Ode to Tel Aviv

Today I'm checking out of the David InterContinental after a 18 nights stay.

First thing I saw in the mornings is the sea. Then I get out of bed, overlooking the beach from the 17th floor.

It's such a nice beach - you know, a proper aqua blue color, with proper yellow/white sand, and huge waves crashing on the rocks (where there are rocks, of course).



It's so different from Sandymount beach that I got to know quite well while in Dublin! And even though I really enjoyed Sandymount beach, I have to say that the Tel Aviv beach is just so much more beachie - so much more the right kind of beach... What can I say, I'm biased!

Donkey vs. Cinema

Here's a story I heard from a friend yesterday:

"You know my grandfather and his family used to live in Jaffa in the 1930s. They had a donkey back then.

However, when the riots started (mid 1930s), they had to run for their lives, and left their donkey behind. They went to seek refuge in the North of Tel Aviv. Can you imagine - seeking refuge in North Tel Aviv? Hilarious!

Anyway, when the riots had calmed, my grandfather and his family went back to Jaffa. They started looking for the donkey they left behind and someone told them he saw a donkey in the mayor's garden.

They then went to see the mayor's donkey and realized it was indeed theirs. They asked the donkey back. The mayor was reluctant to give the donkey back, since he grew fond of it.

After reflecting for a while, the mayor said: 'I want to keep the donkey. I am willing to give you Noga Cinema in exchange.'

Her grandfather was thinking of the mayor's offer for a moment, then made up his mind: 'Thank you for your generous offer, Mr. mayor. However, we want our donkey back'.

This is the story on how my family inherited donkey leftovers rather than a cinema that had become a successful, famous theatre (Gesher)."

Goodbyes...

Goodbye gloomy weather and loads of rain (yeah, just had to start with the weather!)
Goodbye Saturday-Sunday weekends...
Goodbye bus-driver who greet the passengers
Goodbye Foosball tables
Goodbye huge, extremely comfortable bin bags
Goodbye free gym
Goodbye Sky news at the gym
Goodbye Grand Canal and Forbes Quay
Goodbye stupid drivers. Now I'll have to handle predictable Israeli drivers, then Aussies
Goodbye ATM machines that were fed with noodles and Veggies overnight.
Goodbye fresh blackberries straight from the bushes
Goodbye Sky news at the gym
Goodbye rogue police cars
Goodbye my private Blogger help (yeah, Pezzin, you!)
Goodbye my secret admirers
Goodbye drunk scumbags who threten to sue me
Goodbye DART
Goodbye urban foxes
Goodbye Dutchman and his jacket
Goodbye stupid Christmas parties and silly drunken people
Goodbye Region 4, you really are the best (one may think its a fraternity. he he)

And of course, goodbye Ryanair. Even though it's not fun travelling in Europe anymore, having the new baggage allowance restrictions...

Modern City Living

This is what I see when I look out of the window:



in the evenings we can both see everything that's happening in the other side of the street. If you pity us, then don't! We have a river view as well, which makes things nicer when we do bother to look out of the window.

There are several neighbours we can tell you about and it feels like we know them and their routine so well (they probably recognize us as well). We sometimes spend our alone time together, which makes it feel pretty strange to leave Ireland without any other type of communication.

Here's the story of one of the neighbours, we call her "our friend":
From the beginning we notice there's a lady in her 30s, who's living in a one bedroom apartment on her own. How do we know it's a 1 bedroom? Just because we can see everything!

And how do we know she's living on her own? Every evening she's sitting on her red leather sofa (she has 2 of them, by the way), dimmed lights and watching TV. We've noticed she has guests from time to time. However, sometimes the curtains in her living room are closed, and then we assume she has a date. Yet, we can say for sure she's not in any kind of relationship with anyone.

We live in this apartment for 8 months now, but only lately (right after the holidays) have we noticed she's using a crutch (we're not quite sure whether she's using two or just one). We are unable to say whether she had it before or had she some kind of accident...

It might seem like we are watching at our neighbours all the time but we're actually so aware of them and their habits just from quick glances here and there, now and then.

Waiting for an Ending to Come to an End

I hate endings. I hate that it sometimes lasts forever

Here's a quick glance on how my life looks like these days, and will probably last for the next 2 months:

Too much bureaucracy and filling in all kinds of documents I had to fill in over the last 1.5 years, in less than one month (my bad)

Selling, giving away and donating too many personal belongings (a great way to know new people at work!)

Packing and shipping the rest of my stuff

Trying to see as many friends as possible because I know I won't see them for a very very long while. This includes having lunch dates with so many people, can't keep up with my calendar (and my calendar cannot keep up with me)

There are still several more places in Dublin that I want to see since I never got the chance to

Still going to the gym coz I need to maintain some healthy habits, moaning all day about it, feeling great right after, though

Reading 2 books at the same time so I'll be able to sell them over the next 2 weekend I have left in Dublin

Did I mention that in the next couple of months I'll be living in and leaving 3 different apartment:
3 weeks left in my Dublin apartment
3 weeks in a company housing in Tel Aviv
2 weeks in Rehovot

After that, by the way, I'll be moving to Perth (yay!!!), so that's the 4th city in 2 months.

I'm so tired of living on suitcases, accumulating, selling and most importantly, leaving friends behind...

The Big Hummus Experiment - the Results

As promised, that's what happens to hummus after being 54 hrs outside of the fridge. The pics are courtesy of me, whereas the state of the Hummus - Lufthansa...



Can you see the amount of oil in the product? This experience (experiment) convinced me not to consume industrialized Hummus anymore. If possible...

In case you are not quite aware of the texture of an industrialized Hummus, you have to know how Hummus looks like before the 54 hrs adventure.

The Big Hummus Experiment

Have you ever wondered how long can frozen Hummus last?

I might have an answer soon enough!
Yesterday I was flying back to Dublin with Lufthansa, via Frankfurt. Due to the stormy weather in Frankfort, there was 1 hour delay in my flight. That leaves me with 30 minutes between my flights and when we landed I had to walk (couldn't run with the heavy carry on I was carrying) to another terminal. Luckily, few minutes later, when I found the nearest departures list, I discovered that the flight to Dublin was delayed by 20 minutes.

After boarding was completed, the captain announced that we are waiting for another passenger, whose flight was delayed and she was making her way to the aircraft. It should take another 20 minutes.

After she arrived, the captain announces that now we have to wait until the airport's snowplows (there were about 40 of those) will clear the snow from the runway and this should take another 15 minutes. After sleeping for half an hour I woke and realized we are still at the gate.

Eventually we left Frankfurt 1.5 hours later than scheduled. We landed in Dublin airport just after midnight.

I felt pretty lucky after queuing for 1 minute at the immigration and I was happily heading to the luggage belt, presuming my luggage will turn out first, since it probably was amongst the last ones to be loaded.

But I was so wrong... 30 minutes later I discovered that my luggage wasn't even on the plane. After a quick and not so thorough investigation by the airline agent, I was told it will arrive in Dublin in the next morning flight.
At this moment, almost 24 hrs later, it still didn't arrive.

What does it have to do with Hummus Experiment?

My flatmate just loves good Hummus. Can I think of a better Christmas present? Yes I can. But I thought to myself why not taking with me a whole kilogram of Frozen Hummus? By the time I arrive in Dublin, it will stay cold. If only I knew...

So... Have you ever wondered what it looks like when Hummus is out of the fridge for 2 days (hopefully) or more?
Thanks to Lufthansa, who were even worse than Ryanair yesterday, I might be able to tell.

Stay tuned to find out about the finding of this experiment.

Alice in Wonderland or Notes from a Christmas Party

On Friday we had the annual Winter/End of Another Great Year/Christmas Party.

Here are some of my observations from that party:

1. At the bar, while waiting for a bartender to serve us, some girls, who made so much effort in order for them to look astonishing that evening, started drinking the leftovers from the glasses that were left on the bar, while trying to keep stable and balanced (unsuccessfully). Did I mention that we had to pay for our drinks this year? Does the word Recession rings a bell?

2. When I was dancing with my Croatian (girl)friend, the guy who was dancing next to us started bumping into us whilst dancing (pretty hard!) just in order to make a pass at us. I was just ignoring him. Some might think of me as a snob or antisocial. However, I do think that he could just start dancing with us or start (some kind of) a conversation. Just say something (you can call me old fashioned if you like). Anything. Even a weather talk works here, it's Ireland for Christ's sake. The weather is always interesting. It's much more dynamic than working in Google. Seriously! You may also say something about the DJ and the band if you like.
Anyhow, at some point my friend started dancing with him for a while. All this while, by the way, they just said nothing. Except for apologizing every time he bumped. That's the only thing that came out of this guy's mouth the whole time I was around.
I'm abandoning my Anthropological duty for a moment just to make an opinion: What an odd way to come on to girls...

3. An Israeli girl was dancing all night with a Swedish guy who had the most original ,I must say, opening line: "Hi, I'm Sven and I'm Swedish. Since I'm Swedish I support the Palestinians".

4. A married guy held hand and hugged his colleague every time I bumped into them. The morning after the party I came across him and his family (wife and daughter) catching a taxi. That's what happens when living in the Google ghetto...

5. A young guy was happily dancing (in my opinion, he was the cutest drunk in the party), shouting: "Wawawiwa". Yes, just like Dova'le Glickman in Zehu Ze. Apparently, he was imitating Burat (Sasha Baron Cohen, remember?), who was saying it in the movie 'Burat'. We were also dancing together, for a while, until we hit a girl with drink. He then became serious for a moment, apologizing to her (and so did I). After a whole minute we were expressing our deepened apologies to the unfortunate situation, I just disappeared in the crowed.
It all happened, by the way, due to the temporary lose of his sense of space. Although I was very sober and tried not to dance like we had the whole dance floor to ourselves, it was rather difficult with a partner who does believe so... I assume it also looked very funny to other observers. Were there others like me? The only one I can think of is the guy who doesn't need to consume alcohol in order to have fun.

6. The girls who did everything they could in order to look astonishingly beautiful and fabulous that night, wend home looking like a wreck. Some were sitting on the side-walk, ruining their fancy Cocktail (may I say Oscar?) dresses when going out to have a smoke, others looked like (rather unstable and unbalanced) zombies. I remember one girl at the elevator had her boob out of her dress and it was her friend who noticed this and fixed her dress in order to cover it. It didn't seem the girl even noticed neither her exposed breast nor her friend's gesture.

To summarize my experience:
I'm happy I got the chance to be in such a party, since it's probably will be the last one. Felt like Student's party, just that they tried to act like adults but it didn't really work out for them nor turned out the way they expected.

I also feel much better for feeling that I don't belong sometimes. Sometimes I really don't want to belong to some of the above.

And I can also have fun without consuming alcohol. I actually did prefer the gorgeous Éclairs. I had some whenever I had the chance. God, I had so many...

My Favourite 2008 Christmas TV Ad

Ahhhhhh... Christmas brings out the best of everything and everyone!

Even myself! Feels like I'm a completely different person after this ad shows on TV. It usually happens at the gym and I become too chatty and all smiles afterwards, and if you know me good enough you know I'm usually not!

By the way, it's all about the song. I ignore that gimmicky baby...
And you should look for their 2007 one as well!

Common People, Part I

" ... I want to live like common people
I want to do whatever common people do
I want to sleep with common people
I want to sleep with common people like you
Well what else could I do?
I said I'll see what I can do

I took her to a supermarket ..."

Well, the supermarket in Israel is a nice anthropological experience and I'd love to share this kind of experience with you someday. However, you can also go the ministry of interior. Or take the bus. Or just go to the doctor if you prefer:

A man with a tracing bracelet on his ankle enters the clinic. His name is Dror Ohana [yes, just like one of the known mafia families in Israel]. He brings along his ugly little dog, cheeco. Hanit, the receptionist, asks him to keep his dog outside of the clinic, since dogs are not allowed. Dror Ohana wants to see the dermatologist [this bracelet must have given him a rash…]. Hanit explains that he's fully booked for today and over the next few weeks he's on vacation. It makes Dror Ohana pretty angry that he cannot see the doctor today and wonders out loud: "I can't understand, why on earth is the doctor going on vacation when so many people must see him?!" [if only I knew, I would have given up my GP appointment and go to the dermatologist as well!]

Then he calls the information center asks for an appointment with the nearest dermatologist. He also puts the phone on loudspeaker, of course, while he was waiting [I believe it’s highly uncomfortable o use his mobile as a handset]. He pays no attention to Hanit, who demands he would not make these calls here or at least not on speaker. And since cheeco was still inside the clinic, she added that this is not the place for dogs!
But Dror Ohana says that no one could watch after cheeco, so he had to bring him along. Also, he cannot be left outside, unaccompanied! Then he adds: “Besides, if you were willing to help me and let me in today, I wouldn't have done that. This is all your fault so stop complaining!”

While Dror Ohana is holding [the information call center. remember?], Cheeco is chewing his lace, tearing it, and now he's free to wander around the clinic. Dror Ohana is still on the phone, but now he’s speaking to a representative who's trying to schedule an appointment for him [with another dermatologist. Remember?]. When he's done, he loudly asks all the people in the clinic: “Where is Ezorey Hen?”
Everybody is staring at him, but nobody answers.
“Where is Ezorey Hen? Nobody knows?!”

The receptionist asks him again to take the dog outside of the clinic. But then Dror Ohana discovers that Ezorey Hen is too far for him and he doesn't know how to get there, so he has to call again, to shout at the representative and schedule an appointment to another closer dermatologist.

After taking out his anger on the current representative, he gets a new appointment, to another dermatologist, who’s not on a vacation when most people need to see him!

Then Dror Ohana turns to cheeco, discovering the torn lace. “You ate your lace again?! Why? It’s a new one, bought it yesterday! You bad dog, this cost me 20 Shekels! OK, let’s go, Hanit doesn’t like us and don’t want us here.”

And then Dror Ohana, Cheeco, the ankle and the bracelet left the clinic and things became quite boring again.

Couldn't ask for better friends - I love you R4!!!

Using this platform to thank all my friends here in Google Ireland who organised some amazing birthday surprises. This years birthday is definitely the winner in my Best Birthday at Work category.

So thanks again.

By the way, I'm not mentioning names since I'm certain I'll forget few.

Back to civilization?

My holiday in Israel is over. That's the first time I was actually a visitor in my homeland. It definitely is a good feeling.

At the moment I'm at the airport, reminding you I'm still alive (even though I met most of you while visiting in Israel).

But I'm not going back to civilization. I wouldn't call Ireland a civilized country. No, it's a 3rd world country.

So, this post is to ask you to stay tuned for some updates and my newest adventures in the holy land.

The Fragile Relationship Between a Dutchman and his Jacket

It was early in the morning. Too early to have more than 2 people at the 6th floor. One of them is me. The other is...

A dutch guy comes to work. Since he's working in Dublin, he has to wear a jacket, even though it's pretty much late July.

When he gets to his desk, he takes off his jacket. Since he has just moved to his new desk on this new floor, he looks around at the empty chairs around him. He spots an empty chairs, he heads towards it, then places his jacket nicely over it.

A little while later, a Turkish guy (it almost sounds like the Israeli, Arabic and American jokes) enters the floor, and stops next to the chair where the jacket rigidly lays. Imagine how surprised the Dutch man was (as a matter of fact, almost as surprised as the Turkish), while rushing to grab a hold on his precious jacket before the Turkish sits on the chair and ruin its perfect ironing!

This scene was repeating itself every morning for several days, different chairs, however. Until one day I noticed that he actually was brave enough to abandon his jacket on the nearest coat hanger. aaagh!

What about me? I'm just the Israeli girl who came to work quite early during those days and had the opportunity to witness these amusing events (to my humble opinion).

Dear Ex-Landlord!

You better don't mess with me, my blog and my SEO-Expert friends!
Don't let me use these resources in order to get back what was mine to begin with.

Sincerely yours,
Denya

The New Kid on the Block

According to a certain taxi driver, Yael is about to have a new neighbour.

Here's how I found out about this mysterious neighbour:

Elie: ohhh... I forgot to tell you

guess who's going to be my neighbour?

denya: whos your neighbour?

gingi?

Elie: better

so much better....

denya: cmon???

Elie: colin farrell

or however you write it

A Time for a Change

The day I wake up and ask myself what have I done with my life, has arrived.

Years ago, I was thinking to myself what I'm going to do and be when I'm older. Today's answer is not exactly what I expected it to be back then.

At the moment it doesn't matter what I believe I should be doing or what the main purpose of my life should have been. The important thing is that I blame my parents. For growing up in a city. Why? Well, for example I blame them for running in my schools stadium, when I should have ran on hills and mountains.

Why is it important that I blame my parents? Probably since everything I am now, profession wise, is what they expected me to be. Now that I have realised this, I can actually do something about it. Be what I expect myself to be.

Starting tomorrow. Just because I'm so tired and want to clean all my mess from the last few weeks, and then go to sleep. I need to be early at work tomorrow, so I can go and see some flats. Yes, moving to a different apartment, again...

How not to Write, Part II

Apparently, some haven't read, nor implement, my How not to Write lesson from last June.

I wonder, though, how long does someone have to live in the US, illegally of course, without knowing how to spell EUROPEAN...



In the picture you can see Ellen, our expert copywriter, pointing the fatal mistake. It is fatal, taking into consideration nobody have stop this from becoming a big sign alongside one of the main roads in Las Vegas.

By nobody, I mean the copywriter (he he he... yeah right. The copywriter of this sign was probably the grandfather of the owner, still living in Israel, who probably doesn't know how to spell his own name in Hebrew, not to mention English), the designer, the company which print the sign and probably others as well.

At least they had a great OrangeNana juice - orange juice and Limonana barad. Yum yum! Seriously! I had 2 (and had my reasons :-)

And please, don't be caught in my next How not to Write.

All These Years of Watching Animal Planet are Finally Paying Off!

While I was preparing to go to bed (I know it's quite early, but you should give me some credit. As someone who's jet lagging at the moment, I'm doing quite well), I spotted a creature with a very big tail out the window, at our parking lot.
Knowing it too big to be our neighbour's cat, I realized it's actually a fox. Yes, fox. Like the bad cunning fox in Pinocchio and Nils Holgersen.
This fox is the second one I got to see. The first one was in the Dunes of Rishon Lezion. It was quite a shabby one. But the one I saw tonight seemed to be real British beautiful fox. It was Awe-inspiring :-)

Unfortunately the fox went towards the road, so I didn't get the chance to even try and look closer.

So, I felt the urge to tell you as Dan didn't seem to be so impressed... Not as much as I was. Or at least expected.

And now I'll go to bed. Goodnight!

Live from Terminal 1, Las Vegas Intl. Airport

Unfortunately, my holiday is over.

Ellen dropped me at the airport, and I have 30 mins till my flight to San Francisco. Then I'll have few more hours before the flight to Ireland. That's ghetto!

I slept less than 4 hours, as yesterday we went to see the Phantom of the Opera in the Venetian. It was amazing! Then we went gambling. we lost $20. Responsible gambling, he he he...

Long story short, I had wonderful time, Both in San Francisco and Las Vegas. Both amazing cities, yet very different.
The first is somewhat surrounded by the ocean and the latter is surrounded by desert mountains and I cannot even find the words (in English) that can describe the respect (or Yer-a, in Hebrew) it makes me feel. That's such a simple word to explain such an amazing thing, But I really cannot come up with the words. Maybe I'll ask Ellen soon, or she can comment and explain. She's good with words, as we all know.

Anyway, It's almost boarding time, so I'll publish this rough draft of a post, apologies for any spelling mistakes that you might encounter :-)


By the way, this is the Red Rock Canyon, outside of Las Vegas. Amazing, isn't it?

Live from Terminal 5!