This post was composed just as agression is stirring up in the region. I prefer to post it now, in case an actual war will make it truly irrelevant to readers in coming days, but also as a wish for peace, sent from Jerusalem. This post presents seeming opposites that peacefully coexist in the same city. We can all coexist as well, just as peacefully. I believe that deeply.
The opposites in question are a church and a bar. The Ethiopian “Church of the Covenant of Mercy” is located in central West Jerusalem, a few steps away from a popular bar named “Uganda”.
Visiting both, a few days ago, I realized that focusing on a single contrast in a city of countless contrasts may help make sense of them all. Here, then, are a few snapshots of each, with the church always first. I apologize for the iphone quality. Jerusalem is the kind of city that chooses to fascinate you when you’re least prepared.
Do these two places have nothing in common? I left one stoned on incense and the other drunk on beer, other than that – decide for yourselves.
At the gates
Household objects
Decorated walls…
…bearing peculiar portraits
and finally: the clientele
Disclaimer: the image of the Uganda’s toilets is in fact a photo of a photo: the original hangs, framed, on that toilet’s wall. The night I was there it was in a better shape.
And a last word: at the end of sorting these photos I found myself left with one that had no “twin”. It is my photo of the Ethiopian church’s rotunda and dome.
The search for a paralel among my photos of other places Jerusalem led me to think about the nature of both locations. Each is an “embassy”, the represantation in Jerusalem of a certain foreign spirit. In containing both, Jerusalem isn’t different from any other city that is diverse, but seldom does one find in a single neighborhood such authentic, in your face manifestations of both Lalibela and Kreuzberg. On a good day, Jerusalem is the entire world, let’s hope many such good days lay ahead.
