Holy Exposures

Renewing your USA Passport in Tel Aviv, Israel

A (not so) funny thing happened at the USA embassy today as we were updating one of our kid’s USA passport. On the form it asks for your child’s place of birth. We wrote Jerusalem, Israel.

The (very friendly) employee at the embassy must process hundreds of these passport requests every week. He asked us a few questions, in Hebrew since the local processing staff at the embassy are Israelis. He reviewed the form in our presence to make sure everything was filled out correctly. He then  asked what city was our child born, and we responded “Jerusalem”, he very quickly and matter-of-factly crossed off “Israel” from the form, so that it was plain to see.

I wonder if there are other cities of birth in the world for which the country is left blank on the passport application of our beloved USA?

Seen at Malcha Mall

We’re experiencing the nearly annual ritual of pigeons setting up a nest in our back yard. 

There’s a Torah commandment (שילוח הקן) for sending away the mother bird of a nest in order to take the eggs. 

I’ve always performed the mitzva, without a bracha, under the assumption that it’s already in my possession, being that the nest is in my backyard.  I saw a ‘cellular shu”t’ last week from Harav Eliyah of Tzfat, I think, who says it’s not a mitzva at all if it’s found in your back yard. 

Oh well, I guess it’s just a nuisance then…

Nadav Shragai does a good analysis in today’s Haaretz of how Jerusalem is the key to the entire Mid East peace process.

When it comes to Jerusalem, there is no need to mention either natural growth or natural development; what is at stake is nature itself, the nature of our connection to this city and the realization of the right that is rooted in our religion, our history, and 2,000 years of memory and longing, during which the Jewish presence in Jerusalem never ceased to exist.

I wonder how many of our political leaders adhere to this sentiment?

Eilat has got it right

Ramat Gan Safari 2009

If animals could speak.  I wonder what was on his mind.

Baboon at the Ramat Gan Safari, 2009.

These photographs are copyright 2009 Moshe T. and are made available under a Creative Commons License.

I still can’t believe that headline!
– Satire begin
Those crazy Palestinians. Look how far this has gone. Now when you offer them a state of their own, not only don’t they take it, but they get angry at you for offering it! It reminds me of the typical Jewish mother. Guilt, guilt, guilt. “What, we’re not good enough to live with you? You want to send us to our own place? After all we’ve done for you. After all we’ve been through together? tsk…
Satire over -

You would think that on the day Bibi Netanyahu actually utters the words “We’ll accept a Palestinian State” that finally the world would show some positive emotion. The EU has already said that it’s not enough. The US and Obama gave a tepid response. The Arab League, buoyed by the lukewarm response of the western world, snapped at Israel and demanded that not one iota of land ’settled’ could be built on, including the 40,000 citizen ’settlement’ of Ariel (which was the actual example given by the Egyptian Minister).

In effect, however, the underlying argument the world is trying to shove down our proverbial throats is “Jews can’t live in Judea & Samaria, period.”

Herzl would be proud. On Friday, Tel Aviv staged the 11th annual Gay Pride Parade. The newspapers report that over 20,000 attended and the groups represented in the event included Bat Kol – Jewish religious lesbians (weren’t they called ‘Orthodykes’ once?), Transgenders for Change, the Israeli Arab lesbian group Asawat, among others.
The event capped off the month long celebration of Gay Pride month in Tel Aviv, which was an official part of the 100 year anniversary of Tel Aviv’s inception celebrations.

I attended an entrepreneur’s conference last week in Herzlya at the offices of Sun Microsystems. At the meeting we heard from one VC, Blumberg Capital, who specializes in seed round investments of internet companies.
The partner of the firm who spoke, Bruce Tarragin, said that they were closing a deal in Tel Aviv now, and had already closed another deal earlier this quarter.

The Capital Market Bulls Return
There had been several months, since last October, with virtually no dealflow that was actually leading to investment. Now, there seems to be a reawakening of the capital markets. The negative sentiment of the market has been replaced with a feeling that we have already reached bottom, and now there are good ideas out there that are worthy of investment.
Are VCs too pricey?
There was a separate thread to this meeting that perhaps internet startups had precluded the need for capital investment in today’s age. Now, with the relatively cheap servers and cloud computers available, coupled with veteran entrepreneurs who have weathered many storms, there are internet ideas that can be launched with virtually no capital.
Mr. Tarragin pondered if VCs would eventually have to change their model to enable smaller ventures to participate in their capital programs. Typically, a VC will offer capital to a start up along with a seat on the board and a regular routine of hand-holding. This interaction drains the resources of the VC and reduces their ability to seek out new deals. Therefore, the traditional VC model was to buy a chunk of a new company for an investment of at least 3-5 million dollars. Nowadays, an internet company can get off the ground with very little, and often can get to prototype/beta to market with self-funding of the founders. New startups often cannot justify an investment of such great magnitude, and VCs are having to find creative ways to pad the projected budget to make the investment look attractive and still show a ROI based on projections.

It’s All About Who You Know
Mr. Tarragin also mentioned that his firm sees many thousands of business plans being sent to them yearly. They usually meet with only a couple hundred in person. The best chance of getting a meeting with the VC and a chance to show off your idea is by having someone the VC knows and trusts submit your executive summary or refer you to them.
The deal Blumberg is closing on now was refered to them by the founders of Check Point, a company they invested in early, and one of the most successful Israel hi-tech stories.
He said that the business plans VCs are finding most interesting these days are the ones that have a revenue model based on actual sales, such as software licensing, SAAS, and not exclusively relying on banner ad-based sales. [ed. I suppose they would have passed on Facebook and Twitter...].

Some good news for a change.

This weekend’s Haaretz reports (in Hebrew) that the Haredi population in Israel, the fastest growing segment, now has an average of 7.2 births per family. Obviously, since this is an ‘average’, there are B”H many families who are having as much as 13 or 14 children each.

Ken Yirbu!

Israel finds 17 more A/H1N1 flu cases

Consider this: You are sitting near someone who is coughing up a lung. You know that he often travels overseas for work. He just got an aliyah and benched gomel, returns to his seat cough and all. Do you worry that maybe he has the swine flu?

Stay Home
With the WHO (World Health Organization) now classifying the Swine Flu as a world pandemic, we really have to think twice about where we go and who can enter our ‘private’ space. Sneezing and coughing, aside from disturbing other prayer goers from hearing the chazan, also raise the possibility of you catching whatever they have. There’s got to be heter (permission) somewhere that says you should stay home and not get others sick in order to make a minyan.

Today’s Haaretz suggests that it may even be better for Israel if Ahmadinejad wins in Iran.

Ahmadinejad, with his Holocaust denial and his long series of provocations, drew most of the attention, but apparently had less influence on the nuclear program. There are even senior members of the Israeli defense establishment who share the public stance of former Mossad chief Ephraim Halevy, who claimed that the Iranian president’s behavior, perceived in the West as quasi-lunatic, advanced Israel’s security interests.

In other words, the enemy that you know is better than the enemy that you don’t know…

Worldwide Epidemic

More than 1 million people are killed worldwide, and more than 50 million are injured in traffic accidents each year. Road deaths are now the number-one global killer of people aged 10 to 24. While 965 people lost their lives in air crashes last year, more than 3,000 people die on the world’s roadways every day. 85 percent of traffic casualties occur in low- and middle-income countries… The rate of child deaths due to road accidents in South Africa is 26 per 100,000 population, compared with 1.7 per 100,000 in Europe. Someone is killed or badly injured on the world’s roads every six seconds.

Israel Statistics
As of June 8, there have been 155 road fatalities in Israel. Today is the 159th day of the year. That’s nearly one person killed per day on our roads. There has been a drop in overall traffic accident deaths as compared to recent years.

Although this may not seem like a great number; if heaven forbid there should be 360 lives lost this year, that would represent a nearly 15% drop in traffic fatalities than the average of the last five years. Israel is a country of only 7 million citizens. Let’s extrapolate that number dead to the USA with approx 303 million citizens, and that would amount to approx 15,430 traffic accident deaths.

USA Statistics
According to the USA Department of Transportation, there were approx 31,000 road fatalities on the interstate highways from Jan-Oct 2008, and that’s for 10 months, not a full year.

We may be doing better than we thought, but this stat only covers deaths. It does not include the mamed, injured, and traumatized from car collisions. Many of the injured in Israel from road accidents are pedestrians.

Day trips in Bet Shemesh – Haelah Junction Area

The story of David and Goliath is told in detail in Samuel I.  King Saul and his camp were on the mountain top, and Goliath and the Philistines were in the valley below taunting anyone who would dare come and fight him.  Young David took his slingshot went down the valley and knocked Big Bad Goliath down with one shot.  According to Jewish tradition, the monumental event occured in the Valley of Haaeleh and Tel Azeka.

Tel Azeka

There’s a nice KKL (Jewish National Fund) park at the bottom of the Tel, and an easy footpath up the hill to the breathtaking views of the valley below.  The steps up to the top of the hill are incscribed with quotes from the Scriptures renacting the great story of David vs. Goliath.

Getting there from Bet Shemesh

Take Road 38 south from Bet Shemesh towards Beit Guvrin.  About 2KM after the gas station by Zecharia, make a right turn at the junction leading to Re’em.  (If you’ve reach Haelah Junction, you’ve gone too far).  Shortly after the turn, about 1KM, there will be a left turn into Park Britannia.

Enter the park and drive along a winding narrow paved road.  You will see 2 or 3 parks on the left side of the ride, keep going until you reach a junction.  There will be a sign to turn left towards Tel Azeka.  Make the left turn and drive up about 1KM uphill and pull up to a parking area for the park.  Admission is free.  Follow the footpath up to the top of the hill for a wonderful view.  You can also bring your BBQ from home and have a cookout at the bottom of the hill.  A nice way to enjoy history for free and with relatively easy access.  The hill can easily be climbed by all ages.  The last time our family went, there was a family in front of us with a grandmother in her 80s.  She made it to the top ahead of us!

Panorama Photo of Tel Azeka and Haelah.

The stitching of 5 photos here is a bit sloppy, but you get to see this stunning panoramic of Tel Azeka, which is on the perimeter of the shefela, and near Haelah Junction.  On the far left is the village Zecharia.