So here I am, in the east seashore of Mediterranean. I am so happy to breathe the sunshine, and to smell the dirt. I finally feel I revive from the endless coldness of Boston. Bravo!
I feel very lucky to spend the summer in Akko. The nature, the history, or the destiny, have brought the uniqueness to this UNESCO world heritage old port city. The colors are dirt yellow, coral blue, olive green, and shell white, which make up my favorite combination - the colors of the land - rooted deeply into the earth. I wander through the narrow and winding alleys of the old town every day, using my nature to find my way, by sensing where the sun is, where the marina is, where Mediterranean is, where the souq is, where the minarets are. No need any signals, or names of streets, or numbers of houses. The smell of fish and falafel and shisha tell, the texture of sunlight and shadow tells, the colorful cloths hanging in the air tell, the old arches and the sandstones tell, the breeze from the sea tells, the eyes of cats tell, the old man making fish tells, the chaos of the souq tells, the tall palm trees tell, the voice of Allah from the minarets tell, the Arab kids’ laughter tells. Let the nature lead my way, which is the authentic charm of old cities forgotten by modern urban planning.
The cats are deified animals in Israel. They are always my friends as we can understand each other easily. It made me feel so lonely in US since I’ve never seen any cats in the streets, or at least in the places I’ve been. (I’ve never experienced such lack of street cats in any other countries I’ve been. I think there are many cats in Puerto Rico, though. Maybe this is part of my culture shock and one part of the uniqueness of the center of the world called United States of America.) I am so glad to see them running and lying and wandering around and eating everything and bathing in the sunshine and talking to friends and giving birth to babies everywhere in Israel. I don’t know what is happening in the kingdom of cats in Holy Land, but I can feel that they are basically living a free, happy and democratic life. The Holy Land cats are different, though. Most of them have long faces. Perhaps this is decided by the gene of the “holy genre”. Their eyes are peaceful without alert. They are big and careless and a little wild. Most of them are not elegant or beautiful or smart. I feel that maybe they are the type of cats of a millennium ago, when they were not that beautiful or sophisticated. A few of them are special, though. One night an elegant cat with a gap on her right ear came to my home and asked me to tame her. She is gentle, lonely and lovely. Another night a new born kitty with long legs ran to me and yelled at me, full of passion, curiosity and desire for adventures in her little baby soul. They are my new friends here.
The landscape of many places is amazing. The Mediterranean climate gives birth to so many families of plants, creating a beautiful landscape with complexly overlapping layers, with a myriad of colors. Each of them blossoms in a way of expressing their joy from sunshine, as they have some natural link to God. As a result, many of them strech with impressive profiles and poses, maybe because they are happy and proud. Holy land is very dry. The Israelis invented dripping irrigation system. I can see the thin brown rubber pipes everywhere. It is brilliant that the smart low-tech intention has irrigated such a beautiful landscape.
Unfortunately, most new cities (most part of them) I’ve ever been in Israel are ugly. They have industrialized and westernized faces, boring and soulless, though a few of them are vibrant or elegant. The Bauhaus architecture heritages in Tel Aviv are quite inspiring, still strongly expressing the dreams and ambitions of the group of European young people at the beginning of 20th century. I was deeply moved by those buildings (though they were built before 1948). Another interesting thing of Israeli new architecture or new cities is the transitional space where the buildings talk to the sky. Unlike the boring straight lines for most modern architecture, many Israeli houses built after 1948 have solar panels and solar heaters on top of the roofs, which are environmental friendly and look very organic and vivid. Furthermore, I find that although the new buildings themselves are not that good-looking, people’s ways of using houses are vibrant and lovely, which give birth and souls to the buildings. The old neighborhood Yemenite Quarter in Tel Aviv feels so comfortable. Every home has many beautiful plants, which are planted in interesting colorful potteries, here and there around their homes. The blue violet and wine rosy flowers falling on the ground have changed the plain pavements into unpredictably dreamy carpets. I always feel that vegetation is an important architecture element integrated into and interacting with the buildings themselves. They cannot be separated from each other. And another day I was invited to my friend’s house in Haifa, which is located in the middle of the mountain (Haifa is a port city built on mountains). Although many parts of Haifa are not inspiring from my perspective, the visual experience from his home is amazing, with a great view over the city and the port. In the morning we climbed up his roof to enjoy the amazingly vibrant panorama with all kinds of terraces and vegetations overlapping with each other and reaching the far-far-away. I think Israel is very lucky to have the Mediterranean climate, in which the sunshine, the terraces, the open space, the mild temperature, the brilliant color, the beautiful plants exist naturally. Although basically, compared to other Mediterranean towns I have been, the Israeli towns are less beautiful, they still holds some gifts from the beautiful climate, as a spoiled baby born with a silver spoon.
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