Full moon

3.30am moon

The moon will be completely full tonight. But even last night it was already so bright you could see all around in its light. I was out on the terrace to catch some cool breeze at 3am when I saw the moon over the Old City. Yes the nights are so hot it's impossible to sleep. it's between 28 to 30 degrees. But what makes it worse is all houses are built with stones. These stones absorb the heat during the day and releases the heat during the night .... so indoors is like a furnace. During the day the sun beats down mercilessly ... but fortunately there's a slight cool breeze blowing. It's enough to stay under a shade to feel a couple of degrees cooler.

The virus infection has plateaued these a couple of days but it's too early to rejoice. The govt is still warning that night-time and weekend curfews might be enforced in order to reduce the contagion. Actually it sounds more like a move to stop the nightly demonstrations against the PM. At least that's what the protestors will claim.    https://www.timesofisrael.com/ministers-mull-nightly-curfews-local-lockdowns-to-stem-covid-19-spread/?fbclid=IwAR0OOVi-ExlO9RQYpt5tfQMpu2EJia4RVvTHiE3RVywaxX37pWdGipVC0co

Meantime when infection were 2000+ a day last week, we now learn that the govt only managed to put up 19 new hospitals beds. No wonder hospitals are collapsing and nursing staff are at wits ends. It's really sad. The country has the money to provide the best health system but it's tangled with military tensions in the north and south (Gaza had fired missiles into Israel and Lebanon had fighters entering Israeli space to plant bombs), and politically infighting. The people suffer in the end.    https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-added-just-19-hospital-beds-during-outbreak-mks-hear-as-wards-fill-up/?fbclid=IwAR1sXCKkGiGOT61b2RLrw8HVCIk95AmqQC-hp1FYM5FXkJUnn22Xlgizgf8

Tiramisu birthday cake

Yesterday one of our seminarians in Jaffa celebrated his birthday. Though he invited me over for lunch at the community, it was obvious I wasn't going. Jaffa-Tel Aviv is the 2nd epicentre for coronavirus. So today I bought a small tiramisu and ate it on his behalf! The pandemic has certainly changed our way of life .... distance birthday celebration! It's making us grow fatter as we can't share the birthday cake! We have to eat it all!