Geckos and insects and seeing the sights!

I seem to remember we did quite a lot of travelling around that first trimester before the war started in earnest.

The Lebanese border

The Sea of Galilee

The Jerusalem Walls

I just love this photo of the busker in Ben Yehuda Street, Jerusalem. He was probably a Russian gastric surgeon, who'd "made Aliya" and couldn't get a job. The place was heaving with highly skilled immigrants - doctors, accountants, lawyers - but what they really needed were farmers and sewerage experts.

Not so much "Eyeless in Gaza" as Bug-Eyed in Sinai! It was jolly cold that day.

The first few weeks were a blur to be honest. I remember the food was great except I couldn't eat it. I had succumbed (along with everyone else) to "Shishak's Revenge", a condition which caused "dire rear" and other nasties. Shishak, for the uninitiated, was an Egyptian Pharaoh who went through Israel like a dose of errr ... . well ... Shishaks! See 1 Kings 14:25. Onomatopoeia is a wonderful thing!

As well as being attacked from the inside, we were also attacked from the outside by flying and creeping things . In my case I had so many lumps and bumps and festering sores that even Quasimodo would've been a bit envious. And I'm not even going to mention the roaches! Ok I will. These tended to congregate in the little room where the public telephone was. Soon as you turned on the light you could see and hear them scuttling away. One day I caught one lying on its back in the telephone cradle! I think it was exhausted from hanging on for the overseas operator! I also learnt that leaving a few crumbs lying around is like a call of reveille to the ants. You turn your back for a minute and whole battalions of them are marching across the floor in neat military rows. I lost my inner-slut PDQ!

Happily, after a while, Gordon the Gecko moved in and became my room-mate and buddy :>) He ate all the creepy-crawlies and flying things (except the roaches!) until he was inadvertently squashed in the door one day while munching on a mosquito :(