A tale is quick in the telling, but a deed is slow in the doing. However, sooner or later, everything begins, continues, and ends, except perhaps the omniverse, and even about that we don't know much for sure. And so my journey is coming to its logical conclusion. I'm still talking about how, on Saturday evening, I boarded the first bus after the end of Shabbat.
Having said goodbye to Yigal in the rays of the setting sun, I made it to the bus stop, a hundred meters from my home hangar. Curiously, what is essentially an intercity bus also stops at internal city stops. While I was cooling my heels with a hungry belly, an older guy materialized nearby, with whom we couldn't communicate in English, but in Russian — no problem. It's often like that in Israel: everyone speaks English, but if someone doesn't, then they definitely speak Russian.
For some reason, he told me a story about how a whole crowd of gays checked into the hotel in Bulgaria where his son works, holding hands and hugging. The bus arrived noticeably behind schedule, by about twenty minutes, which quite surprised the old guy.
I managed to load the bike easily and quickly, and they didn't even charge extra for it — a true miracle. In the cabin, right above the driver's head, there's a monitor that broadcasts video from the luggage compartment during passenger loading, just in case. A comfortable express whisked me away to Be'er Sheva, where in literally 3 minutes I transferred to a bus to Tel Aviv, loading the bike and bags with the same success. There are plenty of free seats on the buses, and they run quite often.
Tel Aviv Central Bus Station is not a place for the faint of heart. At the time of its construction in 2010, it was the largest bus station in the world — 7 floors, and 29 escalators and 13 elevators. It was built in a sketchy neighborhood, and after the desert with its friendly tourists, it made my knees tremble with its crowds, dirt, and non-obvious navigation. Rumor has it that prostitutes, junkies, beggars, vagrants, and petty thugs hang out inside and nearby. I myself probably saw a somewhat suspicious crowd too, but after a whole day on wheels, in the turmoil of an unfamiliar night city, it's not that easy to gawk at the surroundings while trying to keep your belongings safe at the same time. There will be no photos, since I don't have octopus genes, and I haven't grown a third arm yet.
There were also non-threatening, but amusing personalities.
Arabs in kanduras (traditional snow-white robes), African-looking women in colorful, patterned, and impossibly intricate dresses, moreover, two of them with one guy: makes you want to fantasize that it's a husband with two wives. Black, chocolate, curly-haired, and with kippahs on their crowns, people in business suits and practically in sweatpants. People, people, people. But just wait and see what awaited me the next day!
By nightfall I managed to reach Nathan's, puncturing my tire one more time along the way. I was flying on one wing, as I really didn't want to patch it in the middle of the evening highway, full of traffic jams leaving the station, and deserted as it approached the residential areas.
Since Shabbat, which had just ended, is connected to another popular self-restriction of Judaism — kashrut, which would begin the next day, on Sunday (shh! I'm getting ahead of myself again), I'll talk about that too. Contrary to popular belief, kashrut applies not only to food, but here I'll be talking specifically about food products, as the most well-known aspect.
Talking about kosherness, of course, is silly from the standpoint of common sense - it's enough to quote one paragraph from Wikipedia, and everything falls into place.
- The animal must be slaughtered in accordance with all the requirements of Halakha. This process is called shechita (Heb. שחיטה), and a qualified slaughterer is a sho(y)chet (Heb. שוחט). In accordance with Halakha, one of the necessary conditions for kosher shechita is shechita with one smooth movement of the knife, simultaneously cutting through the majority (of the diameter) of the trachea and the majority of the esophagus. A tearing movement of the knife, a delay in the movement of the knife, or puncturing the animal's tissues with the sharp tip of the knife renders the shechita non-kosher, and the animal forbidden for Jews to eat.
In Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, and the Netherlands, shechita is banned by animal protection laws as an inhumane method of slaughtering livestock.
That is, in civilized countries, which are based on a scientific worldview and reason, all these ancient monstrosities and aberrations of consciousness are simply banned.
Nevertheless, when I was flying to Israel, I made sure to check whether my edible gifts were kosher — sprats (the answer is yes, if produced by Gamma-A) and Latvijas Balzams balsam. For the latter, an expert turned up just in time, confirming that a rabbi periodically comes to the factory and walks back and forth through the workshops, studying the production, and then issues a certificate.
When I was writing to Couchsurfers, only one of them was religious enough to strictly observe Shabbat and kashrut. Luckily, fate took pity on my nerves, or else he himself figured out what a hardcore atheist I am. In any case, I didn't end up staying with this person, although the experience probably would have been interesting. Alas, the older I get, the more cynical, angry, and irritable I become. Studies tell us that pessimists and cynics see the world more objectively, but they are less happy because of it. If I were engaged in something global and important, I would prefer to see my surroundings more clearly, but since I'm just living to the best of my modest abilities, I surrender — I want to be happy, and believe in unicorns and the invisible threads that connect us all. Nevertheless, immersing myself in a religious way of life would hardly have come easily to me.
The answer to the question of why Yigal has two ovens in his hangar, which I recently asked you, was enough. The answer is simple: one for meat, the second for dairy. The thing is, the vague phrase: "Do not boil a kid in its mother's milk" was stretched to such expanses that you marvel at the deviousness and imagination of the interpreters.
It is forbidden to cook meat and milk together even without the intention of consuming it. The very act of cooking is forbidden regardless of what will be done with this product later.
Therefore, it is even forbidden to light a fire under a pot belonging to a non-Jew, out of fear that it might contain a mixture of meat and milk, and by lighting the fire, we will cause this mixture to cook.
Detailed idiocy, for those not too lazy to get their hands dirty
In the end, from all this, the "sages" concluded that meat and dairy cannot be placed near each other at all. Ever. Including heating them in the same oven, even if everything has been washed and a thousand hours have passed.
The conclusion from all this is simple, but no less true for it. We are still in the twilight of reason. Civilization and progress, which have brought us to our current heights (including humanistic heights), are still something abstract and vague for a huge part of the planet's population. Restrictions that currently make no sense and bring no benefit still dictate the lives of billions of people (Hindus, Muslims, Christians, and Muslims at a minimum). Instead of relying on our understanding of natural processes, scientific research, reason, and logic, believers rely on myths, legends, and the personal authority of leaders or scriptures. It's sad, especially considering that in my native Latvia such people are the majority, both by personal impressions and by statistics.