The 11th Floor

A Perpsective Overlooking Jerusalem, Israeli Life, and Talmud Torah

Monday, November 19, 2007

A strange treasure on Rosanes street.

Not too far from the Shalom Hartman Institute is the kind of block that seems part of a bygone Jerusalem, as if taken from a short story by Amos Oz. About a five minute walk from the shops of Emek Refaim Boulevard,with its exceptional bakery (Pe’er) and immaculate butcher shop (Shoshani and Sons), Rosanes street is quiet, secluded, and drenched in greenery. The old stone buildings feature large lots with gardens and patios, fenced and walled in from noise. The street dead-ends, and it’s intersection is set far enough back that if on a bike or in a car, you could miss it easily enough.

As I have written before, Jerusalem is a city of hidden palaces, a veritable kingdom of secret gardens. Walls and fences are built thick or high to keep the world at a distance. On occasion, you will peer through an open gate and discover displays of horticultural skill that evoke dreams of garden oases and Mediterranean spas.

But on this street is a remarkable, perhaps singular treasure in Jerusalem: a water spigot for passers-by. The spigot is tarnished brass, the setting is done in a pale blue which leaps out at the eye from the limestone of the wall. "All those who thirst, come to the water,” reads the Hebrew (Isaiah 55:1, the start of one of the most comforting chapters in Tanach). The water gushes out with force, and the unused water trickles back behind the wall into a garden.

On one hand, the street dead ends, and this water is not along a known shortcut or regular path. Who would stroll by? There is no through traffic here. And yet, in this dusty mountain town, where water can be scarce and heat can be scorching, what a gift to a lost wanderer on foot. Which is, after all, how I found the place, when in the heat of an August day I was trying to find a shortcut home so I could get a drink.

The rest of the verse in Isaiah reads "and all who have no money; come, buy, and eat; yes, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." If they had something in the wall for that part of the verse, I have a feeling Rosanes Street would be a horribly crowded place.


Tuesday, November 13, 2007

the next big update

It finally got cold here. Cold by Jerusalem standards, I should say, because the weather that they call winter in Jerusalem is better known as Autumn in the parts of the USA that are not infested with fire ants. Even last week was a day with a high in the 70’s- and now that the days

only make it into the low 60’s Jerusalemites are wearing several layers. These are the layers
most northerners in the US have had on since
September, but would never bother to wear if it was still this warm back home. Please note I did not call it “Fall”, because leaves here don’t normally turn colors before falling off trees. They just turn brown and die.

Its not all bad, mind you. Flowers still bloom in riotous bunches, as pictured here.

Please don’t tell them that its November, and it's too cold. After all, they are Israeli flowers; if you tell them its too late in the year to be blooming, they might just glare at you, and say “And who are you to tell me how to bloom- and when?

Still, people feel colder here in December than they do in Milwaukee or Toronto. What makes a

Jerusalem “winter” so chilly is a three fold process.

  1. Damp. It is rarely cold enough to snow, but it is usually humid enough to cause mold to grow indoors. Damp+ Dark= Bleeeeuch. It's also a windy time of year, so umbrellas are of little help when it rains.

  2. No forced-air central heat. If you are lucky enough to have central heat and you are renting, heat is through radiators that warm up once a day. One corner of the room is always decent, and the rest of the room will keep your beer cold all day.

  3. Stone floors. These damned tiles that make up the floors in almost every Jerusalem home are cold, cold, cold. Whatever heat you may get rises right up, leaving your tootsies clammy. There’s not a nice wooden floor in sight. Even gym floors in this country are on plastic or composite materials- but not wood. The best bet is a good rug- and a good rug costs big cash, so most students do without.

Of course, the first rain was cold and made big puddles, but it was not forceful enough to wash away a summer’s worth of plant debris and cat feces from the streets and gardens of Jerusalem. All this rain did was rehydrate stuff that had been desiccated for a long time, making a funky musty smell reach out at unexpected moments. Eeeech.

Israeli high school teachers and professors have been on strike for nearing a month or more at this point. They don’t picket the schools here, where nobody would see them. Teachers here stand on the corners of intersections with signs that read “Cheap Education is costing us a fortune” and “Honk if you support the teachers.” And people honk back, because as I’ve noted before, Jerusalem drivers will honk at anything, even signs that say, “honk you moron.”

The teachers stand with whistles and horns and beat out the same rhythm each day- ta-ta, ta-ta-ta, ta-ta ta-ta. People honk it back, shout their approval, and the strike goes on. One moring last week, the teachers were on a nearby corner. I could not see them, or even hear them all that well, but I knew it was teachers by the beeping and drums- ta-ta, ta-ta-ta, ta-ta ta-ta.

The latest tactic seems to be signs plastered on trash bins everywhere that read in clear black print “Olmert! Take [the] Education out of the trash!”

Ta-ta, ta-ta-ta, ta-ta ta-ta.

In close, I wish to share my prayers and best wishes to my cousin Phil, who just survived a heart attack. Refuah Shelaeymah.