Celebrating 2014 with Celebrities

I have celebrated more than a few New Year Eves. Some involved a noisy dance party. Others were simply a get-together with friends and a glass of champagne.  At times we chose to stay home, cuddled in front of the TV, and waited for the “ball drop” in Times Square. And oh, there were times we couldn't quite stay awake, and fell asleep before midnight.  Anyway, the 2014 New Year Eve was quite different…

Golan Heights – Between Heaven and Hell

Last week I visited the Golan Heights twice. On Wednesday, I drove up to Mt. Hermon with a friend to do some skiing.  On Friday and Saturday I went up with a group of friends and we hiked two segments of the ‘Golan Trail’ (שביל הגולן). The winter storm that blew a week earlier covered the Golan Heights with fresh snow - the whole area turned into a “fantasy land”. The Israeli side of the border was filled with visitors who came up to play in the snow. But on the Syrian side, you could hear explosions and heavy machine guns, as the battles raged between pro and anti-government forces. It was a surreal experience.

Abolishing the [financial] Pyramids

For thousands of years Jews have been celebrating Passover. Celebrating the liberation of our forefathers from slavery in Egypt, where many broke their backs building the Pyramids.  While ancient pyramids serve as archeological artifacts now days, new types of pyramids are still being built. Over the past decade, several “financial pyramids” have been erected in Israel, exploiting the fruits of labor of common people.  But this past week, the process of abolishing these pyramids achieved a few important milestones.

Rediscovering Talmud

I consider myself reasonably well educated, with elementary school, high school, under-graduate school, and grad school under my belt.  I do read quite a bit – books, newspapers, magazines, websites and blogs.  But I have never opened a Talmud book.  That is until yesterday…

The Future of Israeli Debate

When I watched political debates in the US, I couldn't help being impressed. The participants (mostly) played by the rules: when one party spoke, the other listened; arguments made by one side, were carefully countered by the other. Not so in a typical “Israeli debate”: participants tend to speak over each other, there is very little listening, and the whole thing often turns into a “shouting match”. But before you shake your head in frustration, know that I have seen the future - and there is hope!

NetBus: the bus-goer “Waze”

Today I traveled to Tel Aviv on a public bus. “You rode on a bus???” you must be asking, “are you CRAZY?!” The answers are “yes”, and “no”. I did ride on a bus, and I am not crazy. True, most of the times I travel to Tel Aviv I use my own car. But the process has become quite unbearable, especially if I need to get somewhere during “rush hour”, which seems to be any time between 7:00am and 8:00pm. So rather than battle with other drivers on the road, hunt desperately for parking, and pay for expensive gasoline, I decided to take a bus.

Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Middle-East Peace

I just finished taking a class called “Selected problems in Ethics”. It was my third class in philosophy, and I am finally starting to get the hang of it. Frankly, after spending most of my earlier life studying topics such as computer engineering, finance and marketing, my brain synapses evolved in a very specific way. I used to regard philosophy as a pointless rambling, but I am beginning to realize it actually tackles some of our most existential questions. I actually find it quite relevant to daily existence here in the Middle East.