Alexa Shows No Mercy

At least the kids are happy - pretty sad looking snowman though - but I guess, limited snowman experience....

Isralies are a big bunch of pussies when it comes to the weather.  No offence.  It is surprising though, because, in general, they are one of the toughest, most hardy groups of people on the face of the earth.  Shower them in rockets fired non-stop by neighbouring maniacs – no worries.  Bomb the shit out of their public transport system – life goes on.  But drop temperatures enough for them to break out their winter knits, and shit hits the fan.  Even dipping down to a balmy 18 degrees makes people start to wrap themselves in scarves and huddle in groups visibly distressed about the Arctic turn the weather has taken.  Meanwhile, I’ve got the kids in their bathers and have stocked up on cheap beach bucket sets made by poor children from the Chinese countryside who recently moved to Shanghai to make a new life for themselves, and send their $4 a month home to their elderly parents, for whom the rice paddy business has taken a back seat as they fight to defend their lands against real estate developers, who want to build yet another empty set of giant apartment blocks, inevitably destined to become eerie ghost towns, a modern blight of the recent transition from communist financial structures into a winner-takes-all capitalist approach to an emerging global economic power house …….

Traffic Mayhem

So back to the pussies - I pass people in decked out head to toe in wool jumpsuits hoovering down steaming cups of coffee and toasting marshmallows over the ends of their cigarettes, almost in tears about how cold it is.  In Tasmania on a similar day, the streets would be full of celebrating fools eager to soak up the sunshine on a mid summers day.  We would all flock to the beach with a “Woooooo Hoooooo” and a picnic basket full of egg sandwiches and blackcurrent cordial, and spend all day trying to avoid 3rd degree burns from the lack of an ozone layer and watching our kids lips turn blue as they play in the shallows.  But we’re not in Kansas now……

At least he's got a plastic cover for the hat

So when the largest storm to hit Israel in decades loomed, it’s only natural that people would start the panic well in advance.  Business's closed their doors, schools were cancelled and the whole country went into lock down – especially in Jerusalem which copped massive amounts of snow, and sent the entire place into chaos.  The road in and out of the city was shut, power has been out for days, and residents have been advised to stay indoors.  At least they can freeze to death privately rather than mess up the streets I guess.  I also read that 350 have been treated for cold related injuries.  You see, I'm just not buying that.  Cold related injuries?? Please.  Canada gets temperatures of -35 and the people are outside drinking egg nog and joking about shovelling their driveways - Israel goes down to zero and people are calling the ambulance because they have cold feet.  Just get a bloody hot water bottle  or build yourself an igloo or something.  Sooks.  Even on the first day the cray-cray already started.  The traffic lights were down across Tel Aviv  – can you imagine this city without traffic lights?  Maybe not, but take it from me it’s like End of Days…..There was also looting – well, at least my sister in law’s place was broken into by some cruel hearted bastards who took their heirlooms and computers.  Can you imagine how devastating the loss of a laptop is to one of the most important doctors in the country and one of the top experts in the world on Cystic Fibrosis???  Just a little bit of essential information contained in there......Not like mine.  The worst I would lose if my computer got knocked off would be some pictures of my butt taken in the bathroom mirror - not so much Kim Kuntrashian with the side boob and white bathers, more like Stick-It -Up-On-The -Fridge-To-Tempt-Myself-Away-From-The Hummus kind of style, plus a detailed and hidden record of the online shopping I've recently developed an addiction to.......

Snowball fights never get old

Anyway, old Storm Alexa did her best and hung around for 3 days.  And it wasn't just throughout this country that things got nasty.  Those poor god dam Syrian refugees.  Things were pretty bad across Lebanon as well, not to mention Gaza and The West Bank.  How awful can life be for some people? Cairo got snow for the first time in 112 years - now there must be some serious amounts of city snowmen going on over there.  Meanwhile back in the Holy Land, people who went to Jerusalem to see the snow ended up being stranded there all weekend - bet you're regretting that snowball fight at the Western Wall now suckers.  Buses took 12 hours to make the 1 hour journey to Tel Aviv (and that was before the road was closed completely).  Jerusalem does get snow on occasion during winter.  But not to this extent.  Apparently the storm was rare and unusually intense.  Tel Aviv got hail - but it missed out on the snow.  I remember the last time my home city of Hobart got snow.  I was 13 years old and it was memorably thrilling.  School was cancelled and all the kids went to the school grounds and had snowball fights. For kids that shit is more exciting than Christmas, or should I say Hanukkah. No, I was talking about Tasmania so I'm good to go with the Christmas analogy.  I remember that there were people skiing along the Tasman bridge to work and surfers in full wetsuits and hoods surfing the swell that came up the Derwent River.  There were surfers out in the waves off Tel Aviv yesterday as well.  Riding large waves in the now brown coloured sea.  I was in the process of hosting my first Shabbat dinner for the family on Friday.  I put on my best Martha Stewart apron and went overboard, sending my tortured husband to the market on the most hellish day of the year.  Apparently there was an actual river running down the middle of it which doesn't sound fun.  What did I care.  I was inside all day with the heaters on, pigging out, and making mini pies and lemon tart.  I have never heard more emergency sirens go past as I did that day.  More cold toes I guess.

Iconic Shot of The Holy City

And how did dinner go?  Well it was fun.  And fortunately our own power outage didn't happen until well after the main course.  Things got pretty chilly soon after and I had a few feelings of guilt for paying out on the pensioners of Jerusalem who had been freezing since Wednesday night.  We all hung around in the dark for a while, expecting it to restart again - but nothing happened and everyone left.  The most unfortunate thing though, was after everyone left when the alarm had a spaz out due to not having any power and an incessant beeping started up and did not cease for 2 hours.  That was enough to make me consider cutting out my own eardrums and pelting them at the flashing box.  The electrical company finally came round and we suffered acute embarrassment to realise that it was a blown fuse.  Ooops.  But to be fair it was a blown fuse in the second hidden fuse box that we didn't even know existed.  With the heaters back on and the beeping stamped out at last I slept cosy through the night.  I didn't even know it got this cold here.  Cold weather and Israel is something I never imagined went together.  And considering it was 30 degrees a week ago, it seems kind of sudden.

It's a city made for snow photos - Hey!  He's got a plastic hat cover too!

Anyway, it seems that the crisis is over and life will go back to normal. Well as normal as it ever gets in this country where daily life continues to surprise and excite me.  And that's the way I love to live.  After that stupid line, I had the repulsive urge to end this with "Peace Out" but luckily vomited myself into realisation that it would be going to levels of pathetic and tragic that I'm just not ready for.  So instead I say, put on your second pair of socks Israelis, and hang in there.  And if that fails, just call the cops and ask them to bring you a cup of hot cocoa and a blankie. H.T.F.U.