welcome back

its been a while since i have reflected on one thing or another here. a good friend just started writing his thoughts down in a blog - baseballfilmlit.blogspot.com -and so i decided to go back to therapy too. it seems to me that for blogs like mine, those that are not actually read by any anybody except for offshore servers and google's own electronic brain, posting a blog entry is a lot like speaking with a therapist. a bit of forced introspection and some time to reflect on interesting observations. here goes...

i think i'll write a bit about politics and economics, but first let me put the next few entries into context for the electronic web crawlers.

1. i have been in tel aviv for a year and a half.
2. i have become increasingly a fan of economic libertarianism.
3. i am neither a war-monger nor somebody who is blind to the realities of the world.

so recently i have been trying to understand why there is so much fighting in the world - why there has always been. many people believe that the US is responsible for it all. i dont believe this is true. as per the wikipedia, there were 34 wars fought around the world from 1990-2002. there have been 9 wars from 2003-2006. there are also no less than 20 ongoing "conflicts."

in the context of the massive amounts of killings and struggles and horrific acts of violence all over the world and since the beginning of time, the unted states' recent offensives must be looked at as the unfortunate means to increased peace in the future.

from all of the wars and conflicts of the past 15 years (44 of them), the vast majority have either been fought by underdeveloped countries where negotiation wont work since neither side has much to offer the other, or by eastern european countries seeking Independence and democracy. once a democracy - or some other form of fair government, people are less likely to go to war. i believe that this is the point of the current conflicts in the middle east. and also the reason why it is so important that all of this madness ends in something productive. the people of bahrain, qatar, canada, brazil, great britain, israel, usa dont want to fight, to lose children, to cause harm. once people see hope, economic stability and a future there are better things to do than fight.

i believe the current conflict must be taken to the end. the end is a politically and economically stable middle east where the citizens are motivated by better things than fighting for ideology and religion. this could take a lot of time, but wars have fought since time's beginning. wars are not new. if this war wasn't being fought, other wars would be. and they wont stop, or at least history has not given us any reason to believe they will. and unlike many wars in the past, which were often fought for land, religion and wealth, this war, as bungled and clumsy and horrible as it has become, at least has a noble purpose. democracy is a social stabilizer. the more democracy, the less wars. we have to believe that this will work.

turkey

in new york i dreamed about long dark bars - dangerous and filled with smoke, mysterious and magical - belly dancers, arms deals, cards, maybe even a monkey. nobody asks you where you're from - its enough that your there and the reason is nobody's business. in new york its not about what you do. its about goldman or morgan. washing down that rough day with a single malt and wishing you never had that conversation about politics with your overly sensative co-worker. if you live in brooklyn and your drinking in the city - thats interesting, and vice versa. i always dreamed of finding that one place that nobody knows about. where they didnt have to pay a new york rent and the bloomberg laws didnt apply. you walk down the stairs and lots of people are doing the wrong things. and they are talking about things that you dont already know about and might care to overhear. it wasnt really possible, of course, nobody could afford it - the rents are too high and the stakes are too large in new york for anything really out of the ordinary.
tommorow im going to turkey - snake charmers and spices and old churches turned into mosques and smoke filled bars - hopefully no arms deals, but maybe some belly dancers and though coldplay wont be playing behind the whirling dervishes (a good friend pointed out that 'fix you' sounds great playing in the background of the meditative dance), i'm sure the music will be enchanting. new york is my home - my heart filled with 20th century architecture, modern art, traffic and 2nd avenue cafes. but i'm really looking forward to a little seediness and some ancient color.

back and holier than ever

4.99 for a kilo of apples, 2.99 for a kilo of nectarines - the tel aviv market, shuk haCarmel - named after the coastal mountain now home to haifa and on which the competition between the baal priest and the jewish god took place. 3pm and pressing through the saturated aisles of the outdoor market, i thought about the old tradition of the market vs the high-tech surroundings of tel-aviv, the high density of people and the always small but present possibility of an attack. maybe clashes in nature and society occur during change - like a relationship between two people - when one has advanced and another has not - when one entity progresses - economically, socially and idealogically and the other is still moving on steam and coal. a gap in understanding is created and the ability to relate deteriorates - but you fight against it - out of jealousy or fear or the unknown. and a clash occurs.
like the relationship between the nation of baal worshipers lead by balak who fought with the jews on mount carmel thousands of years ago. the jewish nation had left egypt and were moving on - making progress and had recently accepted a new code of laws. they were advancing and others would clash with their progress - not allowing/understanding the progress.
so the shuk haCarmel - a symbol of the old world - the physical trade of merchandise, paid for in cash, marketed by your voice and selling nothing but necessities is an ancestor from the past, highlighting the present and helping us to remember the gap. and most importantly, helping us to relate to both sides of it.

from ape to man

the last day of the great darwinian transformation. it was a micro evolution on a macro scale, a quick concentrated conversion. current evolutionary incarnation: man.

skin

skin. yo, man, give some thought to tel aviv. all the hipsters are out at etas unis tonight. am i becoming a hunchback? i dont think i've ever given so much thought to anything in my life. but as destiny would have it, a soothsayer visited me when i was still in the womb and told me that birds are prisoners to the chains of the skyway and that everybody's got to serve somebody. then he cut my upper lip and called me uninteresting. i wont go into who im serving. its unclear, possibly even embarrasing. and anyways, tel aviv is far and i have a life here and a business, of course. and i know something about love, of course. and as dr filth would explain - she's smart - trying to capitalize on current value - prior to depreciation, of course. is there such a thing as a calling? why do we often unconciously gravitate toward the choice that when thought about at our clearest points is, in fact, the one that brings the least happiness. or is that just me. and so it goes. drip drip drip.

neve tzedek 6.12 

staying sheltered in the holy land

had the pleasure of pleasures last night to have dinner with one old dear friend, one new dear friend and some in between. 18 rechov shiftai yisrael was the place to be for delicious roasted peppers, matbucha and some late night likutai moharan. when monsey turned the conversation toward typical yeshiva black hat intolerance, anna became a bit disenchanted, but a quick turn of the conversation toward other dimensional letters comprising the molecular structure of physical objects made it better.
In the last 6 days, we have been to the tel-aviv beaches, the artist communities in Yaffo, florentine, neve tzedek and the old city of jerusalem. We have visited the graves of Abraham, Sarah, Jacob, Esav, the ramban and Jesus. We've bathed in Liftah, climbed masadah and bathed in the dead sea. We have seen the well of queen helen, the Western Wall, Mea Shearim, became extensively familiar with theTel-aviv night life, dined in countless restaurants, visited Yad Vashem and The Jerusalem Museum. We have toured all four quarters of the old city and passed through four of 7 gates leading into the great walled city. A more in-depth account of the vacation will follow.