Thursday, September 11, 2008

Haifa:

We met with Rami Levi who is the Vice-Mayor of Haifa. He is Arab, which is uncommon in Israel, I think. He said that they often try to hire Arabs and women in the city council of Haifa. Haifa is said to be one of the biggest cities where Jews, Arabs, Druze, Baha’i’ and others live and work side by side with little conflict. There are many projects happening to increase this and it seems it isn’t complete harmony but they are getting there. I asked what made Haifa work so well when places like Jerusalem only seemed to be dividing. His response was that it was not the religious center of the world. Haifa was a very cool city. The Baha’i gardens were amazing. I highly suggest you Google it. It reminded me of Lombard street in San Francisco, although this is definitely more beautiful. The view from the city was amazing, it looked much like San Fran on one large hill surrounded by the bay. It was extremely hot and humid though, even well into the night, unlike Frisco.

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