A Stranger No More
The last post by guest writer Abigail Pickus. She writes about breaking the fast Gatsby-style, meeting strangers, and finding home in the homeland.
The last post by guest writer Abigail Pickus. She writes about breaking the fast Gatsby-style, meeting strangers, and finding home in the homeland.
‘Have you picked up your gas mask yet?” From her casual tone, you would have thought my Israeli friend was asking about the weather.
Where is it written that the holy and the profane cannot live side by side? Maybe it’s because I’ve now lived in Israel for a few years that if I ever had any misty-eyed nostalgia for the place, it’s long gone.
“You can ask me anything,” the Israeli cabbie said. But I didn’t want to talk. You know why? Because everyone else in this country is doing such a good job of it already.
My bureaucratic adventure wasn’t an adventure. It wasn’t much different than going to city hall in Chicago, except this being Jerusalem, the waiting room was full of kippot and shtreimels and hijabs.
I’m a Zionist. That’s why I moved to Israel from Chicago. But that was before I woke up the morning of Yom Ha’Aztmaut to discover that I had no water.
“It turns out I like my cars the way I like my men: Little, lithe and compact. And in bright colors.” Jerusalem-based writer Abigail Pickus dishes on driving, cars, and men in Israel.
I felt like I had descended into Bosh’s hell, minus the nakedness. The smoke, the strobe lights, the thumping techno music, the 20-somethings groping each other, and me, the American, in glasses.
When Jerusalemites stack up on batteries and canned foods in preparation for an impending snow “storm,” this Chicagoan-turned Israeli just laughs and reflects on what a REAL winter feels like.