Tel Aviv nights

I had a real New York moment tonight.

It's Shabbat here in Israel, which is kind of like a Sunday, except that it starts on Friday night and continues until Saturday evening.

Almost everything should be closed because as an observant Jew, you're not supposed to work - not even drive a car (remember Walter Sobchak's rant in The Big Lebowski when he has to get into his car on Shabbes?). Obviously, that does not happen because not everybody is Jewish, or that observant, or whatever.

You do notice that a lot more shops are closed and streets less crowded though, even here in Tel Aviv.

So tonight, when I was looking for a place to eat, I was prepared to make compromises; or rather: to be glad to get some sort of decent food at all.

I ended up in an Italian Restaurant of all places, not only because it was one of the few restaurants open - as opposed to just any ol' joint that sells Pizza, Burger and Chicken (really in that combination) -, but because I really felt like having some other kind of food after days of eating mostly Hummus and the likes.

I had the oddest experience ever because it was such a cosy, dim place, playing wonderful Jazz and Opera music in the background (okay, a bit kitsch, but oh so lovely); it was just the place you'd imagine one of those Woody Allen scenes in New York in: Remember the opening scene of Melinda/Melinda? Exactly that kind of place. I had delicious pasta and treated myself to a glass of Italian red wine. I also started reading Uwe Tellkamp's Der Turm, the beginning of which is set in the winter, which gave me a strange, somewhat disconnected feeling.

It was the most amazing evening.

Tel Aviv - 3rd Day

The Tel Aviv Museum of Art hosts a quite impressive collection of Modernist painters: impressionists, expressionists, cubists, surrealists - Monet, Degas, Van Gogh, Picasso, etc. etc. - you get the picture.

I thought I didn't like impressionist art anymore; or any of the Modern Avant-Garde, because they are so overconsumed. Probably one of the first notions one has of art is impressionism; or rather, it is an art which has come to such a degree of pleasantness almost everyone would agree on the beauty of a Monet painting, it's candidness, it's aesthetic value - it is, in short (and maybe that is the most sordid thing one could say about art): pleasing to the eye. Impressionism seems to have lost - at least it did for me - every sense of radicality or even shock it must have had. Nowadays, you can find a reproduction of an impressionist painting to adorn everybody's living room; noone is offended anymore, quite the contrary.

I was somehow bored in advance, then, by the impressionists section of the exhibition. But a second look on a Degas painting - yet another one of the ballet scenes he is so (in)famously known for - puzzled me: Was I hallucinating, or was the background of the midst-rehearsal scene really a landscape -- did the wood floor actually discharge on a placid green field and trees? There could be no doubt about it. Was it - even more witty - the representation of a stage setting, and thus not "real" nature at all?

Thus, I suddenly discovered an incongruency in the painting: something was louche, as the French say, in this picture, something was not quite fitting this presumably harmonious and intimate moment of supposedly unobserved female figures abandoned to a moment of pause. Not only the way in which the painting was made - so comforting to our eye today, so outrageous to the impressionists' contemporaries - but what it supposedly depicted questioned the sense of reality or realism, of what was or wasn't "really" shown in this picture.

Jerusalem

The first thing you notice when arriving in Jerusalem is the Orthodox Jews; there are a lot of them, comparing to Tel Aviv, and they are, obviously, very visible. As I was riding a bus to the Old City, a group of young orthodox jewish boys boarded the bus -- fully dressed like their elders. But as the bus ride went on, you'd realize that they're just teenage boys, making lots of noise and spoofs and nonsense. Well, obviously, I guess; but I have to admit that I first thought they would be more, uhm, dignified I guess. Full of religious feeling and observance and all that stuff.

Arriving at the Western Wall was somewhat of a shock because it seemed more like an theme park: large groups of people and buses and screams and noise. The Western Wall itself is somehwat weird: crowds of men gathered along it, while the women wait about 50metres or so at a fence in a distance. I didn't get why - I guess it has something to do with the Jewish faith - but women weren't allowed to access, or maybe they're only allowed to access on women only days?

The whole Old City continues being either crowded with people and vendors trying to lure you into their shops or being really deserted. I walked around and got totally disorientated and lost, but you can orient yourself pretty well once you've reached one of the outside walls. I also did - the part I liked most - a ramparts walk, going along the northern side. It was quite interesting to be able to peep into the backyards of Old Jerusalem; because, though I can't imagine how or why, people really actually live there. (I think I'd go nuts within a week.) It was also really pleasant getting away from the crowd.

I duly strawled along the Via Dolorosa, walking by the place were Jesus was flogged by Pontius Pilatus. The Via Dolorosa is maybe the weirdest of it all, though, with all the shops alongside it. When you think about it though, it must have been like that when Jesus walked there too.

All in all, I found the Old City of Jerusalem highly irritating. I don't think I liked it. I walked around the city centre a bit; but was already too tired and worn out to really enjoy it. Jerusalem itself is very different from Tel Aviv; very hilly.

I am not sure whether I'm going back to Jerusalem at all; I would, but only to see Yad Vashem.

Tel Aviv - 2nd Day

I saw a pug on the beach today.
It refused to bathe in the sea like every other common golden retriever around.
It very elegantly hurdled through the sand.
I was in awe.

Israel: First Impressions

People seemed surprised, both here and back home, about my choosing Israel as a place for vacation.
Mostly, I guess, for reasons of security.
Lonely Planet states that the chances of getting killed in a car accident in your home country are higher than the chances of dying here in Israel because of a suicide bomber or the likes.
Still: Israel isn't just like any other country to spend your holiday in, and you notice right away.
Someone who lived all his life in Western Europe or the US is struck by the presence of soldiers - armed soldiers, that is -, and to some degree discomforted. I saw a twenty-something year old kid walking past me today with what looked like a machine gun dangling around his body. I didn't feel particularly safe because of it.
When I read Amos Oz A Tale of Love and Darkness before coming here, it struck me how fragile the Israeli state was from the beginning on. Coming from two different backgrounds and never really having cared about either of the two countries or cultures I was socialized in, I find it hard to imagine what it must mean to live or be born in a country like Israel. I saw a man at the beach today who had the geographical outline of Israel tatooed onto the right side of his chest. Can you imagine tatooing your home country - no matter how big or small - on your body? (And his tatoo was big, taking up almost all the right side of the thorax.)

Tel Aviv

Taking a bath in the lukewarm Mediterranean sea; jumping into the huge waves; falling asleep as I grub my hand into the sand.
Holidays: I heart you.

This is it.

And it didn't hurt at all.

Bring it on

Review: almost done.
E-ticket: printed.
Limit on VISAcard: expanded.
Library books: returned.
Playlist for b'day-party: made.
Dress for b'day-party: cleaned.

In other words: I'm almost there.

My momma told me: there'll be days like this

Jedes Wort mühselig erkämpfend fühlst dich wie ein Stein, aus dem man - wie im Märchen - nur unter größtem Druck einen Tropfen Flüssigkeit herauspressen kann. Ausgewrungen; abgerungen.

Good morning

Getting fined by the police for listening to Music on my Ipod while riding my bike: 10 Euros.
Telling a joke to the police officer and him not getting it: priceless.

Twentyfirst lesson of academic logic

Diss, oh Diss
I gotta tell you how I feel aboutchu
cos I oh I
can't go aminute withoutchu
Diss

Like a satellite
I'm in an orbite all the way aroundchu
and I would fall out into tha night
can't go aminute withoutchu
Diss

My other new fancy

So Trude and I started blogging about our masqueradique-photographic escapades. Go have a look.

Twentieth lesson of academic logic

So my friend made this great typo: emergy, which conflates three different things:
- energy
- emergence
- emergency

We decided to make it our PhD-slogan.