Sparkling SodaStream water!

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Happy WORLD WATER DAY!
The 2018 theme is Nature for Water and the idea is to raise awareness about nature-related solutions to the water crisis.
Over the last few years Israel has gotten itself out of our water shortage; now we re-use a whopping 86% of our water.
So I'm going to blog today instead about a more exciting topic--SPARKLING WATER!

On a blustery January day our group's bus pulled up to the gate for a factory tour.
The sign says Welcome to the SodaStream family.

The plant is huge, spread out in many buildings, in the brand-new Idan HaNegev industrial park.
SodaStream moved here and closed its much smaller factory in the West Bank less than four years ago.

Our tour started with a little lecture in the Visitor Center where all the varieties of soda makers are on display.
Here is how to make flavored soda water at home:  https://www.sodastreamusa.com/how-it-works.aspx

We also got to see the funny video with Mayim Bialik and Hodor about the Lost Tribe of the Homoshlepians, the primitive people who used to schlepp water around in plastic bottles.  :)
Watch it here!

Then our guide took us into the factory!

You don't see many workers because so much of the production is automated.

But if something is a bit off, you do need a person to get right in there and fix it!

Our SodaStream guide needed amplification to make her voice heard over the machine noise.

Watching the robots is a bit mesmerizing, even in my little videos!

This man is from Peru!
SodaStream prides itself on fostering a happy work atmosphere filled with mutual respect and equality among its 1,700 employees.
Jews and Arabs, new immigrants and native-born Sabras, all ages, all work together in peace.
Every day a bus from Jerusalem brings 80 of the Palestinians who worked in the previous factory in Mishor Adumim.  (And travel time is paid.)
And 40% of the workforce are Bedouin--Israeli citizens from the close-by Bedouin city of Rahat or from the Negev's many unrecognized villages.
And half of those Bedouin are women!

Just outside SodaStream's gate you can see Rahat (well, you might have to click a few times on the photo to see the houses).

It was early afternoon Friday when our bus left in order to be back home in Meitar before Shabbat.
What warmed my heart that cold day was this picture of two smiling young men bringing platters of food or goodies as a nice little Sabbath Eve extra for the "SodaStream family" that stayed on to work, 24/7.
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At the official website you can click on your country for local information about SodaStream.
SodaStream came to Israel in the 1970s, and today its headquarters are here and the products are exported to 47 countries.  Soon China will join that list too!

Learn all about SodaStream over at Wikipedia and check out the links at the end too.
And happy World Water Day!
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Wind-whipped palms

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You could tell the direction of this morning's cold strong wind by the direction of the palm branches. 
Despite the gray sky, the Negev did not get rained on.
Today's rain, and even some snow, fell more to the north. 

We visited Idan HaNegev, a big industrial park that is being built near the Bedouin city of Rahat. 
The huge SodaStream plant is already in operation there, and we got to go in to see and hear the machines and the workers.
More on that in future posts. 
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(Linking to SkyWatch Friday.)
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70-year-old Kibbutz Hatzerim is thriving

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Our monthly Shishi Zioni (Zionism Friday) study day took us to Kibbutz Hatzerim in the northwest Negev. 

On the walking tour our group was lucky to see the nursery school children going outside to enjoy the warm winter day. 
The kids are so cute!
And they have such a good life--well, at least they do when rockets are not being fired at them from the nearby Gaza Strip, as happened in 2014 during the 50-day conflict between Israel and Hamas.

Behind the olive trees you see some of the simple older housing for the kibbutzniks. 
Hatzerim was begun from nothing, from barren desert, on October 6, 1946.  
So as a 70-year-old kibbutz, its population is multi-generational.
The 18-year-old Scouts, 5 girls and 30 boys, who were sent here in '46 as a pioneering group persevered through very hard conditions and are today the grandparents of a highly successful kibbutz. 
Living here are 470 members (chaverim) and 300 children (up to age 18). 
And so many of the post-army sons and daughters want to return that there is a waiting list for new houses being built. 

Hatzerim is one of the few kibbutzim that has resisted privatization; life is still communal, egalitarian, and democratic.  And with lots of idealism. 
They still eat all meals together in the big dining room.
There is a big dairy cow shed and also falcha (field crops), but the really huge success stories are the Netafim drip irrigation factory and the jojoba plantation that produces quality oil for cosmetics.
More about those two in the coming blog posts. 
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Their website has a page in English with good information and vintage photos. 
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Ben-Gurion stands on his head

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This morning the usual group went down south to the Ben-Gurion Heritage Institute at Sde Boker for this season's last Shishi Zioni session.
We saw two presentations on the subject "Movies and Internet social media as instruments of social change."

This little statue by Dina Babay is part of an exhibition there. 

On the Institute's brochure is the iconic photo of David Ben-Gurion standing on his head at Herzlia beach in 1957.
It is juxtaposed with the equally famous photograph of "The Old Man" proclaiming the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.
The caption above says something like "The man who turned worlds upside down in order to stand a nation on its feet."

In this 2009 colored ink print by Moshik Lin the tables are turned: here it is the map of Israel that is upside down.
I think B-G would appreciate the humor because he always stressed that our southern desert, the Negev, should have top priority; and indeed he himself retired to Kibbutz Sde Boker and is buried there.

You can read here all about the exhibition “David Ben-Gurion and his Legacy in the Mirror of Israeli Art."

Ben-Gurion's "personal trainer"  who slowly slowly got him ready to do the headstands was none other than Moshe Feldenkrais (the famous founder of the Feldenkrais Method for mind-body improvement). 
What I didn't know was that Feldenkrais was recruited in London in the early 1950s and brought to Israel to work as a rocket scientist!
Read the fascinating story in Haaretz.
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Shabbat shalom.
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Sand fly threat

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So, let's get back to discussing the intentional communities in Ramat Negev Regional Council that my group visited a few weeks ago. 

Everything looks nice and we heard about the advantages and good feeling of living together by choice in a communal settlement (yishuv kehilati).
 But we also noticed the lecturers kept rubbing their arms as they spoke.

And then our guide pointed out these fly traps hung all around (around the kindergarten, in this photo)  and the source of the itching became clear.
Traps not just for regular pesky flies but rather for dangerous little sand flies.

Sand flies of the genus Leishmania bite and cause leishmaniasis, known colloquially as the Rose of Jericho.  (Warning: that link shows ugly scars that can result from the bites.)
It has always been endemic in Jericho, but apparently in the last few years the disease has spread into Israel's Jordan Valley.
And now the sand fly has invaded certain parts of the Negev too.

Two years ago the Israel Ministry of Health designated  Sanford F. Kuvin Center for the Study of Infectious and Tropical Diseases of the Hebrew University as Israel’s National Laboratory for Leishmaniasis.
I just hope the various government authorities get their act together and decide who should be  responsible for controlling this threat in Israel.
 An estimated 12 million cases of leishmaniasis are reported worldwide, with 1.5-2 million new cases a year.

No one promised the early and the current pioneers in the Negev a rose garden, but they should not have to suffer from the Rose of Jericho.
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(For ABC Wednesday, U is for ugly urticarial papules.)
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A religious pioneering community in the Negev

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This week the blog has been showing you some of the three different types of intentional communities that our group visited last Friday.
They all belong to the Ramat Negev Regional Council in southern Israel.

Here is the Council's "city hall" in the desert.

Our next stop was Kfar Retamim, a religious community/ yeshuv kehilati.
They started small in 2006 and today they are 180 adults and 280 children. 

A member (with his first-born holding his hand) explained to our group how it works.
But why not hear it from this 6-minute video. Enjoy the young woman's enthusiasm!

And more info and a map are here.

I'll be showing you two surprising things at Retamim in the coming posts.
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Happy Thanksgiving to the friends in America.
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UPDATE: Online info about Retamim.
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15 young families living together in the desert

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As I was saying (in the cat selfie post), on Friday my Shishi Zioni group went down south of Beer Sheva to visit and learn about three different ways of living together in the Negev desert:
 1. a kibbutz mitchadesh, 2. a religious yeshuv kehilati (community settlement/planned community), and 3. a mixed religious + secular yeshuv kehilati.

Our bus slowly went up the dirt road to Sheizaf.
Half in jest our guide said not to fear the guard dogs because they were tired from having barked all night.

Our busload of older Israelis numbered just about the same as the current population of Sheizaf which is 15  young couples with 20 little kids.

Each family lives in a caravan, the portable pre-fab houses that were set on the ground in 2012.
Or maybe they are big enough to be considered caravillot.
(The Hebrew word caravilla is a portmanteau of the words caravan and villa.)

  Itai, who was a driving force in creating this yeshuv kehilati/community settlement, spoke with pride about the young people who were attracted from all over the country to come and establish a new place in the sparsely-populated Negev desert.
BTW, recruitment was done via e-mail and Internet. 

Our guide for the morning was Ofir, head of hityashvut/settlement for the Ramat Negev Local Council.
In addition to his help, Sheizaf got backing from Ayalim Association, a 21st century organization whose slogan is "Bringing young adults to live and volunteer in the toughest places in Israel to serve as its newest Pioneers."
This means the Negev and the Galilee. *

See a short video explaining Ayalim's altruistic aims.

Sheizaf is not enclosed within a fence.
At their website you can enjoy a slideshow of the houses and people of the community.

One of the fathers brought up his little son, to the delight of all the grandparents of our group.

Sheizaf is a rare example of a social experiment  deliberately mixing observant and non-observant Jews.
There vision is to grow to 250-400 families and when the kids are ready for school to have a mixed religious + secular education for them.
(The practice in Israel today is for a child to attend either religious school or secular school.)
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Good luck to these brave and idealistic young people who chose a far-from-easy life!
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*UPDATE: I see Ayalim does good work in central Israel as well.  This article and little video about their new project in Lod just appeared today.  A shipping container village is going up to house the enthusiastic students!

Selfie of a cat

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Well! -- this was the first time I ever took a selfie of a CAT!

But there is a good reason why I couldn't get up and stand in front of the cat and take a normal shot.

Yesterday my Shishi Zioni group went to three places in the Ramat Negev region to hear about three different types of communities.  (More about that in coming posts.)
Most of the folks sat down on chairs on one side to hear Itai, a member of Shizaf, talk to us.

I sat on a row of stacked stones on another side.
A cat came from behind to check out the several people on the stones.
I said "Psst psst" to invite her him over.
She He accepted and came for a good snuggle, then settled down right next to me!
The lady on the other side of the cat was not at all happy about our new neighbor.
But I happily laid my hand on the warm, fluffy, clean, purring kitty and tried to concentrate on the lecture and not attract attention.
I just had to,  however, take one discreet selfie of this sweet animal!
Wish I could have taken her him home. 
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UPDATE: I am now reading the garinsheizaf Facebook page of the community and learn that the cat is a male named Bentzi and he is their only cat.
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(Linking to Camera Critters.)
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Eagles riding thermals

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So there we were, in the spectacular Ein Avdat canyon, a part of the great wadi Nahal Tzin!

Having water all year round, Ein Avdat is a real oasis in the hot dry desert, a watering spot for birds and other animals and a magnet for hikers.
The path in Ein Avdat National Park is part of the Israel National Trail. 
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Our group had come for Shishi Zioni, the monthly program at Midreshet Sde Boker; and last Friday guide and bird expert Meidad Goren lectured about migrations and led us into the canyon.
We watched two fledgling humming birds in a bush and flocks of rock pigeons flying around.
We listened to the Tristram's Grackles' shrill cries.
One small chutspah-dik bird flew so close past by head I instinctively "ducked."

But most exciting was when a big Bonelli's Eagle, aka  Hieraaetus fasciatus or עיט ניצי
 hopped off the cliff and took to the air!

Then two other big raptors joined it in flight!
Click on the photo once and then once again to see all three.

With binoculars we could soon see them above Kibbutz Sde Boker.
They had caught a thermal and were circling upwards in the column's warm air. 
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(See also my post about ibex in Ein Avdat.)
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(Linking to Camera Critters and Weekend Reflections.)
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Beginner's luck

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Early Friday morning I went to the monthly program of Ben Gurion Heritage Institute at Kibbutz Sde Boker.
Before his lecture about bird migration our guide, Meidad Goren, took us down into the spectacular Ein Avdat canyon to watch birds.
It was my first visit and I was very excited.
I was even excited about the hairpin curves of the steep road that led down to the valley floor and to the entrance to the nature reserve.

I was snapping pictures from the bus window at every turn.
Only back home, looking at the downloaded photos, did I suddenly see animals in the center of this one!
What luck!
A baby ibex trying to get up behind mama ibex on the top of a narrow ridge, right there in the middle of nowhere!

You'll have to click on the photo, and then once again, to get it large enough to see the sweet mountain goats.

If ibex come near you inside the canyon, do not feed them.

Oh, and also "do not annoy the wild animals."
: )

(Linking to Camera Critters and to Signs, signs.)

See more about ibex at http://jerusalemhillsdailyphoto.blogspot.co.il/2013/11/ibex-free-and-friendly.html
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Greening the desert

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See the bust down on the ground floor of this unusual building?

It is David Ben-Gurion,  Israel's first prime minister.

Today I was there  at Ben-Gurion College at  Sde Boker, Ben-Gurion's kibbutz.
One Friday a month they offer great lectures and/or guided tours.

At the entrance to the kibbutz is Ben-Gurion's famous prophecy about how we would make the desert bloom and make the Negev a blessing to the State of Israel.
The green shrubbery overtaking the writing on the wall seems to prove that it  really is happening.
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(Linking to Whimsical Windows, Delirious Doors meme.)
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