Thanksgiving

We miss you.

More Olives

Here are some additional photos from our day of olive picking:

Having lunch with our "Olive" family. The trees we were helping to harvest have been in this family for many generations. After some serious olive picking we sat down to an amazing lunch of homemade olive oil, olives, veggies, tuna, and laffa, a kind of pita bread. It was delicious and lovely. Also, we drank the best hot tea ever ever.

Covert photo. Josh speaking to soldier on patrol. I was told to photograph all interactions between the army and the people (including us). I'm a bit of a wuss, so I was not hanging out of tree taking action shots :)

The view from our olive grove. We are looking toward an army checkpoint.

Josh with some local kiddos. They wanted to fly to America with us.

These curious dried plants (or seeds?) were numerous on the ground. What are they??

Reflection: Olive Picking

This is a delayed post.

Well over a month ago, Natalie and I found ourselves in the northern West Bank, in the village of Awarra. We had volunteered with the organization Rabbis for Human Rights to join in the beginning of the Palestinian olive harvest.

Its hard, with this much time between the experience and this reflection to accurately describe our emotions during and after the day. It was an intense day. It was hot and very dry. Our hands were swollen from stripping the trees of their fruit (Josh) and sorting through the piles of the green and purple olives (Natalie.)

We went out as observers. To provide a watchful, Jewish eye, and to situate ourselves meaningfully between the Palestinian farmers, the army--who's job it is to provide a safe picking season--and the occasional Jewish settler.

The two of us joined a small family--Dad, wife, several children, mother-in-law--to pick their handful of trees. These olives were going to be pressed and/or pickled for the family to make it through the year. No one was making any money with these trees. We stood on ladders, picked, and then sat down to a remarkable, simple lunch. We had, hands-down, the best sweet tea of our lives. The secret, apparently, is sage. The dad spoke very good hebrew, and we chatted about all sorts of mundane and serious things. Otherwise we giggled with the children.

We also encountered the Israeli Army. Some of the officers were mellow. But as the day progressed, the Army became twitchy until we were finally advised by Rabbi Arik Ascherman that we ought to abandon our posts or risk being arrested.

The issue was the presence of violent settlers who stir up anxiety among everyone. We were picking olives in the distant shadow of the Jewish settlement of Itamar. This particular area of the territories has a fraught history. During the second intifada a Palestinian infiltrated Itamar and murdered a mother and her children. More recently a Palestinian farmer was chased and murdered in the fields--probably the same ones were in working in that day.

I feel weird reporting all this. Our experience was basically fascinating. We met with the local council chairman. We were permitted to put faces--many children's faces--to the rather abstract struggle that everyday--both here and in America--seems to completely absorb our hearts and minds.

Both of us agree that more interactions and extended encounters of this sort are important for us to gain deeper understandings of the circumstances surrounding the injustices which the Palestinian people suffer daily.

That said, for me, at least, I cannot say that going out to pick olives has made my own perceptions of the conflict more clarified. Of course, we hope for a quick and just resolution to the struggle. With two states for two peoples. Freedom of movement, education, peace, economic partnerships. I know my grandparents would buy oranges in Ramallah in the early 70s. That would be a nice reality again.

I am an idealist. And I think peace is good for our people. But I also do not want to be naive and not think there aren't elements out in those same hills that given the chance wouldn't murder Jews, and cannot--at least in this generation--accept any presence of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel. Similarly, there are violent and aggressive Jews who will do anything to thwart the return of Palestinian land and to blatantly intimidate and attack innocents Palestinians. So my idealism is tempered.

And, all of that tempered-ness said, the work of Rabbis for Human Rights and other Israeli progressive organizations is heartening. There is a vast wave of people here who genuinely want peace and reconciliation. And they are not just lefty secularists. There are many rabbis and religious Jews for whom peace is a central goal. RHR represents many of those folks. And any trip to Israel really cannot be complete without some participation in their projects--on either side of the green line.

Here are two photos from the day. We will post more tomorrow.

An olive tree and tarp with olives. The branches are stripped and the olives

drop to the tarp. They are then sorted by hand.

Olives, close up.

Curious Sighting

Down the street from our house is this curious garden made from old laundry detergent bottles, plastic caps, juice boxes, plastic animals, hats, and other pieces of plastic. It has a name, which I can't recall, and I think it has been acknowledged by the city as being a tourist attraction. I really want things to spin and water to shoot out, but every time I pass the garden is fairly still. It's really neat to stand and look at all the different pieces. I also wonder who took the time to create this! It's really intricate and obviously required a lot of time. It is also a pleasing burst of color on an otherwise slightly dour street.

More Yaffo

While in Yaffo we stopped by two really amazing art studios.

The first-- AdinaPlastelina. The owners/artists Sami Leder and Adi Prahia use a technique called "millefiori" (it means "a thousand flowers" in Italian) on polymer clay to create really amazing jewels. It's like phemo beads, but much much much cooler and prettier.

The second--the drawing studio of Julien Roux. We bought 5 awesome postcards and will be going back for a larger piece of art before we leave Israel. We were giddy at the sight of his strange work. One of my favorites is a black ink drawing of a Rabbi on a skateboard that has this caption written on the bottom "Cool Rabbins Are Skateboarding"

We didn't take any photos in either studio for fear of annoying the proprietors, but here are are few more photos of our brief time in Yaffo.

A Russian Orthodox church inside the walls of ancient Yaffo (can't seem to locate the name).

Blurry and saintly.

Still inside ancient Yaffo.

This lucky house overlooks the sea, ancient Yaffo.

Really ripe dates!

Vade and other good things

Yesterday evening we put Vade in a taxi headed for the airport so he could get on an airplane headed home. He visited for 3 weeks, coming and going, giving us advice on everything, and generally being the wise sage that he is. We had a great time wandering around Jerusalem together, traveling to Tel Aviv, and eating in far flung (East Jerusalem) restaurants.

Over the course we had some great conversations. Here are some of the topics we covered over the past 3 weeks:

--Food

--Israeli Politics

--Israeli Food

--Things we (Josh and I) do right

--Things we (Josh and I) do wrong

--Don't ask "why questions"

--What to eat on Thanksgiving

--You (Josh and I) are loved

--I Love Janet (we all love Janet, but Vade lead the charge on this one)

--I (Vade) Love Hummus

Our time together was capped off by a trip to Tel Aviv and Yaffo. Yaffo is one of the oldest cities in the world (4,000 yrs).

Out to dinner with my cousin Ariel and his wife, Jana. Our friends Samantha and Sacha were in town as well and joined us for dinner.

Josh and Vade at Yaffo. What you can't hear are two cats fighting each other to the death. It was scary.

We ascended into the Ancient City (in Yaffo).

It stopped raining for about an hour. This is taken during that pause.

Vade. Contemplating by the sea.