An Unjustly Overdue Post

After disappearing from the blog-o-sphere for some time, I have returned and offer the following brief updates:

1. Following my return from Jerusalem, I ventured to Haifa with an entourage to nosh at Fattoush (arguably, one of the best restaurants in Israel), visit the Bahai gardens, and enjoy the Haifa International Film Festival. Nearby the film festival, we ventured into a bazaar offering food and gifts to moviegoers.

Photos of the trip as follows:

Labne at Fattoush in the German Colony (note hummus with garlic and mushrooms in upper-right of photo)


View of the Bahai gardens from the German Colony (note that the Shrine of the Bab seen in the distance marks approximately only half of the way to the top of the gardens)


View of Haifa from the tayellet (promenade) on top of Mount Carmel


How bazaar! (Sorry, I couldn't resist)


View of Haifa from the tayellet (promenade) on top of Mount Carmel at night

2. After a day off, we traveled north again heading further east towards the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee). We spent the night at kibbutz Tel Katzir, a kibbutz with a rich history given its proximity to Syria prior to the war in 1967. I learned that eucalyptus trees, not native to Israel, were planted along the road to the kibbutz to prevent the Syrians from seeing military trucks heading north. Additionally, the kibbutz has bomb shelters throughout, with paths dug from places on the kibbutz such as the kindergarten to the shelters to protect members of the kibbutz from constant shelling by Syria. Apparently, members of the kibbutz could tell whether a rocket was coming from Syria to Israel or leaving Israel for Syria based on sound alone to determine whether they should take cover. The kibbutz also constructed a wall to prevent Syria from observing the daily workings at the kibbutz from the Golan Heights. However, following Israel's acquisition of the Golan at the conclusion of the war, members of the kibbutz recalled being able to see over the wall from the Golan. Oy...so much for preventing onlookers from abroad.

The return trip to Tel Aviv included stops in Zichron Yaakov and Caesaria. Since I'm returning to Zichron Yaakov in a few days as part of my official program to study the first significant waves of Jewish immigrants to this region, I'll skip the explanation for now. Caesaria offers everything one would expect of Israel's West Palm Beach. A golf course, a wealthy retirement community, fancy restaurants, a picturesque beach, and, um, ruins? Yes, Caesaria's rich history dating back to the Roman period allows one to walk through ancient ruins sitting along the Mediterranean Sea. Is there any wonder why Bibi likes to hang here?

Photos:

Sunset over the Kinneret from the kibbutz


Entrance to Zichron Ya'akov, established by Baron Edmond de Rothschild during the First Aliyah


Ruins and all along the Mediterranean, Caesaria

Zehu. That's it for pics from my Sukkot travels. Now to catch up with my move to Arad and some of the things that I've been doing here in the Negev...

The Jump to J-town

Sukkot has meaning for every Israeli. Contrary to the name "feast of booths," Sukkot looks nothing like your average eighth grade science fair or city international sampler food festival. Instead, both secular and religious Israelis get off their tahat and go eat outside in the sukkah. For many Israelis, "getting out" means even more: they get out of class (basically, a "fall break" for a week), get out of the city (travel north to go hiking or take part in one of many festivals occurring during the week), or get out of the country (what better way to spend a Jewish holiday than to sunbathe on the Black Sea with Romanians, Bulgarians, and Turks as part of your $400 Israir holiday vacation package?).

We chose something a bit different: we went east, well, to Jerusalem. Waking up in the wee hours of the morning (8 AM in Israel--I love this place!), one immediately notices a different demographic at the train station (pictured below).


Soldiers, who can be seen everywhere in the country since Israel has a mandatory service requirement for Jewish young adults, commonly use public transportation to get to work all expenses paid for by the government. In this picture, they await the northbound train in Herzylia to head to bases farther north. Note: in explaining the mandatory service requirement, in no way do I intend to minimize the contentious exemptions provided for yeshiva-bound religious Jews, who risk their lives to protect the state of Israel by studying Torah all day in a dark room, or conscientious objectors, who must object to the concept of a military and not just serving in the shtechim (territories) to be eligible for exemption without repercussion. Few things in this part of the world are without complexity and controversy.

The train ride to Jerusalem was scenic, clean, and quiet--a great way to travel in Israel compared to other forms of public transportation. The unique problem with taking the train to Jerusalem, compared to using it to get elsewhere in Israel, is that one must switch trains at Bet Shemesh and, thus, take more time to get to Jerusalem than using roadways. The train travels on historic old tracks that curve around both massive hills and avoid entering what was then Jordanian territory farther south. When someone first mentioned Bet Shemesh to me, I was quite confused and thought she said Bet Shemush, which translates literally to "house of use" and happens to be another term for bathroom. I thought it was a funny name for a town until I realized I was the only one laughing. Then again, I was the only one laughing during Superbad in the movie theater since none of the Israelis seemed to understand the ridiculously funny things the main high school protagonists would say throughout the film.

Jerusalem, always fascinating, did not disappoint during this visit during Sukkot. We coursed our way through a brand new outdoor shopping center outside of Jaffa Gate (Joan Rivers might as well be standing at the gate saying, Who are you wearing to the Western Wall, darling?) and into the shouk of the Old City. Tourists abound in the shouk ready to purchase touristy merchandise. Fascinatingly, politics plays more of a role for tourists than for sellers, who are merely looking to make a living for their families based on what people will buy; note that this shop offers everything from "Free Palestine" to "America: don't worry, Israel is behind you."


The Kotel (Western Wall) was packed full of people to celebrate Sukkot, including haredim, secular Jews, Modern Orthodox Jews, Conservative Jews (at least 1), Reform Jews, Reconstructionist Jews, and a very large group of Beta Israel (Israelis of Ethiopian descent). Upon encountering such a spiritual center to one's religion, many describe a sensation of awe. We, too, felt a grand internal sensations but given the growling, it seemed to be emanating from our stomachs. We then left the Kotel and walked to the spiritual center of Israel's literary elite: Tmol Shilshom. Some of Israel's most famous authors have been known to frequent this historic site to sip coffee, nosh on a sandwich, and soak in some inspiration from the environment. Hey, they get hungry, too.

After lunch, we made our way through the scenic neighborhood of Yemin Moshe that overlooks the old city as well as the rolling hills of the West Bank beyond the (please choose term based on your stance) "security fence/separation wall" (pictured below) to Emek Refaim, where we sipped coffee among English-speaking American-Israelis discussing a progressive approach to contemporary Judaism (oddly enough, a rare find in Israel outside of this "Jewish hipster-intellectual" neighborhood).


We headed back to Kikar Tzion and Ben Yehuda to walk around as we awaited our dinner reservations at Darna. Darna likely represents the best kosher Moroccan restaurant in the world and comes complete with authentic ambiance and extraordinary cuisine. To walk off dinner, we made one last run through this holy city's surprisingly lively night scene and flagged down a sherut to return home to Tel Aviv. There, we celebrated the "festival of sleeping" (not a Jewish holiday but still a favorite of mine).

More Just Deserts

So I've managed to do a bit more than watch MTV music videos (they play all day on MTV's international channel) and become confused by relationship swaps on Melrose Place (episodes, too, air all day on Israeli TV). I got some traveling in over the Sukkot break but not before I spent another day volunteering at the PHR clinic.

On this visit, many more patients originated from the Sudan. One of the physicians, who did most of his training in the United States, pointed out that refugee care in Israel was different from America. For one, refugees fleeing persecution from any country who make it to the U.S. generally had the resources to fly, even if that's all they had. The refugees at the clinic in south Tel Aviv never had that option available to them.

Israel does provide these refugees some resources but aspects of care that were straightforward in the U.S. are not necessarily the same here. For one, no 24-hour telephone interpretation service is available at the clinic. Interpretation services usually consist of someone asking in the waiting room if someone speaks both Arabic and English or Arabic and Hebrew if no student interpreter or Arabic-speaking staff is available. Some staff at the clinic do speak both Russian and Hebrew but interpretation can still be limited. Even at an inner-city hospital back in the U.S., professional interpreters were somewhat available and our education emphasized the dangers of letting family or non-professionals interpret (e.g., mistranslation, deliberate withholding of information, etc.). Nevertheless, the clinic must be practical to some extent and utilizes the resources, if any, available to it.

The second difference I've noticed is in the provision of care to HIV-positive refugees. One refugee from Eritrea said that a simple visit to see a doctor at the AIDS clinic in Tel Aviv could cost 1000 shekels (~$250). It is not clear why this disparity exists and I can only guess that the government may provide limited funds for non-citizen healthcare. I can't even imagine what a non-citizen would be charged if she or he had to begin antiretroviral therapy.

Even given these differences, one significant difference remains: every citizen in Israel has health insurance. When I hear physicians complain about the provision of care to refugees in Israel, I am saddened when I think about how we treat our own citizens in the United States. Shame on us. We let ourselves get bullied into a dysfunctional system out of a fear that socialized medicine was two steps shy of Communism, that the government would make medical decisions for our doctors. Instead, HMO's have fulfilled that role instead and even patients with insurance sometimes get left behind.

People debate about the number of uninsured in the United States, whether or not this figure represents a significant number of young, healthy individuals or people between jobs. Regardless, if a single person in these categories develops a disease (e.g., Hodgkin's lymphoma) that is treatable but would drive an individual beyond bankruptcy in the absence of insurance, we have failed as a society. Certainly, there are countless examples beyond the example of Hodgkin's, a disease that tends that affects young, seemingly healthy men in its bimodal distribution.

When I describe our healthcare system to Israelis, they say they cannot even comprehend what is going on the United States. One staff member at the PHR clinic who wants to look at other countries to determine how care could be provided to refugees feasibly and economically said, "We would never use America as an example."

I despise economic arguments because I think that social justice must always take precedence. We've somehow managed to revert from the Declaration of Independence's life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness to Locke's life, liberty, and property with a much heavier emphasis on the last pursuit than either of the first two. Nevertheless, in a political world where tax cuts inspire action more than the plight of the poor, an economic argument can be made for universal care. Some argue that the United States cannot afford healthcare when mired in an expensive war, but certainly Israel has significant per capita defense expenditures and still manages to see healthcare for all citizens as essential to a healthy society. In the U.S., politicians fail to comprehend that the average taxpayer spends more on our "catastrophic" system of care (because patients wait until something catastrophic, like a heart attack, occurs that costs thousands of dollars to treat) rather than a system of "preventative" care (where we could offer medication to treat hyperlipidemia and reduce the likelihood of a heart attack much more inexpensively).

None of these revelations seemed to have reached our current president, who said that all people have access to care since "you just go to an emergency room." I guess Bush never saw the inside of an emergency room at an inner-city hospital or the crisis that's threatening closure of them and trauma centers all over the country. He seems too busy fighting to make sure American children can't see a doctor instead.

Well, enough about the disaster of U.S. healthcare for the time being. I'm in Israel now, where although access issues exist for refugees, any citizen can receive expensive in-vitro fertilization technology for the birth of up to two children if needed at the government's expense.

On that note, I better go back to watching Melrose Place. It's much less depressing to watch the superficial lives of fictional characters than to think about the superficial approach our leadership has taken to barricading Americans from the right to health.

Just Amazing

Thanks to Arie, we had the opportunity to attend the freestyle DJ semifinals here in Tel Aviv last week. Highlights include a 13 year-old competitor (this kid could spin his own Bar Mitzvah party) and this nifty move:

I've been traveling lately over the holiday of Sukkot, so I'll post more in just a bit...