The International Klezmer Festival

We are now right in the middle of a 3-day event (or, more accurately, 3-NIGHT event) that happens every summer right here in Tsfat. In fact, פסטיבל הכלייזמרים הבנלאומי festival ha-klezmerim ha-benleumi ("The International Klezmer Festival") is by far the biggest event of the year in Tsfat.

We have now lived here for more than 5 years, but last night was the first time we ever ventured into town to check out this major event! Partly this is due to geography. Although we do live within the city of Tsfat, the festival happens in the old area (the downtown) of Tsfat, which is probably a good mile from here, even as the crow flies, and, of course, since Tsfat is on a high hill, with several peaks and ridges, one does NOT get there in anything even approaching a straight line, not even when walking. Furthermore, we live at a somewhat higher elevation. So, whereas the walk into town is doable but much too tiring and time-consuming, the walk back home is simply unthinkable for us at our age and in our condition!

Even on normal days, parking in town can be tricky. During Klezmer, it could only be worse, despite the fact that only residents are allowed to even drive up from the base of our big hill after 5:00 p.m. So, driving into town is out of the question. That leaves the local buses, which means a wait at both ends and some worry about how late the buses will actually run.

Finally, this year, however, we decided to get in there. I had even planned ahead and taken Monday through Thursday this week off from Berlitz (as vacation time, so I'll still get paid). From the official festival website I downloaded and printed the schedule of events and the map of town showing where the various stages were located. The first concerts (ALL of which are outdoors and free!) begin at 8:00 p.m. each evening, and the last ones don't end until 1:00 a.m. (which is WAY after our bedtime!).

We left the house before 7:00 p.m. and arrived at the bus stop at about 7:05 - 7:10. We figured the bus should arrive soon, but it was quite some time before we even saw it going the other way. It didn't get back to us on its way into town until about 7:40, and it was already quite full of people with many standing in the aisle. A couple of young women actually got up and offered us their seats (which I was very thankful for but which made me feel rather old, I must admit!).

During the day, the number 4 bus is the only one that comes to our neighborhood, but, in the evening, both the number 4 and the number 3 are replaced by the number 10, which basically covers BOTH routes. So, rather than heading more or less directly into town, we had a tour of Kiryat Sara and Ibikor, with even MORE people getting on along the way. The central bus station was the end of the route, though normally the buses all go from there up Palmach Street and then back around down on Aliyah Bet Street.

So, we finally got off the bus and headed up into town from the Central Bus Station. Normally, at that hour (around 8:30 p.m.) downtown Tsfat would be pretty much dead, but, of course, it was just coming to life last night. A lot of the regular stores were closed, but the eating places were all open and even serving food along the sidewalks. People were walking in the street since almost no vehicles were being allowed to use it. After the intersection with Aliyah Bet Street, Y'rushalayim Street was completely closed to vehicular traffic. We continued under the bridge and down to the stage we had selected, in the Artists' Quarter.

Our friend, Norman, at our synagogue had mentioned to us that his cousin was the accordion player for a group from Vienna called "Shalom Aleichem" that would be playing in the Festival. Sure enough, I had found the group on the program, and naturally we had selected the stage where they would be performing.

We got there around 8:40, just shortly before the group playing the 8 o'clock hour had finished. Shalom Aleichem was scheduled for the 9:00 to 11:00 time slot. While listening to the last number of two of the previous group, David noticed that he was probably having an insulin reaction (i.e. dangerously low blood sugar levels). He tested, and, sure enough, he was. He immediately took glucose tablets that he always carries with him for this purpose, and I headed up to a nearby market to buy candy, completing my purchase there just before their 9:00 p.m. closing time! Between the glucose tablets and some of the candy I brought, he was soon just fine.

The Shalom Aleichem group was fabulous! Besides the accordion player (whose last name was indeed the same as Norman's!), they had a violinist, a string bass player, a trumpet player, and a clarinetist. The latter two were brothers, and the clarinetist also played the keyboard brilliantly for a couple of their pieces. There was also a singer for the most of the selections (the others were instrumental), and he also introduced each piece and said a few other things, as well. The words for the songs were invariably in Yiddish. All of the musicians were excellent, but perhaps the trumpet player was the most amazing. In part of one song, he played TWO trumpets at the same time, something I've NEVER seen before! One of the two trumpets was also somewhat bigger and a different shape, another thing I'd not seen before. I took a couple of pictures of them, but, not surprisingly they didn't turn out well because of the night and the bright illumination of the band.

On the walk back to the bus station, we heard booms. When I looked up, I saw that they were doing a fireworks show, launching them from the m'tzudah at the top of the hill of the old city. We stood there and watched until they were finished, and I'd say they were as good as some of the 4th of July fireworks I'd seen in the States.

Unfortunately, we couldn't stay for the whole 2 hours that Shalom Aleichem played (so we only heard their 1st hour) because it was already past our bedtime, and we still had to walk back to the station, wait for the bus, ride it to our neighborhood, and then walk home. Actually, in fact, David waited at our neighborhood bus stop while I walked home quickly and came back for him with the car. In the end, we got to bed around quarter to midnight. At least I slept very well and didn't get up until about quarter to 8:00 in the morning.

The whole thing was a bit much for us, so we won't try it again this year, at least, even though the Festival continues tonight (Tuesday) and tomorrow night. But it was a great adventure, and we enjoyed it very much, especially the wonderful Klezmer music!

Asuta Hospital - Tel Aviv

Recently, David has been having some extensive dental work done. Because of his unique combination of illnesses, we have to travel (many times!) to a dental clinic in Tel Aviv. The clinic is part of the MaccabiDent network, which is the dental service of our kupat kholim (health fund -- like an HMO in the U.S.). This particular clinic is in the Asuta Hospital of Tel Aviv.

The hospital is located in a new, very modern building in an area of the city that is still rapidly developing. The architecture of this building is very interesting, with different textures, many non-right angles, and even some walls that lean outward! The back side of the building faces a large natural park along a river, and there is a large, multi-story glass window. One of the most interesting features in this part of the building (which we walk right by on the way to the dental clinic) is the synagogue. As you can see in the picture below, it is a black box that looks likes it's suspended between heaven and earth. I rather like that symbolism for a place of prayer!

Dangers avoided

Today, I'm writing about 3 complete unrelated things. Unrelated, that is, except by the fact that, in each case, something dangerous ended up causing no one any harm at all.

First story

The first is about an anniversary. Five years ago this past week (on August 2, 2006, to be precise), two Katyusha rockets fell in our immediate neighborhood. This was, of course, during the Second Lebanon War. For those of you who haven't heard or don't remember the story, this is a very brief synopsis. It was about mid-morning, and David and I had just finished taking a shower. He was on the side of the bed right next to the north-facing window, and I was still in the bathroom (on the south side of the bedroom), drying myself. There were no sirens, but, suddenly, there were two very load BOOMS and we knew that we had been hit. Something (we later discovered it was a ball bearing) had come through 4 panes of glass (the window was open because of the lovely summer breezes), also damaging the frames as it came. It had to have flown less than a meter from David's head. It then bounced off the ceiling of the bedroom nearly on the opposite side and then hit the A/C unit located right above the door to the bathroom. I heard the coolant hissing as it leaked out.

As it turned out, one Katyusha had hit just across the street (which was where the ball bearing had come from) and another had hit very close to our neighbor's house. The first Katyusha did some minor damage to the north side of our house (including the above-mentioned broken windows), and the second broke the outer pane (but NOT the inner one!) of the upper half of our large stairwell window (which faces south). All the south facing windows on our neighbor's house were broken, and there were pock marks on the walls and ceilings of nearly every room of his house. The other 3 houses in our complex also suffered varying degrees of damage. But no one was injured at all.

The emergency services people showed up within only a few minutes and quickly determined, of course, that no one was hurt. Later that same day, someone from the government insurance agency came out and assessed the situation. Within a week, all the damage to our house was repaired, and by the end of August, the money from the government was in my account.

Second story

Last night, we were at Kabbalat Shabbat prayers at our synagogue, Emet V'Shalom (EVS), in Nahariya as usual. This week, there was a bar mitzvah. The boy is a descendant (great grandson, at least, if not more generations) of a founder of the synagogue (it was founded by German Jews before WW II, as was the city itself) who was also its rabbi at one time.

The service was nearly finished, and Rabbi Horovitz had just begun to talk about the bar mitzvah boy, as he usually does, when a policeman burst in the door and told us we must all get out immediately. Although I don't think he said why, we all pretty much knew, and we proceeded very calmly to exit. Of course, the reason was a suspicious package. David actually saw it as we went out. At first, they just sent us to the other side of the street, but then they pushed us back even further, around the corner. There was no panic at all, and, in fact, we all just hung around talking and socializing. I don't know exactly what the bomb squad (at least I assume they were called) did, but after some time, we were allowed to go back in. As soon as we all got back in, Rabbi just picked right up where he had left off.

As you can imagine, unattended packages are always considered suspicious here, especially if they are located near any significant group of people.

Third story

After we got home last night, David got to bed a little before I did. When I was about to get into bed, I noticed that Pascal (our BIG black white with a white bib and some white paws) was playing with something over on David's side of the bed. I went over to check it out. When I got there, I saw that there was a good-sized black scorpion, right on one of David's thongs by the bed! Very quickly, I could see that it was dead. I'm sure the cats had killed it, since, as you may remember, they are experienced scorpion hunters. Anyway, I just picked up the thong, took it into the bathroom, dumped it into the toilet, and flushed. If I hadn't have found it, though, David would have had a possibly nasty surprise when he got up in the night and put his thongs on.