Communities of Israel

[av8rmike]

Today we finally made it to צפת (pronounced "tsfaht" but spelled in English as "Safed" for some reason).  We were leaving the kibbutz, so we had to pack everything early in the morning and load it on the bus.  Safed is a sharp contrast to cities like Tel Aviv and the kibbutzim.  Everything was made out of limestone, including the narrow streets, so it looks more like a Middle Eastern city one would picture.  It's also situated on the side of a big hill, so there are some great views overlooking the Hula Valley.  Safed was either the home or birthplace of Isaac Luria (I can't remember which), the founder of the Jewish mysticism movement.  There are many Kabbalists and other followers of the mysticism there.

We went to a beautiful old Sephardic-style synagogue, with three arks (most only have one) and many other elements taken from ancient texts that are symbolic.  We then went to Livnot U'Lehibanot, another tour sponsor, and a sort of "mission" for Americans who want to come to Israel and study Judaism.  The guy who spoke to us was from Kansas, and the other people we saw there seemed to be Americans as well.  We next went to the studio/gallery of David Friedman, an artist who bases much of his work on the mystical ideas like gematria (assigning number values to letters) and color analysis.  I didn't buy any of his art, mostly because it didn't do anything for me, and I don't really believe in the whole mystical stuff anyway.

Next, of course, was lunch, where several of us went to a schwarma restaurant.  Schwarma is an Israeli dish, meat and vegetables with hummus and tahini in a pita.  This place had a huge stack of meat that looked like pancakes, and they just sliced off huge chunks straight into the pitas.  We had to get right back on the road, this time to drive almost half the length of the country.  We were picking up several Israeli soldiers as part of the "mifgash" (which essentially means "rendezvous") program, as sort of informational exchange.  There were four women and three guys; the women were tank instructors and the men were intelligence officers, and all were about 20-22 years old.  One of them was American, from Long Island, and had been living in Israel with her parents for several years.  We were picking them up further south, in Latrun, near Jerusalem, and had to drive almost the whole way around the West Bank to get there.  On the way we passed many Palestinian and Jewish towns, on both sides of the border, and the wall that is starting to be built to separate the two territories.

After we picked up the soldiers, it was another long drive south to the Negev, where we'd be staying the night at a Bedouin camp.  The terrain outside became progressively more desolate and rocky the further south we went.  At Arad we turned off the main road and onto a long, winding road along the mountains to the Bedouin camp.  It was an (artificial) oasis in the northern part of the Negev, the desert, not far from the ancient fortress of Masada.  Accomodations for the evening consisted of two large tents with a lot of sleeping bags and mats.  One tent was for the women and one for men.  There was also an eating tent and a smaller one for our "hospitality" program.

First up were the camel rides, which I admit, I'd never done anything like before.  There were about 20, enough for us to double up.  They didn't spit or smell as bad as I'd feared, but it still wasn't the most pleasant of experiences.  Camels aren't very obiedient animals, so they were all tied together in several rows.  We only went about 1/4 of the way around the encampment and back, not all that far. Our camel seemed to like the one in front of it. The next event was the "Bedouin hospitality," consisting of a guy talking too quietly about the Bedouin life.  Tea and Turkish coffee were also part of the ceremony, but I couldn't hear the explanation why.  They also played some folk songs on their native instruments for us.  We had dinner in one of the sleeping tents, sitting on the floor around little tables.  They brought out trays of bread, rice, kebabs, and vegetables, which we ate with our hands.  I think that was probably the best meal we'd had all week.  It was mostly the same foods, but for some reason it tasted better tonight.

We had to be up extremely early the next morning to catch the sunrise over Masada, but Natan offered to lead some of us on a walk across the desert to look at the stars.  It was ראש חדש (Rosh Chodesh, or new moon), so it would be a very dark night.  The "desert" was more of a huge rock bed that proved difficult to walk on, even in tennis shoes.  There was a big hill to walk down to a clearing, but once we got out of the camp's lights, the view was simply stunning.  Compared to even the suburbs, the desert is so dark and quiet, you could see thousands of stars and hear camels braying from over the hills.  We couldn't stay long, because we had to get to sleep for the next day's hike.