1) Ariane and The Giant
2) Desensitization
3) Recent Happenings
4) Photo Project
1) ARIANE AND THE GIANT
I think I'm in a strange mood because it's been so rainy lately, so I thought about waiting to write until I'm in a more upbeat mood, but on the other hand, nobody is in a fantastic mood 100% of the time, so why not represent a fuller picture of my experience overseas?
Everything I've written about Israel and the land and my friends here and how much I love it is still true, but simultaneously, I've been thinking a lot about what human beings (okay, what *I*...) do to find fulfillment in life.
I spent the past few years in the states dreaming and scheming about how to make the move to Israel. And I would say 4/7 days of the week I wake up really excited to be here and have a moment of "OMG living the dream!!" And the other 3 days are just fine, normal, good life days. But it's interesting to me how often I meet Israelis who are dreaming and scheming to go somewhere else entirely. The States, often, or Europe, or Australia/New Zealand, or India. Lots of people here pining for India.
And sometimes my response is "OMG, Go! Go live your dream! Yes it is difficult at times but it's wonderful and there's nothing more satisfying than realizing you can pack up and go and make a new life for yourself in a foreign place and muscle through it all." Actually, that's always my response, because I believe encouragement is almost always the only thing worth offering someone.
But sometimes I think that there's no such thing as a geographical cure for the human condition (confusion, aimlessness, loneliness, ennui, emptiness...) and the fact that I dream of Israel while Israelis dream of America kind of indicates a human being's general tendency to pile our hopes pnto some "other" which supposedly will solve our problems. It doesn't really matter where Shangri-la is as long as it's not where we happen to be standing at the moment. It reminds me of this quote from Emerson that I found while reading with Mitch this past spring...
“Traveling is a fool's paradise. Our first journeys discover to us the indifference of places. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty, and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. I seek the Vatican, and the palaces. I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, but I am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go.”
I guess I land somewhere in the middle. I'm totally intoxicated here. But my giant is here beside me as well, he refused to be left behind in Boston. My giant and I are totally intoxicated. Which is actually maybe a little dangerous, Ariane and her giant, drunk.
2) DESENSITIZATION
Yesterday I had a long phone conversation with Caroline back home, which was really amazing. I love my friends here in Israel but being with new friends really highlights how old friends are missing from my every day life. No amount of enthusiasm can compensate for history with someone, the context someone has through long friendship. I love you, Caroline!
Anyway, she opened by saying how worried she'd been about me, and she really did sound worried. She was worried because of the murder of several innocent people in a Jerusalem synagogue last week. I definitely appreciated her worry (and all the rest of your worries, thank you for reaching out and thinking of me!), but at the same time it caught me off guard because it wasn't something I'd really been thinking about.
Don't get me wrong, there are of course tons of people here who were personally impacted by this horrible event. I know people who sat shiva last week because of some connection to the victims. And of course it's on the news here. And of course I'm disturbed on a certain level. Mostly I'm disturbed by the fact that there were axes and meat cleavers involved, which is particularly barbaric. And because despite the inaccurate reporting of foreign news sources, I assure you that the site of the murders was not a controversial location at all. It was in a synagogue in a very jewish neighborhood in Western Jerusalem, not contested territory at all. I've only been to Har Nof once but it's basically this enclave of religious students and families and not much else. So what's troubling is sometimes you think here that you can be "smart" or "safe" by avoiding obviously tense areas. But when something like this happens the idea that any action of your own can prevent you from being exposed to terror is wiped away. You just kind of have to hope you're not around when random acts of violence sprout up.
But despite all of that, I have to say that my personal life really wasn't impacted, nor was the life of most of the Israelis around me. Life really just goes on. I've noticed they check my bags now at the Central Bus station, but that's it.
It's bizarre to me. After the Marathon Bombing of course all of Boston shut down (although in that case, there was a man hunt, and in this case the terrorists have already been apprehended/killed), and the city went into shock and mourning for months. And I personally had all kinds of weird reactions. But here it's practically routine. People are used to it. People are used to it!
I'm not sure what else to say about that.
3) RECENT HAPPENINGS
A lot has happened since my last post, so again I will sum up via photos.
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| We got a fridge for the apartment! And a lot of booze for the party! |
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| Yahli, Me, and Ido at our apartment party! |
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| A lot of beautiful Doroters came, too: Leonora, Kiyomi, Sam, and Louisa |
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| And Geva and Rivka and Tuna! |
It was really fun! I got to meet a lot of Yahli and Ido's friends, and there was a lot of imbibing.
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| Best roomies ever. |
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| The aftermath |
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| In which I, typically, got far too emotionally involved. I was Meretz, the far left party here, and I'm pretty sure this was my reaction when the supposedly moderate-left party, Yesh Atid, joined forces with the Israeli version of the GOP, Likkud. Mofos!!! How could you??? |
We also had a seminar on the Nakba ("the disaster"), or the Palestinian view of Israel gaining independence in 1948. Obviously I could write an entire book about this but I think I'd mostly be repeating what I iterated last year when I went on the West Bank Trip, so if you want to read about that, it's here.
For this seminar we went to Lod, or Lydda, a mixed Arab/Jewish city that was once primarily Arab. Lod is notorious for being the city where the Palmach (Pre independence Israeli military force) supposedly killed many Palestinians. I'm not saying "supposedly" to express any personal doubts about this, just because the evidence is so controversial and contested that I really have no idea what I think happened.
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| The Mosque where "supposedly" many were rounded up and killed by a grenade. |
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| The square outside the mosque now called Palmach Square, which the locals view adds major insult to major injury. |
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| A map of the area which has been interestingly defaced. |
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| A church in Lod dedicated to Saint George (as in Saint George and the dragon) who "supposedly" hailed from the city. |
Back in Tel Aviv, I saw this snail:
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| I really like how you can see it's trail. Speed Demon. |
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| Singing and Dancing |
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| It was gorgeous |
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| I saw this on Sheinkin, the cross-street I live near, and it made me laugh. Somebody has a serious issue with the wealth disparity in TLV. |
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| They don't use electricity or do any work on Shabbat, they're very dedicated. |
I realize my posting has become rather infrequent, and I think it's because I've adjusted a bit to life here and I lose sight of what might be interesting to someone reading my blog. But even though people don't comment much here (pointed look), apparently a lot of you are reading it because people keep nagging me to update.
So I think what I'm going to do is a make it a point to take a photo of something interesting and post it with some explanation every. single. day. That way you all can have your minimum daily value of Ariane and it will also keep me observant and thoughtful about my surroundings.
Today I bring you:
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| Mahzeh 9 |
Most of my work here is independent... writing, reading, studying... and I don't like doing it in my apartment because it feels weird, so I need to go out to work, but working in cafes gets expensive really fast, so I was bemoaning the absence of libraries last night when my new friends Sammy and Paul told me about these workspaces that have popped up around TLV for free-lancer types like me. Lots of programers and start-up people especially. This one has free wifi, clean space and bathrooms, and sometimes free coffee. I pack up coffee and food and type away to my heart's content. Next great American-Israeli teenage romance novel is being written here, my friends. Get ready.
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