Giraffes, Bibi, football, Roni, Natalie, and Elvis
In which we wonder about feeding giraffes, tossing a football, kissing at the Kotel, joining the army and skiing on Shabbat
25 Feb 2005
Feeding a giraffe
Did you ever get a strong urge to feed giraffes in the middle of the night? A group of 15 Israeli youngsters apparently did, or at least that’s what they told police after being detained for breaking into a zoo near Tel Aviv. (Yigal)
Throws left, runs right
Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did a walkthrough at a ceremony Wednesday night for the rededication of a community football field in Jerusalem endowed by New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft. Netanyahu knows the Krafts, a wealthy family of businesspeople and big Israel supporters, from his days in the Boston area. For the crowd of 500+ mostly Anglo American football players and local paparazzi, Bibi and Kraft exchanged a few passes. Let’s just say the left-handed Bibi won’t be going as a high draft pick any time soon. We’ll give him a partial pass on his poor throwing by saying his well-tailored suit with broad shoulder pads may have been too tight for him to throw properly. But wait, don’t football players wear shoulder pads, too?
At least she went
Local virginal pop-tart singer (think a pre-sex Brittney Spears, about four years ago) Roni “Superstar” Duani (this fan site and all the others are in Hebrew - her own site wasn't working last we checked) has just entered the army, and will not skip her regular service the way many other young Israeli celebrities have managed to do. Good for her. But, of course, her fellow soldiers are complaining that she’s getting perks they don’t - showering alone and not doing guard duty at the base entrance. The latter, at least, seems reasonable to me and likely safer for her, too, especially in this celebrity-obsessed age.
It’s risky for a celebrity enter the service. Elvis went into the U.S. Army in 1958, and became a tanker in Germany. His career continued apace afterward, but he was never the same as an artist, IMHO. He got hooked on drugs when a sergeant gave him amphetamines to stay warm and awake in all-night tank exercises, and his heart was rarely in his musical or cinema performances ever after.
According to "Memphis Mafia" member Lamar Fike, the one night Elvis pulled regular guard duty at his base in Germany, a near riot occurred. Maybe the IDF brass has read up on the King's stint as a G.I. Joe....(Alan)
Black and white and hot all over
It's been a good week for the ultra-Orthodox. On Tuesday they got a glimpse of Natalie Portman visiting the Western Wall (OK, so what if they chased her away because they were offended by the kissing scene she was filming there?), and a couple of days later the prime minister said he would increase the funding for ultra-Orthodox Jews over the age of 23 engaged in full-time religious studies by 40 percent.
On the other hand, they did get food poisoning from some bad shawarma. (Clark)
Rockin’ down the highway
Two members of the Jewish rock group Soulfarm are on tour in Israel early next month. They will be at Club Tzora, on Kibbutz Tzora near Beit Shemesh, Raanana, Jerusalem, and elsewhere. Soulfarm is one of a number of “religious” rock bands making it outside religious circles. Some of the gigs in Israel are in religious settings. One is in the Tel Aviv nightspot Barbie Club (site in Hebrew, but Flash opening and sounds don't need translation), not a place where kippot and tzizit are seen that often.
Jewish bobbies
Great Britain’s top cop told British website Totally Jewish that he wants more U.K. Jews to join the police force. “This diversity is not just something cosmetic,” he said. New York City has had a Jewish police officers organization - Shomrim Society - for 81 years.
Texas, Shmexas
This falls in the “it’s really safer in Jerusalem than in (fill in the blank)” category. The Houston Chronicle reports on a spike in anti-Semitic vandalism and other possible hate crimes across Houston in recent months – 14 in total, the paper says..
Shussing and shuckling
Boulder, Colorado, Rabbi Jamie S. Korngold - the Adventure Rabbi - offers skiing and prayer on Shabbat, not to mention rock climbing or hiking during the appropriate seasons.
