Miss Me?

It's my last day in Israel. 

Later I'll wander over to the Carmel shuk to buy a mind-boggling assortment of gummy worms for my kids (they are never too old for gummy worms), a couple of "Israeli" scarves (imported from India), and a few last-minute things for my daughter's apartment here in Tel Aviv. 

But first I'll catch up on the baseball game from Shabbat, the Friday night one that they won. I tried to watch Saturday's evening game live, since Roy O was on the mound, but the 2 AM start time did me in. I managed to stay awake until the middle of the top of the third inning - long enough to see a less than magical start by the Wizard. This morning I woke in a series of mini-dreams where I checked the final score over and over, and kept half waking to remind myself that I didn't actually know yet whether they really lost - or whether they came back to win the game for Oswalt despite the bad start. I wasn't very shocked when I finally got out of bed and saw that they lost.

I'll miss today's game - it's a day game, so it will start in prime time in Tel Aviv. But I'll be at the airport, waiting to get on my plane to come home. 

It's really hard to leave. I'll miss so many things here, starting of course with my daughter Miry. She is so perfectly at home here it's hard to imagine her living anywhere else. It will be a bummer not seeing her smiling face every day, and hearing "Hey Miry!" from everyone as we walk down the street. 

I'll also miss: 

The incredible - and cheap - produce in the shuk (a two-minute walk): 2 shekels for a kilo of delicious cucumbers (who knew cukes actually had a flavor?) - that's about 25 cents a pound, 3 shekels a kilo for gorgeous tomatoes, a shekel and a half for a huge bunch of fresh herbs.

The Mediterranean beach (a five minute walk to the closest, 15 to stroll down to the beach near Jaffa).  Spent hours yesterday afternoon building a huge "drip castle" on the beach, with the help of a flock of local kids, both Jewish and Arab. They asked me "Is this how they make them in America?" I think I started a new sand castle fad here.

The restaurants - I've heard that Tel Aviv has more sushi restaurants per capita than any city except Tokyo. Even in Tel Aviv (a much more secular city than Jerusalem, which is kind of Holy Disneyland) there are kosher restaurants everywhere. Fancy restaurants, kiosks, street food, people here seem to be eating all the time. If they didn't walk everywhere, they'd be as fat as Americans.

The amazing diversity of people here - whoever thinks that Israelis are a homogeneous population because most of them are Jewish has obviously never been here. It boggles the mind that anyone would use the term "racist" to describe a country that has people of so many different colors and national backgrounds. Hanging around the shuk area, I've seen a lot of Sephardim (Jews from North African and Eastern/Middle Eastern countries), Arabs, and also "Filipinos" (who could be from the Philippines or from any of a dozen other South Asian countries).

The culture - literature, performing arts, and visual arts. We spent half a day wandering around the Tel Aviv art museum, an evening at a Ehud Banai rock concert, a poetry night at the Writers' House (featuring my husband's Hebrew poetry), the arts & crafts fair down the street every Tuesday and Friday...

And of course, I will miss the newfound family members I met on this trip - the family I never knew that I had in Israel until my son's genealogy research discovered new branches of our family tree: The cousin in El Rom, a kibbutz all the way at the top of the Golan Heights, my grandmother's cousins Clara and Chava who came here from Argentina 50+ years ago, and the chassidic branch in the Old City in Jerusalem. 

It's a bummer to leave. Our two week trip went by so fast and I can't wait until I can come back again. When I get on the plane to come home, I will console myself with reminders of what I have to look forward to when I get back:

My job - just kidding. It's going to be crazy catching up.

My other daughter Leah, who stayed home (with various friends) to babysit my house and dog. She told me on the phone this morning that she has a surprise for us - I think she turned her bedroom into an art studio.

My dog Shana. Miry's dog Leroy Brown Jr is a sweetheart, but I miss my pup.

Speaking English - or more specifically, speaking intelligently. I am so embarrassingly bad at speaking Hebrew that I sound like an idiot whenever I open my mouth. Resolution for my next trip: Improve my Hebrew language skills. I'm bringing home dozens of menus from restaurants for practicing with, since food is one of the things that I like to talk about the most (how to cook it, grow it, match it with wine). Of course I like to talk about baseball - and the Astros - most of all, but there is really no one to talk baseball with here. 

And, of course, I am looking forward to watching live Astros games in the evenings, not in the middle of the night or reruns in the morning. I was hoping for a bit better outcome of the 2 weeks that I was gone. I wanted to come back to a team that was at least one game over .500; instead they are 6 games under. There are some bright spots, especially in the hitting - Tejada and Pence are in the top 5 for the NL, Lee and Bourn continue to do well at the plate, Maysonet has been a terrific addition. Berkman is slowly creeping up to where he should be, although I hoped to see him on the good side of .250 by my return. The pitching has been sporadic - Wandy an All Star Wannabee vs Wandy ("Is He Tipping His Pitches") the Loser, Classic Wizard vs last night's Roy ("Which Way is the Plate") O, Backe is Back - but should he be? Half the bullpen seems to be injured. Matsui is on the DL (what a surprise - NOT), but I'd rather see Maysonet playing anyway. 

Let's just net it out to say that I'm coming back to a team with some challenges. (Did I mention that they are in last place in the division?) And, wow, I can't wait to see them! 

Now for that Friday night win on the archive...