Winter didn't really arrive in Jerusalem on Friday. A bit chilly, winds blowing, but it's still the air of Jerusalem. And so, despite the gloomy forecast - cold and strong winds - I went out into the atmosphere of Saturday evening in the Mahane Yehuda market. I was surprised to find many good people there who I haven't seen for ages.
At the entrance to the market, a soldier on weekend leave stops by two street musicians - one playing a saxophone and the other playing cans of olives and pickles - and gives them a sizable donation. He remains standing. Just before I leave, he places another sizable donation. "Let them have a good time on Shabbat," he says, smiles, and walks away.
Wigs on an ultra-Orthodox soldier are no longer an attraction. The item here is the new unit badge on the soldier's shoulder, which tells us that he serves in one of the elite units in the IDF. Later I saw that it says on the back of his bag that he is from the Egoz unit. Really hard to crack.
The Bookashpan twins sit every Friday on Hagoz Street. Although they are not in the IDF unit, they are in the Haredi unit that sits and drinks beer. The two scroll through all the news of the week on their phones. It's amazing how much they are twins in their movements.
His daughter, Pnina Bir, bought a car, and she no longer comes to the market with him. But Eli Bir, president of the United Hatzalah, will not give up shopping at the Friday market. He stands and adds a few more strawberries to the scale every now and then, so that everyone will have something on Shabbat.
His name is Rabbi Yaakov Sassona, the son of the bard-singer Rabbi Edmund Sassona. He is a community rabbi in America. When I took a picture of his son, he immediately smiled at me and said: "Are you Haredim 10? I see your pictures from the market every week... It really brings us to life in America. To see and meet all the people and the atmosphere that we don't have abroad.".
Public relations man Ari Gelhar walks around the market together with the personal assistant of the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, Avinoam Kotsher. As a public relations and crisis management man, Ari immediately recognizes the crisis in the photo and responds accordingly. The rabbi's trusted man, he still prays that the photo doesn't get out from under his hands.
They finished playing, folded up, and left the market. Meanwhile, the friends linger for a few minutes, and he stretches and raises his violin high and high. When I pass him and show him the picture I took, he responds: "Well. The world of the music hall is at the very top, next to the seat of honor.".
On the sidelines, waiting for his father to finish shopping, he talked to himself with the figures drawn on his fingers with perfect makeup. When he saw that I was taking a picture, he was embarrassed and hid the elephant that was drawn on his other hand. But he couldn't hide the eagle.
""Take a picture of us, take a picture of us too. Every week we're at the market and you've never uploaded us to the website." I took a picture. When I asked for their names so I could tag them, they told me: "Upload the picture first. We'll tag you when we put it on Facebook.".
""I'm tired and I don't have the energy to go to this market and meet the whole world," Mandy Grossman complained firsthand to Ari Gahler. Ari, for his part, used his crisis management skills here too and solved the problem immediately: he took Grossman for a shopping spree...
The well-known artist photographer Yossi Rosenbaum, a talented and high-quality guy, was walking around the market with his new daughter in a stroller. His wife lingered behind with the other girl. When I photographed him, he smiled somewhat embarrassedly, and then told me enthusiastically: He hasn't been here for years, but after seeing what goes on here at the market, he plans to come every Friday. "It's crazy, the whole world is here.".
Hezki Shechter - the one who used to try to send the times of Shabbat's beginning on WhatsApp to all his friends - came with his wife to tour the market. His wife hid in the back and refused to come out to be photographed. So I took a picture like this. Hezki is worth a photo with his children. Isn't he?
The entire market suddenly smiled at my camera. Starting from the first ones in the foreground, and ending with those right behind. It took me a few seconds to realize that something special was happening beyond my sight. When I turned around, I saw what was happening - and this is the next picture.
Avishalom Shiloah, the guy with the one dyed wig, a Jew who believes in everything by his own definition, comes dressed as a European, smiling and making everyone around him laugh. The beer in his hands passes from hand to hand, until the bottle slips and shatters. And yet, despite all those who surrounded him, I remembered one word from one of his poems that he wrote on the walls of Jerusalem: "Loneliness.".
Journalist Yair Sharki from News 2, who came for a quick shopping trip to the market and a drink with friends, didn't understand what I wanted from him again: Wasn't it enough that I photographed him last week? But this time at least I caught him with a smile, and not with an angry-stressed look. The person standing next to him didn't want the photo to be titled "Rabbihood and Journalism" and avoided the photo in his honor. I didn't include the full photo in which he is seen in person.
The following photo was taken by Kobi Hershberg, a smiling photographer with one drawback: he's still single. But he'll probably resolve the matter when the opportunity arises. Anyway, the person being photographed is his friend and he wanted it to turn out well. So here's the photo: it turned out wonderfully.
The market empties, his father rushes to buy some challah and cookies for Shabbat, and he stays in the corner of the market, with the shtreimel and the suitcase, waiting anxiously for his father to return.
""What will you write under the picture?" they asked, before agreeing to let me take their picture. Umm, I said. I'll probably write: Two cute guys shopping for Saturday at the market. "Well, write that, great. At least someone believes we're cute guys...""
Eli Pollak from United Hatzalah approaches with the beer. You came equipped with the weapon, I told him as he handed me a sip from the bottle. In response, he said: "Yes, I must be equipped" - and revealed his personal weapon. That's not what I meant, I replied. But that's good too.
Minutes later, on my way home as the Sabbath siren sounded, I saw the guy hurrying home in a taxi. His belt swept the streets and highways of Jerusalem. I tried to tell him, to shout, and even to convince him to open the window, so he could hear what I wanted to say. But the fear of the camera paralyzed him. He smiled and turned his head. Too bad. The belt must have gotten dirty.
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