Wanderings

Horowitz Travel-Israel-Jerusalem-LGBT, etc.-February 2, 2017

We met with Rachel at the Jerusalem Open House, the LGBT Community Center. She's only been working there a couple of weeks, but was able to fill us in on their programs, which are many. The facility is on the second floor of an office building & proudly flies the rainbow flag. They serve all aspects of the LGBT community including the most orthodox Jewish & Arabs. There have been Pride parades here for years.  Two years ago, a woman was killed by an Orthodox Jew. Unfortunately, it took her death to garner the publicity for the JOH to take off. This year the parade quadrupled in attendance.

We were near Ben Yehuda St. & Yaffo. We joined the locals in widow shopping & snooping in the hundreds of bins looking for a "find." An Army Surplus Store displayed huge guns in the window. We gawked & wondered aloud how they could sell them publicly.  The man next to us said, "They're fake." They were still expensive & too real for my liking. No orange tips on these babies.

It was too early for lunch, so we stopped for a coffee break & treated ourselves to late morning brownies. The people at the next table were speaking English. They had a three-year old boy with them who was getting antsy & loud. I saw that he was playing with a Noah's Ark kit. I asked him if he had a hippopotamus. Indeed, he did. No, I didn't convince him to give it to me, but he was distracted by my rambling about my granddaughter who loves hippos. His mom & we got into the "where are you from" bit. She grew up in Beachwood (Cleveland), Ohio. Our friend here,Stuart, was her parents' rabbi. She made Aliyah four years ago.

Eventually it was lunchtime. The place we chose was the first combo meat & milk place we'd been in. You had to decide before you were seated & given a menu which you wanted. What if you couldn't agree? We chose meat and had our first bowl of genuine chicken soup. I ordered my Cafe Americano mostly in Hebrew which created a problem. I asked for warm milk. The server said they only had soy milk. Ah yes, it was the meat side. I took it black. The server pretty much told me I didn't want my coffee with my meal. I told him I did. I didn't get it until right before he cleared our meal in spite of frequently reminding him.

We thought it would be fun to ride the light rail to one end of the line then the other. We'd treat it like an amusement park ride. Well, it was amusing. We were shut out of the first train (ten cars long) due to crowds. There was standing room only on the next. It was interesting to watch people pass their ride cards hand over hand to those near the machine to have them validated. The honor system works. There were shouts to open the door, close the door, &halt. Organized pandemonium are good words to use here.

We'd fought our way with long arms and sharp elbows onto the return train. David had to fight to keep the seat next to him for me. In the U.S., we have special close-in parking for people with young children. Here they fend for themselves as they load strollers & baby carriages on board. Babies are hanging from hips, arms, & backpacks as parents balance & text. It isn't usual for seats to be given to elderly or women.

Couldn't resist attaching this deplorable example of religiosity (kippah). I feel ashamed.

Toby

Trump Kippah