Shabbats are made for walking... so that's just what I do.
Today I explored the neighborhood immediately north of my street, and was richly rewarded. I took some photos; none of them are terribly spectacular, but they give you a sense of the city near where I live.
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| Around New Year's Day a quartet of jade green tropical birds escaped (flew the coop?) from a Tel Aviv zoo and - as all inevitably are - were drawn to the Holy City, where they now abide. They visited Hebrew University a few weeks back, and today I spotted one eating berries in my neighborhood. The other 3 were nearby. |
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| Almond trees are now in bloom all over the city. |
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| The venerable olive tree |
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| Motti Garden. I haven't yet been to Gethsemane, but I strongly suspect it is much like this garden. |
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| A lone pomegranate |
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Abandoned psychiatric hospital abutting Motti Garden
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While I strolled through these verdant paths in the garden, a stranger emerged from behind a tree. He introduced himself as Joachim, told me he was the keeper of this park, and that he was called the Bee Man, or John the Baptist. Needless to say, I was intrigued. He searched around in his pockets for a while and produced a jar of bees, then took one out and let it walk on his forehead for the remainder of our conversation. It stung him at one point, and he sighed with relief: "I had the most awful headache, and this little creature has sacrificed his life to inject me with serotonin. Bees are magnificent creatures and they can heal almost anything. I've lived in this park for many years keeping bees and cleaning the park and I have been stung over 5,000 times." ("How do you know?"- I interject. He pauses: "It's a rough estimate.")
The Bee-Keeper spoke of many wondrous things to me as the sun settled in the western hills - his love of Yeshua, how all the bees would be dead by 2060, that he has lived in this park for many years and sometimes shares meals with a billionaire's family who live on the hill beyond his garden -- he told eerie tales of a group of artists who are renovating the old psychiatric hospital who played loud, electronic "nonsense" music while they worked and who at one point threatened to drink his blood. He quoted Einstein to me, as well as poetry from Ezekiel, Daniel and Isaiah. He shared with me several leaflets he had composed on the hidden theology of bees and told me my name meant "leaping with joy in the Lord!" and demonstrated with a hop-skip-hop. He offered to pose for a portrait, then escorted me to the edge of the garden when I said I must be getting along. He walked with me down the street beyond Motti Garden for a few paces, blessed me, then turned away to reenter his Bee Kingdom.
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| the Bee-Keeper's Gospel |
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"Partake as doth the Bee
Abstemiously
The Rose is an Estate
In Sicily" |
