Picture post 73 - Purim in Mea Shearim

On March 11th I was walking the streets of Mea Shearim in Jerusalem, camera in hand, witnessing its Ultra Orthodox community celebrating Purim. A lot has happened since then and life has changed so much that rather than a few short weeks it seems like months ago. Two days later as the situation rapidly deteriorated with more and more cases of the coronavirus being reported and restrictions on movement and travel beginning to be implemented, I cut my trip short and came home. I had planned to write about my time in Mea Shearim soon after my return but I fell ill with the virus and was unable to do anything much for a couple of weeks. I am much better now and bit by bit am able to resume my normal activities.

Mea Shearim is one of the oldest Jewish neighbourhoods outside the walls of the old city of Jerusalem. The name literally translates as one hundred gates but can also be understood as one hundred fold. Founded in 1874 it was funded through a partnership of 100 share holders who purchased land outside the old city in order to escape the poor sanitation and to live in a healthier environment. The contractors for the project were Yosef Rivlin a prominent member of the Jewish community who worked with a Christian Arab to construct a courtyard neighbourhood surrounded by a wall, the gates of which were locked every evening. 

Today the area is populated almost exclusively by different groups of Haredi, ultra-Orthodox Jews who strictly maintain religious laws, wear modest clothing and generally live separately from the the rest of society. This separation includes rejecting many aspects of modernity, including as a rule, photography. However on certain occasions it is possible to enter the neighbourhood to respectfully and discretely take pictures. However to is not acceptable to take portraits without permission and if people signal that they do not wish to be photographed it is my strong advice to respect that.

Purim is one of Judaism's happier festivals, celebrating the survival of the Jews in ancient Persia and the foiling of a plan to exterminate them. It is celebrated rigorously, almost riotously in  Mea Shearim. Many people take part in the tradition of wearing a disguise or costume, the many yeshivas (schools focusing on the study of religious texts) hold mass celebratory events in the presence of important rabbis and some of the men of this normally sober community indulge heavily in the consumption of alcohol.

As I walked the streets of the neighbourhood with a photographer friend we met with a variety of responses. Some people hurried away or covered their faces when they saw the cameras. One or two called al tetzalem b'mea Shearim - do not take pictures in Mea Shearim, whilst others were curious, wanted to talk a little and in some cases were happy for a portrait to be taken. Most interesting were some of the children who having seen us, would approach, not speaking but inviting us to admire their costumes and to photograph them by standing and posing in front of us, such as the boy in the clown suit pictured above. 

Perhaps the highlight of my time in Mea Shearim was spending an hour in a particular yeshiva where hundreds of Haredi men stood swaying, chanting and singing in the open air on bleacher style seating whilst the rabbis sat at an elevated table observing the proceedings. The singing could be heard several streets away, strong, loud and beautiful. Arriving in the grounds of the yeshiva I first entered a refectory where food and copious amounts of wine were laid out on a series of tables. Several of the men looked the worse for wear including boys perhaps as young as ten or eleven, some of them collapsed on the floor whilst others had over indulged so much that they were physically ill in the courtyard. One or two became very loud from the alcohol, dancing, falling and in some cases collapsing. In the midst of this I noticed a young man wearing an immaculate kaftan (coat) and cap who had perhaps the saddest eyes I have ever seen. Standing alone he seemed preoccupied and apart from the others. He is pictured at the top of this post.

Back in the streets we came across family groups on their way to visit relatives, the children all wearing costumes. Looking up we noticed many small children playing on balconies and watching the activity below with much interest. We also met Shmuel aged 12 who was looking after a bakery but was happy to pose for us. I asked him if the bakery belonged to his father. He said it didn't and that he didn't want to say who owned it. The residents of Mea Shearim are often suspicious of outsiders which probably explains his answer.

Back home and in lockdown, I have no idea when my next expedition will take place. In the meantime readers are welcome to follow my instagram account  or Flickr page. 

Jerusalem - the people in the street

Jerusalem is one of the most stimulating cities in the world.  Important to three major world religions, not only does it have an extremely diverse resident population but it also attracts visitors from all over the world. The city also has hundreds of cafes, busy markets, street musicians and artists and a unique architectural backdrop that make it perfect for people watching and candid photography. This post includes some of favourite images from my recent visit.

Strolling with the strollers, Ben-Yehuda Street

Ben Yehuda Street in the city centre is packed with souvenir shops but still attracts many Jerusalemites who go there to eat, to meet friends or just to pass though this pedestrian thoroughfare on the way to somewhere else. I noticed the two Orthodox Jewish women in the picture above when I was sitting listening to a young woman playing the public piano at the bottom of the street. I like the way the mother on the left and the child on the right are looking at the camera whilst the other two look in the opposite direction.

And speaking of music, musicians can be found almost everywhere in Jerusalem. Abilities vary tremendously but I especially enjoyed the accordion playing of a young Japanese woman who performed a series of chansons near the steaming chairs in Jaffa Street and an Haredi singer and guitar player in Mamilla who gave superb performances of the Eagles' Hotel California and Marianne Faithfuls's As Tears Go By. Good as these two were the star of the show was another singer and guitar player at Shuk (market) Mahaneh Yehuda. Srugim is one of my all time favourite TV series, partly because of the excellent theme song originally recorded by Erez Lev Avi. One evening when walking in the market I thought the song was being played at one of the stalls. Turning on to Jaffa Road I realised that it was being performed live by a young man with a superb voice. A very excited crowd had gathered around him and unusually, waited to hear more songs once he had finished.

Japanese chansonnier on Jaffa Street

Haredi man performing "Hotel California" at Mamilla

This superb vocalist was performing outside Shuk Mahaneh Yehuda

Mahaneh Yehuda is one of my favourite places for candid street photography. It is full of people whose faces tell a story, sometimes sad, even distressing but always interesting. It is also fascinating to notice the differing styles of dress of - not necessarily related to religion or ethnicity but to their personal tastes. The weather was a little chilly and  many people wore scarves as protection against the cold. I liked the scarf worn by the man in the picture below but was also taken by his face where it was still possible to see traces of his younger self despite his age. He is quite stylish in an understated way. The man singing the Srugim song was also decked out in a thick scarf of orange, brown and red, complementing his thick brown jacket. 

My third scarf wearer was an older man I noticed several times. Dressed in what had once been a good quality coat and trousers he was a striking figure, usually upright and purposive despite his begging in the street. He sat a long way apart from the other beggars and I was able to take some candid pictures of him. The depth of the sadness in his face is astonishing and a reminder of how hard the lives of some of the people here have been.

Doing the shopping, Mahaneh Yehuda

Sadness, Mahaneh Yehuda

The market is also a place where unexpected things can happen. One morning a group of young people were making a film which involved a song and dance routine. Spotting one of the elderly herb sellers near the main entrance they asked him to sit in front of them whilst they performed. Not only did he oblige them but he stood up from his chair and did his own version of the dance routine, clapping and singing along with them before sitting down as soon as the song concluded and returning to selling his herbs. A star is born.

A star is born, Shuk Mahaneh Yehuda

Yusuf waiting for customers, Arab shuk in the Old City

Indian tourists visiting the Church of the Holy Sepulchre

Ethiopian Orthodox Christian women on the way to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre

I first spotted Yusuf a couple of years ago. An elderly man with a bright welcoming smile, he is a tailor working in the Old City's shuk. This time I took an item of clothing to him for a simple repair. We chatted a little whilst he worked and he told me that he had been a tailor working in the city for more than 50 years. We spoke in Hebrew as I have only a few words of Arabic and he does not speak English. I asked him if there was much work these days. He said that there is very little work and that today, people prefer to buy something new rather than repair things. Work has become so scarce that he is considering closing his tiny shop. I was to hear a similar story from other tailors and also from a cobbler I met in Tel Aviv. My picture shows Yusuf waiting patiently for another customer. It is sad that these old skills, passed from one generation to another are now disappearing.

The old city is another great location for seeing people from many different backgrounds in close proximity to each other. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre receives visitors from all over the world. In the space of a few minutes it is not unusual to see groups of Russian, Ukrainian or Ethiopian Orthodox Christians, people from Latin America and Western Europe and possibly groups of Muslim tourists from India or Turkey. More recently there has been an increase in tourists from Asia and on this visit I saw several Chinese tour groups as well as Indonesians and Filipinos. In the late mornings, the courtyard in front of the church becomes full of people who enter through the narrow arch on one side or down a flight of steep relatively narrow steps opposite. It can become difficult to either enter or exit and also to get a clear shot or good pictures. Early morning is generally better whilst the quiet evening hours give the opportunity for low light photography.

During the time I spent in and around the courtyard, several Ethiopian groups visited. I noticed the mother and baby pictured below in the courtyard whilst the group of elegant more mature women were passing through the tourist shops that line the approach to the church. The group of Muslim tourists from India were striking due to the brightly coloured clothing of the women and the uniformly white suites worn by the men.

Cuddling up to mum, Church of the Holy Sepulchre

It takes ten minutes or less to walk from the Church to the Kotel in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City. Again people from all over the world and of all faiths come here for many different reasons. I was there twice during my recent stay, once early in the morning and again in the evening after Shabbat had "gone out". My evening visit was especially interesting since people were still dressed in their Shabbat best clothes. The four young men in the gold coloured kaftans were chatting after the conclusion of prayers and I was able to take a series of photos of them as they turned and changed expressions whilst each one spoke. The Kotel is the most sacred site in Judaism but this does not mean it is a quiet place, People talk, pray out loud and there is much movement which can make it hard to capture clear pictures.  I was especially please to capture the morning prayers image with the young man facing in the opposite direction to the others and the seated man poring over the sacred text.

After Shabbat, the Kotel

Morning prayers, the Kotel

Nowhere is very far from anywhere else in the Old City. The Damascus Gate in the Muslim quarter is a very short walk from the Kotel. This is one of the busiest parts of the shuk and the place where local people go to shop for food and household goods rather than the more tourist oriented businesses near the Church and the Jaffa Gate. I visited on Shabbat when the Jewish quarter is quiet and people flock to this part of the old city. The area close to the Gate is packed with small shops selling all kinds of provisions whilst there are also people who set out their goods on the ground, especially women selling various kinds of herbs and vegetables. The woman in the picture below is one such trader whilst the boy carrying the bread was making a delivery from nearby bakery.

Jerusalem, everywhere you look there is something interesting to see...and someone interesting too.

Selling herbs near the Damascus Gate

Bread delivery, Damascus Gate

Elderly man, Damascus Gate

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You can see more pictures from Israel here

Picture Post 45 - A drawing by Josef Budko

I bought this drawing of a young Maghrebi Jew in one of my favourite Jerusalem shops - Trionfo in Dorot Rishonim that runs off the very busy Ben Yehuda pedestrian street. I have found many little treasures there over the years including books, postcards and posters, many of them related to the Bezalel School of Art and its golden era in the first few decades of the twentieth century. This simple pencil drawing on tissue paper is my latest acquisition, its delicate pencil lines capturing beautifully the expression of a child in contemplation.

Budko was born in Plonsk, Poland in 1888 and studied at the Vilnius School of Art (now in Lithuania), before moving on to Berlin in 1909. In the following year he began to study engraving at the educational wing of the Berlin Arts and Crafts Museum under the direction of another great artist - Hermann Struck. In the 1920's he began to shift his focus from crafts to painting. He emigrated to Eretz Israel in 1934 and spent his first few months at Kibbutz Ein Harod where he produced a number of prints focusing on the theme of Halutzim (the pioneers). There is a significant museum at Ein Harod which holds some of his work.

Moving on to Jerusalem he found the time to experiment with colour to capture the strong light and mood of the landscapes surrounding the city as well as working as the director of the Bezalel School for Arts and Crafts in Jerusalem. He held this post until his death in 1940. Budko also produced a significant portfolio of graphic material including woodcuts, etchings and drypoint works and illustrated the work of several stellar writers. Examples of this include Heinrich Heine's Psalms of 1919, Bialik's Babylonian Talmud (1924) and works of Sholem Asch, David Frischmann and Sholem Aleichem. He often integrated Jewish symbolism into his work and made use of Hebrew letters in his illustrations,  recalling his early life Eastern Europe, drawing on his experiences of that world to depict figures from the shtetl.  

Josef Budko does not have the profile that some of his Bezalel colleagues and contemporaries enjoy today but it is possible to see some of his work in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem and the Jewish Museum in Berlin is home to one of my favourite works of his - Two Women. 

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Picture post 24 - Italian Modernism in Jerusalem

Jerusalem's Jaffa (Yafo) Street is the main thoroughfare in the western part of the city. Teeming with people both day and night, it is home to many shops and cafes and also to the recently completed light rail transport system. The streets and alleys running off it hold hundreds of restaurants, religious buildings, more shops and cafes and a huge amount of history. The wonderful Shuk Machane Yehuda is at the upper end, on the way to the central bus station.

The Assicurazioni Generali House, Jerusalem.

I am drawn to Jaffa Street for all of these reasons and also because it has a fascinating architectural history, with many important buildings from both the Ottoman period and from the 1930's.  It is easy to miss some of these architectural treasures if you don't look up as stroll, but some buildings stand out no matter where you are looking. One of the most striking of these is the Assicurazioni Generali House on the corner of Jaffa Street and Shlomzion HaMalka. Jerusalem has many buildings from the 1930's, most of which were designed by emigree German, Austrian and Czech Jews. The Generali House is an exception to this and was the work of the non-Jewish Italian architect, Marcello Piacentini. The original plan had been for an "International Style" building by Richard Kauffmann who drafted a proposal in 1932. This was rejected in favour of Piacentini who was not only was not Jewish, but also a member of the Novocento Italiano group of architects favoured by Mussolini's fascist regime. He also designed public buildings in Rome and in the Italian colony in Libya.

Built from 1934-36 on a triangular site, the four storey building housed the Jerusalem office of the Generali insurance company. Piacentini created a monumental effect by inscribing the company name on the facade in large Latin letters and by using Roman numerals to show its founding year. A winged lion stands on the roof looking up Jaffa Street. It must have witnessed many important moments in the history of this most disputed of cities. Made from Jerusalem stone, the ground floor has rusticated features whilst the upper floors have sanded walls. The open loggias on the front of the building are a reference to Italian classic architecture with the stepped window recesses adding an interesting touch. The loggias also have views of the length of Jaffa Street. 

The Generali building demands attention. There are many more architectural beauties on this street, some less obvious than others. Remember, look up when you walk!

The winged lion keeping watch over Jaffa Street.

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You can see more photographs of Jerusalem and other parts of Israel here.

Picture Post Number Eleven - Jerusalem's Famous Sundial

This is a very familiar image to Jerusalem residents, situated just across the road from the wonderful Mahane Yehuda market on Jaffa Street. The sundial on the front of the building is a well known landmark although few people know the building's name - the Zoharei Chama (Sunrise) Synagogue and even less are aware of the history of the building.

Constructed in stages between 1908 and 1917, by one Rabbi Shmuel Levy, an Amercian taylor who came to  Jerusalem at the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1906 he purchased a small house in Jaffa Street with the intuition of expanding it to provide rooms for immigrants as well as to act as a synagogue. He financed his project through selling lottery tickets in the United States.

When completed, it was the tallest building in Jerusalem and included the ground floor synagogue and the Glory of Zion and Jerusalem hostel ono the upper floors, able to accommodate 50 people. The sundial was added to the fourth floor and was intended to enable religious Jews to accurately identify the time for morning and afternoon prayers and the lighting of Shabbat candles. The top floor was lost in an earthquake in 1927 whist a fire in 1941 caused extensive damage to the building. The Jerusalem municipality carried out a partial restoration in 1980 and the building still serves as a synagogue.

The sundial was a designed by Rabbi Moshe Shapiro a watchmaker and Meah Shearim resident, who taught himself astronomy and also made sundials for a number of other synagogues including the old Hurva synagogue in the old city, destroyed by Jordanian troops during the War of Independence in 1948 and recently reconstructed. The Zoharei Chama synagogue and its sundial is a much loved iconic presence in one of Jerusalem's most exciting and vibrant areas - Shuk Mahane Yehuda. 

Picture post number six - Machane Yehuda Shuk, Jerusalem, Israel

I love this picture. I love it because it brings the smells, sounds and excitement of Jerusalem's wonderful Mahane Yehdua shuk (souk in Arabic - market in English). I love the redness of those tomatoes, the richness of the aubergines, the green vegetables and the variously coloured plastic bags!

Most of all I love the way this photograph shows the diversity of Israel's people. The woman with her back to the camera, wearing a headscarf is an Ethiopian Jewish woman - young enough to have been born in Israel, but perhaps also just old enough to have been one of the many thousands of Ethiopian Jews rescued from the danger of the Mengistu regime back in the 1980's and 1990's. The older woman staring at the camera is an Orthodox Jewish woman - recognisable through her "turban" and the "modest" although still colourful clothing. The fair haired woman - who appears to have already selected a number of items - witness the bags on top of what I think are courgettes - could be an Ashkenazi Jew born in, or having made aliyah to  Israel whilst she could just as easily be a Christian tourist.  The stall holder speaking to the woman at the reader's extreme right of the photograph is almost certainly a Mizrachi Jew, that is, of North African or Middle Eastern descent. It is estimated that more than half of Israel's Jewish population can trace ancestors to Morocco, Algeria,  Libya,  Tunisia, Iraq,  Egypt and other countries in the region, before being driven out from the 1940's onwards.

People from these and many other diverse backgrounds come together to shop in the shuk every day (except Saturday of course). There has been a market here since the end of the 19th century when the city was under Ottoman rule. During the period of the British Mandate, sanitary conditions were upgraded and since independence in 1948, the shuk has seen many changes and developments. There are now some smart cafes and restaurants amongst the fruit, vegetable, fish, herbs and spices, as well as specialist Ethiopian and Iraqi food stalls. These developments have made sure that Mahane Yehuda maintains its character as a place where Israelis of all kinds come together to share normal, everyday activities. It is one of the places in the city where Jews and Arabs shop together.

Security measures are in place to guard against terrorist attacks - 23 people were killed in suicide bombings in 1997 and 2002 (including two consecutive bombings on the same day in 1997), whilst a further 282 were injured. As in many other parts of the city, there is a reassuring army presence to make sure the shuk remains a safe and enjoyable place to shop and spend time.

My favourite shuk experiences? Quite seriously, my favourite times in the shuk are when I can wander around, taking in the delicious smells of the spice stalls, munching a pastry or some dried fruits and stopping off for a Turkish coffee in one of the many cafes - I especially like the ones where you can still see old timers playing shesh besh and other games  whilst taking part in some serious coffee drinking! Less familiar visitors can take advantage of a number of  organised tours focusing on different types of food tasting (!)  and which also cover the history of the shuk. The surrounding area, also known as Mahane Yehuda is also a great place to wander and spend time - full of history and character.

The shuk has its own website with lots more information here.