Blogs from Jerusalem, Jerusalem District, Israel, Middle East - page 47

After days of torpor in the heat of a Jerusalem summer, I’ve managed to make the most of my last few days in Israel. I spend an afternoon in the Orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim and a morning watching the sun rise over the ramparts of the Old City. I head to the shouk to watch the shopkeepers pushing buckets of soapy water over the sidewalk and stacking crates of produce. The fish are getting laid out on beds of ice, their mouths agape. Two Arab deliverymen are having a smoke in the back of their truck, crouching beside rows of empty palettes. They’re flirting with a pair of Israeli soldiers in rumpled uniforms who giggle and nervously twirl their hair. The sun is dipping into the alleys of Nahlaot, casting long shadows over the ... read more

June 18, 2007 My new roommate Steve is completely off-the-wall bonkers, but I mean that in the best way possible. From the moment he arrived, he started jumping all over the place, convincing us all to go out. By the end of his antics he had us all riled up and ready to go. It was a pretty fun night out, even though I had originally planned on taking it slow. Last night’s fun caused me to wake up late today, so I didn’t go to any of my morning classes. I didn’t go to any afternoon ones either because I explored a little with my friends. A bunch of us walked to Ben-Yehuda Street, which is basically where everything happens in this city. There I ran into Sara, who was also on my Birthright trip. ... read more

It’s a magical time of year for Jerusalem, when the city opens its doors to thousands of American college kids visiting on taglit. Described by one website as “first time, peer group, educational trips” to the Holy Land, it’s become quickly clear that “balls-out, drink-till-you-drop fuckfests” might be slightly more appropriate. While the cultural benefits of a birthright trip are surely abundant - prayers at the Western Wall, trips to Masada, bagels with Likkud on the floor of the Knesset - the fact that the Israeli government and prominent Jewish philanthropists are picking up the tab creates more than a few problems. The most obvious is what happens when you give all-expense-paid trips to waves of college students fresh off their end-of-semester grind: the term papers and final exams and STDs picked up after some ... read more

A few local CouchSurfers have organized a barbeque on the outskirts of the city, on a gentle, pine-studded hill that feels a world removed from Jerusalem’s solemn ramparts, from the clamor of the shouk and the crowded lanes of the Old City. There are a few dozen of us gathered - Israelis and globe-trotters and globe-trotting Israelis - and we go through the motions familiar to these sorts of gatherings: routes taken and planned, couches surfed, border officials duped and dodgy trains ridden. There’s comfort in these odd get-togethers, in the assurance that while the faces and cast of characters change, the stories stay more or less the same. We’re grilling kosher hot dogs and dipping into what’s been dubbed “the best hummus in Israel” when we cautiously turn the talk to politics. It’s the ... read more