blog, israeli politics, my life in tel aviv

This is a confession for Kathy, who just wrote a comment that made me want to hug her.

I hate the expression “Bring them home!”  I want to say “Let Them Go!”  After all, it is Hamas who dragged these people out of their beds, or off the dance floor, and stuck them in tunnels deep in the ground.  Yes, maybe we should be negotiating with them directly if we could find them, but the immediate fault is not with our government – impossible as it is – but with Hamas.  We should be screaming it out all over the world:  “Let my people go!”

Bring them home – jan 21, 2024 Read Post »

blog, israeli politics, my life in tel aviv

Patient is sleeping peacefully, and looks a lot better.  Last night I was afraid to go to sleep in case he stopped breathing but today at 8 Dalia drove to Netanya and got the paxlovid before the country runs out completely.  By 9 he was beginning to feel better.  The fact that Oren sent over all kinds of soups, and Orit delivered the results of numerous consultations made a difference.  It is good to have people who care about you.

What will I do if I get it now?  Well, I’m not immune deficient, and I have a ton of cabbage soup in my fridge.  As long as I don’t have to watch the news I’ll be fine.

paxlovid – jan 21, 2024 Read Post »

blog, israeli politics

Except for the kale, which grows in our window, and the lemons from the tree just outside our door, we now get our fruits and vegetables from the beleaguered south.  A text comes to us on Tuesday and on Thursday evening the order arrives.  Tomatoes, cucumbers, and apples are the core.  The onions and potatoes are full of dirt, and sometimes some of the avocadoes are just a bit over or under, but the strawberries are always crazy sweet in this season.  The dates we bought down by the Dead Sea last month are stored in the freezer.  They are incredibly plump and sweet.  How much does it cost? about $30 a week, except for the dates which cost about $30 for 2 kilo.  How does match up?

vegetables – jan 21, 2024 Read Post »

blog, israeli politics, my life in tel aviv

Ezi’s tested positive and feels terrible.  He tested in the morning and since then we’ve discovered that the government cuts on the health budget means that there is no Paxlovid to be found.  And since he has no resistance, that medicine is probably necessary.  Maybe maybe tomorrow morning one of the kids will be able to procure a dose.  I actually think i’ve been sick with it for a few days, but not enough to keep me in bed.  

if Ezi didn’t need me I might have gone to the demonstrations tonight.  

 

 

 

covid and cure Read Post »

blog, israeli politics, my life in tel aviv

I didn’t know they had conquered Egypt. I didn’t know they were probably Turkish or Greek.  All I knew was that they were all over the Bible and then they disappeared.

There’s so much to learn.

And we went to escape from reality through archeology.  Unfortunately, there were a thousand people there and 100 of them were coughing.  So now we too are sick.  But that’s nothing compared to the mess we’re in the real world.

Philistines – Jan 19, 2024 Read Post »

blog, israeli politics, my life in tel aviv

We decided to change phones today. So on an impulse we raced to the apple store near us, and began to bargain.  “How much for our old phones?”  Osama, perfectly dressed and beautiful, sensed immediately that we were not of the class he was used to serving, and even though I was partly kidding, he didn’t crack a smile.  “What if we buy three phones?”  No smile.  In New York I got smiles from the Apple people, sometimes supercilious, but still smiles.  Here nothing.  “KSP gives more on the trade-in.” “So go there.” 

  We did.

Now I am sure that if Ezi had been coddled just a bit, he would have been happy to buy them, right then and there.  But not from Osama with his superior mien.  

We now have 2 new phones, bought from a sloppy. unshaven guy named Dror in KSP and I am wondering whatever made us go out this morning.

 

apple – jan 18, 2024 Read Post »

blog, israeli politics, my life in tel aviv

You ask an Israeli on the street how he is and she will probably say “Well, considering the situation.”  We’re at war, people here are dying every day, the world hates us, and we’re “well.”  In a way it has something to do with the past, and how absolutely terrible the Holocaust was for everyone.  Even here, when we waited for the British to run away and leave us to the Nazis to slaughter us all.  Or after the war when we in the US sent packages of food and used clothes to Israel.  Or during the Yom Kippur war when we had no communication with our relatives who were soldiers for months (I have no doubt that war ruined my marriage and many more.)    So the fact that we’re still functioning, even though some of us are being hidden in pitch-black tunnels, and more are fighting down south and up north against pretty brutal enemies, is not the worst that can happen to us.

 

Well, considering – jan 18, 2024 Read Post »

blog, israeli politics, my life in tel aviv

We went through the Moshe Castel Museum with the best guide possible, the CEO Eli Raz, and it is truly an amazing structure, overlooking the Jerusalem Hills, and filled with the works of one artist, unique in his use of letters of many ancient civilizations. 

There was surely something mystical in what his letters and figures in the paintings were saying but I was perhaps too tired to be impressed.  Perhaps I felt him pretentious.  Actually it was his earliest painting that most attracted me.

This means that he had genius in him, and my failure to connect with his later works may well have been a personal prejudice, or a grandiose direction he took.  The ‘guide’ Eli Raz, did everything possible to bring Castel  down to earth, and I would have loved to give him a delicate kiss.

 

moshe castel Read Post »