Tel Aviv Diary: Karen Alkalay-Gut

Now that I have your undivided attention, I should add that Ezi was not diagnosed – the doctor gave him “tamiflu” and antibiotics a few days ago with a warning that if his symptoms increase he should go to the doctor, and he’s feeling much better. (And I always have the same symptoms whether I’m really sick or not) But we stayed home today just to complete the recovery. A perfect day, not too hot, not too cool, and we are home cleaning out our studies. It was only when we saw the news tonight that we thought about whether we (he and maybe me in my own special way) had swine flu.

I also had the opportunity to put most of the songs of “The Paranormal in our Daily Lives” on line.
Here’s the link: http://www.karenalkalay-gut.com/paranormal.html.
Liz Magnes and I recorded the poems and music a while ago but haven’t had an opportunity to perform together for a long time. I’m hoping we have a chance soon.

I must admit, even as a child I never took this day too seriously. After all I grew up with the idea that the state of Israel existed, and a new world without mourning could be created. But today i heard Rabbi Loew on tv responding to the question of what is the big mourning about, and it concluded a thought that had been on my mind all day. He noted that as a result of the loss of the temple and homeland, the Jews suffered not only expulsion, but also later tragedies including the inquisition and the holocaust. It seemed to fit.

There was another kvetch on my mind as well. Some guy was trying to impress me with his new-found wealth and his new-found culture (wines, clothes, food, and, incidentally, concerts. This always turns me off unless the person shows me how he gives it away to fruitful charities, and today of all days it affected me even more. I kept thinking of Thorsten Veblen:
“This growth of punctilious discrimination as to qualitative excellence in eating, drinking, etc., presently affects not only the manner of life, but also the training and intellectual activity of the gentleman of leisure. He is no longer simply the successful, aggressive male, — the man of strength, resource, and intrepidity. In order to avoid stultification he must also cultivate his tastes, for it now becomes incumbent on him to discriminate with some nicety between the noble and the ignoble in consumable goods. He becomes a connoisseur in creditable viands of various degrees of merit, in manly beverages and trinkets, in seemly apparel and architecture, in weapons, games, dancers, and the narcotics. This cultivation of the aesthetic faculty requires time and application, and the demands made upon the gentleman in this direction therefore tend to change his life of leisure into a more or less arduous application to the business of learning how to live a life of ostensible leisure in a becoming way…. High-bred manners and ways of living are items of conformity to the norm of conspicuous leisure and conspicuous consumption.”
This seems to me to be connected to a general degeneration of Israeli society – but the good news is that it seems much more prevalent in the people of my generation than in the younger people. They’re more into recycling, cycling, and in general having fun with their lives. And understanding. It gives me hope.

You can find out more about me by checking my website here

We would like to invite you to the presentation of Judit Frigyesi’s documentary theatrical montage about East European Jewish prayer chant:

“Fleeting resonances” – Monday 3.8.09 at 17:30
Haniyon Theatre
Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus,

“Fleeting resonances” is a theatrical montage conceived and directed by Judit Niran Frigyesi based on her three-decade long fieldwork on the traditional prayer chant of the East European Jews. The program presents, in the form of a multi-media composition, which lasts about an hour and a half, her original sound recordings and films, readings from her novel, and short musical performances by Ben Niran (marimba) of his compositions and traditional East European Jewish instrumental music. (Previous performances: Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, 2006, Theater im Gewölbe, Cranach-Haus, Festival Jüdische Wochen in Weimar, 2006, Sirály Theatre Budapest, 2007-2008, Felicja Blumental Music Center, Tel Aviv, 2008.)

The program is part of the Music Sessions and Events (Coordinated and Produced by the Jewish Music Research Centre, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, director: Edwin Seroussi, coordinator: Naomi Cohn-Zentner) of the Fifteenth World Congress of Jewish Studies (Jerusalem, August 2–6, 2009).

This invitation allows entrance to Har Hazoffim campus on Monday 3.8.09 from 15:00 onwards. Please be sure to bring this invitation with you.

Naomi Cohn Zentner
Coordinator of Music Sessions and Events
naomicohnz@yahoo.com

Now that there are no wardens giving out fines to restaurants who stayed open last night, almost all of the nightspots were closed. The city was pretty much dark. Are people becoming religious around here, or, as it is more likely, when they are not pressured, they have respect? I don’t think there is more mourning for the destruction of the temple, but there is a little more understanding that respect for tradition is basic to a civilization.

I may have caught the flu that is wracking everyone i know. But I wasn’t feeling lousy this morning when i called the vet to announce that Shusha is not well yet. “Bring her in for another shot,” says Moshe Ben Ari. “Drive over, stop at the door, and call me, and I’ll come out with the injection.” I did, and it saved me at least an hour, and probably saved him from catching the flu that presented itself an hour later. It’s true he’s been our vet since 1987, so I’m biased, but again and again I’ve had opportunities to encounter other vets and compare, and he’s the best.

Tisha B’Av. Because Shusha was violently ill today I had to bring her in to the Vet. He gave her a shot and she needs to come in tomorrow. “But tomorrow is Tisha B’Av,” I say. “Will you be open?” “Sure, it’s one of our busiest. No one knows what to do with themselves, so they take care of their pets.” That was nice to know, since this day was not marked with a particular love for one another in the knesset or among people in the world. And of course, that’s what Tisha B’Av is mourning, not the loss of the place, but the diversity that it created.

Gilad Shalit could be traded for 300 million dollars. That is apparently an alternative to all the terrorists Israel doesn’t want to release into the wilds. And it happens this is what the US is going to give the Palestinians in aid. There is certainly a great deal to do there with that money, but it would be nice if Obama made that aid conditional on Shalit’s release. You can click here to ask him for it.

A guest from abroad – a woman my age – how how how do i keep her cool and happy on a boiling afternoon? Lunch, souvenir shopping and then a new outfit at Comme-il-faut. After a light but not inexpensive lunch, we went to Leiyla and she bought a t shirt that says in Hebrew “Thank God I was created woman” (i bought them last year for my daughters and daughter in law – it’s a variation on the morning prayer, “Thank God I was not created a woman”), and then at the clothes part she got another one that says “Utopia” in Arabic and Hebrew. While the saleswoman was explaining to my friend that it is important that the shirts are in both languages so that we may learn to speak each other’s languages, I also bought some tees at the shop, flowered sleeveless numbers that I had no business even trying on, but made me feel incredibly hip. The politically correct shirts just didn’t do anything for me.

Am i not interested in co-existence? Yes, and I will do whatever I can every chance I can get. But I don’t think I can wear that shirt.

…Maybe because it feels like a way to escape actual action.

Have you sign the protest against the boycott of Israel Scholars yet? click here

Suggestions are now being received as to how to spend our anniversary today. We kind of feel like we celebrate every day and there may be no way to outdo that. I’d go for a photo shoot of Tel Aviv – ending with the bats at night in our neighborhood. Maybe I’ll just put the ones I have online – a Haredi on rollerskates, two horses escaping on the the ayalon freeway (against the traffic), a flock of sheep going down our street…. Where will i find them all?
But if you have any ideas, let me know.

My few recent visits to the Knesset have awakened in me an unwilling desire for architectural design. I don’t want to think about it, but it comes back to me in unexpected moments – the fact that a building can inspire honesty and straightforwardness or deviousness and cunning. After endless twistings and turnings of the corridors we arrived at our destination in which we found a young man smoking. Isn’t smoking forbidden, we asked. Well, he responded, it is forbidden in the knesset, but this room may be considered the offices of a member of parliament which therefore are private and not public. So if I stepped outside my office, I would get a fine, but in here it is a grey area. His response keeps ringing in my ears. And I keep thinking I’d build a building in which there were no labyrinths and no grey areas. A square building with two floors of 15 offices in each corridor and open meeting places in the middle. The ministries could have offices on another floor, but with the same principle of open access.