Purim

Jerusalem really breaks loose on Purim. Maybe it's repressed desires or something, but everyone here, especially the yeshiva guys in the religious neighborhoods, goes absolutely nuts. It's like spring break, minus the nudity: walking through Harnof, a relatively religious neighborhood, there are rented cars packed with teenaged yeshiva students dressed in matching doo-wop outfits or in t-shirts, playing loud reggae or rock and roll, with one or two of them sitting on the windowsill as they careen through the street. Students weave down the road in between cars, clutching drained vodka bottles. The streets are packed with traffic; tons of minivans with speakers set up on the roof blaring Israeli music, some secular, some religious. The minivans are usually party buses packed with yeshiva students, and have the doors rolled open, and drunken students hanging out shouting. The noise level is intense.

People set off serious firecrackers in the street, right in the middle of crowds. You'd think that in this country, people would be a little more circumspect about setting off loud explosions in crowded places, but nobody seems to blink an eye.

On Purim you're not supposed to turn down anyone who asks for money, and the schnorring scene is incredible. I got held up by a group of three six-year-olds, one of whom asked me for money three times in succession (a future Jewish fundraiser). A burly 17 year old kid with a fedora shoved a cup half full of coins into my face and growled "yeshiva" until I contributed. My favorite schtick, though, is a variation on the Italian violinist scheme. We were in our host's apartment, two long tables set for a meal, and there was a gentle knock at the door. I go and open the door and a whole conga line of yeshiva students in marching band outfits dance in, singing loudly, and join hands and start circling the apartment, singing and dancing, until hour host waves a 20 shekel bill at them to get them to leave. This happens two or three times more--if the door is open, a group of yeshiva students burst in and start singing, sit down at the table and start pouring themselves wine, and won't leave until the host bribes them out.

Another weirdness is that you see groups of 7-10 year old kids running around dressed in costume with lit cigarettes hanging out of their mouths. I confirmed this with my host "Purim and weddings" he says. The kids get approval to do anything they want, and you see these little kids that haven't even reached bar mitzvah running around smoking and drinking.

On the good side, there is very little lewdness; the costumes and general dress is all pretty tame; at a rave party in the park, I saw one couple making out on the ground, and one girl with a short skirt dancing around by herself.

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Although you couldn't get a group of Israelis to stand in line at gunpoint, switch on a small red outline of a man on any street corner and that same group will stand there on a deserted street corner in the middle of the night for hours without daring to cross. I don't know why.