haifa.12

Haifa Fornightly(Editor--Huzefa Mehta) 12th edition 15/4/93 Nothing much happened in the last couple of weeks. Pandit Ravi Shankar was here in Israel and he was an national celebrity. Was invited by Rabin etc and several interviews on the television. He was accompanied by his 12 year daughter. We could not go to the Tel Aviv concert because we did not know about it and the later concert in Jerusalem we could also not go because of the impending Hebrew exams. He was asked by the interviewer if Ravi Shankar is a Jewish name and he answered "My name is not Rabbi Shankar it is Ravi Shankar" It has become a lot warmer in the past few days and we have been swimming in the ocean. We watched several hindi movies rented from an Indian video store about 20km from here(in kiriat ata). Indian movies are not just popular amongst the Indian Jewish population here but also among the Arabs. About India awareness most of the people know about Raj Kapoor(Awara) Amitabh Bacchan, Sanjay Dutt. And this is true with most countries around in the Middle East. I had previously asked an Arab friend about what it is in Hindi movies that is so appealing to them. He said it was that it was very Eastern. I wondered what it meant till I myself saw an Arabic movie..with songs every couple of minutes and very melodramatic stories. We had gone to the restaurant Salaam Bombay at Rosh Hanikra during one of the weekdays and found several interesting facts from a Goan waiter. Most of the top army personnel in the UN peace keeping force on the Lebanon border are retired staff from the Indian army. Its a proud and interesting fact to know. Doug is here and we took him to Rosh Hanikra and then a drive along the Lebanon border. Interesting to see so many houses in the buffer zone between Lebanon and Israel. We left for Cyprus using the Independence day the memorial day and the weekend . We landed in Larnaka. Cyprus is divided into two parts North Cyprus and South Cyprus. Nicosia is the capital of Cyprus(South Cyprus). The trip was not eventful as the Turkey trip but was fun nevertheless. The best part about Cyprus are its churches and mountain villages which are on the cliff in the Mediteranean. White washed churches with bougan villa,narrow lanes. On Sunday everything was closed. The first day we went to a mostly touristi town called Agia Napa on the east coast. The sea was cold there were simply too many tourists. We left for Limassol that evening. We reached Limassol and spent the evening roaming the town. The next day we swam and left for Paphos. Cyprus is island of Aphrodite and the birth place of Aprodite was here. We visited a castle/fort the next day on the beach and a Greek theatre. We did not visit Nicasol the capital and also couple of other places(Trodos) Cyprus is the Switzerland of the middle east with it maintaining relations to most of the countries around the world including Arab countries and Israel. It is hence used as most stopovers in case of transferring from Israel to any other Arab country(Lebanon, Jordan, Syria...). The only country it does not maintain relations with is Turkey. Turkey invaded the island and almost 30% of the island is occupied territory. It is not possible to go to North Cyprus from South Cyprus as there are no diplomatic relations. If the passport indicates travel to N. Cyprus then Greece and S. Cyprus will prohibit entry. I tried to figure out the history from a couple of sources. One from S. Cyprus and another from L. Planet Guide. Cyprus sources say that when the President proposed some changes the Turkish community responded with a rebellion('63) leading to withdrawal of turkish ministers. In '74 when a coup was staged by the military junta in Athens Turkey launced an invasion on Cyprus and the Greek Cypriots are refugees in their own country. North Cyprus is not recognized by any other country except Turkey. The green line divides Nicosia the capital of South Cyprus. The lonely planet guide says that after Cypruses independence from Britain they were always strongly stirred by "enosis" or unification with Greece. The Turk Minority opposed it and after some turkish representatives resigned with accusations that they were not allowed to participate in decision making Turkey sent in forces after the military coup of Cyprus. about almost half of the cyprus population (the greek cypriots) have had to flee their homes in north cyprus. Well the latest situation is that talks between Turkey,Greece and UN have no solution. I get my license to kill this weekend. We are going for white water rafting on the Jordan river with Ezra tomorrow. We did go on the Jordan river..Doug,Myself,Reena,Ezra,Dina and Dina's cousin for UK. It was a short stretch of the Jordan river in the upper golan and stopped quite a while before we entered lake kinaret. Was fun anyways though.