The Lord and Nike

Though Jerusalem is not my kind of a city, one thing that I can not complain about is the number of weird things to blog about around here. I am not sure if Be’er Sheva, where I am moving this week, will provide as many, but a half would more than suffice. Just a few weeks back, a crazy American guy that sells back-scrubbers yelled out to me: “Cover your nakedness woman! You are in the Holy Land now!” Yes, the heretical outfit of tank top and jeans again (see the post below). At the time, I was gulping down my coke whilst balancing a bunch of groceries, and it did not hit me that he was talking to me until I was way past him. I still have it on my “before I leave Israel” to-do-list to walk past him in the most revealing outfit which I can find and tell him to go fuck himself in Russian. Russian will be especially appropriate since he always yells out his fashion reprimands in English to people who may not understand him in the first place.

Which brings me to today. Yes, I know, there was no transition there. Unless it was some ancient Hebrew sign that my ex-Soviet agnostic ass is unaware of, I think I saw a kippa with the Nike swoosh. Now, you often spot all sorts of interesting and funky kippots around here, but this is the first one that expressed a sneaker preference of the ones I've seen. I really do wonder, if God was one of us, would he prefer Nike or Adidas? OK, after a bit of googling, I have come to realize that there are more brand-promoting kippots out there than I suspected. I even found a Harley-Davidson kippa. Who knew? OK, I really need to get back to pretending to pack.

Ultra-Orthodox Summer Fun

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is summer and hence, the height of secular vs. religious tensions on what constitutes appropriate dress in the Holy Land. An acquaintance of mine thought that jeans and a tank top were reasonable attire for the increasingly hot Israeli sun. And so, one fine day, the girl got on a bus – a regular, public bus that is – full of the ultra-Orthodox. The ultra-Orthodox in question seemed to be under the impression that since they constituted the majority on the bus, they had the right to institute the dress code for everyone on it. One of the men started yelling at her, and asked if she thought that this was the beach. To the bus driver’s credit, he refused to heed the ridiculous demand to kick her off the bus because of her scandalous summer wear. Nevertheless, she got off. When I asked her why, she told me that: “There were many of them there, and I am afraid of them.” Of course, her mother and I spent a good fifteen minutes discussing the various variants of what she could have said to tell them off. My comebacks would have been: 1) Is this Iran? 2) Is this Siberia? Add yours in the comments, who knows, the summer is just beginning, and I have lots of buses to catch…

Encore

Thanks for all the e-mails, comments and metro suggestions on my “Bitchy Cow and Blue Dream” post. For those wondering where it went, I removed it. I decided that it was so perfectly marvelous that I should work on expanding, spicing it up and eventually, republish it as a work of fiction. Poor parents, NonnaBlog is killing their hopes of a law degree and a PhD with every post. Anyways, for all the bitchy cows and assholes of the world who think that ex-Soviet Jews are all prostitutes, drunks, not really Jews, “WHATEVER” and so on, I reproduce the “I Have a Dream” part of the post:

My “blue dream” is to organize a massive field trip sponsored by the Israeli government and private donations (I think this is the ONE thing that we can get the ex-Soviet Jewish community to contribute to big time) to send the bitchy cows and assholes in Israel and the Jewish Diaspora on a good old field trip to ride the Moscow metro. Boy oh boy, it will be fun!!!!!!!!!!!!! Everybody should come!!!!!!!! Yalla! The ultra-Orthodox, the modern Orthodox, the seculars -- everyone is absolutely welcome. Come as you are with your hats, kippas, Stars of David, but most importantly, just come! YOUR FACE SHOULD BE ENOUGH!!!!!! It will be a real “Russian” experience. After we enrich our Russian vocabulary with words like “urodlivaya zhidovskaya morda” (ugly kiky face) and a couple of you get your ignorant brains get splashed against the nearest window, we will all hop on an El Al flight back to Eretz Israel. Then you fuckers will tell my community what’s what.

PS: BTW, Marianne, what happenend on the Budapest taxi? I might be riding one in the future not too distant along with Anna and Anouk.

Dogs and Disengagement

As some of you may know, the anti-disengagement camp in Israel has adopted orange as their color. Curiously, this seems to have been done in the spirit of the Ukrainian protestors of the successful “Orange Revolution,” with which the settlers and their supporters have nothing in common. Be that it as it may, it’s orange all around here. The most hair-raising manifestation of it was when some of the settlers sported orange Stars of David, fancying themselves to be the like the victims of the Holocaust who bore yellow Stars of David before they were gassed, shot, worked to death, etc., This being a country founded by Holocaust survivors, the PR campaign backfired big time. Sometimes, the Israeli flag is defaced by being painted orange, though I think that most disengagement opponents have figured out that this doesn’t go over well either. More commonly, they just tie an orange ribbon next to the flag instead of dumping orange paint on it.

Government security, however, has sometimes gotten a little too paranoid at the sight of the color, like the time they blocked an Indian delegation bearing gifts of orange. As Jewish Week reported back in May:

This week the color foibles reached a peak when a delegation of Indian lawmakers arrived at the Knesset bearing gifts: a bagful of orange scarves, orange being the official color of India’s largest opposition party and believed to represent the Lotus flower, which brings good fortune to its wearer.

Knesset guards refused to allow the scarves in the building, and the Indian lawmakers had to enter sans gifts, picking them up as they left.

A spokesperson in the Knesset office said in response to the orange scarf scandal, as it came to be known in Israel, that while the guards were following orders, they may have been a little overzealous, according to Israeli press reports.

“It is absolutely prohibited to enter the Knesset with placards or any other propaganda material,” the office was quoted as saying. “Upon examination of the incident, we nevertheless conclude that there has been a certain degree of exaggeration in refusing to allow our Indian guests to enter with their scarves.”

Yesterday, I saw a little dog with an orange ribbon around its neck. I have seen toddlers wearing anti-disengagement t-shirts and so on, but this was the first time I saw a pet expressing his views on the withdrawal from Gaza. Yes, they say that the owner and pet come to resemble one another over time, but who knows? Maybe the little dog would rather be sporting Peace Now gear? In any case, I don’t know about Barney’s (The First Dog) views on disengagement are -- though I have a feeling that like President Bush he is pro -- but it looks like he can multiply pretty darn well. Never thought I would live to see the day when American dogs help out the English with their math homework. Yes, you too can send in your question to the First Dog and get all things Barney on his website. I highly recommend seeing the Barney Cam II (2003), which you can find under Barney’s Films on the right-hand side, it’s hilarious. Let’s just say it involves Karl Rove and Christmas lights... Do see the 2003 film and NOT the most recent one, which sucks. All of this pet talk makes me want to read Mo Rocca’s All The Presidents’ Pets which promises to shed some light on the real influence of First Pets in American politics. It is at times like this when I wonder if I should devote my writing non-talents to blogging about more substantial things like world hunger and so on…

Worthy Read

"Hi Dina, Regards From Ali,"Ha'aretz.

Bibi Says!

For those who have not yet noticed, I have a sick fascination Israeli Finance Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu. It’s hard not to. Who else will assail academic criticism of his economic policies by saying that impoverished professors should just shove it, and let Bibi and his business buddies do the talking! And so, kicking off the brand new “Bibi Says” feature is Ynetnews:

Speaking at a social-economic conference at his Likud party’s headquarters in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu said that he once told a man who complained about his son’s problem in finding work that his economic policy would bring market growth.

He said he told the man that jobs in the high-tech sector will be the first to open up, and then his son would have more options. When the man refused to accept his answer, the minister said he told him, “You want to know what I can tell your son now? I’ll tell you: Go to work! Go to work! You are a young man. Go mop floors, go sweep stairwells, go clean offices. Go work in anything, go to work, go to work!”

Netanyahu also noted many Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union had to relinquish degrees in science and engineering because there was no work for them and take up jobs in other fields. Many such people work as janitors and supermarket cashiers.

But the respect associated with any job, the minister said, was determined by the ones who perform it.

“When I was a student, I washed offices, I swept stairwells. I cleaned,” he said.

Can someone please find a way to give Bibi his old job back?

Ad Madness

I saw an awful, yet hilarious ad in a Russian-language Israeli publication. It was a simple, tiny box with the name of the establishment, the establishment's slogan, and phone number. It went as follows: "ABORTION: The Best Gynecologists."

Nonnka's Scribblings Elsewhere

"An Uneasy Alliance," MotherJones.com.

A Friendly “Destinos” B*E Wager

Intrigued? If so, you can find out about a bet I have going with one of my editors in this call for backup on Craig’s List…And of course, if you can, ayyuuuuuuuda meeeeeeeeeee!

Babushka’s Warning

Of all my wacky family members, grandma undoubtedly wins the prize for saying the funniest things year in and year out. Who can forget the time when we went to see “Dumb & Dumber,” and she asked the teller for two tickets for “Bump & Bumper?” The other day, I was telling her of my plans to spend the summer on a kibbutz -- think collective farm minus the mass starvation, little red books, and killings of its Soviet and Chinese counterparts. Grandma somehow got the kibbutzim and settlements mixed up, and told me that I should reconsider going. After all, she warned, "you could fall into the clutches of the Palestinians.” Laughing uncontrollably, I tried to explain that the kibbutzim are not settlements, and that I will be well inside the Green Line. I refrained from reminding her that I am, after all, living in Jerusalem and see plenty of Palestinians everyday. Strangely, the Palestinians don’t seem to express much interest in me except to, like Jews, ask me for directions in Hebrew, which I can’t even properly give half of the time. So don’t worry babushka!