Weird Rubber Shoes–The One Thing Everyone Likes

Something I’ve noticed since landing here is the high number of people wearing Crocs.  I don’t really have anything against Crocs, they seem comfortable, but honestly, I think they look pretty silly.  I never quite understood how Brown’s Shoe Fit  Co. in Grinnell could sell their mountains of Crocs.  Who is buying all of those funny looking shoes?  Here, though, there are entire stores selling only Crocs.

And it is not at all surprising.  Some of the most stylish girls on the street wear Crocs.  Off duty soldiers wear Crocs.  The spaced-out “manager” of the hostel-bar-indian restaurant-movie theater we stayed at in Tel Aviv was wearing mismatched Crocs.  Moms wear Crocs.  Babies wear Crocs.  Dads wear Crocs.  Even this stately Arab man has taken advantage of Crocs Inc.’s endless array of colors to perfectly complete his all-white ensemble.

Maybe if all Israelis and Palestinians would just take a look at each others’ feet every once in a while, they would see that whatever their differences are, they really are all just people who like Crocs.

Tel Aviv

A day at the beach

The trip from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv only took forty-five minutes in a shared taxi, but when we arrived it felt like we had traveled to another country.

Tel Aviv, which sits on the beautiful coast of the Mediterranean, is Israel’s largest metropolitan area and its most modern city.  Before 1900 the area was just a cluster of houses on the sand dunes north of Jaffa.  This location means that the weather was stifling, just as hot as Jerusalem, but unbearably humid.  On the other hand the modernity and beachfront property make the city feel like a natural party town, sort of how I imagine parts of Miami or one of the surf towns near Los Angeles.  It helps that Tel Aviv is full of really nice bars and restaurants and cafes.

The population is known to be largely secular and that was apparent from the first few minutes of walking down the street.  Of course you still see men wearing kippot and women in long skirts in far greater numbers than you would in New York, but the streets aren’t crowded with men in black hats the way that Jerusalem’s are.  Tel Aviv residents also seemed—and I feel pretty shallow and guilty saying this—quite a bit better looking than those of Jerusalem.  On the whole the city felt, to us, pleasantly normal.

In a lot of ways Tel Aviv makes Jerusalem feel like some kind of provincial outpost inhabited by fanatics.  I have grown to love this city, but I can’t help feeling that this impression of it as provincial and fanatical is largely correct.  Over a third of all Jerusalemites are ultra-Orthodox.  They live in a society of their own.  To say the least, they are not the kind of people you’ll find playing volleyball in Speedos or bikinis on the shore of the Mediterranean.  There are also very few Palestinians in Tel Aviv, as opposed to Jerusalem, half of which is technically occupied territory according to international law.  This is not to say that the absence of Arabs that makes Tel Aviv pleasant—I generally feel more comfortable among Arabs than Israelis and prefer Arab culture overall—it just makes it possible to forget for a minute about the conflict that plagues this region.

What I found interesting was that being in Tel Aviv made me feel—for pretty much the first time since I arrived here—that I can be proud of Israel and supportive of Zionism.  Zionism is a movement to provide a homeland for a nation that lacked one.  Unfortunately, much of this has come at the expense of a people who already had a homeland.  (And there have been countless flaws with the way Zionism has been implemented.) But in Tel Aviv, which was built on an empty piece of land, incurring minimal displacement, there is a feeling that maybe this project could be a success. Maybe Zionism and the State of Israel don’t have to be dominated by religious fanatics and marred by racism.  As a Jew, I do get a certain satisfaction and sense of pride from going to a café or bar and knowing that everyone there is also a Jew, this is a country that was made for us.  But that satisfaction and pride are far greater at a bar in Tel Aviv than it has ever been in Jerusalem.

What kind of tourists are we?

Haaretz, one of Israel’s most prominent newspapers, ran this story the other day about tourists to Israel.  This is one of the things that they said:

Tourists who visit Israel are divided into clear categories, adds Heisman. The majority are Jews from the United States or France who come to the Holy Land for a vacation and at the same time, when possible, also conduct real estate deals. Next on the list are Christian pilgrims, who, to the dismay of many business owners, are not that wealthy for the most part and not big spenders. Another large group is comprised of business owners who make brief but regular visits here several times a year. There are also cruise ship passengers who spend a night or two, as well as casual tourists from all over the world.

So what are we?  I am a Jew from the United States here for a vacation, but I am most definitely not conducting any real estate deals.  Helen is a Christian, here on her own sort of pilgrimage, but she has little in common with the troops of Koreans or Spaniards you see at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. And I am here on business, kind of, but not for a regular visit by any means.  And neither of us have ever been on a cruise.  Does this mean that we are “casual tourists from all over the world”?  I guess so.  We have stayed in hostels, traveled the country, floated in the Dead Sea, but even this broad label seems like it doesn’t really describe us.

A friend of ours who spent last semester in Tel Aviv commented that he found it interesting that our experience in Israel was so much more political than his.  I think that this gets to the heart of what kind of tourists Helen and I are in Israel.  We are both news junkies, fascinated with politics, attracted less to beaches and luxury than important and misunderstood cultures.  This is why Helen and I lived in Moscow and Amman respectively last semester, as opposed to Australia or Paris.  We are in Jerusalem largely because we want to see for ourselves this place that we read about in the New York Times every day.

Which is not to say that we are strictly political tourists.  We appreciate biblical history or romantic scenery just as much as oppressive walls or Zionist political ideology.  And I don’t think that we are alone in finding these aspects of travel in Israel interesting.  A number of those interviewed for the Haaretz story expressed a similar interest in visiting Israel. This is undeniably a draw for a lot of people who come here.  That’s something to keep in mind while you read about what Helen and I are up to.

Marketplace Marketplace

See those sandals they are selling? I bought some of those the other day.  They are the kind that look like what the Romans or Jesus would have worn, which I guess is the point.

I had been glancing longingly at those shoes since I got here.  A couple days ago I was walking through the Old City and lingered at a sandal shop.  Lingering on anything is obviously an invitation for the shopkeeper to start offering tea and good prices and a pleasant buying experience.  But when I was walking away, the shopkeeper said “Come back!  Free shoes!  You can have free shoes!”  I thought that was such a hilarious proposition that I went back and bought some shoes.  They were very reasonably priced, though not free.  In fact, I’m  pretty sure that I paid quite a bit more for them than I had to.  I am absolutely terrible at bargaining, unless I don’t want something.

After I left, wearing my new sandals, every sandal shop I passed was even more aggressively courting my business than they had been previously.  I understand I had tagged myself now as not simply a tourist, but as a tourist who buys things.  But the sandal-sellers drew the obvious conclusion that if I had just bought myself a pair of sandals, the next thing I would want to buy would probably be a pair of sandals.  Of course.

Anyway, now I’ve got new sandals.  When I walk I stare at my feet and think about being a prophet or the Virgin Mary.  I say to myself, “I’m just another pilgrim with the simplest leather sandals, on my way to the ATM.”

The Armenian Quarter

A few small things to say

We returned from a couple days in the lovely town of Nazareth on Saturday evening. On Sunday we went back to work. Thinking of Sunday as a work day requires a little bit of turning my brain inside out, but I dealt with it ok.

Anyway, here are a few things I saw yesterday:

A VW Bus

Three black breifcases, the ultimate sign of adulthood

A cushy chair, a cup, and a closed “Oriental” restaurant.

War at the movies

Seeing a movie in the theater isn’t the kind of thing that should vary too much from one country to another.  You go, you sit in the dark, you eat popcorn, you watch the movie, and then you leave. As long as the subtitles are in English, why should it matter if you are in France or Russia or Jordan or wherever?  But last night when Helen and I went to see a new Israeli movie called Waltz With Bashir, the fact that we were sitting in a movie theater full of Israelis entirely changed the way I thought about the film.

Waltz With Bashir is an animated documentary about the filmmaker’s struggle to sort through his memories of being a 19-year-old Israeli soldier fighting in Lebanon in 1982.  At first he can’t remember anything, but then he probes the far reaches of his memory by conducting interviews with fellow soldiers and psychologists.  The truth—if you insist on calling it that—he dredges up is harrowing.  Waltz With Bashir is in many ways a classic anti-war movie; it deals with the inhumanity of warfare, the absurdity of wars being fought by teenagers, the trauma that it inflicts on the soldiers.  But the movie conveys its message originally and thoughtfully.  I would have appreciated Waltz With Bashir even if I had seen it in the comfort of my living room in Montclair, New Jersey.

At the end of the movie I stood up to leave and looked around at the crowd in the theater with me.  Many of the moviegoers were middle aged, about the same age as the filmmaker.  Among them there must have been at least one who fought in Lebanon, I thought to myself, one who could relate to the memories that the film depicts.  If I had seen Waltz With Bashir back at Oberlin, it would still have been a powerful movie, but having seen it in Jerusalem lent the themes a far greater immediacy.

Life in Israel-Palestine is quiet right now, though it would never really be described as peaceful.  Israel and Hamas are set to begin their ceasefire tomorrow; terrorists haven’t attacked in a while (aside from the rockets that continue to fall from Gaza) and the Israeli Army hasn’t launched a major offensive for a few months (though they continue to bomb targets in Gaza).  But conflict is never too far away here: potentially on the ground, always in people’s memories.

Bible Tour

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre

The seventh station of the cross.

Amidst cries of “Hello, where are you from? Would you like a tour? Juice? Want Juice?” and a lot of buying and selling and chaos and people, I followed around the Via Dolorosa today in the Old City. I have been to that part of Jerusalem so many times now that it seems I should know my way around, but I am always immediately lost as soon as I start trying to find my way to any specific point.

They’re Everywhere

The other day on the bus, someone’s cellphone started blaring Sheryl Crow. I looked to see where it was coming from and, of course, it was the girl with big sunglasses, manicured nails, an army uniform, and a machine gun whose pink-sparkle cellphone was ringing (not the same girl as pictured above). And the other day a young couple in civilian clothes asked Max and I for directions. It was jarring as they walked away to see their machine guns swinging behind them.

Mandatory military service is just a part of life here, and the soldiers are required to keep their guns with them all the time. I don’t feel threatened by the nice kids with guns, nor do I sense that there will be any reason for anyone to use one of those guns in the vicinity of myself. But still, it is hard for me to imagine having military service be so much a part of my daily life, and I still find it difficult not to stare at the stylish girl soldiers. As Max pointed out, the two of us would have finished our time by now, and who would I be if I had just finished 3 years in the military instead of 3 years majoring in Art at Oberlin College?

Anyway, yesterday must have been field trip day for the soldiers. I ran into the crowd above while taking a bus tour of the city. And later, at the archeological attraction City of David, where the top picture is taken, most of the visitors were soldiers.