Ben Hartman has a great piece in today’s Ha’Aretz newspaper about the sheer insanity of Israeli politics, how coalitions are put together, who runs our ministries and why we have nothing to do but laugh at the situation.

On what must have been a slow day at the Knesset, the de facto head of the Health Ministry, MK Yakov Litzman, stated Monday that swine flu would be from here on in referred to as “Mexican Flu,” as pork is non-kosher and considered unclean under Jewish law.

…While this may seem to be just the semi-weekly “Haredi government minister gone wild” comment that makes for great office banter, the truth is that it’s just one more in a series of state-sanctioned declarations by a government official that serves only to further humiliate Israel in the eyes of the world.

Audition for a new musical. 

Star in a musical

Auditions are being held for ‘1776′  The Musical

Director - Batsheva Garnett

Musical Director – Asaf Finkelstein

Casting – Rivkah Asoulin

Producer-  Yisrael Lutnick

Where:       Emunah – 6 Arlozorov Street  Jerusalem   No Appointment necessary

When:        7pm Reccommended Group warm up - Auditions to follow.   9.30pm last sign in.  

Come With:  16 bars of two contrasting songs (broadway musicals preferred)  Head Shot & Resume appreciated

For More Info:  www.israel-theatre.com

Realise your dreams..become the star you know you are

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Tel Aviv Get Ready To Shake Your Booty. 

 Sidiki Camara * Palm Tree Dancers * DJ Idan K

PERFORMING  LIVE FOR ONE SHOW ONLY 

This weekend Tel Avivians have an opportunity to be tantalised mesmerized and absolutely thrilled by performances of some of West Africa’s most talented artists.

Tam Tam is proudly hosting a concert by internationally acclaimed artist Sidiki Camara, one of Mali’s leading contemporary percussionists.  Also performing is the outstanding Israeli directed & choreographed Ghana Dance troupe ‘the Palm Tree Dancers’ 

Held in the very popular club Comfort 13,  the evening  promises to be an incredibly upbeat, vibrant and colourful West Africa celebration. Sidiki a master percussionist is famous for seducing the crowd with his upbeat style of Modern Manding Music and the Palm Tree Dance Troupe, a musical/dance ensemble will absolutely thrill you with their outrageously high energy performance.

In the grand finale’ of the celebration, the audience will find themselves shaking their toots with the stars as the musicians and dancers, under the direction of DJ Idan K will move down from the stage for an interactive party with the audience.  This is sure to be an amazing event’ says Joseph a long time West African music fan,  ‘the energy of an authentic west african celebration stays with you long long after the event is over’ 

Sidiki Camara & The Palm Tree Dance Theatre  (one show only)

When:  Saturday 29th Nov

Time:   8.30pm

Where:   Comfort 13   13 Comfort Street  Florentine   South Tel Aviv 

Cost:  60 NIS 

Tickets: Tam Tam   03-7511951   OR   052-8088898  Email   info@tamtam.co.il

What/Who is Tam Tam:   Tam Tam is the largest organization for West-African culture in Israel.  The brainchild of Pierre Chaillan, “ole hadash” from France who is the spiritual son of the most famous west-African drummer, the great master Mamady Keita.   Located in Ramat-Gan, TamTam provides drum lessons, workshops with several drumming/ dancing masters and African drum sales and repairs. The centre also organises drumming/dancing workshops in Africa as well as acting as booking agent for African bands preforming in Israel festivals, concerts and numerous national cultural events.

Sidiki Camara: Is regarded as one of the leading contemporary percussionists of Mali. He is also considered one of the founders of the modern current of Manding music.  He has traveled the world performing as featured percussionist with the National Ballet of Mali and has also performed and recorded many famous artists including Bill Frisell, Habib Koite, Mamady Keita, and the Israeli percussionist Zohar Fresco.

Palm Tree Dance Theatre:  Directed and choreographed by an Israeli, the internationally acclaimed Palm Tree Dance Theatre is a Musical/Dance/Theatre ensemble, combining African Traditional Ritual dance and music forms with modern Dub, Afrobeat, electronic, classical, world trance and various other artist collaborations.

Join the celebration.. shake that gorgeous tail feather

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A large crowd singing, clapping and celebrating in the street below, broke the silence in our usually quiet tel aviv city centre neighbourhood.  As the procession was heading out onto Ben Gurion Boulevard towards Ben Yehuda Street we didnt get much of a look, but the happy festive atmosphere had certainly intrigued us.

Grabbing a jacket and my camera we hit the streets to join the party. Walking onto Ben Gurion we were astounded. There in the middle of the intersection was the Alnon Street Synagogue celebrating Simcha Torah 2008 in traditional style and the residents of Tel Aviv were loving it.

The music was pumping and the crowd, growing larger by the second was a sea of smiles, dancing singing and celebrating.  Young couples, families, soldiers, pensioners, tourists, people walking their dogs, folks on bikes, carers pushing oldies in wheelchairs,  you know…  a true tel aviv melting pot, all sharing in the celebrations.

From Ben Gurion Boulevard down to Rabin Square the party atmosphere continued and the crowd now enormous, delighted in dancing and singng in the middle of dizengoff and Ben Gurion Streets. The police were fabulous and patiently controlled the traffic while celebrations blocked the streets.  Oh Tel Aviv, you have a coat of so many different colours.. you are amazing !!!

The city where secular and religion exist in harmony

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After the great success of last years event, Israel’s Moksha Project will again create their ‘SUNSET TO SUNSET’ outdoor dance festival.

Held over the Rosh Hashana holiday (30/9 – 1/10) and atracting a colourful international crowd, this fabulous Israel Summer Dance Festival is one not to be missed. Known for their great party locations in some of israels most beautiful nature spots, mosksha Sunset to sunset is a wonderful way to celebrate the Jewish new year.

The line up is fantastic and with the usual sweet crowd that Mosksha events seem to attract, it should be another great festival and  the perfect way to close yet another wild and wonderful Israel Summer Season.

On the deck’s from overseas are:

Shpongle (simon posford twisted records, coast to coast Ent UK)

Simply amazing !!!

Union Jack LIVE + DJ Set (platipus records UK)

promising to have you peaking with a special ‘trip down memory lane’
HALLUCINOGEN LIVE (simon posford, twisted records, coast to coast ent UK)

The master of magic…Mr Simon Posford

Andromeda live (Dream vision media, SWEDEN)

Taking you where the smiles dont stop

Chromosome  (dream vision Media, sweden)

Andre (Andromeda) will Perform with all his band plus two additional players for the first time in Israel, definately be on the floor for this one!

Plus the supremely talented Israeli stars: 

Amotz (Peak rec.)  Punkass (Moksha family)  Zombi (Blue tunes)  Huda g (Vertikal rec.)  Triac live (Boshke beats rec.)  Ace ventura LIVE (Iboga rec.)  PTX (Noya rec.) launching new album ‘Colour for your ears’
Quantize LIVE  (Iboga rec.)  Gula-k (Moksha family) One of my favourites!!!   Voice (Moksha family) Loud (Drive rec.)

Presale start Sunday 17/8 @ 170 NIS ticket.  There is limited presale priced tkts so get in quick!! Presale ticket’s are available all over the country. Contact Moksha Project via their myspace page at www.myspace.com/mokshaproject  to get the details on the selling points near you. 

Regular 230 NIS priced tickets will go on sale after presale has sold out.

For more details on Israel, how to get here, what to do while you are here plus the full run down on Tel Aviv the city that never sleeps visit www.aguide2israel.com

Gotta love our beloved Israeli, when asked about his views on rising fuel prices:

“I don’t care about the price – I always fill up only 50 [shekels]“

When informed by the interviewer that he will be getting less fuel if he continues paying the same total, our friend says:

“No, not really, as you can see, I drive a scooter”

The video itself is highly recommended! To view it, visit the site here and skip exactly two minutes into the video. To make sure you’re viewing the right video, it should be the one that says (in Hebrew): “Einav Galili laughs at the whole world.”

All Night Fun on the Streets of Tel Aviv Celebrating the White City

Isragirl Presents : Bauhaus Building on Bialik Sqr – White City Architecture, Photo by Tel Aviv Wiki Portal ©

In July 2003 UNESCO announced the White City of Tel Aviv – A World Heritage Site. Since then the city of Tel Aviv celebrates the occasion, annually, in a series of cultural events called “The White Night“. During one summer night people walking around the city will be able to enjoy many street shows (dance, theater, music, art exhibits etc) as well as indoor shows at very late hours, galleries, museums, illuminated buildings, lectures, movies and all the rest that Tel Aviv nightlife has to offer on regular nights. The White Night events of recent years were very successful and got raving reviews both from usually-nasty-reporters and Tel Aviv’s residents (and that by itself rarely happens). With the success the tradition grew and this year we will all have too many choices and too little time… Get ready to a very long list of events that will take place this Thursday, July 3^rd, all night long, all night, all night…..

50 Bauhaus buildings will be specially illuminated along Rothschild Blvd; Pishpeshuk night market will take place in Jaffa Flea Market (from 10pm); Beach Party on Charles Clore beach, near Manta Ray restaurant (from 9pm The Desert Blues, Party starts at midnight). Banana Beach will host a party and music concert as well: The Giraffes and Metropolin with Efrat Gosh. For sunrise – one Daniel Solomon on the menu.

In Hasharon garden (HaKhashmal Garden) you can listen to writers reading Alterman poems, and Israeli musicians singing Alterman songs (starting midnight). At Kikar Atarim, near Gordon beach, the sea breeze will welcome those who come to listen to Opera. Farther north on the beach in HaTzuk (cliff) beach, David Broza will give his famous sunrise concert (hopping to match his Masada sunrise concert). Outside the Opera House a special tribute evening to singers Ella Fitchgerald and Frank Sinatra (starting at 11pm).

More White Night Events in Tel Aviv’s White Night Post – Part 2.

Its not just about the street concerts and shows, its about a city staying up all night, going a little crazy and having lots of fun…

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The arrogance and silliness of Israelis reached an all-time low with what must have been the most disapointing high tech/Internet conference ever.

The TWS 2008 event earlier today assembled a group of 10 Israeli start-ups (although I’m not sure what Answers Corporations was doing there, almost 10 years after being founded) to present themselves to the Israeli marketplace, VCs and others in the Industry. In addition to the featured “start-ups” were panel discussions and other bonuses.

One of my main problems with the conference was that everyone was forced to speak in English. Just because someone is an entrepreneur, even a very smart one, doesn’t mean he or she’s a good presenter on stage. What’s more, it doesn’t mean he’s a good presenter when forced to use something other than his mother tongue. Worst of all, of coruse, is when people make bad jokes in their second or third languages. I understand there were several people from America who don’t speak Hebrew but translations should have been provided for them, not the other way around. Some presentations were entirely incoherent, defeating any purpose of trying to cater to the few rich foreigners (in the end no one ended up understanding anything).

Because most of the panel discussions were entirely boring, without direction and filled with nothing but buzzwords (“mobile is going to be big!”) most people didn’t even pay attention to what was going on on-stage. Certainly nothing new was shared or learned today. This was exacerbated by nearly every speakers’ silly habbit of polling the audience. Almost no one raised their hand for any question. “Eh, how many peoples in audience have profiles on the Facebook?” “If you do twitters raise your hands.”

The event opened with a game both excruciating to watch and painful to participate in. They has three different venture capitalists pitch the audience based on Powerpoint presentations they had never seen before. What could have been a funny 60 second excericse turned into 30 minutes of grown men making fools of themselves to an audience that couldn’t have cared less.

Combined, I think more harm was done to the impression foreigners have of Israeli high tech than anything else. The games we play here, the lack of professionalism in how projects are presented and the complete lack of respect we show for each other that leads us to leave cell phone ringers on and talk in loud conversations while some poor guy is trying to present his product in something other than his mother tongue.

This post isn’t meant to poke fun at a random Israeli speaking with a few mistakes. Rather, I am picking on one Israeli to make a larger point. For most Israeli companies to succeed they have to have their eyes and strategy set on international markets from the beginning. The Israeli marketplace simply isn’t large enough to sustain many large companies. So start-ups immediately set their sights on Europe, the Far-East or America as destinations to export their technologies and as targets for their marketing.

That’s all fair and good. The problem begins with a basic Israeli weakness – the overwhelming impossibility of a typical Israeli to admit his or her flaws. You’ll seldom hear waiters or public sector workers admit they don’t know something or that they did something wrong. This universal Israeli weakness is even more acute among those that become entrepreneurs and managers. Of course, if they are ambitious, have ideas and pursue them, they will almost never admit personal shortcomings.

A very blatant example of this phenomenon is seen in almost all Israeli attempts to market their products to American audiences. The false-confidence stems not only from general over-confidence but also from most Israeli businesspeoples’ belief that they know English well. “Ehhhh, of course, I spent one year in America with Shoshana and the kids, of course I am speaking the English goodly.”

In my line of work I get to meet a lot of Israeli start-ups and entrepreneurs. Those I like will surely hear from me this tirade and my bottom line of “get a native English speaker on your team to present your company to Americans! Do not assume you’ll do a good job just because you’re the CEO and grew up watching Seinfeld.”

What prompted me to write this post is a video by Israeli CEO Uri Shinar giving an elevator pitch for his company, Aniboom, which Techcrunch posted recently. Click here to see the video (sorry that WordPress won’t let me embed it here but I promise you its worth the link to watch this horrible video).

In my opinion the video is the perfect example of the over-confident Israeli CEO telling himself “of course I should be the one doing the pitch, I am the CEO.” What he probably didn’t consider for a second is that his English will not only be a detriment to the video but may even turn people off entirely because they won’t really “get” what he’s trying to say. And before you tell me that maybe he had no one else available to do the video let me say that I know for certain several native English speakers work at the company. One of them could have made the company’s pitch in even less than 30 seconds and wouldn’t have made people cringe from some of the mistakes Uri made: “eh, we get great feedbacks from the peoples.”

Good luck Uri! I hope others learn something from this, seriously.

Dance, Music and Theater – A Celebration of Performing Arts

Isragirl Presents : Yussuf and One, Photo by Israel Festival ©

Usually when travelling people feel almost obligated to focus on local art and culture and easily pass over opportunities to enjoy artists from around the world who happen to perform in the country they are touring. This should not be the case if you are in Israel and Israel’s Festival is going on. This is the Mega-Culture-Event of the country and it offers a special atmosphere that only Jerusalem can provide. Although featuring many performers from abroad, the festival is a celebration of Israeli performing arts and a celebration of Jerusalem which hosts the festival.

The Festival takes place annually for a few weeks in the spring. Throughout the festival, audiences are able to enjoy performances by artists from all over the world, as well as premieres of Israeli works and tributes to leading Israeli artists. The public can also attend a large selection of free performances, including street theatre, children’s shows and a nightly jazz club.

Isragirl Presents : Hydra, Inbal Pinto Dance Company Photo by Israel Festival ©

Theater, Dance and Music of all kinds, over a thousand performers and artists in over a hundred shows, mostly in Jerusalem – at the city’s most beautiful time of the year.

Take the time to examine the program and make sure you don’t overlook a unique opportunity to see someone you’ve always wanted to see and somehow never got the chance to. The festival is extremely popular and in some cases tickets are hard to come by.

When: May 24 – June 22

Where: Jerusalem, Holon and Herzliya.

Program, Calendar, Tickets – Festival’s Website

Not only for the music of every kind, the dance companies and the inspiring theater – Israel’s Festival has its own special atmosphere

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Isragirl Presents : Ninet Tayeb at last year’s Singing at the square, Photo by City Mouse ©

Israel is known for its dichotomies. We would like to think of our selves as a democratic country but at the same time maintain our Jewish identity. We strive for peace but we hate to compromise…Most of us cant speak Arabic but we expect our Arab citizens to salute at the site of our flag with its star of David, not to mention the national anthem which talks about the Jewish longing for Zion…

This is Israel and these are the Israelis: we love our country, but can’t stop criticizing it. One of the oddest dichotomies in Israel is the beloved mix of joy and mourning. Our national memorial day for IDF soldiers and casualties of Terrorist attacks, is marked in the 24 hours proceeding our Independence Day. Thus, the whole country is extremely sad for 24 hours and then we start parting for another two days…How strange is that?

On Tuesday, May 6, at 8pm a siren will be heard throughout the country – The Memorial Day for IDF soldiers who died in Israeli wars, shell begin. Another siren will be heard the next morning at 11am when ceremonies will take place in every cemetery in the country. If you are visiting Israel and you are in a public place while these sirens go off, stand still and respect this national mourning day.

On Tuesday evening (8:45pm), a special live music concert – a very sad and emotional one – will take place in Rabin’s square, at the heart of Tel Aviv. The concert is dedicated to Israeli casualties of war and their families. Many famous Israeli singers will perform much loved Israeli songs. Among the singers you will find: Hemi Rodner, Mati Caspie, Eti Ankri, Shiri Maimon, Yoni Bloch, Daniel Solomon and Maya Buskila. The concert is free and everyone is welcome to come and sing at the square.

Live Israeli Music Concert in Memory of IDF Soldiers

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Featured links and friends’ posts » Travel Israel: Guide, Tips, Photos and Videos, Holocaust Museums in the USA, Israel National Holidays, Jerusalem Guide, Israel Restaurant Guide, Israel National Trail
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What’d F**k’s the connection ? – it doesn’t make sense…

First, I want to apologize for the previous post -
I got some replies saying it is a bit boring (and I could not agree with them more) song… Actually I was pretty sure the role of the Sphinx Cat was bigger (a bit post modern of me – ain’t it?) -
So, that is that, and we can go back to our usual business (or should I say bullshit).

It’s Spring time now in Israel – and the Citrus is blooming in a powerful intensity -
The oranges and grapefruits, lemons and tangerines plantations alongside the roads are breathing a beautiful scent (something like Jasmin blossom – but much stronger). I ride my scooter from home to work each morning, and crossing the plantations – and back home at the evenings – I fill my lungs with the fragrance that dispersed all over.

I wish this intoxicating smell could stay for more than a few weeks a year -
It is so lovely – it is almost unbearable !!!
I sit in my office ( 1111 ), the window is open and the air is soaked with this smell of fresh flower power, seriously it drives me nuts !!!
And for that – Today, I want to bring you this fun video of -
Riverside’s Orange Blossoms Festival (what ever that is):

Trip N’ Burn presents : Video by Irish Tuckerera ©

Smile – it is spring time – soon the summer would come, with it’s unbearable heat and we can return missing the winter…

Spring is the time for Festivals -
Fill your lungs and start to party…

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Can it be? Are Israelis actually fashionable?

“STREET CLASH is an international style competition between blogs & photographers around the world. At the end, one city will be named best dressed 2007.”

I think we’re all stunned to find that Israeli street fashion blog ILook won! Christmas is indeed the time for miracles.

Thanks to Designist Dream for the heads up.

Thanks to Designist Dream for a great link to an insanely out-of-touch article on Ha’Aretz.com today, titled How We Dress.

Apparently, the aging newspaper, while staying away from the yellow journalism of other Israeli papers, is nevertheless trying to exhibit more “inioot” (that is, the quality of being “in” in Israeli, pronouned “in-ee-yoot“). As a result, they interviewed a guy on the street who was dressed rather strangely. See, they’re trying to keep up with fashion trends. Get it?

There are only two problems: the interview itself is extremely boring and they didn’t even include a picture of the guy!!

The following story comes from a dear friend of mine who recently made Aliyah. I’ve been explaining to him that life in Israel is full of really funny stuff and he’s been taking it all in. Yesterday, I got the following story in my inbox and I had to share.

For other funny stories, visit his blog. 

Here’s his story…

Living in Jerusalem is a great challenge, especially if you go around assuming that things make some modicum of sense, like an insane asylum, where the lines of insanity are clearly demarcated by locked doors (insane) and guys in white coats (sane). Here, it’s also like an insane asylum, except there are no clear borders, everything’s mushed together like a Jerusalem mixed grill, and the only guys in white coats are the ones who stand behind smelly counters all day at the shuk and their coats are smattered with fish guts and they’re yelling at you, “Fish guts! 10 shekel a kilo!” in 5 second intervals, each one louder than the next, until you come up to him and ask him what kind of fish guts he’s selling and he yells at you for disturbing him because he was in a groove.

So as to the belief that there is some sense in this city – only crazed lunatics believe such nonsense. Nobody here does. Everyone here is completely honest with himself, he lives in reality, he has no fantasies, he’s a realist, which is why he never assumes that when the Israel Museum attempts to charge you 37 shekels for entry during what was advertised as a free weekend, maybe, at least, someone would be at the counter to sell you the ticket, and that the museum wouldn’t be closed for renovations after you got one.This is what happened to me last week when, what was advertised as “Hamshushalayim” – Israel jargon for Thursday-Friday-Shabbat-Yerushalayim-free-weekend-we‘re-just-joking-we-wanted-to-see-if-you’d-fall-for-it – said that entry to the Israel Museum would be free for the weekend in order to attract stupid tourists who believe in logic and truth-in-advertising. So my stunt-double and I, whoever that is, walked to the Israel museum and attempted to walk past the guard, thinking he was just there to stop terrorists from blowing up the Aleppo Codex without paying an entry fee (”Excuse me, are you here to blow up the Aleppo Codex? OK, that’ll be 37 shekel.”), but not to charge us for entry that we assumed we didn’t have to pay for because that’s what the stupid Hamshushalayim pamphlet said.

But the guard asked us if we had a cartis, Hebrew for “give me money,” and we said, “No, it’s Hamshushalayim, it’s free.” And he said, “That was on Thursday from the hours of 9 to 9:02. You need a cartis.”

So we went to the ticket counter, and there was nobody there. We asked the Jewish-looking guy with the big gun who probably was the real guy charging entry for anyone trying to blow up the Codex, where the guy selling the tickets was, and he said he was in the bathroom. So we went to the gift shop, the one place that they didn’t charge entry for, and stood by the Museum-side exit from the gift shop, waiting clandestinely for someone to open the door so we could do theimpossible and get into the museum illegally, past the guy with an M16 at the front.

Then someone did, we had our chance, and we splurted through the door like bats in the night, except it was day and we felt more like lethargic mice, which would be a great name for a pickup bar in Tel Aviv somewhere.

Our first stop was the Codex, because we wanted to see it because it’s the oldest copy of the bible in existence written in 200BCE, except the Arabs burnt most of it in the 50’s. Then we went searching for the actual museum. The main path to it seemed closed, so we had to go around through the art garden, which consists of large swaths of empty nothingness with random rusty spikes and weird-shaped metal blobs meant to convey the despair you feel because you can’t find your wayout of this crazy place to get to the actual museum. We escaped, and, still trying to find the entrance to the museum, we went through the water art exhibit, which houses such artistic masterpieces as – as we saw at the entrance to the magnificent water art exhibit – a sprinkler enclosed in a glass cube, circling around and sprinkling…absolutely…nothing. I can’t tell you how much Jewish pride I felt looking at that…thing. It was something like, “All those empires that tried to conquer and kill us are gone, but we survived throughout the millennia, and now we’re back in our homeland, and we have the freedom to build wacknutty pieces of crap like this useless sprinker enclosed in a glass cube and put it in our national museum and nobody can stop us ever again! Damn you Hitler!”

We escaped that horror as well, and asked the guy at the front of the water art exhibit, “Where the hell do you crazy sadists hide the friggin museum?”

“Sagur la’shiputzim.” It was closed for shiputzations. They’re renovating the thing.”

So let me get this straight,” I say, “You charge us entry on a free weekend, but won’t sell us a ticket because the guy is probably still in the bathroom, to a museum that is closed for renovations?”

“Fish guts! 10 shekel a kilo!”

As fellow Zabajnikit Maya (ok, well, not so much Zabaj on her as she’s like 90 lbs soaking wet) is nearing her Israeli rite-of-passage, the dreaded “psychometri” exam, we learned some fun things about how the test itself is composed and what it means to Israelis and Israeli society.

It’s divided into a few parts, including Hebrew, Logic, and Math, among others. The Hebrew part I’m sure is pretty tough, but I thought I could wrap my head around the Israeli Logic section pretty well. Israeli Logic…here are some actual* sample questions from the upcoming 2007 exam. The answers are below the jump, let’s see how you do!

Answer the following multiple choice (Americai) questions.

1. (5 pts) You are waiting in line at the bank where there are two windows with tellers, and eight without. You are thirteenth in line. Suddenly, another window opens. Do you:

a) Continue waiting, relieved that at least the line will now progress more quickly

b) Take the window opening as a sign that other windows should be opened as well, and let fly a good “ALLO ALLO!”

c) Quickly rush to the newly opened window ahead of anyone else, regardless of your position in line or trampling anyone in the way

d) Line? What are you doing waiting in line in the first place? Go *immediately* to the front and demand service, frier!!

2. (3 pts) You are driving on a three-lane in each direction highway approaching an intersection. You need to make a left turn, but you notice that there is a large buildup of cars also waiting to make said turn. The other two (non-turn) lanes are wide open. Select the logical solution:

a) Enter the queue of cars at the end and await a green arrow

b) Stay in the center lane and turn from there, screw the green arrow

c) Stop at the end of the center lane, block traffic in this lane, and force your way into the front of the line, honking profusely

d) Reverse around the corner from the other side, make a three-point-turn, and look at everyone you’re inconveniencing as “frierim” who should never look at you like that

3. (10 pts) You’re at a bar with Dudi, Hezi, and Motti. You order a rum and Coke, and Dudi and Hezi order a different drink from you but the same drink as each other. Motti is drinking something red, but then orders a drink with the same carbonation as you but served in the same glass as Dudi and Hezi. What are you drinking?

a) Goldstar

b) Vodka Redbull

c) Chaser of schoog

d) None of the above — all of you are sharing one beer that remains half-full all night

4. (3.5 pts) You and a passenger are driving and need to park in front of your favorite café, but doing so requires you to block in a parked car as well as disrupt traffic in the lane you’re blocking. But you want to park there. Select the logical response:

a) Let your friend off to buy you both coffee and drive around the block so as to not disrupt the flow of traffic

b) Stop in front of the café, but send your passenger as in a) and remain in the car with the hazard lights on in case you have to move

c) Stop in front of the café, enjoy a nice coffee break, but keep a good eye on your car and move it if neccesary

d) Go inside the café, take your sweet damn time, and if anyone says anything about you blocking them in and/or blocking traffic, make sure they understand that this is their fault, not yours, and “lo kara klum.”

Done already? Okay. Here are the answers:

1. d 2. d 3. d 4. d

Score:

0-3: Frier

4-10: Ma’afan

11-18: Gever Gever

19-21.5: Totach

*fake!

Anyone who is familiar with Israeli “newspaper” sites is very familiar with te ubiquotous “talkback” feature at the bottom of almost every single page. The responses to articles on any Israeli news site are usually extremely vile, vulgar and disgusting. You’d think the only people who take the time to contribute are out of work psychopaths.

Well, one intrepid Israeli filmmaker took the plunge and produced an entire documentary about the “talkbackers.” Check out a funny video about the movie to gain some more insight into this wacky place we call home.