From Rokach and Rock-arse

Shimon Rokach is the founding father of the Neve Tzedek neighbourhood in Tel-Aviv. Having been sent from Jerusalem to work for the family business in Jaffa by his father, Shimon decided to set up the first Jewish neighbourhood beyond Jaffa's walls in 1887, just as had occured with the founding of Yemin Moshe outside of Jerusalem's walls sometime earlier. Rokach's house was the first of 10 houses built as part of this new Jewish settlement outside of Jaffa. Even though the founding of Tel-Aviv as the first Jewish city is considered by many to have taken place in 1909 with the establishment of "Ahuzat Bayit", it can be strongly argued that it all began 22 years earlier in Neve Tzedek, where indeed the first town hall was set up in Rokach's house itself. The new neighbourhood, known as "Little Paris" attracted many intellectuals such as the author Shay Agnon and the artist Nahum Gutman. Rokach's contributions to the development of the city were many and continued through his son Israel who served as Mayor of Tel-Aviv for 17 years between 1936 and 1953.

After the neighbourhood fell into temporary decline during the 60s and 70s, in 1983 Rokach's granddaughter and artist, Leah Majaro-Mintz, decided to invest her money into the restoration of the decaying building in order to return it to its former glory, which she succeeding in doing worderfully well. In fact, today, the house is pretty much an art gallery, teeming with sculptures of naked females; i mean, there seems to be an arse or pair of breasts staring at you from every corner of the building - it's like an Alfred Hitchcock thriller or something. This women clearly has some sort of unhealthy obsession with the female form. Her grandfather would probably turn in his grave!

Anyway, in Rokach House I guess I've filled in another piece of the Tel-Aviv puzzle. It's definately bootylicious.

A Living Legend

Last week my gran turned 94! If you just consider that for a moment, it's quite extraordinary. Born during the first world war, you can say that the old girl has lived through a few things, and today, still with a pretty clear mind she can comfortably maintain a conversation with me in broken hebrew. Buying a gift for a 94 year old is limited, since, obviously the senses are not as acute as they once were, so I opted for a bunch of roses so that gran can at least smell their fragrance if not see them very well. My rendition of the birthday cards from my mum and my sister written in Rumanian just made her chuckle, but it was good enough for her to understand and to correct my pronunciation.

All that's left to say is happy birthday Safta.
Mazal Tov!
Until 120!

The Colony

Throughout history this land has attracted it's fair share of religious nutters of various color, creed and religious tendency, all eager to do whatever it takes to guarentee their place in heaven and buy their one way ticket to eternal life - a noble cause indeed. Well yesterday I discovered that i didn't need to stray far from home in order to find evidence of the lengths these fanatics would go to in order to realise their holy cause.

There's a plaque at the southern end of the Tel-Aviv promenade which marks the spot where a group of American Christians from the "Church of the Messiah" landed in September 1866, boats laden with the wood and plaster from which they would build their new homes in the Holy Land. Having come across this plaque some time ago, I had tried and failed to locate the "American Colony" in Jaffa and started to doubt whether it was still in existence. Yesterday I gave it another shot, this time approaching from the direction of Florentin rather than the Jaffa side, and in doing so, stumbled upon another little historical treasure of Tel Aviv-Yafo.

George Adams was the spiritual leader of this rabble of bible-bashing yankees, who made it their mission to prepare the Holy Land for the return of the Jews and the second coming of Jesus - well they would have been well pleased with my arrival three years ago. Unfortunately for them their mission failed within a year, George being exposed as some sort of fraud apparently, and their homes were bought out by another wave of Messianic nut-jobs called the Templars, this time from Germany - I don't know which is worse! Their cause was somewhat less ambitious: just to prepare the land for the return of Jesus, but not to encourage the return of the Jews - that's probably why their mission was somewhat longer lasting. Thus the "American Colony" became the "German Colony"; a familiar story throughout the land in fact.

One of the Templars purchases was "Beit Emmanuel" an impressive looking building which became Templar headquarters. Throughout its history Beit Emmanual functioned in many capacities (mostly Christianity related of course) including as a hotel, hospital, girls' school, British army HQ, police HQ and now as a guest house. Interestingly, one of its most famous owners (1878) was a Russian named Baron Plato Von Ustinov, who is in fact that grandfather of the late hollywood actor Peter Ustinov (of Hercule Poirot fame). It was Ustinov's rennovations which gave the building it's current palacial design and in its heyday, this building was the focal point of the whole city of Jaffa, with exotic gardens visited specially from far and wide. Today, the colony has inspired the current development of "The Village", a complex of restaurants and bars and no doubt the next hot nightspot in Tel Aviv-Yafo. Well then, we can soon say that the Christian colony will finally have served it's true purpose; for the Jews to get pissed and have fun, right? Good tactic, as maybe it'll encourage more of us to come here.

Like many, I can't really relate to the fanciful ideas of these religious fanatics, but they certainly added and still add a little extra spice to this multicultural, multiethnic mix we call Israel, Palestine or the Holy Land. And let's face it: without such loonies, who would we have to take the piss out of? Go check it out!

Still on Benefit

My friends.

After a brief blogging interlude for employment related activities, I remain on benefit. Apparently going through a five stage interview process with good references (thanks Shirley) doesn't necessarily land you a job. I seem to be the only one I know that manages to pull off such tricks; it isn't the first time it's happened to me.

Anyway, the outcome being that I retain my original status and can return to my more relaxed, less profitable way of existance until such time as a further opportunity pops up. Luckily I still have a few items left on my list of things to do while unemployed in Tel-Aviv; maybe that's why I didn't get the job; the timing just isn't right. "A time to work and a time to rest"! Isn't that what's written in Ecclesiasties or did I just make that up?

Anyway, as usual I'll be pleased to share with you any shananigans that I get up to during my extended sabbatical.

Yours Faithfully,
Avy (still) on benefit.