Photo Friday (Vol. XVI) [signs of life edition]

Many of the most common comments I've gotten about the pictures I've posted of my commute route have used terms like 'lonely' and 'desolate' to describe the landscape.  I decided to post some other pictures to help people understand why I found these comments to be off-base.

My drive to work does indeed take me through some wide open spaces, but there are signs of life nearly everywhere one looks... it just so happens that I didn't point my camera in the right direction for you to see them.

Until now:

One of the most common sights one is likely to see are the small piles of rocks that have been left by shepherds.

I have wondered for a long time what these piles meant.  There are plenty of references in the Torah of the Patriarchs setting up make-shift alters by stacking stone upon stone, but I had my doubts that these modern piles had any religious meaning.

On a recent drive I had to wait for a shepherd to cross his flock, and while I was snapping the following picture I decided to pull over and ask him about the stones.

I was initially worried about how an Arab shepherd would take to being approached by me, but when I walked over to say hello, he spoke to me in perfect Hebrew!  It turns out he was a Jewish shepherd from one of the small agricultural settlements in the south Hevron hills!  What are the odds?!

This Shepherd told me that there were several explanations for the stone piles.  He said that some shepherds set them up as a way to mark the edge of roads and other hazards (such as holes and caves).  On the rolling hillsides it is often hard for the shepherd to spot places that could be dangerous to the flock from a distance... so they set up markers.

He explained that some shepherds set up the markers to mark the borders of areas where they have permission to graze their flocks.  He said that this is less common since most shepherds do not feel bound by silly things like borders and property ownership. 

As an example he pointed out a field of rusting oil barrels.  I had seen them before but never understood their purpose.  As we walked closer he pointed out that each one had a small tree poking out of the top.  The barrels were there to keep sheep and goats from chewing on the saplings.  The owner of the young trees figured it was easier to protect the trees than to try to keep the shepherd's flocks away.

On another morning I was driving through the seemingly empty landscape and was startled by an Ibex leaping across the road in front of my car.  There was no danger of hitting him, but I jammed on the brakes none-the-less.  I quickly pulled over and grabbed for my camera, but by the time I was out of the car the Ibex was a small dot on the next hillside.  Here is the blurry results that my little camera's zoom provided:

I guess the lesson I'm hoping people take from this week's Photo Friday is that things are rarely as they appear at first glance.  Seemingly desolate landscapes are actually brimming with signs of life... and almost everything one thinks they know about Israel changes as the lens of time brings things into focus.

Shabbat Shalom!