The sky is on fire over the Holy Land

So I decided to go over to the Other Side. I had a friend that I met in Dunhuang last summer who lives in Tel Aviv, so I took the opportunity to visit him. I also have a cousin – or the cousin of my father – who lives next to Tel Aviv, in Erzliya (a rich upscale neighborhood). It would have been sad to not see both sides of a conflict.

My first impression about Tel Aviv was “where are the old people?” It’s actually amazing: there is almost no one over 35 years old!!! That city is incredibly cool, actually! There are thousands of nice trendy cafes where I had great food, organic stuff, cappuccinos, glass of nice wine and etc… Actually now that I’m writing I remember some guys I met in Ramallah who swore only by Tel Aviv for the party scene. That city has a really great vibe! It’s quite strange to arrive there coming not only from the Middle East, but also just coming from Jerusalem with its cops and guns and security fences everywhere. Once you pass the bus terminal’s last checkpoint, and you actually get in Tel Aviv, it’s just another world!

This led me to another thought: it’s like a bubble! People here enjoy themselves while doing their best to ignore The Other! And actually it’s even worse than that, because when they stop ignoring The Other it’s only to build up their prejudiced preconceptions! It struck me when I visited my extended family. We went to a dinner organized by another uncle, and the discussion kept coming back on the conclusion that “they don’t want peace, over there.” That particular idea struck me because interestingly enough I heard the same in Ramallah in Cafe La Vie when I was discussing for the zillion time the conflict: “they don’t want peace, bla bla bla, bla bla, bla bla bla…” How funny, isn’t it?

Anyways, then I went back to Jerusalem because I learned that I had a friend studying there. After spending a couple of days I realized one thing: how can people can live like that? Everyone live in constant fear, with a constant threat, and are constantly surrounded with machine guns and military people running around. It’s a fucked up country, that’s what it is! And that led me to another [brilliant] thought: how can people be so stuck ed up with their issues! Ok, the good old “stop war, make love” thingee is maybe a bit cliche, but I think that still ought of be applied a little bit more to people’s lifelong deep philosophy! It’s a crazy world, that is. STOP THE WAR!!!!!!

I had one little epiphany one night, though. We went to Lifta (لفتا‎, מי נפתוח),  this abandoned Palestinian village in Jerusalem where people were chased out during the 1948 war and no one came back. There was this party organized, so we stayed up making barbecue and drinking beer around the fire until early morning, mostly with students in masters studies in Middle East, so we had plenty of discussions. But then, at around 03h37 a.m. came those two orthodox Jews who just settled down in the same terrace as where we were and started to play flamenco/orthodox amazing guitar music! They played on for hours this slow yet captivating melody, singing about love and all different things in life. Then I had the very elaborated thought: wowowiwow!

That night my hope for human race went up a little bit.

hhh

So, after pligrimming for a while I decided to go camel riding for 3 days in the desert. I think that camels were part of my destiny for some time, and on Sunday it became reality. With two travel companions, Gil and Cedric, I book a tour (yes, a tour for tourists and everything) to go camel riding for 3 days/2 nights around the giant sand dunes of Dunhuang.

We thus started this thing with a strong feeling of being scammed just like any other fool tourists, and as we would later realise it was a sort of scam. We paid too much.

But as we were getting going we put our anger on the side and decided to enjoy this thing; and it was really cool. The suffocating heat and our sore ass made us understand the Bedouin life. Also my camel had some driving issue and was always on the side. But I fast learnt to sit and enjoy. Camels are a quite comfortable thing (for a while). It was the occasion to take some nice pictures, get a Central Asian suntan, and climb a dune that was high as something very (very) high. Camping in the desert is also a fun experience, but the best was when we found a little stream with some shade available and water to clean ourselves.

One of the most thrilling moment of this trip was running down from the gigantic dune, creating a mini-sand avalanche, and hearing the whole dune resonating as the sliding sand was making vibrations. Quite nice also was to arrive back in town as this lazy trek was in fact exhausting.

And now I’m barely able to concentrate so I’ll take a nap before going to Turpan tonight!

Cave at Mati Si

Thousand Buddha Caves and etc… In the past week I realised I have seen quite a lot of Buddhist sites on the Silk Road; almost as performant as a pilgrim! And actually I could say that I have been religious sites hoping accross the Silk Road. It all started with the big Mosque in Xi’an, and then Tianshui with the cliff full of huge Buddhas, then Zhangye, with its 35 meters sleeping Buddha, Mati Si, a temple carved on another cliff somewhere in Gansu, and finally the cherry on the French Toast: Dunhuang!

So I went to one of the most famous sites on the Silk Road: the Mogao Caves （莫高窟）。 I was quite sceptical of this big tourist attraction. I had even read somewhere that it was quite disapointing.

But the night I arrived in Dunhuang is worth a short summary:
I arrived at a hostel, which I had been dreaming about for days! A real hostel with dorms, a courtyard, some backpackers and even some foreigners!!! Fantastic! Among the people I met was a French couple, travelling with a Jeep Cherokee, and coming from Beijing. Quite cool. And the best is that they had Pastis de Marseille, the wonder drink. So we drank, and some Chinese travelers joined us, and we played Chinese drinking games, and at 3 a.m we decided to climb the enormous sand dunes (150m) that’s just behind the hostel, see the stars and finally the sunrise. That was quite fun. I went to sleep at 8 a.m.

But the point was that Daphnee, the French girl, told me I still should go and see the paintings, as they are suppposed to be amazing even though you have to follow a group with guide. And that was true. The painting are actually amazing. Some flashy light blue color dates from the Tang dynasty, 1300 years ago… Really impressive.

Apart from the caves DUnhuang itself is quite pleasant. It lies in a oasis in the middle of the desert, with lots of grapes, water-melon, and tons of other fruits. People are so chill! It’s all tranquillo! Great. And from everywhere within the city there is the ubiquitous presence of the sand dunes that lies right on the borders of the town. Very nice!

I should write again after my camel experience, and then I’ll be going to Xinjiang…