You could find something like this in America, though Israel is so much more condensed that you can find it all nearby. Plus, the general population in America isn’t necessarily the most smiley and friendly crowd. A hot air balloon festival is really a get drunk festival and a renaissance fair is really a dress up as a goth fairy and get drunk festival. Before prohibition, alcohol was even common at voting booths and a great way to get votes.

In Israel, the crowd is generally … quieter. The smell, when there is one, is usually that of nicotine instead of marijuana, though at the winter lights festival it was only pot – terrible smelling pot. The crowd was quiet and well behaved – even my daughter, mostly.

Getting there requires finding the parking lot at the botanical gardens which is an unpaved controlled chaos – cars parked in the middle, cars coming and going down the same narrow row, and somehow, it moves and parking spots are to be found. Where do you go from there? Well, we saw the strobe lights in the distance and walked towards them – which was apparently an illogical thing to do. As I’ve written many times before, Israel isn’t big on signage which is a blessing and a curse. We don’t have road signs every 0.1 miles to distract from driving, though we also don’t have signs saying, “entrance”.

Once in, there’s a kosher food to be had which is nice though we rarely partake. At least I know I could if I wanted to. It’s like – we’re supposed to live here. Eating is so much easier when you’re with people with the same dietary choices (gluten free people like it here too).

Upon entry, after walking past the guy who has got to get some better quality pot – that was so rude – you’re treated to lights on the water and music which is something like open-source relaxing electronic Disney music, where you walk around in Legend of Zelda, or fairytale music (with no goth fairies, thank the lord).

Some of the Exhibitions

Enjoy.

Shopping

There were some booths for sale – though, as I keep writing, Israel has nothing on America in terms of commercialism. The booths were few and minimal.

Here’s the one place you can get “hot liquor for Jerusalem winter” – its hard alcohol – which brings me another cultural difference between the U.S. and Israel. In the U.S. the most popular alcoholic drink is beer in relatively small cans. I miss 12 oz seltzer bottles – they’re unavailable in Israel where large bottles are the norm as is hard alcohol. Wine is everywhere – even candy stores. There are hundreds of kosher wine choices whereas he average supermarket, if it has beer, may have two unrefrigerated choices.

While the guy with warm alcohol was doing well, it seems Mr. Poop had to close:

(The joys of a language written without vowels … except for when you do and the vowel can be one of two, neither of which matches the vowel in English.)

The Christmas Feeling

This was a ‘winter festival’ – okay, true, why let winter be hijacked by a specific religion? (There was nothing pointing towards or away from religion here – except that it’s closed on Shabbos.) Perhaps this is my baggage – too much reminded me of Christmas. Does Santa Claus own reindeer or trains? I guess not, though my daughter called the train a waste of photons: