Day 70: Streets
The streets of Modiin usually have very boring names, names of flowers, or birds or rivers, or the occasional Biblical name. These names follow a certain logic — larger thoroughfares are named for major rivers or valleys or figures, e.g. Emek Dotan (the Dotan Valley), Hashmonaim (the Hasmoneans), Yitzhak Rabin, etc. and are also grouped by themes. For example, the neighborhood I live in is called the “Tribes” because it’s named sons of Jacob: Reuven, Shimon, Levi, etc. The main street is named for Yehudah; Dan and Naphtali are smaller streets, and the street named after Dinah, Jacob’s daughter, is in the border between my neighborhood and the one whose street names are all Biblical heroines: Sarah, Esther, Rachel, Rivkah.
Not that the system is perfect: there is another Shimon street in a different neighborhood, named after Shimon Peres, and packages sometimes get delivered to the wrong building. And the bilingual spelling isn’t always accurate or consistent. But overall, it’s an orderly, planned and innocuous system, just like the city itself.
One of the best parts of living in Modiin is that it’s a great place to walk (or go out for a run.) It’s easy to find shade, and there’s water fountains everywhere. It’s also easy to cut from one street to another via a system of lanes (and because it’s hilly, also lots of stairs and ramps.) These often double as urban gardens, and in neighborhoods where there are still young children, as playgrounds. When B was little, we used to walk to his kindergarten through a network of these lanes and stairs, and he’d always stop to play in one of the small seesaws or look for snails in the multitude of shrubs and trees along the way.
I never paid much attention to the fact that many of these lanes have names until I joined a running club few years ago: they carry the names of fallen soldiers from our city. For the past five years or so, every Memorial Day afternoon we jog or walk through these lanes and stairways (or “upward paths” as they are known in Hebrew) and read from the plaques in their memory, or sometimes even hear from one of the members of our group who knew them or the family.
Our “run” always ends atthe official Memorial Park that holds columns with the names of all the fallen soldiers and victims of terror attacks from my city since its founding in the early 90s, a peaceful garden overlooking the large park in our city. It feels like a nice and meaningful way to end Memorial Day before rushing home to shower and take out the picnic blanket to see the Independence Day fireworks and local artists.
A couple of days ago, our mayor began holding more of the unveiling ceremonies with the new names of lanes and stairways, including the first soldier from the October 7th attacks, Shira Shohat Z”L.
From the dedication ceremony of the new Shira Shohat “Maale” (loosely translated as “Upwards Path”) comprised stairs and a ramp that connects between two streets in my neighborhood - photo taken from Modiin City Hall Facebook page.
This morning, after having coffee with B and A in the local market, I decided to skip the gym and instead take a walk around the city. I ended up on in Memorial Park, where I noticed that the construction of two more columns was already on underway.
The rightmost column holds the names of fallen soldiers until 2022 (and yes, you can see my reflection on the marble)
Reading / listening/ viewing recommendations for the weekend:
Another good episode of Unholy, featuring an excerpt from an interview to US Security Advisor Sullivan, and more interestingly, a conversation with Yasha Munk on identity politics.
DAYENU HQ, an volunteer-run Instagram page created by a loose group of friends that brings fact-based, thoughtful and diverse bits about daily life in Israel. It came together as an antidote to doom scrolling and vitriol present in social media. I first heard about it from a friend, who is also one of the volunteers that created it.
Oh, and if it’s not obvious, Substack should not be for Nazis.
Shabbat Shalom, and thanks for your feedback and questions so far. Keep sending more.