The Cairenes

Just wanted to thank Michael McCain, Josh Keiler's old pal from E-Translate, and the merry band of Cairenes and foreigners with whom he connected me. Thanks to Osama, Shyima, Bardy, Maria, Phillip and Sebastian for great times at the pyramids, at the Cairo Jazz Club, at the Egyptian Flamenco concert and all the taxi rides in-between.

Check out Osama's excellent photography. He uses all kinds of old photographic proceses that no one does anymore. Awesome. He's a Spanish and Russian-speaking Syrian based in Minnesota who is spending 2 years in Cairo capturing its magic. Im'sh'allah he will have a show in Manhattan sometime this spring. (Sorry Shyima if the photo embarrasses you!)

The greatest mystery of the ancient world

The greatest mystery of the ancient world is now your opportunity to buy 10 souvenir postcards for a low, low (and negotiable) price! What's shocking about the pyramids is that the ROAD to the PARKING LOT goes right between the damn things!!! No Disneyesque well-sculpted entrance into ancient secrets here--- just the usual Cairo traffic jam, street vendors and indolent police officers..

And yet, for all the initial lack of mystique, the pyramids, with proper time and space to contemplate, are quite astonishing. From up close, the angles make them seem small. But as you get farther away, the awesome scope of them hits you. And when you're 5 miles away and still see them over the skyline-- hoo haa! We climbed inside the smaller of the two big pyramids, and entered the burial chamber, constructed of rocks bigger than two double-wide trailer homes stacked on top of each other.They certainly demand a return visit. Perhaps on a full-moon night.

Most impressive was the reconstructed "solar boat," built of 4,500 year-old cedar wood, buried for all these millennia in a limestone pit right next to the Great Pyramid. The thing is amazing.

Thanks to Josh Keiler's awesome connections, I have made friends with a whole gang of hip Cairenes- it's a real international community: a Syrian-American photographer, a beautiful Egyptian painter, a Texan guitar-playing translator with his French girlfriend, a young German diplomat and his fiery-haired Polish friend, an Egyptian drummer who owns his own pharmacy---> quite an amazing bunch, and all multi-lingual.

I tell you-- we are sheltered as hell in America. Ach, even in Jerusalem which, like South Florida, is kind of another borough of New York. But it's a big world out there, and there are a billion places to go, stories to hear, lives with which to intersect. Actually, six-point-something billion, but I was generalizing.

That's it for now. Tomorrow I go to see the mummies, then back to Sinai to reconnect with Ye Olde Lorde and Maker once again. Bism'illah.

Spread the Love

I just bought a book on the street here in Cairo. On the cover is a picture of an old, white-bearded Jew with tallis and tefillin. Surrounding him are various planets. Not sure what that means, but my guess is that the title is something to the effect of,

THE FILTHY JEW: HOW HIS GODLESS EVIL

CONTROLS THE PLANETS (and you)

Other fine publications featured images of the Star of David and a bullet and some blood, or a Star of David in a bullseye being shot by an arrow or a Statue of Liberty holding a Star of David-topped torch. I told the merchant that i was CANADIAN-- then we gave the thumbs down to the US and the Jews (Yahud). Fun.

Tomorrow Shabbat with some the few remaining Jews of Cairo. Sunday, the Pyramids.

Hope you're all well. Miss you guys.

running from this overpriced internet cafe

in Eilat-- but quick enough to feed yer imaginashuns with my new plan for the next few days--
going to the pyramids!
Then the Rainbow retreat to shut up for a week, then back to yeshiva, where many beloved brothers have been calling me with wishes for my safe (and smart-assed) return.

typo fun: my fingers 2wice typed "sage" instead of "safe" up there. eh- i won't be so cocky right now

Behold! The bush burned with fire but was not consumed

I am in Sinai. On the beach, in a little shack. Eating, reading Dostoevsky, listening to Bedouin music by the fire, slowly slowly meeting people, talking about the soul-- Soul of Man, Soul of Nations, Soul of WanderingStu.

I am reminded again that, whatever the word means, wherever the path leads, whatever preparations are needed, whatever clothing and certifications and the like are involved-- I am on a path to become a Rabbi. People who have never spoken to me somehow see it in my eyes. It is not a choice so much as the essential situation. And so I embrace that, and will take the steps necessary to fulfil that aspect of my destiny, whether it be to finish HUC quick and dive into work, to spend years at Bat Ayin or to meet a whirling mystic and follow him across the sands. Whatever it be, I see that I can't hide from the fact that my being was shaped to help others, to guide them, to inspire them to, as one beautiful little person recently told me, "Light up people's hearts."

But I reckon all that is better done if I am committed to it, "with all my heart, with all my soul, and with all my beingness." So a prayer that all those elements are aligned, driven and FILLED with holy fire-- soon soon, and in our time!

Selah.

There's a good chance that, before returning to the Yeshiva for the spring, I will spend some of this terrifying winter at a Rainbow Healing Retreat here in Sinai. Rather than run to Sinai for a week of indolence, it might be wise to use the momentum of this trip to actually confront myself and my Creator in a deep way, the way Moses did out here, the way Elijah did, the way the Children of Israel did when they came of age at the mountain.

That's all for now.

Be well, and be in love, friends.

Petra-Fried

This is the world's second largest and second highest flag. It is in Aqaba, Jordan, near Eilat, the southern tip of Israel. From Eilat, it is possible to see Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and, on a clear day, an obese Moroccan man in a skimpy bathing suit. The largest and highest flag (height, I assume, refers to height of the flagpole, certainly not elevation) is in Amman, Jordan, the capital. "That's Jordan's thing," the tour guide explained. "Every country has it's thing." Colombia has cocaine, Canada has proximity to America, Jordan has big flags.

This is mom talking to Elias, our excellent tour guide, who is looking at the world's second largest and second highest flag:

This is the amazing first glimpse of the "Treasury" at Petra, just before coming out of the canyon. The Nabatean people carved all of these tombs out of the cliffs. Their own homes were free-standing (and dust by now). But their necropolis lives on.



You'll remember this from the last Indiana Jones flick. Indiana Jones, by the way, is based on Vendyl Jones, a tripped-out archaeologist who supposedly knows where all the good stuff is. Or maybe there's no connection:


Here's a few nice shots of my ass:



And the boys having a smoke, Jordanian style. I was also having a hot drink at the time. It was a chilly day in the desert.

**********************

We went to Petra last Tuesday, hung out in the desert Wednesday, then came back to rainy Jerusalem. We spent Shabbat at the Dan Tel Aviv, on the beach. It was rainy, but we had two great walks on the beach. And three huge meals. You shoulda seen the mound of chopped liver. You really shoulda.

Esta left this morning at 5:30am. I cried. She cried. For the first time, I think I was more sad than her when we parted. Sad, alone, and scared. What to do next? .....The adventure continues. Now that the travelling is over, I'm taking a little vacation. Location undisclosed.

name change 2

call me Ishmael.
actually, don't

but be aware the blog is undergoing another chapter transition. (as if you had even noticed the first transition from Jerusalem --> Into the Hills)...

the period known as

WanderingStu, Chapter II: Taking it Higher

>>the Judean Hills rise up once again in the mind of the reader
as a place of revelation, confusion and redemption<<

in which this young man was described thusly:

The boy struggles to become a man by abandoning the safe path of success and affluence, returning to his soul's root to therein find Oneness and self.
OR: Stu flips out again and runs to the hills to live in a trailer park with a bunch of nutty chasids who don't eat enough meat.
Either way, it's gonna be a good time- no jacket required.

... is over.
i reckon i very well might find myself in the hills again, soon enough,
but the framework has been changed. perhaps imperceptibly, but changed nonetheless, at least from my side of these 2 eyes.

enjoy the ride.

tell 'im like it is

been trav'lin' with mom, folks, sinking into un-funky funk, breaking hearts and getting broken, always with that wanderingstu twinkle in my eye.

not true, actually. some days the twinkle is twunk as well, brethren and sistren.

this week featured a baby naming-- Yikrat Meirah Shifraya bat Leah v'HaRav Raz Hartman (sorry about the misspellings), and a Bar Mitzvah-- Shoam Shmaryahu ben Miriam v'Ilan Avraham Venzelbaum (not mandelbaum). So joy is in the air as well as rain and wanderingstu's deep sense of loss and lostness

tomorrow mom and i head to the desert. tuesday is the 10th of Tevet, a half-day fast, and wednesday we go to Petra, where Harrison Ford found the Holy Grail.

unrelated note-- I once worked with a guy named Harrison Lord. a Jew, at that.

in the meantime, friends, let's take a moment to help wanderingstu weather his all-time-worst identity crisis yet. {fun!} just click the "comments" button, and let us know just who wanderingstu is.

no flattery, please, and no bullshit.

be well, and love each other. i'll be moving to Mykonos by the end of next week. i've decided to become a Greek fisherman.

now answer the question.