9 The Road to Benyamina

The road between Pardes Hannah and Benyamina is a time tunnel to me. On entering it, with the trees on both sides, light and shade hit my eyes alternately, and for a moment it seems as if I have returned to the Israel of my youth – a time when the plains were blanketed with orange groves that were usually fringed with fir trees and every little path wound its way lined by trees. I remember, for example, the huge eucalyptus trees along the road between Gedera and Hazor junction. Today it is a wide two-lane road but in my imagination it is still the same narrow road on which I walked in the shade of the trees holding my violin on my way home. A few years ago, in Ile de France and Normandy, I saw vast fields crossed by narrow lanes lined with shade trees that could be seen from a distance. In Israel, the rows of trees along the roads have almost completely disappeared. When the orange groves disappeared, the rows of fir trees disappeared with them. The sabra (cactus) fences to which we used to go in order to pick the sweet fruit disappeared long before (Just writing about sabras causes my palms to "feel" their thin fuzzy thorns).
Thus the road to Benyamina represents a little treasure from the past. It is a reminder of times gone by. It is impossible to stop development and broad roads are a necessity. Nevertheless it makes me sad to see that every new road is the end of a beautiful line of trees. Every time I go on the road to Benyamina I am thankful that the road, with the trees on its sides, still exists.