Photo Friday (Vol. LIX) ['huh?' edition]

Sorry this is up so late in the day... I'm home alone with Yonah on a rainy Friday morning and he has required my, er,  undivided attention.  :-)

Today's Photo Friday is a tiny sampling of the kind of signage one sees around Israel that blurs the border between Hebrew and other languages spoken here.

First up is one of the many political billboards that have sprung up around the country with the elections fast approaching.  It is an ad for the party 'Yisrael Betainu' which has a very strong following in the Russian immigrant community.  No party can take for granted its support base and most are always looking to strengthen ties.  The billboard has pictures of the #1 candidates on the Likud, Kadima and Yisrael Betainu lists respectively (I guess they consider Amir Peretz - with his Stalin mustache - to be a non-starter) above the Russian words 'Nyet' 'Nyet' and 'Dah' (no, no, yes) written in Hebrew characters:

The next picture is a neon sign I notice each evening as I leave work.  I 'notice' it, but until yesterday I hadn't bothered to read it.  It is written in Hebrew letters but they spell the English words 'Car Lease Trade In'' phonetically. 

Last up is a Beer Sheva florist (who knows, it might be a national chain for all I know) that chose as its name an English expression (There for You), but written phonetically the way an Israeli would pronounce it.  I crack up every time I pass this place:

[Update:  Thank you to the astute commenters who pointed out to me that 'Zer' is both the Hebrew word for 'bouquet' and a play on the way Israeli's would pronounce the English word 'there'.  I'll still giggle when I see if but part of the joke will be on me for not knowing the Hebrew word.  In fairness... an Israeli living in the US might not be familiar with the English word 'bouquet'... oh wait a minute... bouquet is a French word!  There goes that theory! ;-)]

That's it for this week.  Next week I have some great pictures of a ruin that sits in the Negev Desert outside of Beer Sheva.

 

Shabbat Shalom!