Today is יום האצמאות Yom HaAtzma'ut ("Independence Day") here in Israel, and we are celebrating the 61st anniversary of the country. Yesterday was יום הזיכרון Yom HaZikaron ("Memorial Day"), when we remembered all the people, both soldiers and civilians, who have died in wars and terrorist attacks.
Last night, on TV we watched the ceremony at הר הרצל Har Herzl ("Mt. Herzl") in Jerusalem that marked the transition between these 2 holidays, the first very somber and serious, and the 2nd very joyous. I like to watch this ceremony for several reasons. First, it's a way of feeling connected to this country, of understanding the people and the culture. Second, it's quite an amazing show, with top-notch lighting effects, dancing, music, and lots of pomp and circumstance, all of which help one move from the sadness to the joy. Finally, because the people are making grand and formal speeches, it's easier for me to follow because they speak more slowly and clearly. One moving and very interesting part of the ceremony is when they light 12 torches representing the 12 tribes of Israel. Each torch is lit by a different person (or sometimes 2 people connected to each other in some way). Of course, they deliberately select a great variety of people to do this. Before he or she lights the torch, each person reads a short speech, which always begins by telling who they are and giving a little of their background, and which ends by with a list of who or what is being honored. The very last words are ALWAYS ולתפארת מדינת ישראל ultif'eret m'dinat yisrael ("and for the glory of the State of Israel").
Today, we took our friend, Alex, for a little drive around several parts of the North, including near the Lebanon border, קרן נפטלי Keren Naftali ("Horn of Naftali" a hill that sits somewhat alone and looks a little like the horn of an animal), and מצפה גדות Mitzpe Gadot ("Gadot Lookout" a place from which the Syrians shelled Israel, including Kibbutz Gadot, nearly constantly from 1948 until 1967), where we ate a little picnic lunch.
Alex is from Ukraine and is about a decade younger than we are. Russian, though, is his native language (he says that he doesn't speak Ukrainian), and his Hebrew is quite good since he's been here nearly 2 decades. However, he speaks very little English, so this forces me to practice my Hebrew! He speaks slowly and doesn't rattle on much, and he doesn't have much of a Russian accent, so that also makes it easier for me. I felt like I was able to say pretty much whatever I wanted to to him, and I also was able to understand almost everything that he said. As I commented to him, when I was a boy growing up the the States, I would never have imagined that one day I would be communicating with a Russian in Hebrew! This, too, seems appropriate for this national holiday. After all, this is a country of immigrants. There are very, very few people in the entire country, including even the Arabs, whose ancestors were living here 150-200 years ago!
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Drive in the southern Golan
Today we took a drive in the southern part of the Golan. We didn't go to any places that we had never been to before, but I did get some nice pictures.
We started by driving south along the eastern side of the Kinneret (the "Sea of Galilee"). At the southern end of that road, we turned left (east) and took the road that follows the Yarmoch River, which is the border between Israel and Jordan in that area. The road goes along the top of a vertical cliff that drops off to the bottom of the valley where the river runs. This river flows into the Jordan river south of the Kinneret, and from there on the Jordan River is the border.
After following the Yarmoch River valley for a while, we come to the point where the main road up to the Golan turns off on the left (heading basically north). A short distance up that road, I pulled over to the side and took a few pictures.
Here's the first one, in which we are looking about west-southwest down the Yarmoch River valley. In this view, you can see a bit of the vertical cliff I was talking about, the water in the river itself, and a broken bridge that obviously used to cross the river at one time, probably when this was the border between Syria and Jordan, before 1967.
Here's a close-up view of a pretty pale pink flower. I saw plenty of these in that area, although I don't recall seeing exactly this same type of flower before:
In this picture, taken from that same place, we are looking basically north. You can see the road that we are about to travel on winding up the hill ahead. The road is steep, narrow, and has many very sharp hair-pin turns!
Rather abruptly, the road reaches the top of the hill, and one might be surprised to discover that it's nearly flat up there! The farmers (Israeli farmers!) have made good use of this area, planting large fields of grain or hay.
After passing through this large, flat area, the road comes to a place where it basically follows a sort of "isthmus" where the terrain falls away on both sides of the road. Then we come to the next part of the Golan, which is again somewhat flat, but more rolling than the southern area. A short way after that, I saw several cars pulled over on the side of the road, so I also pulled over. The people from the cars had probably gone hiking on a nearby trail that, according to the sign, led to a spring. I didn't check that out, because there was no indication of how far away the spring might be! I did take some pictures, though, of the beautiful flowers right along the road. This picture isn't so nice in itself, but I'm including it to give you some idea of the variety and beauty of the flowers right by the road:
Here's a close-up of several of the lovely white flowers and one beautiful red poppy:
After that, we continue northward on the Golan, entering a more desolate, wild area, where there are no fields and only a few cows or the occasional orchard. We decided to eat our picnic lunch (hard-boiled eggs, dried figs, dates, pecans, and water) at Har Peres (Mt. Peres), the round mountain (it looks like one of those rounds chalot that we eat for Rosh HaShana!) in the Golan that we can see almost due east of our house.
As we were driving on the side road that leads up to Har Peres, I suddenly noticed that there was a stork standing right at the side of the road not far ahead. These are magnificent large birds! Before I could get a picture, though, it flew away. However, there were several of them soaring around that area, and eventually another one (or maybe the same one) landed near the road again. This time, I was able to get a couple of pictures. Here's the best one:
I also tried my luck at capturing them while they were flying. I only succeeded once, and even that time the stork was clear over in the left side of the frame, meaning that I barely got it! Here's the appropriate detail of that picture:
The storks were not the only birds enjoying the updrafts around Har Peres. I have no idea what kind of birds these are. They are more "normal" sized birds than the storks. There were quite a few of them obviously enjoying themselves, and I managed to capture one of them in this photo:
Har Peres is clearly a volcanic peak (as are virtually ALL the peaks in the Golan). It even has a crater in the middle of it! We parked the car in an available area just after the road passes through a small gap and starts to circle around the crater towards the military installation on the far side. Then we ate our aforementioned lunch. After eating, I grabbed my camera and snapped some nice flower pictures right in that area.
Here's a close-up of yet another kind of gorgeous red flower:
I've been seeing a lot of these "purple flame" flowers all over northern Israel this year, whereas in previous years I don't even remember seeing them at all:
After leaving Har Peres, we continued northward on the main road. Suddenly, we came over a little rise, and this is what we saw:
Here's a close-up view of just a couple of the cows wading in the shallow water and grazing:
From many places along this road, we had been able to see the snow on Har Khermon (at the extreme northern end of the Golan), but the views had not been so good for getting a nice picture. It still may be a little hard for you to make out the snow, but after this we turned westwards and began heading home. So, here's our car in the foreground with the snow-capped mountain in the background:
Here's a close-up view of the small yellow sign that you can see in the previous photo. I'm including this as a typical example of an Israeli sign. The top part is a standard international warning symbol indicating the the road will be turning left. On the lower part of the sign is the written part, in Hebrew, Arabic, and English. The Hebrew says האט (which is pronounced "hate"), and, of course, means "slow". I assume that that is also what it says in Arabic, but I don't even know the alphabet in that language!
While I was stopped, I also took several other pictures. Here's a detailed view of one of the many white flowers that I see everywhere:
I also got very lucky! I noticed a butterfly flying around, and it landed not far from me. I managed to get a couple of pictures before it flew away. Here's the best one:
I'll close with yet another picture of the tiny pale orange flowers that we have been seeing so many of this year. Actually, in this particular location, there were only a few of them:
We started by driving south along the eastern side of the Kinneret (the "Sea of Galilee"). At the southern end of that road, we turned left (east) and took the road that follows the Yarmoch River, which is the border between Israel and Jordan in that area. The road goes along the top of a vertical cliff that drops off to the bottom of the valley where the river runs. This river flows into the Jordan river south of the Kinneret, and from there on the Jordan River is the border.
After following the Yarmoch River valley for a while, we come to the point where the main road up to the Golan turns off on the left (heading basically north). A short distance up that road, I pulled over to the side and took a few pictures.
Here's the first one, in which we are looking about west-southwest down the Yarmoch River valley. In this view, you can see a bit of the vertical cliff I was talking about, the water in the river itself, and a broken bridge that obviously used to cross the river at one time, probably when this was the border between Syria and Jordan, before 1967.
Here's a close-up view of a pretty pale pink flower. I saw plenty of these in that area, although I don't recall seeing exactly this same type of flower before:
In this picture, taken from that same place, we are looking basically north. You can see the road that we are about to travel on winding up the hill ahead. The road is steep, narrow, and has many very sharp hair-pin turns!
Rather abruptly, the road reaches the top of the hill, and one might be surprised to discover that it's nearly flat up there! The farmers (Israeli farmers!) have made good use of this area, planting large fields of grain or hay.
After passing through this large, flat area, the road comes to a place where it basically follows a sort of "isthmus" where the terrain falls away on both sides of the road. Then we come to the next part of the Golan, which is again somewhat flat, but more rolling than the southern area. A short way after that, I saw several cars pulled over on the side of the road, so I also pulled over. The people from the cars had probably gone hiking on a nearby trail that, according to the sign, led to a spring. I didn't check that out, because there was no indication of how far away the spring might be! I did take some pictures, though, of the beautiful flowers right along the road. This picture isn't so nice in itself, but I'm including it to give you some idea of the variety and beauty of the flowers right by the road:
Here's a close-up of several of the lovely white flowers and one beautiful red poppy:
After that, we continue northward on the Golan, entering a more desolate, wild area, where there are no fields and only a few cows or the occasional orchard. We decided to eat our picnic lunch (hard-boiled eggs, dried figs, dates, pecans, and water) at Har Peres (Mt. Peres), the round mountain (it looks like one of those rounds chalot that we eat for Rosh HaShana!) in the Golan that we can see almost due east of our house.
As we were driving on the side road that leads up to Har Peres, I suddenly noticed that there was a stork standing right at the side of the road not far ahead. These are magnificent large birds! Before I could get a picture, though, it flew away. However, there were several of them soaring around that area, and eventually another one (or maybe the same one) landed near the road again. This time, I was able to get a couple of pictures. Here's the best one:
I also tried my luck at capturing them while they were flying. I only succeeded once, and even that time the stork was clear over in the left side of the frame, meaning that I barely got it! Here's the appropriate detail of that picture:
The storks were not the only birds enjoying the updrafts around Har Peres. I have no idea what kind of birds these are. They are more "normal" sized birds than the storks. There were quite a few of them obviously enjoying themselves, and I managed to capture one of them in this photo:
Har Peres is clearly a volcanic peak (as are virtually ALL the peaks in the Golan). It even has a crater in the middle of it! We parked the car in an available area just after the road passes through a small gap and starts to circle around the crater towards the military installation on the far side. Then we ate our aforementioned lunch. After eating, I grabbed my camera and snapped some nice flower pictures right in that area.
Here's a close-up of yet another kind of gorgeous red flower:
I've been seeing a lot of these "purple flame" flowers all over northern Israel this year, whereas in previous years I don't even remember seeing them at all:
After leaving Har Peres, we continued northward on the main road. Suddenly, we came over a little rise, and this is what we saw:
Here's a close-up view of just a couple of the cows wading in the shallow water and grazing:
From many places along this road, we had been able to see the snow on Har Khermon (at the extreme northern end of the Golan), but the views had not been so good for getting a nice picture. It still may be a little hard for you to make out the snow, but after this we turned westwards and began heading home. So, here's our car in the foreground with the snow-capped mountain in the background:
Here's a close-up view of the small yellow sign that you can see in the previous photo. I'm including this as a typical example of an Israeli sign. The top part is a standard international warning symbol indicating the the road will be turning left. On the lower part of the sign is the written part, in Hebrew, Arabic, and English. The Hebrew says האט (which is pronounced "hate"), and, of course, means "slow". I assume that that is also what it says in Arabic, but I don't even know the alphabet in that language!
While I was stopped, I also took several other pictures. Here's a detailed view of one of the many white flowers that I see everywhere:
I also got very lucky! I noticed a butterfly flying around, and it landed not far from me. I managed to get a couple of pictures before it flew away. Here's the best one:
I'll close with yet another picture of the tiny pale orange flowers that we have been seeing so many of this year. Actually, in this particular location, there were only a few of them:
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Fun with alphabets in Israel
If you are interested in languages and alphabets, Israel is the place to be! First, there's the principal language, Hebrew, which has its own ancient alphabet. Then, there's the 2nd official language, Arabic, which also has ITS own alphabet, which looks VERY different from Hebrew. Next, there's English, of course, whose alphabet is different from the other two but far from unique in the world. Almost all official road signs are in these 3 languages.
But it doesn't stop there! It's not at all unusual to see store signs, billboards, and writing on products in the supermarket and in the pharmacy in Russian, which uses yet another alphabet, the Cyrillic alphabet.
Yesterday, I was at the pharmacy getting nearly all of our prescriptions for the month filled. Since David takes so many medicines, this is always quite a lengthy process. I have to stand there at the counter and wait while the pharmacist gets together all the medicines. This gives me plenty of time to look around, and, of course, there are plenty of things to read. After all, the pharmacy has a captive audience, and they hope to get us to buy additional items! For example, sitting right on the counter on my left, there was a bottle of some kind of hair product. Without even turning the bottle around, I saw English, Hebrew, and Russian. Ironically, I don't think I saw any Arabic anywhere despite the fact that all but about 2 or 3 of the pharmacists who work there are Arabs (including Saeed, a very nice guy who was helping me) and I regularly hear them talking to each other in Arabic.
There are always copies of the pharmacy's latest flyer sitting there on the counter, of course. I can't resist trying my Hebrew reading skills on these. The front page this time features special prices on 12 different products than one can get if one buys at least 59 shekels worth of other things. Each item is pictured, its special price is shown in a large blue circle, and its name and a few other details are printed in Hebrew. Only, it's not really exactly Hebrew, except in one case. The other 11 products all have English names, and most of them are American brands that I recognize.
OK, so let's have a little fun, at least for those of you who know the Hebrew alphabet. Here are the 11 products with their "Hebrew" names. How many of the brands can you transliterate back into their original English?
אולדייז
מאך 3
הד אנד שולדרס
פלמוליב
הוואי
אולטרסול
קרליין
דאב
שואו
קולגייט הרבל
סנסודיין דואלקר
Remember, these are all actually English words, and the products are all personal hygiene or toiletry products. Most of the brands are quite well-known in the U.S.
I must confess here that I myself would probably not have figured most of these out without the help of the pictures of the products, where the English name is usually shown on the package, as it is in all but one case. I think that one case is not actually an American product, either, but I'll give you a hint: it's name is actually the name of one of the states in the U.S.!
So, there you have it.
Have you pondered them enough?
Are you just about ready for me to spoil it and give you the answers?
Not quite yet, Saeed is calling the hotline of our קופת חולים kupat kholim (literally "sick fund", but actually more like an HMO) to get a special approval since the total comes to over 2000 shekels (that's over $500, folk!). The voice on the speaker-phone announces (in Hebrew, of course) how long the wait will be, right down to to the second (how do they know?!?). Saeed hangs up and calls again. Now the wait will be even longer. He hangs up and calls yet another time. About the same wait announced this time. So, he leaves the "hold" music playing and counts out 60 pills from a bottle of 100. Finally, he gets through and gets the approval. They ALWAYS approve it!
OK, you've waited long enough, even though it's NOT as long as I had to wait at the pharmacy. Here's the list in English:
Alldays
Mach 3
Head and Shoulders
Palmolive
Hawaii
Ultrasol
CareLine
Dove
Show
Colgate Herbal
Sensodyne Dual Care
A couple of notes: that "Mach 3" is from Gillette, but I only know this because "Gillette" appears on the package in the picture. "Gillette" wasn't in the Hebrew at all. The Ultrasol is a Dr. Fischer sunscreen, as I also can see from the package, but they didn't put "Dr. Fischer" in Hebrew this time, either, although I believe that I have seen it transcribed before.
So, there you have it! I hope you enjoyed the puzzle.
But it doesn't stop there! It's not at all unusual to see store signs, billboards, and writing on products in the supermarket and in the pharmacy in Russian, which uses yet another alphabet, the Cyrillic alphabet.
Yesterday, I was at the pharmacy getting nearly all of our prescriptions for the month filled. Since David takes so many medicines, this is always quite a lengthy process. I have to stand there at the counter and wait while the pharmacist gets together all the medicines. This gives me plenty of time to look around, and, of course, there are plenty of things to read. After all, the pharmacy has a captive audience, and they hope to get us to buy additional items! For example, sitting right on the counter on my left, there was a bottle of some kind of hair product. Without even turning the bottle around, I saw English, Hebrew, and Russian. Ironically, I don't think I saw any Arabic anywhere despite the fact that all but about 2 or 3 of the pharmacists who work there are Arabs (including Saeed, a very nice guy who was helping me) and I regularly hear them talking to each other in Arabic.
There are always copies of the pharmacy's latest flyer sitting there on the counter, of course. I can't resist trying my Hebrew reading skills on these. The front page this time features special prices on 12 different products than one can get if one buys at least 59 shekels worth of other things. Each item is pictured, its special price is shown in a large blue circle, and its name and a few other details are printed in Hebrew. Only, it's not really exactly Hebrew, except in one case. The other 11 products all have English names, and most of them are American brands that I recognize.
OK, so let's have a little fun, at least for those of you who know the Hebrew alphabet. Here are the 11 products with their "Hebrew" names. How many of the brands can you transliterate back into their original English?
אולדייז
מאך 3
הד אנד שולדרס
פלמוליב
הוואי
אולטרסול
קרליין
דאב
שואו
קולגייט הרבל
סנסודיין דואלקר
Remember, these are all actually English words, and the products are all personal hygiene or toiletry products. Most of the brands are quite well-known in the U.S.
I must confess here that I myself would probably not have figured most of these out without the help of the pictures of the products, where the English name is usually shown on the package, as it is in all but one case. I think that one case is not actually an American product, either, but I'll give you a hint: it's name is actually the name of one of the states in the U.S.!
So, there you have it.
Have you pondered them enough?
Are you just about ready for me to spoil it and give you the answers?
Not quite yet, Saeed is calling the hotline of our קופת חולים kupat kholim (literally "sick fund", but actually more like an HMO) to get a special approval since the total comes to over 2000 shekels (that's over $500, folk!). The voice on the speaker-phone announces (in Hebrew, of course) how long the wait will be, right down to to the second (how do they know?!?). Saeed hangs up and calls again. Now the wait will be even longer. He hangs up and calls yet another time. About the same wait announced this time. So, he leaves the "hold" music playing and counts out 60 pills from a bottle of 100. Finally, he gets through and gets the approval. They ALWAYS approve it!
OK, you've waited long enough, even though it's NOT as long as I had to wait at the pharmacy. Here's the list in English:
Alldays
Mach 3
Head and Shoulders
Palmolive
Hawaii
Ultrasol
CareLine
Dove
Show
Colgate Herbal
Sensodyne Dual Care
A couple of notes: that "Mach 3" is from Gillette, but I only know this because "Gillette" appears on the package in the picture. "Gillette" wasn't in the Hebrew at all. The Ultrasol is a Dr. Fischer sunscreen, as I also can see from the package, but they didn't put "Dr. Fischer" in Hebrew this time, either, although I believe that I have seen it transcribed before.
So, there you have it! I hope you enjoyed the puzzle.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Trip near Lebanon and back through Karmiel
Today was a nice sunny day, and we had all the things we needed to do done before noon. So, in the afternoon, we decided to take another drive. This time, we headed west and took roads as near to the Lebanon border as we could. In fact, I took a narrow (but paved) farm road from N'tu'a to Shtula, 2 settlements (kibbutzim or moshavim, I don't know which) that are both very close to Lebanon. At one point, we went for a short distance right along the border, at a point where it crosses a shallow valley. Right after that, there was a wide place in the road where I could easily park the car without blocking traffic, and we also noticed a number of interesting flowers nearby. So, I grabbed my camera and began shooting pictures. Here's the very first one. We saw a number of flowers like this in that area:
This butterfly (or maybe it's a moth?) caught my eye, and it was nice enough to stay in one place and even with its wings spread long enough for me to get several pictures. Here's the best one. If you look closely, you'll discover, as I did only after I got home and looked at the pictures on my computer, that there is apparently ANOTHER butterfly below this one, with its wings mostly folded together!
There were also a number of beautiful lacy white flowers like this one in the area. Even though the picture's a bit washed out, I think it's still quite nice:
After I took these pictures, I wandered back on the road a bit to the place where it was right by the border. I took a few interesting pictures showing the border, including one of a small rather make-shift sign that said: זהירות. עיקול מסוכן z'hirut. 'ikul m'sukhan. "Caution. Dangerous Curve". I thought this was rather humorous for several reasons. First, this is a very minor road with almost no traffic but bumpy enough that no one is likely to be traveling very fast. Second, it really was only a very gradual turn, hardly what I would call a "dangerous curve". Third, the sign was right by the border fence, and the only danger most people might be concerned about would be the country right on the other side, I think!
I had gotten just out of sight from the car, where David was sitting and reading, but I could hear that vehicles were approaching it. Sure enough, as I came back into sight, I saw that 2 military Hummers (the real, armored ones, not the expensive sport-ute imitations!) had pulled up right next to our car. A couple of the soldiers had already talked to David, and now they were walking towards me. I wasn't worried or scared, but I did realize that I had better be completely honest with them. One of them asked me, in Hebrew, if I spoke Hebrew, to which I replied, also in Hebrew, "a little". He immediately switched to English! Of course, he asked me where I was from and what I was doing. I told him, put my camera in viewer mode, and let him look at the pictures that I had taken. They decided that we were OK, after making us wait a minute or so while they probably checked out our car registration or whatever. Interestingly, they didn't ask to check our IDs or to check us or our car out at all. One of them did look in the trunk (well, actually the hatch) when I put my camera back in there. Then they told us that we needed to move on and that we weren't supposed to take pictures in this area. They didn't seem upset, though, and they didn't make me erase the pictures I had already taken. In any case, that's why I'm only showing you the flower pictures and none of the pictures of the border!
The border turned away from the road not far after that (which I knew from the map). Then we came to an intersection where I turned right, toward Shtula. Not too far along that road, I stopped at another wide place to take a few pictures. We saw many groups of these lovely flowers throughout that area. Here's a close-up of just one of them:
Here's another close-up of 3 of those delicate orange flowers that, as I've mentioned before, we've been seeing more of this year. I didn't see so many today, however, but this picture really came out so nice that I just had to post it here:
After driving a little further along the road and passing some orchards and farm workers, we were starting to get near the border again (I could see the row of light posts) when some purple flowers on the left side of the road caught my eye. I again pulled over (the road was plenty wide there) to check them out. They were gorgeous, and there were lots of them! The first group that I came to was shaded by trees. Here's a close-up view of these tiny flowers (could they be orchids?):
Just a very short distance away, there was another large group of them in the sunlight. Here's a close-up of a couple of them:
I noticed that a bumblebee was buzzing around from flower to flower. She didn't stay long at any one of them, and she tended to be almost invisible as she was making her visits. Finally, after several attempts, I managed to get a good picture of her:
We continued following roads close to the border all the way past Park Adamit (which we did NOT stop at this time) and down the steep very curvy road to the valley. After a brief stop at Kibbutz Matzuba to check in with Golan, our snake-loving friend, and a stop in Karmiel to buy a few things, we started up the hill towards home. Since it was quite a clear day, and we were in no particular hurry, I decided to stop at a viewpoint at the side of the highway above Amirim, where there are good views of both the Mediterranean Sea and the Kinneret (the "Sea of Galilee"). Actually, the Mediterranean is barely visible (it's quite a bit further away), and it was late in the day, so the sun was also not at a favorable angle. Nevertheless, you CAN see a bit of the glint of the sun reflecting off the water in this picture if you look very carefully:
From that very same spot, here's the much better view of the Kinneret:
This butterfly (or maybe it's a moth?) caught my eye, and it was nice enough to stay in one place and even with its wings spread long enough for me to get several pictures. Here's the best one. If you look closely, you'll discover, as I did only after I got home and looked at the pictures on my computer, that there is apparently ANOTHER butterfly below this one, with its wings mostly folded together!
There were also a number of beautiful lacy white flowers like this one in the area. Even though the picture's a bit washed out, I think it's still quite nice:
After I took these pictures, I wandered back on the road a bit to the place where it was right by the border. I took a few interesting pictures showing the border, including one of a small rather make-shift sign that said: זהירות. עיקול מסוכן z'hirut. 'ikul m'sukhan. "Caution. Dangerous Curve". I thought this was rather humorous for several reasons. First, this is a very minor road with almost no traffic but bumpy enough that no one is likely to be traveling very fast. Second, it really was only a very gradual turn, hardly what I would call a "dangerous curve". Third, the sign was right by the border fence, and the only danger most people might be concerned about would be the country right on the other side, I think!
I had gotten just out of sight from the car, where David was sitting and reading, but I could hear that vehicles were approaching it. Sure enough, as I came back into sight, I saw that 2 military Hummers (the real, armored ones, not the expensive sport-ute imitations!) had pulled up right next to our car. A couple of the soldiers had already talked to David, and now they were walking towards me. I wasn't worried or scared, but I did realize that I had better be completely honest with them. One of them asked me, in Hebrew, if I spoke Hebrew, to which I replied, also in Hebrew, "a little". He immediately switched to English! Of course, he asked me where I was from and what I was doing. I told him, put my camera in viewer mode, and let him look at the pictures that I had taken. They decided that we were OK, after making us wait a minute or so while they probably checked out our car registration or whatever. Interestingly, they didn't ask to check our IDs or to check us or our car out at all. One of them did look in the trunk (well, actually the hatch) when I put my camera back in there. Then they told us that we needed to move on and that we weren't supposed to take pictures in this area. They didn't seem upset, though, and they didn't make me erase the pictures I had already taken. In any case, that's why I'm only showing you the flower pictures and none of the pictures of the border!
The border turned away from the road not far after that (which I knew from the map). Then we came to an intersection where I turned right, toward Shtula. Not too far along that road, I stopped at another wide place to take a few pictures. We saw many groups of these lovely flowers throughout that area. Here's a close-up of just one of them:
Here's another close-up of 3 of those delicate orange flowers that, as I've mentioned before, we've been seeing more of this year. I didn't see so many today, however, but this picture really came out so nice that I just had to post it here:
After driving a little further along the road and passing some orchards and farm workers, we were starting to get near the border again (I could see the row of light posts) when some purple flowers on the left side of the road caught my eye. I again pulled over (the road was plenty wide there) to check them out. They were gorgeous, and there were lots of them! The first group that I came to was shaded by trees. Here's a close-up view of these tiny flowers (could they be orchids?):
Just a very short distance away, there was another large group of them in the sunlight. Here's a close-up of a couple of them:
I noticed that a bumblebee was buzzing around from flower to flower. She didn't stay long at any one of them, and she tended to be almost invisible as she was making her visits. Finally, after several attempts, I managed to get a good picture of her:
We continued following roads close to the border all the way past Park Adamit (which we did NOT stop at this time) and down the steep very curvy road to the valley. After a brief stop at Kibbutz Matzuba to check in with Golan, our snake-loving friend, and a stop in Karmiel to buy a few things, we started up the hill towards home. Since it was quite a clear day, and we were in no particular hurry, I decided to stop at a viewpoint at the side of the highway above Amirim, where there are good views of both the Mediterranean Sea and the Kinneret (the "Sea of Galilee"). Actually, the Mediterranean is barely visible (it's quite a bit further away), and it was late in the day, so the sun was also not at a favorable angle. Nevertheless, you CAN see a bit of the glint of the sun reflecting off the water in this picture if you look very carefully:
From that very same spot, here's the much better view of the Kinneret:
Saturday, April 18, 2009
A trip to the northern Golan
The weather turned a bit cold during the latter part of this past week, and we even got some more much-needed rain. Today, though, the rain is gone, and it has been mostly sunny. It's still been a little chilly, however.
So, we decided to take a drive to the northern Golan. After driving down the hill to Rosh Pinna and north on highway 90 through Kiryat Shmona, we turned right (east) and headed towards the northern Golan. Once the road crosses the northern end of the Hula Valley, it heads up the hill. I noticed lots of flowers along the sides of the road, of course, and finally I just had to stop to take some pictures. So, we'll start with those.
First, a pretty white daisy with a fly on it:
I had seen that the fields looked blue, but it wasn't until I stopped that I was able to see exactly which flowers were causing this. Here's a close-up view of just two of them:
There were only a couple of these purple thistles blooming right there, and I probably would have missed them both if David hadn't drawn my attention to them:
Turning my camera in the opposite direction, I took this picture looking toward Har Khermon (Mt. Hermon, the highest peak in Israel). The peak is really behind the clouds, though, so you can't see in this view that there is still snow up there. We later got to a point where we could see it clearly, but the pictures I took there were too cluttered by junk in the foreground, whereas this one is quite pretty:
When we got to Mas'ade, a Druze city in the Golan, we turned right and headed south. I decided to visit a little valley we had discovered last year. The valley is hidden away just south of Har Bental, but I knew from our visit there last year that there would be many beautiful flowers. And we were definitely NOT disappointed!
Here's a sample of the view, taken ride by the side of the road where I first parked the car:
Here's a very close-up, zoomed-in view of some of those lovely white flowers:
I saw quite a few of these gorgeous tall dark blue flowers. I think that they might be lupines:
There were actually even more of these paler blue flowers, which might also be some kind of lupine, but they didn't stand out as much because of their more subtle color. They were also smaller and closer to the ground, so it was a bit hard to get a good picture of them. Still, I think this one turned out quite nicely:
This picture of one of the yellow flowers turned out so well that I just had to share it with you. I had been worried that it would be blurred, because there was a breeze that kept moving it around as I tried to capture it. In fact, I took 3 or 4 photos, hoping that at least one would be OK. As it so happened, they were ALL quite good!
Here's a picture of a very tiny flower that I don't think I've seen before. There were several there in the valley, but they weren't all that abundant. It was so tiny that I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to get a good photo, but, as you can see, I succeeded:
We've seen many more of these beautiful tiny orange flowers this year all over the place than we had in previous years. However, the ones I saw in the hidden valley seemed just slightly more pale than others that I've seen. They are also so tiny that it can be challenging to capture them, but I was quite successful today. Here's the best picture of them that I got:
After visiting the hidden valley, we started on the road westward across the Golan and down, heading for the Jordan River. Before really descending into the narrow, deeper part of the valley where it runs, I stopped at a memorial site that we had passed by many times before but at which we had never before stopped. It's called Gadot Lookout.
There's a large, impressive memorial to those who fought to eliminate the Syrian bombardment of northern Israel, which went on for nearly 2 decades. I listened to the audio that was available there (in English -- the other choice was Hebrew), and learned more about that time.
A good portion of the account was given in the 1st person by a member of Kibbutz Gadot, which lies only a short distance west of the Jordan River and is highly visible from this lookout (and gives the lookout its current name, of course). Before 1967, a Syrian bunker was in this area.
From the time Kibbutz Gadot was established, in 1949, until 1967, it, like several others in that same area, was shelled nearly constantly by the Syrians, who controlled the Golan at that time, right down to the banks of the Jordan River. A whole generation of children on these kibbutzim grew up in bomb shelters due to this. Farmers were forced to plow the fields in armored tractors because of the danger.
The woman, the kibbutz member whom I mentioned above, described how, in 1967, the Syrians completely destroyed the kibbutz. When the residents emerged from the bomb shelters, there were no buildings, no dairy, no chicken run, not even any water left! She said that people from around the country came to help them re-build, an effort which took 2 months. Then the Syrians completely destroyed it again! It was only after this that the Israeli military took the Golan, to finally put a stop to the constant bombardment. You might want to keep this history in mind when you hear Syria whining about the Golan!
Kibbutz Gadot and other kibbtzim of the Hula Valley are not the only things that can be seen from Gadot Lookout. Here's a great view from there of the hill where Tsfat is located:
Here's a detail of a zoomed view taken from that same spot. On the right, you can see the antenna tower which is located directly west of our house and not far from us. I inserted the arrow to show you exactly where our house is!
You might also want to keep THIS picture in mind when you hear about the idea of giving the Golan back to Syria!
So, we decided to take a drive to the northern Golan. After driving down the hill to Rosh Pinna and north on highway 90 through Kiryat Shmona, we turned right (east) and headed towards the northern Golan. Once the road crosses the northern end of the Hula Valley, it heads up the hill. I noticed lots of flowers along the sides of the road, of course, and finally I just had to stop to take some pictures. So, we'll start with those.
First, a pretty white daisy with a fly on it:
I had seen that the fields looked blue, but it wasn't until I stopped that I was able to see exactly which flowers were causing this. Here's a close-up view of just two of them:
There were only a couple of these purple thistles blooming right there, and I probably would have missed them both if David hadn't drawn my attention to them:
Turning my camera in the opposite direction, I took this picture looking toward Har Khermon (Mt. Hermon, the highest peak in Israel). The peak is really behind the clouds, though, so you can't see in this view that there is still snow up there. We later got to a point where we could see it clearly, but the pictures I took there were too cluttered by junk in the foreground, whereas this one is quite pretty:
When we got to Mas'ade, a Druze city in the Golan, we turned right and headed south. I decided to visit a little valley we had discovered last year. The valley is hidden away just south of Har Bental, but I knew from our visit there last year that there would be many beautiful flowers. And we were definitely NOT disappointed!
Here's a sample of the view, taken ride by the side of the road where I first parked the car:
Here's a very close-up, zoomed-in view of some of those lovely white flowers:
I saw quite a few of these gorgeous tall dark blue flowers. I think that they might be lupines:
There were actually even more of these paler blue flowers, which might also be some kind of lupine, but they didn't stand out as much because of their more subtle color. They were also smaller and closer to the ground, so it was a bit hard to get a good picture of them. Still, I think this one turned out quite nicely:
This picture of one of the yellow flowers turned out so well that I just had to share it with you. I had been worried that it would be blurred, because there was a breeze that kept moving it around as I tried to capture it. In fact, I took 3 or 4 photos, hoping that at least one would be OK. As it so happened, they were ALL quite good!
Here's a picture of a very tiny flower that I don't think I've seen before. There were several there in the valley, but they weren't all that abundant. It was so tiny that I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to get a good photo, but, as you can see, I succeeded:
We've seen many more of these beautiful tiny orange flowers this year all over the place than we had in previous years. However, the ones I saw in the hidden valley seemed just slightly more pale than others that I've seen. They are also so tiny that it can be challenging to capture them, but I was quite successful today. Here's the best picture of them that I got:
After visiting the hidden valley, we started on the road westward across the Golan and down, heading for the Jordan River. Before really descending into the narrow, deeper part of the valley where it runs, I stopped at a memorial site that we had passed by many times before but at which we had never before stopped. It's called Gadot Lookout.
There's a large, impressive memorial to those who fought to eliminate the Syrian bombardment of northern Israel, which went on for nearly 2 decades. I listened to the audio that was available there (in English -- the other choice was Hebrew), and learned more about that time.
A good portion of the account was given in the 1st person by a member of Kibbutz Gadot, which lies only a short distance west of the Jordan River and is highly visible from this lookout (and gives the lookout its current name, of course). Before 1967, a Syrian bunker was in this area.
From the time Kibbutz Gadot was established, in 1949, until 1967, it, like several others in that same area, was shelled nearly constantly by the Syrians, who controlled the Golan at that time, right down to the banks of the Jordan River. A whole generation of children on these kibbutzim grew up in bomb shelters due to this. Farmers were forced to plow the fields in armored tractors because of the danger.
The woman, the kibbutz member whom I mentioned above, described how, in 1967, the Syrians completely destroyed the kibbutz. When the residents emerged from the bomb shelters, there were no buildings, no dairy, no chicken run, not even any water left! She said that people from around the country came to help them re-build, an effort which took 2 months. Then the Syrians completely destroyed it again! It was only after this that the Israeli military took the Golan, to finally put a stop to the constant bombardment. You might want to keep this history in mind when you hear Syria whining about the Golan!
Kibbutz Gadot and other kibbtzim of the Hula Valley are not the only things that can be seen from Gadot Lookout. Here's a great view from there of the hill where Tsfat is located:
Here's a detail of a zoomed view taken from that same spot. On the right, you can see the antenna tower which is located directly west of our house and not far from us. I inserted the arrow to show you exactly where our house is!
You might also want to keep THIS picture in mind when you hear about the idea of giving the Golan back to Syria!
Monday, April 13, 2009
Interesting things on a short walk
Today is a beautiful Spring day here, so we decided to get out of the house and take a little walk in the neighborhood. Initially, I didn't take my camera, but, only a short distance down the road, we came upon a small tortoise on the sidewalk! David kept it from "running" away while I went back to the house and got the camera. Here's its picture:
In several place along the sidewalk on the other side of the road, there are beautiful groups of flowers including some very nice red poppies:
A little ways further along the road, I saw several of these blue flowers blooming. I think that they are some kind of lupine:
We turned around at one of our usual spots, and I snapped this picture of a bug on a white flower near there:
In that same area, I caught this interesting long-legged bug on a yellow flower:
Not far from that, we came upon a group of ants. This piece of bone had somehow gotten there on the sidewalk near the ant hole, and these industrious ants were wasting no time getting what they could from it!
It's cherry blossom time here in Tsfat (well, actually I've only seen 2 cherry tree)! Our cherry tree is blooming, but these blossoms are actually on a small tree in the yard of a neighbor not far away:
The peach tree in our yard has almost finished blooming, but there were still a couple of blossoms left on it. Here's one of them:
This is MiniMe and Beatrix. Beatrix is the one closer to us in the picture, and MiniMe is her now-full-grown male kitten. Beatrix had another litter of kittens about 2 weeks ago, but we haven't seen them yet. All we know for sure is that she was very pregnant, she disappeared for a couple of days, and then she came back obviously no longer pregnant but very hungry and with lactating tits. I'm sure she'll bring the kittens for us to see when she and they are ready. In the mean time, we don't even know where they are or how many of them there are.
And, finally, here is Katom, our indoor-only cat who made aliyah with us from California:
In several place along the sidewalk on the other side of the road, there are beautiful groups of flowers including some very nice red poppies:
A little ways further along the road, I saw several of these blue flowers blooming. I think that they are some kind of lupine:
We turned around at one of our usual spots, and I snapped this picture of a bug on a white flower near there:
In that same area, I caught this interesting long-legged bug on a yellow flower:
Not far from that, we came upon a group of ants. This piece of bone had somehow gotten there on the sidewalk near the ant hole, and these industrious ants were wasting no time getting what they could from it!
It's cherry blossom time here in Tsfat (well, actually I've only seen 2 cherry tree)! Our cherry tree is blooming, but these blossoms are actually on a small tree in the yard of a neighbor not far away:
The peach tree in our yard has almost finished blooming, but there were still a couple of blossoms left on it. Here's one of them:
This is MiniMe and Beatrix. Beatrix is the one closer to us in the picture, and MiniMe is her now-full-grown male kitten. Beatrix had another litter of kittens about 2 weeks ago, but we haven't seen them yet. All we know for sure is that she was very pregnant, she disappeared for a couple of days, and then she came back obviously no longer pregnant but very hungry and with lactating tits. I'm sure she'll bring the kittens for us to see when she and they are ready. In the mean time, we don't even know where they are or how many of them there are.
And, finally, here is Katom, our indoor-only cat who made aliyah with us from California:
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