| Herzliya,
Israel
19.4-21.4
|
 |
london |
| Herzliya,
Israel
19.4-21.4
|
|
london |
Enough bitching. I've got 510 pages of Mircea Eliade (pilfered from E.'s extensive anthropology collection) to keep me occupied.
Is that kippa-headed mob up front a toilet queue or a minyan (Jewish prayer congregation)?
Just what I needed: turbulence and thunderstorms, Larnaca Airport lit up with strobe flashes of lighting, kids bawling their lungs out.
On the final leg of the flight, the coastline of Cyprus faded into the horizon, the halogen lights of the ring road lighting up like an amber necklace in the darkness...
The flighh did eventually arrive in Israel, more than 3 hours late, on what should be a 4-hour hop. "I trust you've enjoyed your flight", recited the captain, without the faintest hint of irony.
|
The khamseen winds from the Sudan have kicked up a sandstorm, which has deposited layers of brown dust as far as Israel. The skies are colored a muddy gray, no clouds, just suspended dust particles. Underneath it is atypically cold for the season, less than 20 degress Celsius, and it feels more wintery than last January. Cairo is supposed to be even worse -- dammit, can't I even work up a tan here? Meanwhile, Israel is busily going about the halachically ordained task of obliterating all traces of hametz before Pesach (Passover). Pesach celebrates the liberation of the Jews from slavery in Egypt, so this is commemorated by eating only unleavened bread, mostly the famous (and amazingly bland) matzoh. Correspondingly, all leavened bread (ie. anything containing yeast or another rising agent), also known as hametz, must be destroyed. This includes, but is not limited to, hamburger buns, dog food, and all the water in Lake Kinneret (Sea of Galilee), since some fishing bait is hametz! In other news, The Institute for Sabbath Technology is sponsoring a study to develop a bottle cap that can be opened on the Sabbath without a breaking action, classified as "work" and thus forbidden. Only in Israel... |
Oy vey! HEL-STN 40 min late, STN-TLV 90 min late, and now TLV-CAI(ro) no less than 150 min (2.5 hours) late. So far. This travel log seems to consist primarily of transport delay kvetching... but then again, I'm going to Egypt. What can I expect?
The annoying part about this is that I'll have to break one of my unwritten rules and, for the first time ever, eat at an airport restaurant. (I have less than fond memories of even train station restaurants.) I left the Eliade book at home, but the 890 pages of Laurence Durrell's (excellent!) Alexandria Quartet ought to keep me entertained for a while...
E. would've liked this -- she's the only person I know who claims to actually enjoy waiting at airports. Men are men, women are women and never shall the twain meet...
I've already had three people come up to me with official questionnaires
and quiz me about my satisfaction with Israeli passport control, the airport
and Israel in general. Whaddayamean, I don't look Jewish? Unfortunately
I'm afraid that my truthful replies will skew the distribution of any questionnaire
rather radically...
| How many times have you been to Israel? | 5 |
| What tourist sites did you visit? | None |
| How much money did you spend per day? | 0 shekels |
| Did you find Israeli passport control questions intrusive? | No, since the goon from the Finnish embassy didn't let me say a word... |
Ah, geopolitics, that bane of the Middle East. This flight is an Air Sinai flight, flown in an entirely unmarked plain white plane, solely to allow the parent company EgyptAir to claim that they don't fly to the country of the evil Zionist oppressors. The route map provided in the in-flight magazine shows the West Bank as independent, the Golan Heights boxed off, and Gaza as belonging to Egypt!
Despite the gray pancake suspended above everything, on take-off Tel Aviv was at its best, glittering a sparkling white with even the cemetery gravestones casting reflections of the sun. The place flew over the distinctive curve of Jaffa harbor and out into the Mediterranean.
The plane's passanger list consists of very American geezers with "BYU" shirts (Brigham Young?) and not much more. Maybe I should change my flight back to be a few days earlier.
