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Thursday, July 10, 2003 ON THE STROLLwe stayed at the DAVID INTER-CONTINENTAL HOTEL in TEL-AVIV, which is right on the beach. everytime we’d return to the hotel, our bags were checked for weapons. in fact, everytime we’d enter most buildings, our bags were checked and our bodies were scanned for weapons. that would have to be the most obvious difference between ISRAEL and THE STATES. everywhere we’d go, there’d be these very young men and women in army uniforms carrying large rifles. they all looked so gorgeous in their outfits, that i had to go out and find an army surplus store. i ended up getting two ISRAELI army uniforms, an orange beret, some red clay colored army boots and a couple of service pendants. the one and only time that i left the hotel without JOELLE, was when i walked up SHEINKEN street to check out some shops at around 8 o’clock at night. SHEINKEN is very trendy, not unlike 8TH st. in NYC or MELROSE in L.A. after browsing for about 45 minutes, i stepped into McDONALD’S for some french fries. at the counter, a young women approached me from behind and told me that she had just watched a film that i was in and that she and her friends would be honored if i sat at their table. i said “sure, lead the way”. her name was RONNIE and i liked her alot. she was 20 years old and she looked like CHRISTINA RICCI. her friends were two boys and one girl, all about the same age as RONNIE and gay. while we ate and talked, one of the boys told me that he had faked insanity to get out of the army after serving for a year. later, RONNIE invited me over to her apartment, which was right across the street, to read a script that she had written. she promised that it would take only 20 minutes to get through it. i said “yes”, which is something that i would never do in L.A. because every goddamned body in town has a fucking script that they’ve written, including the mailman. i secretly just wanted to see her apartment, which turned out to be a replica of my old living situations in the east village of NYC. it even had the obligatory old mannequin dressed up in kitschy thrift store clothes. from what i could tell, she had about 4 roommates, more or less. her script was about an ISRAELI girl who schemes her way to NYC to attend a MADOODOO concert. i liked the story, but the characters needed to be developed a little more. i told her to rent the greatest “road picture” of all time, THE WIZARD OF OZ, to scope how the characters change by the end of the movie. i ended up hanging out with them for about an hour and a half before returning to the hotel. MY NEW GOLDEN GIRLS it’s always a trip to see what AMERICAN tv shows make it into syndication over seas, and even stranger is the selection of tv channels that the hotels allot for their english speaking guests. because of the limited choices, i always end up watching things that i would have never given a second glance, had i been in THE STATES. case in point, THE GILMORE GIRLS. the two saturday afternoons that i spent in TEL-AVIV, they ran 4 episodes of that show back to back, and i am now thoroughly hooked. the show is completely stupid and unrealistic, but i totally love it to pieces. . | Permalink 2009 RuCo, Inc.—All Rights Reserved |
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