Cold Discoveries and the last drop of Christmas!

Today happens to be one of the coldest days yet in Tel Aviv.  I don't know this for sure, but it seems like it may be true, so I'll go with it.  Today is also the day that I made a great discovery in my car...well, Paul did:  There is a button that says "Info" and when you turn it the dashboard tells you what the temperature is outside.  15*.....Celcius that is.  ~60*.  Brrrrr!

The Christmas decorations are all put away, the laundary is almost done, and the cookies are gone.  The only part of Christmas that remains are the online gifts bought with gift cards and the thank you notes.  Yesterday the mail room at work was flooded with packages!  I think everyone did the same thing:  shopping after Christmas to hit the sales or spend gift cards. 

Baking Project #1: Orange Sponge Cake
with a Cointreau Butter Cream Frosting - Delicious!



(Or their families didn't send Christmas gifts on time and they are just now arriving.)  Whatever the case, we got 3 packages yesterday!  :) 

The best part about being back is having our kitchen!  It was great before, but now!  Now I have a Kitchenaid Mixer, spring-form cake pans, a tart pan, new flour towels, and a butter crock!  I'm running out of room to put the kitchen toys.  All of these new toys lead me to baking, but I should really be running. Maybe I'll become that person who bakes for everyone else's birthdays and parties!

Tel Aviv sea during storm

Friday at work everyone was talking about "The Storm." It rained for 5 minutes and we thought "Hm...typical."  On Saturday the skies were cloudy (which is odd for us) and in the afternoon it started to get darker.  We would have walked to our friend's apartment by the beach around 7pm had we not been running late - but we were, so we jumped in a cab.  

My picture from same spot in May.

The driver was hesitant to drive down by the water - the obvious route.  We understood why when the sea came into view and the biggest waves I have ever seen were crashing over the stone walls that usually protect the beach.  As we paid the cabby and stepped out of the cab we were hit by much stronger winds than we were feeling 1 mile in from the shore.  Our friends like on the 17th floor with a balcony looking over the water and from there you could see (and feel) that this really was a storm.  

Leaving their apartment that night we were hit immediately by the 60mph winds!  Before bed we brought in our plants, stacked our furniture and closed all of the protective shields on the windows...just in case.

Sunday morning worse.  We unclogged the drains outside a few times to let the water drain down and re-staked our poor little fruit trees that were right at the end of wind tunnel. (Two of them were uprooted and quickly replanted.)  Sunday was consistently rainy and windy and one set of friends opted to not have us drive over to their place by the sea because it was "too dangerous to drive."  We didn't understand.  It wasn't THAT bad by us.  

So we went North to a co-workers for dinner.  The horrific traffic on the way was due to a few downed branches (very small) and blinking traffic lights. (Side note: Israel is one country where blinking yellow lights are not okay as all of the drivers are pushy and impatient - myself included - so we ALL push our way into the center of the intersection and one by one weave through...oh so inefficient!)

Anyway, getting there was bad but doable. The way home...another story.  The wind was blowing the rain almost horizontally and the slight flooding on the highways made the lines invisible (the lines here aren't straight...so you can't guess where your lane is!).  It was only the third time in my life that I have pulled over on the side of the road because the conditions were so bad.  We made it to a circle in the city only to find that part of it we had to go through was flooded.  (I later went to get a picture of this and the water was halfway to my knees!) 

The real surprise was when we got home.  I went straight to the front to check the patio drains which were flooded.  I put on a coat and some flip flops and ran out the side door (the water was up to the front door) to clear the drain.  I pushed away the debris (and nothing happened) and I ran around to the back to clear the other drain.  The water was deeper in back (above my ankles..on our 6th floor balcony!), it was dark and I couldn't find the drain.  Enter the hail.  I am getting pelted with little hail balls, standing in 4 inches of water in my flip flops...and I locked myself out. 

Paul came to the rescue and as I slipped into the house (literally slipping, not sneaking...falling) he ran to the back room to turn on the lights.  "Jen...come look at this!"  Not only was the light not working, but the room was flooded.  Water was coming in from under the door to the patio in the back where I couldn't find the drain.  Begin the frantic soaking-up, wringing out, clearing debris, calling for help, heaving buckets of water off the balcony.

Two hours later (midnight), after the government services guy left, the floor was drying and at least the back drain was working.  This is when I grabbed my camera and ran to get pictures of the flood (which I'll post later).  

The drive to work took an hour the next morning as the roads were flooded and many lights were out.  The beach was...and still is...a mess.

Jen's First Sandstorm

"It's a bad one out there," says an elder colleague as he exits the office. "What?" replies Jen, confused at the thought of less than perfect weather in Tel Aviv. "The sandstorm, it's a bad one," he clarifies. Jen runs to the window to see a haze over the city. It's the end of the world!!

Khamsin (with the harsh "H" at the beginning) is a sandstorm produces when winds kick up the sand in Africa (Egypt) and blow them towards the Mediterranean Sea. The sand is then carried thousands of miles until it blows West onto the shores where we found it in Tel Aviv this week.

Because my image of a sandstorm prior to this was either a.) winds blowing sand into your face in the desert or b.) my brother throwing sand at me, I'll explain what it was like: The sky was a yellowish-gray color like something from a movie about the apocalypse, the beach was deserted and few people were outside. (I purposely did not play with the colors or blur on the photo so you could see exactly what it looked like. This is well before sunset. The buildings are .5 miles away)

When you walked outside you were greeted by the finest mist of sand almost unnoticeable except for the grind you start to feel in your teeth and the sand collecting in your shoes. (Think of magic ferry dust.) The sand was most noticeable on the cars which looked like they had just passed under a bridge and sand/cement splatter on them. Before we could pull out of our parking spot we had to turn on the windshield wipers - but instead of water dripping off, the sand was pushed aside. At home our "garden" plants were doing better than we'd expected, but the balcony floor had a light coating of sand.

The temperature was the same and you didn't feel or hear the sand falling, but the eerie color of the sky, the grit in your mouth and the light covering of sand on everything really looked like the end of the world. But don't worry- it is sunny with a high of 75 today. I think we'll be okay.