Rock and Ramallah

Though not by design, I went camera-less this weekend, hence no pictures here. After sleeping-in quite late last Friday, I ended up eating cheese pizza for lunch (I absent-mindedly inquired if they have any meat pizzas and the guy in the store sternly reminded me that it is a kosher place.) I stayed afterwards at the nearby coffee shop to do some weekend work. Yes, you’ve heard that right. It’s mostly just proofreading and Bluebooking the legal footnotes of a report due to be published today but since it was a long one, I ended up spending a couple of hours on it. But I was happy to be indoors for most of the afternoon since the sun was blazing hot anyway.

I accompanied an acquaintance walk her baby to Hayarkon park where we stayed for about an hour and then from there, I went straight to meet my friend Itamar at another coffee shop at Masaryk square. I stopped making weekend plans very early on in my stay here so when he asked me if I feel like going to a concert that night, I just replied yes. Talk about flexibility. Well, sometimes being flexible brings good surprises. Geva Alon was fantastic. I rediscovered the kind of music that I happen to like back when I was more into rock than anything eclectic. Barby, a nice concert venue in south Tel-Aviv, also reminded me of the days when I used to hear live music. The show finished at around one in the morning and we proceeded to our weekly barhop. We settled on Bartleby’s, a deliberately inconspicuous hole in the wall along Dizengoff, as if to ensure that only the people who intend to go there can actually find the place. I was told that it’s a relatively spiffy one. They had great food and a good drink selection. The most striking thing was the sense of intimacy inside. At one point, the bartender gave us all vodka shot glasses for a group cheers.

Despite the late hour of sleep, I managed to wake up early the next day to meet Daniel in Jerusalem. After a brief tour of the Old City (and especially to eat the super delicious knafes at Jafari’s Sweets), we took bus 18 at the Damascus gate going to Ramallah. With no surprises or hitches, we arrived there just in time for a late lunch. Ramallah reminded me of certain parts of Manila actually. Lively, crowded, a bit dirty and incredibly noisy. With no idea of where to go and minimal command of formal Arabic, we ended up going to this restaurant with huge chicken roasters outside. A full meal of a quarter chicken, vegetable soup, pita bread and mashed potatoes cost us only 22 NIS. The bus ride from Jerusalem to Ramallah was 7 NIS. The only waiter was incredibly nice but had limited English language skills outside of taking food orders so he referred us to a Caucasian couple eating at a nearby table. The guy sounded jaded enough to say that if we are looking for entertainment, there is none in Ramallah but he suggested a visit to the government complex and to Arafat’s tomb which is what we did. With two people following us closely as we looked around (apparently the place where Abu Mazen stays is quite close), we didn’t feel comfortable taking pictures. Countless shops and coffee houses later, we ended up at Friends School listening to the lecture of Naomi Klein on divestment from Israel. Everyone at work would later tell me how famous she is but at that time I had no idea who she was and I wasn’t particularly impressed with her either.  The auditorium was packed and in many ways, it felt like a human rights hippie/ Woodstock festival. More than half of the audience were foreign human rights activists, I didn’t feel I belong at all. Add that to the growing list of things to ponder on at some point in the future.

On our way back, I got a small glimpse of the Israeli restrictions on movement when we had to alight the bus some distance from where the Kalandia checkpoint is and go inside the terminal where we spent about ten minutes being screened, and then board the bus back again at the other side of the checkpoint.

It was a pretty exhausting weekend overall and I am looking forward again to just staying in Tel Aviv come next week. Time flies by pretty fast. I can’t believe I’ve been in Israel (mostly in Tel Aviv) for about a month now. It’s not so bad after all. I’m just a late-bloomer for a lot of things, this one included. But maybe everything is good because I have some nice things to look forward to, including my friends’ visit at the end of the month. Can’t wait.