Tel Aviv Diary - February 21, 2003 Karen Alkalay-Gut

February 21

The international hate that is spreading to all nations is really remarkable - as if it is the secret weapon of Saddam and of AlKeida. All they have to do is sit tight and we "allies" will destroy and neutralize each other and ourselves. This is a psycological phenomenon that we actually have control of if we get control of ourselves. Friends from the States say the news reporters keep announcing that things have never been this bad, that we are at the brink of the greatest disaster, etc. etc. We do that in Israel too. And the media's mood is extremely influencial - causing people to distrust the economy and withdraw from it, causing a further downward spiral, for example. We need a Dame Myra Hess badly all over the world!

Even though we're no where near the desperation of the Blitz.

The situation here now seems to be so bad that we are finally paying attention. Yaakov Frenkel will agree to be the minister of finance and save the economy only if there are political changes - negotiations, for example. Mitzna will only agree to be in the government (and a non-religious government is desperately needed to save the economy) only if there are negotiations. So maybe we'll finally get negotiations.

I remain fluey - although nowhere near as sick as Ezi was. But we managed to get out and buy, at last, plastic sheeting and duct tape. We still have remnants of duct tape on the door jams of our previous safe room, the kitchen. Because the solution to get the tape off was so odorous we found the gas masks most useful, but it was hard to see accurately through them and we missed a lot of the tape.

There really wasn't much action in the duct tape section of Ace, incidentally. Either everyone's already stocked up or they don't care any more.

And then, suddenly, I looked at some of the glass stuff we've got i would like to see get through another generation. Should I wrap up the Galle? Should the Lennox go into the underwear drawer? Will any of this matter if something goes really awry?

How wonderful that I have the leisure to think of these things!

I havent checked out the total veracity of this - but there's an article on chemical, biological and nuclear attacks and how to deal with them that sounds pretty intelligent. check it out. Just the fact that he tells you what to do AFTER the attack is comforting - assuming there is an 'after' helps.

Ronen Shapira was telling me about his composition he's going to be performing on Monday and Tuesday at Tmuna Theatre. A war piece. He takes the words of the last letter of a soldier to his girlfriend before he was killed last year. It's the letter of a man who knows he'll be dying in battle, and wants his girlfriend to carry on with her life and get married. Ronen said he was influenced by me - by the idea that the politics of the world are reflected in the intimate lives of individuals more intensely than the generalities of the news. But we've been working together for so many years i have no idea who influenced whom.

As for his composition - i will hear it only on tuesday. If i'm better by then.

February 22, 2003

Last night's dinner conversation centered around past leaders in the middle east and who and how they made peace. How Egypt and Jordan signed peace agreements with Israel in exchange for some land but insisted that the land with the Palestinian camps remain with the Israelis. They wanted land for peace, but they didn't want the headaches that went with some of the land.

Some of the people at dinner had been to an academic lecture that morning by the President of the Dayan Center. So we discussed the history of the leaders of the Middle East for a while. But what really interested us all - and apparently what really interested the people at the lecture - was whether we were going to get hit by Iraq or not. Our minds kept going back to the last war, our experiences, our limitions. As if we are fixated on the Gulf War,

But of course we are all fixated on the past and can't get out of the old models. I repeat myself.

February 23, 2003

Despite the weather and my continuing flu i am on my way to beit agnon in jerusalem to talk about the need to continue to support culture - writing in particular. The idea that culture is not necessarily expensive and creates the spirit of a nation is extremely important and i think this principle has been washed out of the minds of people by the influx of mediocre foreign entertainment. tv. we've imported all that is not good in u.s. entertainment - the competitiveness of quiz shows, the lowest common denominator of emotion in soap operas and sit coms, etc. not that i don't likes these shows - but what israel takes from them and translates is not relevant to the world of the middle east, to the lives of the people, to the situations we are all enduring. At the same time amazing writers and artists are creating an amazing culture but they are isolated from each other and from their potential audience, and therefore cannot grow.

Not a word about Mitzna.

But Somebody's going to have a problem keeping his seat as head of Labor this week.

February 24, 2003

Because the more I know about this government the more I like my dog, I will give my social commentary today on the cats of Tel Aviv. In the old days, when there were open trash bins, the cats would fight each other over the food and run away when people approached. They were particularly ugly cats - one-eyed, misshapen, evil looking. At least one of the major reasons for their looks were the endless fights over trashbins and the malnutrition. But many of the people I knew in Tel Aviv thought that this was the nature of all cats. When they started cleaning up the city, and distributed monstrous looking trash bins that closed automatically, many hard-core cat lovers feared the end of a generation, starvation. But very soon people carrying big bags of cat food began to appear on the corner of many streets. I began seeing thm in the afternoon, around 4. I noticed them because they were followed by a trail of multicolored felines, all cooing and calling and trying to behave themselves. And lately I've noticed that they are even becoming better looking. Certainly they are more warm to humans. And more happy to show their individuality.

Why am I talking about the cats? Because yesterday at the literary evening in Beit Agnon it was clear that some of the writers, and in a way the editor of Moznaim (the literary review of the Hebrew Writers' Association) are so desperate, so excluded from society, so hungry, they have lost their connections with society, with the world.

Azriel Kaufman spoke - very simply and very directly - about the fact that he has an issue ready to go and no money to publish it. Why no money? Because the suscriptions and ads have been cancelled - why? because there was no money from the Hebrew Writers' Association. So even though there is a long waiting list, and good material, it isn't coming out. Some of the audience whispers about all the funds that got filtered to other pseudo-literary organizations. But, someone counters, if you would publish big names, and current literature, more people would buy. The big names want payment, Azriel answers, and how can I publish a "Purim" issue if I don't know if it will come out before Hannuka. The problem, another member of the panel (fill in name later...okay?) say that the Hebrew Writers Association has no literary credit anymore because they've been taking in second rate members as part and parcel of political wheeling and dealing. The entire organization is rotten to the core! (He's right too). But the immediate problem - as we know - is we need an old lady with a bag of cat food. Spread some cat food around, like the old ladies do, in a lot of seperate piles, and everyone will feast quietly. It really is cat food - small sums - we're talking about. And no one knows where to get it now that they've closed the trash bin (the Ministry of Education..).

Ten minutes later. Rachel calls me and warns me that I may have insulted the writers of tel aivv by comparing them to cats. didn't mean that - i meant - i am a hungry writer too - okay maybe less hungry because i write in english, and don't care about publication or money (fact: you're getting this for free and its a personal site - not a literary journal) but a cat nevertheless.

And I think this country is teeming with talent that isn't getting its reward, its encouragement, etc. etc. This subject hurts me almost as much as the new government.

February 25, 2003

I used to have a 'suitor' who Ezi fondly called "Harry the Horse." When I was newly divorced and very poor, Harry the Horse suddenly appeared and took great pity on me. For his generosity and his sympathy I will always remember him fondly, but there is one other attribute of his that today came back to me with great strength. I was reading the NY Herald Tribune when suddenly I remembered that in his deep despair at being unable to get even my attention much less my interest, he began to lose touch with reality. He began to send me pages from the Tribune with articles marked and connected. When he dropped by I asked him what these marks meant. "Don't you see?" He said, "In this article it mentions my first name and in the article next to it your first name is mentioned. Someone is sending us a message that we are meant for each other." So I looked at the front page of the Tribune and there was an article about Israel's interest in the war in Iraq. How much we wanted a war and looked forward to its clearing up our economic problems as well as changing the face of the Middle East. How we envisioned even a kind of domino effect in which our other enemies, Iran and Syria, would fall as well. Next to this article was a piece about the beads of Mardi Gras, how valuable and desirable they are during the Mardi Gras and how quickly they turn into junk as soon as the holiday is over. "Harry!" I shouted. "You're back!" Because it is clear that if indeed the Tribune is really representing the opinion of Israelis (and not just Sharon and Limor Livnat) our values have turned into Mardi Gras beads. I find it impossible to believe that we can only think about what this war might do to our (rotten to the core) economy and not what will happen to human lives in Baghdad.

But I find many many things impossible here.

On the other hand I find great breadth of consciousness. Someone from the American Cultural Office here sent me an interview by REGAN GOOD with Billy Collins, published on February 23, 2003 in Versus Verses . Here is the last paragraph:

"The poets who have written the best poems about war seem to be the poets whose countries have experienced an invasion or vicious dictatorships. Poets like Vaclav Havel, and Mandelstam and Akhmatova from Russia, and from Poland, Milosz, and the poet whom I am centering on, Wislawa Szymborska, a Nobel Prize winner. She has a poem, ''The End and the Beginning,'' that begins: ''After every war/someone has to clean up./Things won't/straighten themselves up, after all./Someone has to push the rubble/to the side of the road,/so the corpse-filled wagons/can pass.'' I would probably stand at the White House and hand out this poem. "

Not that there must not be a war - but that the consequences HAVE to be considered.

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