I know I promised to post about Krav Maga, but I don’t have very much time before class, and a piece on that subject would be slightly involved. So… if you want my random thoughts on the day so far, read on. If you’re looking for something profound, don’t waste your time.
I walked to the Neve Avivim quarter after my Hebrew midterm this morning, because the pharmacy is there, and I need to to get some salisomethingorother acid (I know the name, I really do – it’s just not coming to me right now) because apparently I have a viral wart on my finger, which stinks. It’s not painful or contagious or anything, but it’s the little things that drive me crazy.
It was interesting just walking through this suburb of Tel Aviv. I guess I never realized just how much more family-oriented this society is than that of the States. It’s probably because of the huge emphasis Judaism places on having a family – you’re not worth much as a person if you don’t have kids – and even though seventy percent (I think, don’t quote me) of the population is secular, the cultural values still carry over.
Especially in the morning, you pass the inevitable withered older woman hobbling along with her hand thrust through her stern-faced, heavily made-up daughter, who’s also past middle age, but pretending not to be. Personally, I find the Grandmothers’ Stroller Club more cheerful. These are a bunch – at least five – of doting women, maybe in their fifties or sixties, who take their time in pushing along baby strollers full of grandchildren, gossiping like crazy along the way.
The more affluent part of Neve Avivim is really pretty – stonefaced buildings fronted with blue-tinted glass. Almost everyone here has a balcony, or psuedo-balcony, because they’re great to catch breezes when it’s hot, which is a majority of the year here.
Dang, my grammar is falling apart.
But even in the middle of the city, there are tons of flowering trees and bushes. I keep seeing trees that we used to have in our old house in California, and the hibiscus bushes are terribly prolific.
The lady at the pharmacy was really helpful. The insurance the school is covering us with didn’t pay for the acid (I don’t know why I had to have a prescription for it, but apparently I had to), so she found me the cheapest option, which was about four dollars, and added that cutting out the heart of an onion, putting salt in it, and sticking my finger in it would do just as well. I opted for the acid. Salicylic acid. Ha. I remembered.
I’ll leave it to Ryan to figure out how the salt reacts with whatever’s in the onion.
On the way back, this random old man asked me (in Hebrew) if I was Russian, pointing at a hairdressing salon advertisement (the woman was redheaded and obviously Russian), adding, “like her.” I told him I was from the US. It’s odd, actually, that I don’t get asked that more, like other people I know. This is the first time it’s happened. Red hair here is usually associated with Russians, but I guess my features aren’t all that, erm, northern European. I’m fine with that.
through a glass darkly 