City of three religions - Part One (Judaism)

Just two days ago we came back from Jerusalem. My fiance has been talking for a long time about the magic of this place. He has been there 4 years ago and really wanted to show me Israel.

We were traveling at night and arrived at the Tel Aviv airport early morning. Sherut took us to Polish House which is located in Mea Shearim - part of city inhabited by the Jews Orthodox. Polish House was created in Jerusalem 80 years ago by Sisters of Elisabeth and existed in this part of the city even before the Jewish people moved there. Now the sisters have some problems because of the neighbourhood, as the people living there don´t look favourably at anyone who doesn´t belong to them.

Before I say anything else I need to clear something - I am not an antisemite. All the opinions in here are based purely on the observations. In fact I don´t like any of the extremists - in any religions - especialy those who hate anyone, who is not with them.

To go to the Jewish part of the Old City and the famous Western Wall you need to pass through the muslim quarter. Going through the Damascus Gate I felt like entering another world. Narrow streets full of colorful pashminas, spices, sweets and any kind of souvenirs you can think of accompanied by the melody of "welcome to my shop" sang by every owner reminded me of Marrakesh. And then I observed 2 young Jews quickly walking by. Suddenly both of them muttered some words to the young Palestinian next to them. I suppose it was some rude words because the other guy looked suprised, repeated them and shaked his head.

I was observing many times how the Jewish people go through this quarter. They make very long steps, almost running - it looks like they dream about go by as quickly as they can.

You can feel the tension between different cultures and religions, although according to Miguel it is much calmer and peaceful then 4 years ago. Anyway on every corner you can see the jewish army guarding the peace of the country. The M16s in their hands are a good reason for staying out of trouble.

Western Wall

To be honest I thought it´s a long wall, but the place is not so big. Divided to two sections - bigger for men and small one for women it´s a mirror of the jewish society. The man section is very loud - men praying, singing "shalom aleichem", some of them even dancing.

Women side is silent. Filled with girls completely focused on the prayers. Each one separate in their own world. Lots of them crying quietly with Torah in their hands.

You can see the difference in the status of the women and men in any occasion. Women are usually very young - I´ve seen girls which looked like 15 years old already with 1 or 2 children. This society of Israel in general it is extremely important to have children - as many as possible. Seeing families with 12 children is something very usual there. Women don´t really mean much, they are meant to take care of the children. I´ve seen a family going through a crowd near Damascus Gate - the crowd was so thick it was very difficult for me to walk. People were pushing each other. The girl - about 17years old struggling with 3 years old child and double pushchair. Her husband (close to 40 years old) was walking in front of her - not even looking if she manages....

Another thing which shocked me is how many little children are on their own. 4 years old Jewish boys standing in the middle of the busy street scared to cross is another usual view. You can see as well older children taking care of little ones.

The Jewish Ortodox society is very grey. All of them wear clothes in black, white and grey mostly. Very seldom you can see any other colours. Men are wearing hats. I was trying to find an explanation of their meaning. It´s not easy to find why they wear different kind of hats.
The best explanation I found on the following page: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090902145019AAn6ZFA

Shabbat

Shabbat starts at 5pm on Friday and remains till sunset on Saturday. For this period everything in the Jewish part of the city is closed. Restaurants close the kitchen about 3.30pm on Friday to make sure that everything is closed till 5pm. Buses, taxis, shops - everything suddenly stops. One of the great experience was going out in our extreme neighbourhood on Saturday evening.The place looked abandoned. Lots of rubbish covering the empty streets. Only several dark dressed figures walking by quickly. We passed several buildings with colourful wilndows spreading light. In each of them we could hear voices of children and seperately men singing their prayers.

It is definitely very extreme society. Dark clothing, serious faces, devoted to praying. Fear of God seams to be the main foccus of their existence. It has been very interesting to observe their everyday life. Of course most of the Jewish society is not Orthodox. In a New City you can find restaurants and shops which look like taken from Europe. Appart from the extremists people are friendly and try to help if you have any questions.