Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
We stayed a day and a night and hit the road with no real objective but to find a kibbutz
with less fervor and more females. We found another kibbutz a bit higher off the desert floor,
a cooler place with fewer dorms and buildings but much more land. More greenery at elev-
ation felt more inviting than the desert floor. We spent three days pruning, aerating, tending
and picking the acres of pear orchards on this second kibbutz. Hard work was rewarded with
three squares daily and a bunk bed with clean sheets. A bonus was a warm welcome to social
events, including group discussions on God, the State of Israel, the meaning of Jews who live
in the land of Zion or elsewhere, the ways of the world and working together. Then came the
naked swim.
The kibbutzers loved us, mostly as a polite means of loving Bruno, the exotic Roman
Catolica; he was so strong, warm and hard-working that his other talents boosted his stock to
new heights. In mere days he already exchanged words and phrases in Hebrew and actually
attempted jokes by twisting the language incongruously in a way that made people laugh. Was
that accidental? He did it at will, in a language he hadn't heard till last week. Some people
stared; he was so hung and uncut.
In three days came a memorable event, unanticipated as a sudden turning point and no
big deal really, except that it was, when Bruno realized he was home. A seeker for years who
couldn't resolve needs with skills had finally arrived. He stayed. He may be there still. David
cried in farewell. Then Bruno cried too. I told them to get a grip and didn't look back.
David and I caught a bus back to Tel Aviv after being warned about hitching. Wha? Two
Jews from America? Are you nuts? We stayed one night at the King David Hotel, and it didn't
blow up.
We flew back to Rome the next day and got a huge room with an incredibly high ceiling
in a massive pension with Doric columns surrounding an interior courtyard where a writer in
exile surrounded by Italian antiquity could knock back espresso and Fernet Branca and table-
grade Chianti that went down like lemonade.
The next day I picked up the money old Mom had wired to the American Express office.
At the moto shop in the alley, my BSA 650 Lightning Rocket sat out front looking brand new
and ready to go. I kicked it over to hear it rumble sweetly.
David said he needed to go north into Germany. I didn't want to press him and knew his
motivation, his morbid—to my mind—drive to visit some concentration camps. Okay, maybe
morbid is the wrong word, but I didn't need to go and didn't want to go. I was born a few years
after the camps were shut down, and for all I knew, what with Buddhist inclinations, I'd been
there already. The dormitories, work places, showers, ovens and mass graves made me shud-
der and resist.
He said nobody was required to go, meaning he wouldn't insist, and he wouldn't mind rid-
ing on back if I wouldn't mind. We'd both grown, successfully avoiding condescension.
