Part 1 - Erev Shabbat
A song circle in Yarkon Park with plentiful hand drums, guitars, ouds and a harmonium, for kabbalat Shabbat where we sang not only "Adon Olam" but also "Pacha Mama". ;D
Flexible Fire-spinning, dreadlocked, neo-bedouins who when asked where they live gleefully reply "Nowhere!"
Young, raucously drunk teenagers with Jack Daniels t-shirts and cargo shorts getting in on the holy-Shabbat-song frenzy, dancing themselves clean.
Volunteers working the festival, some from outside Israel, some don't speak any Hebrew! I order my Labneh-cucumber sandwich from a French volunteer in English. "Merci," I say. "Enjoy, ma Belle," she replies with a smile.
Back to Neve Tzedek to crash at the pad of a friend of a friend, creeping into the room at 3 am, trying not to wake anyone.
And my friend? The one who invited me on this adventure? A French Jewish girl named Deborah, with short curly brown hair and 5 younger siblings..
Back to the park today, to do it all over again in a new way..:}
Part 2 - Saturdayz
A song circle in Yarkon Park with plentiful hand drums, guitars, ouds and a harmonium, for kabbalat Shabbat where we sang not only "Adon Olam" but also "Pacha Mama". ;D
Flexible Fire-spinning, dreadlocked, neo-bedouins who when asked where they live gleefully reply "Nowhere!"
Young, raucously drunk teenagers with Jack Daniels t-shirts and cargo shorts getting in on the holy-Shabbat-song frenzy, dancing themselves clean.
Volunteers working the festival, some from outside Israel, some don't speak any Hebrew! I order my Labneh-cucumber sandwich from a French volunteer in English. "Merci," I say. "Enjoy, ma Belle," she replies with a smile.
Back to Neve Tzedek to crash at the pad of a friend of a friend, creeping into the room at 3 am, trying not to wake anyone.
And my friend? The one who invited me on this adventure? A French Jewish girl named Deborah, with short curly brown hair and 5 younger siblings..
Back to the park today, to do it all over again in a new way..:}
Part 2 - Saturdayz
Lesson #1 for 30 year old festival goers: know what you are in for if you show up in the early afternoon. The hot blistering sun makes his way across the sky.. The PA is turned over to the freaky DJs and their dark trance music. Not really my jam.. The tanned and fit teenagers fill the dance floor with the Chaos version of the 5-cycle dance, their purposely decrepit garments swaying to the mathematically sophisticated beat. Cave dwellers and hunter-gatherers would be proud.
I strip down to a bikini top and skirt, and am faced with the need to reconcile my insulin-pump-wearing, awkward leg skin condition fostering, and somewhat chubby Body with the bacchanalian aims of my soul. Dance!! Be merry!!! It says. "Ew, Trance music," says I.
I gravitate toward the body-painters and borrow their crayons to paint colorful designs around the red patches of skin on my legs. I draw a big yellow sun on my abdomen.
Man, I feel like a fool. Like a big, diseased whale in an army of playful porpoises. Then, armed with this transformative mantra: "I am the disease of music; I am the cancer of dance!!" I get out there and boogie with the freaks and hot people.
Then I spend some time in a deep philosophical discussion with a schizophrenic Buddist chilling under a palm tree. Little did I cognize that he would die several years later. Nimrod. What a character.
________________________
Several hours later, I lounge on the lawn and listen to the sweet gypsy music emanating from the stage. The sky has dimmed, the temperature mellows, and I am enjoying the heck out of a beer and Shakshuka sandwich. Holy crackers, Batman, meatball subs have nothing on the creamy tahini, crispy chives and parsley, and savory egg, tomato and red bell pepper stew ladled into a baguette.
It really has been a nice day. Better that interesting things should happen than for all things to come too easy. Now if only these yellow lab mutts would cease their humping or else remove themselves from my picnic blanket..
