Israelis love to party. There are always holidays and new moons to celebrate. And Purim is just another way for them to express this interest. Purim is really only a couple of days long but here in Israel it is celebrated all week with festivities. To being our Purim week a couple of my fellow ecos (Beth, Paige, and myself) started off by traveling down to the Negev desert to go to the opening of the Walk About Love Festival. The Walk about Love is a group of people promoting peace and love by traveling/hiking up the famous Israel Trail. This process takes a few months as they start in Eilat and work their way North. In a couple of weeks they will be visiting my farm since we are next to the trail. We’ll host them for the afternoon before they move on to their next spot and give tours of our Eco Village.
But back to my travels, as we made our way down to the opening festival in the desert we stopped for the night at Mitzpe Ramon at an Alpaca farm. There we tagged along with the Shin-shins from the south to their Purim party. In the early morning we traveled the rest of the way to Shitim Ashram, which was hosting the opening festival.
The Alpaca Farm
Beth and I Hiking though the Desert
Shitrim Ashram is this tiny oasis in the middle of the dessert. It is literally surrounded on all sides by at least 80 kilometers of desert. It is the type of desert that is flat and rocky, where literally nothing grows. No trees, no plants, no bushes…You don’t see tumble weeds here. All you hear is the dry wind blowing across the earth. But the desert is magical. Because there are so few distractions it really gives you the chance to open up and look at yourself; to contemplate life and deep internal thoughts and struggles.
I was here sitting and having lunch with my friends in this oasis in the desert when I was awakened to a realization of a past life experience here…that I have lived somewhere very similar to this place. Somewhere in the Middle East in the desert surrounded by willow trees.
The desert is an emotional place to say the least. There is no hiding from yourself here. They say it opens a window to your soul and that is exactly what it did to me.
This was my first festival and being pretty unfamiliar with gatherings like this I wasn’t completely sure what to expect. But it ended up being a wonderful convergence of spiritual growth, laid-back good times, live music, and informative workshops, and a Kabbalah Shabbat service.
After returning to the farm for a couple of days it was on to the next set of Purim parties, which where in Tel Aviv on Floretine St, at the farm, and then Jerusalem. If anybody knows what Halloween is like in Santa Barbara, these parties in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem are comparable. Thousands of people converge on to one main street. There is music everywhere. Drinking and partying with everyone in costume. I was an 80’s aerobic instructor and def pulled it off well.
Paige and I dancing in the Street
When most of the world is done celebrating Purim there are a couple of cities here that are still going strong. They are the walled cities. So of course we spent our last day of Purim partying in Jerusalem, which is one of these cities with a wall. Once in Jerusalem it was off to the neighborhood Naclaote. This was the most random street party yet. As the street wasn’t technically blocked off and there would be the random car trying to drive through the masses of people spontaneously converging on to this street. Drinking on the street is legal in Israel so as you can imagine street parties are a lot of fun.
Israeli’s are so creative with their Purim costumes. I’ve never seen anything like it. It puts our premade costumes from the States to shame. They glue and tape together the most amazing things. My favorite of the week was friend Ben the lobster.
Jerusalem
Yigal and I in Jerusalem
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