Two days in paradise

I just spent two days in paradise, which means that I was not in Israel and wherever I was seemed like paradise in comparison. So where was I? Frankfurt and Portugal. You may try to say that you can't compare a vacation to normal life, but this was hardly a vacation as I only had two days to pack in all kinds of racing around in a foreign country. That's all the vacation time I get, 2 days in the last 4 years.

Frankfurt was a layover for 4 hours where I raced out of the airport and checked out the Jewish part of the East side. Back to the airport and off to Portugal where I raced around again to get kosher food only to fly out the next morning. There was no relaxation but there was civilization. 

Frankfurt is a lovely city even though it's mostly a rebuild after the war. They have had less time to build a city than Israel has had but the place is far nicer, efficient, and classy. And the people are so polite. They are the opposite of Israelis. The Frankfurt airport is massive and runs to perfection, every last piece of it. And what about Portugal, not the perfection of Germany, but elegant, quaint, and full of the sweetest people I have ever met in my life. Lovely architecture too. I stayed in a very clean and quaint hotel: $65 for the night. Try to find something in Israel for less than $100. 

With heavy hearts we headed back to Israel. Already in the waiting area at the Frankfurt airport we got the whiff of the Israel style, people who have no consciousness of one another. There was a youth soccer team that was very loud and the person I was with noted the difference from the Portuguese youth team that we had seen in Portugal that was so well behaved.

We wondered how the Israeli boys would be on the flight, and we learned. They were out of control, shouting, having pillow fights, punching one another. The flight attendant - this was Lufthansa - begged them to sit down. The plane had balancing issues and needed everyone to stay in their seats. But these wild boys would not sit. And their coaches made at most meager attempts to quiet them, as this woman struggled with them. One of the boys grabbed a bottle of water from the serving cart, which is such a no-no. Another poured ice all over the floor. She said to him, "This is not nice what you have done." They had to be told about a dozen times to wait their turn for this or that. They pressed the service button again and again. We weren't even in Israel yet and we were all suffering from Israelis. People couldn't sleep. The whole flight like this. The chilul Hashem was off the charts. 

The boys, who were not wearing yamulkas, ate the traife chicken. An elderly Haredi woman offered one of them her meal. I don't know if she just wasn't hungry or in her tzidkus wanted that one boy should eat something kosher once in his life. That was the one bright spot of the flight to Israel. 

While the view above Frankfurt and Portugal was full of greenery and water, the view about Tel Aviv is all congestion, apartments packed together. 

When we landed I went to apologize to the stewardess on behalf of the boys but there was an Israeli woman already doing that, but she was full of emotion of course, and anger. She was outraged by the boys, outraged I tell you. I don't imagine that her histrionics were much of a comfort to the exhausted stewardess. 

Then we left the plane and entered the airport which is such a dump compared to Frankfurt. We go to the passport machine and it doesn't work. We go to the next machine and it doesn't work. The third one worked. We go to the ATM machine and it doesn't work. What was that about the incredible Israeli technology and all the modern inventions?

We figure, at least in Israel we can get kosher food but we couldn't. The first place wasn't kosher at all. The next had some kind of certificate that I didn't recognize but it didn't have much food anyway. Just some boxed salads. The third place didn't have a certificate.

We left the airport and tried to board the train but the next one was in two hours. This was quite a contrast to Germany and Portugal both of which had clean, efficient, and regular train service. We were told to go the shuttle. And so we walked to it only to find a bunch of very sketchy looking Arabs who seemed to run it. There was a hashish machine, a hookah, I don't know what they call it, on the floor of the van! I wasn't about to board this with my travel companion. 

So we went to the taxi area, passed a tower that had the ribbon symbol for hostages. Back to the land of pain I thought. We got a cab that ripped us off terribly. 

So what are the advantages of Israel? There are none. It is not elegant, it is disorderly, the people are wild and rude, and you can't even get kosher food so easily. It's full of halacha violating people. This is a Jewish state? The airport is named for a murderous heretic. In the baggage area is a mural of an Israeli soldier, long haired with his hair in a bun, kissing his equally non-religious bride. There were no murals of religious people. That's Israel, war and traifkite.

Israel is an illusion, a pipe dream. It's nothing, just difficulties, just pain.

I say again, and I say it deeper every time, aliyah pushers are devils. Anybody who lives in this mental asylum and doesn't warn others away is a devil.