Home in the Jerusalem Hills

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Welcome to my village in the Jerusalem Hills (also known as the Hills of Judea).
We are just west of Jerusalem.
Perched on a hill, our altitude is plus and minus 600 meters, depending on which terrace you live.
The moshav (meaning collective agricultural village) was founded in 1950 by Jews from Kurdistan (Iraq). Soon new immigrants from Morocco also came.
It was a hard life for them, starting from nothing.

Today there are 234 households with about 620 souls.

I myself am a newcomer to this region of Israel, having formerly lived by the coast. Unlike the members of the moshav, I do not own a house. Instead I rent a simple one-room-plus-kitchen house with a big yard from the days of the founders.

From the next mountain across the valley you can see the sun set on our lovely hilltop.

Because the region is so hilly, no big-scale crop growing is possible.
 In recent years the moshav has moved away from collectivism and gone toward privatism, but once every member family was required to have a chicken house for egg production.

Today only less than a dozen hen houses still have chickens.
 Many others have been converted into warehouses, workshops, and even housing for low-budget renters.

Not much traffic on our narrow winding road.
One bus line takes me to Jerusalem, running once every few hours.

It is a nice quiet life, with nice neighbors.
 At night you hear only the chorus of the jackals, even right under my window.

I am blessed to have the best of both worlds--living in the country with woods all around us and yet being half an hour's bus ride from Jerusalem, the center of the world!
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