day between the experience of "Hey, I'm packed and ready to go!" and the experience of "Hey, I'm getting on an airplane and shan't return for nigh on two months!"
To boot, it gave me the opportunity to run some last minute "I forgot to bring ____!"-type errands.
It also meant I got to spend some time with my old and dear friend Annie (who's also done a good bit more travelling than I, so had plenty of useful advice), whose fold-out couch I occupied that night.
The weather in New York was nasty. Overcast and rainy, and I timed my exeunt from the subway to perfectly coincide with the heaviest of the day's rain.
Good news: my poncho works and my bag is mostly waterproof.
Eventually got to the apartment. Took off my bag (which was of much fascination to the two cats), hung up my poncho, and set to (slowly, sleepily) fixing myself some food and making some last-minute web-updates before departure.
Later that night, after running a last-minute errand at EMS, I went to see a play that Annie'd done the set for. It was a powerful play, dealing with substance abuse and death, and most parts were played by actors who had struggled sincerely with the former.
After that, we met up with another friend and enjoyed some festivities, with live music and dancing well into the evening.
My excuse for being out way too late is that it helped with the jetlag (which I think it actually did, a bit)
The next day, I threw some things for the flight into my carry-bag (a lovely little thing from North Face that folds up into its own pocket when not needed, and has 4 compartments: 1 large, 2 medium sized, and 1 pouch) and Annie made a delicious send-off breakfast. After that, I hopped on a subway and headed for JFK Airport.
Friday, June 12, 2009
The Journey's Technology
[note: this is a post about the physical devices, not the connectivity schema. If you're interested in reading about that, go look at Transglobal's blogpost on "The Technology of Transglobal", as I more-or-less aped their setup with some modifications for my application. I may do another post on the software side of things later on.]
So, packing for a 7-week trip is tough. As far as what technology to bring, I wanted to find a good balance between connectivity and portability. Here's most of what I'm bringing:
[click the picture to go to Flickr, where there are notes for each item]
To Computer, or Not To Computer:
Weighing the pros and cons of bringing a laptop was a tough decision. On one hand, even a netbook would be pretty easily packable and would offer all the abilities of a full computer. On the other, I don't want to be worrying about it getting broken, stolen, wet, etcetcetc. and would rather have something that lets me focus on the trip and the experience, while still allowing blog-updates, photo-posting, and other ways to publish my memories and experiences during this trip.
Based on a few posts on the N95's abilities as a standalone device (which I'll link to here if I can find the articles again; they're at least a year old now), I decided to bring that instead of a small laptop. It's a pretty full-featured device, with most of the functionality of a low-end linux computer built into a smartphone.
The N95 offers a 5-megapixel camera (which, for example, took all my pictures during the Morocco trip last winter ) which I'll use as a backup camera, an internal GPS, an open-source software platform with a large developer base (so I can do everything from update my twitter to surf the web to calculate tips and currency conversion on)
I'm also bringing a bluetooth keyboard, which I'll use with the phone. This gives me most of the functionality of a full laptop with about 1/5th the weight and size.
The Camera:
Another key device is the main camera. I'm going to be using a Canon A2000 IS. The deciding factors here were: image quality, size and weight of the camera, price, and stand-out factor. It's a
Canon, so image quality is great. The manual mode even allows some SLR-like control of exposure compensation, ISO, and white-balance.
The size and weight are good- it's not the smallest camera I've ever seen, but for the image-resolution (10 megapixels) and quality (6x optical zoom, above-mentioned controls, good macro-mode), it's pretty good. It's also heavy enough that it feels fairly durable, but not so much that I wouldn't want to carry it around for several days on end.
The price was about $150, which is great for this level of camera.
As for how much it stands out: parts are a bit shiny, but the dark-grey color scheme and reasonable size make it reasonably nondescript. I don't want to be distracted from taking pictures by worrying about the camera getting swiped. I may break out the masking tape and try this camera camo-technique as well.
I also got a Gorilla Pod to use with the camera. It's really fun, and I look forward to no longer being foiled by trying to take stable long-exposure shots. There's a picture of it up on the Flickr as well.
Keeping it Charged:
The keyboard and the camera both take AA batteries. The phone charges from a proprietary Nokia power-cord. So, I've got two power-solutions. (and no pictures of them yet)
First, I found a great deal on a solar-charger/battery. It has outlet-adapters for USB and for the Nokia N-series plug. It has a 2000mah battery inside, which can be charged by the solar-panel or by USB. The only downside is that the charger feels a bit delicate, so I'm going to either make a case or some sort of protective cover for it before the trip starts.
Second, I got a USB-powered battery charger. It charges a pair of AA or AAA batteries, and (at least in theory) should attach to the solar-charger so I can recharge the batteries on the go if need be.
Cellular:
I ended up going with the GeoSIM card. I had a SIM card from eKit before, and they're okay but GeoSIM's rates are a bit better, and they seem to have better coverage in the places I'll be going. They also have data (GPRS) connectivity, which, while expensive, could come in handy.
I'll be bringing the eKit card as a backup.
Overall, I'm pretty happy with this setup. The keyboard/N95 combo has proven itself on the Morocco trip last winter, so I've got faith that it will work well here too. The camera looks like it will serve its purpose without being overbearing. The only totally untested piece here is the USB battery-charger, but, even if it explodes or something, AAs are easy to come by pretty much anywhere.
So, packing for a 7-week trip is tough. As far as what technology to bring, I wanted to find a good balance between connectivity and portability. Here's most of what I'm bringing:
[click the picture to go to Flickr, where there are notes for each item]
To Computer, or Not To Computer:
Weighing the pros and cons of bringing a laptop was a tough decision. On one hand, even a netbook would be pretty easily packable and would offer all the abilities of a full computer. On the other, I don't want to be worrying about it getting broken, stolen, wet, etcetcetc. and would rather have something that lets me focus on the trip and the experience, while still allowing blog-updates, photo-posting, and other ways to publish my memories and experiences during this trip.
Based on a few posts on the N95's abilities as a standalone device (which I'll link to here if I can find the articles again; they're at least a year old now), I decided to bring that instead of a small laptop. It's a pretty full-featured device, with most of the functionality of a low-end linux computer built into a smartphone.
The N95 offers a 5-megapixel camera (which, for example, took all my pictures during the Morocco trip last winter ) which I'll use as a backup camera, an internal GPS, an open-source software platform with a large developer base (so I can do everything from update my twitter to surf the web to calculate tips and currency conversion on)
I'm also bringing a bluetooth keyboard, which I'll use with the phone. This gives me most of the functionality of a full laptop with about 1/5th the weight and size.
The Camera:
Another key device is the main camera. I'm going to be using a Canon A2000 IS. The deciding factors here were: image quality, size and weight of the camera, price, and stand-out factor. It's a
Canon, so image quality is great. The manual mode even allows some SLR-like control of exposure compensation, ISO, and white-balance.
The size and weight are good- it's not the smallest camera I've ever seen, but for the image-resolution (10 megapixels) and quality (6x optical zoom, above-mentioned controls, good macro-mode), it's pretty good. It's also heavy enough that it feels fairly durable, but not so much that I wouldn't want to carry it around for several days on end.
The price was about $150, which is great for this level of camera.
As for how much it stands out: parts are a bit shiny, but the dark-grey color scheme and reasonable size make it reasonably nondescript. I don't want to be distracted from taking pictures by worrying about the camera getting swiped. I may break out the masking tape and try this camera camo-technique as well.
I also got a Gorilla Pod to use with the camera. It's really fun, and I look forward to no longer being foiled by trying to take stable long-exposure shots. There's a picture of it up on the Flickr as well.
Keeping it Charged:
The keyboard and the camera both take AA batteries. The phone charges from a proprietary Nokia power-cord. So, I've got two power-solutions. (and no pictures of them yet)
First, I found a great deal on a solar-charger/battery. It has outlet-adapters for USB and for the Nokia N-series plug. It has a 2000mah battery inside, which can be charged by the solar-panel or by USB. The only downside is that the charger feels a bit delicate, so I'm going to either make a case or some sort of protective cover for it before the trip starts.
Second, I got a USB-powered battery charger. It charges a pair of AA or AAA batteries, and (at least in theory) should attach to the solar-charger so I can recharge the batteries on the go if need be.
Cellular:
I ended up going with the GeoSIM card. I had a SIM card from eKit before, and they're okay but GeoSIM's rates are a bit better, and they seem to have better coverage in the places I'll be going. They also have data (GPRS) connectivity, which, while expensive, could come in handy.
I'll be bringing the eKit card as a backup.
Overall, I'm pretty happy with this setup. The keyboard/N95 combo has proven itself on the Morocco trip last winter, so I've got faith that it will work well here too. The camera looks like it will serve its purpose without being overbearing. The only totally untested piece here is the USB battery-charger, but, even if it explodes or something, AAs are easy to come by pretty much anywhere.
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