Only four days before the official summer solstice, the air is hot and heavy, the sky cloudless. The road along the highway is spotted with shrubbery, gas stations, and occasionally vast rows of crop, somehow withstanding, even thriving under the tenacious desert sun.
Driving south from Tel Aviv along Ayalon Highway, the scenery looks almost identical to southern California — if not for the Hebrew lettered billboards, the green-clad soldiers waiting by desolate bus stops, and occasional black-hatted Orthodox men walking along the road.
Today's destination is a moshav, or cooperative, agricultural community. Among rows of bungalow-style homes suspended on small stilts, playgrounds, tractors and farm equipment, is a large field, and beyond that field are several greenhouses. Friendly, yet protective dogs wake up from an afternoon slumber to greet visitors to these greenhouses, which look like large white tents upright amidst surrounding mud and dust.
