Don't call me a snob, because I'm not condescending - certainly not about books • Lily Milat grabs a shelf

Somewhere at the end of the previous millennium, three friends met in a cafe. The trio consisted of a brilliant engineer who came from Paris, a highly skilled New Yorker technical writer and one from Haifa, who didn't yet know she would have this literary column. Multiculturalism at its best. They made it a point to meet once a month, each time to sample a different cafe, to be one with and for the other and not less important, to rate the chocolate cake.

Intel Haifa gave me many gifts for life in the four years I worked there, and she didn't even know she was like that. The friendship that was born there, at the Haifa Medical Center, turned out to be a brave one that accompanied us to the roofs, births, jobs and other dreams and it holds up well even today, at a trans-Atlantic distance. 

The first time I flew abroad by myself was in May 1998. To my loyal readers here, I will mention that this month is the most significant in my life and will probably come up in other contexts in future columns. Well, somehow I did a good job at Intel and somehow the company that hired me to work there decided to charge me a plane ticket to London Or Paris for my choice. My Parisian friend went to visit her family and invited me to meet her there.

Being in Paris with someone local is a dream. Everything I didn't spend on the plane ticket (and for the information of the young crowd - so it cost much more), I gave to the wardrobe and lingerie. I discovered there how each garment is wrapped with love before handing it to you, the pralines, which made Meg Ryan in Harry and Sally pale in comparison to my performance when the chocolatier honored me with a taste and that the baguette in Israel should be discussed in the courts for its claim to be called the same name as what you buy in the grocery store in Paris. After a long weekend, I returned to Israel with a minimum of feeling Sabrina.

And before you ask, it's not Sabrina the young witch, nor the cake I'm ordering for my parents from Cafe Tibi - Sabrina is, of course, Audrey Hepburn Mine, who returns with Parisian chic to the arms of Humphrey Bogart. 

An apartment in Paris/ Guillaume Mousseau

I would like to write to you that on the flight to Paris I read An apartment in Paris של Guillaume Mousseau. But the fact is that in 98 he still did not write the book that was published in 2017. Ironically, I read Apartment in Paris, on my way toVacation in Rome with my daughters last summer. Yes, Rome Vacation is another iconic Audrey film, which I'm glad I managed to convince the younger generation to watch. The matter was followed by "Audrey Hepburn haircut" in the hand of a stunning Roman book, but again I digress. 

So, in the genre of travel books, as I call them, I took Guillaume Musso with me, which did not disappoint and between the Wishing Fountain, the Colosseum and the Spanish Steps, I also traveled to Paris. The mystery, the art of Sean Lorenz, the detective senses of Madeleine, the life of the writer Gaspar and a special bond woven between the past and the future, were made in a recipe that I loved. Muso knows how to write, knows how to grab me for another chapter and another. Big like.

Books I enjoyed reading, it's hard for me to give them away. I tie them to the event and then they are like a pleasant souvenir. On the other hand, I must have rules in managing my private library. And at the crossroads of deciding whether an apartment in Paris remains or is released? Not easily, but with the understanding that he should make the hearts of other travelers happy, declares him a super loose.

Later in the day I will move it to the changing shelves next to the dining room knowing that someone will take it and continue to give it shelf life. 
Book details: Apartment in Paris by Guillaume Mousseau, Kinneret Publishing House, Zamora-Beitan, Dvir, 2017. 

Guillaume Mousseau will surely be happy to know that, even though I chose to move on from my apartment in Paris, I took another of his books, tomorrow, which is waiting for me to read and interestingly it takes place in New York, the next travel stop where I am taking you now.

"a day in NewYork"

A decade after my first flight alone, and I'm already a mother of a three-year-old girl and Chupchik, I was convinced that it was time to back up the days of maternity leave and visit my New York friend from the cheerful Intel days, who in the meantime had returned to build her home there.

How do you know that you have decided something that is right for you? For me it's the excitement after the decision, something like that that dances inside me and then rolls out. Thus, after the ticket order was completed, Sinatra sang on repeat on the home system, on CD (yes, there wasn't really Spotify back then), "Start spreading the word..." and, "I'm going to wake up in the city that never sleeps." Free translation of course.

We do not know?! It's a good time to do a YouTube search and hear Sinatra rave about visiting New York; This is an opportunity to present another film from my and my father's Beit Midrash - "A Day in New York" (On The Town) starring Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly, as sailors who come for a day's visit to this stunning city. 

The chicken is finished (but the couscous is also delicious)/ Ziv Cohen

Well, I have a long flight ahead of me and I'm alone, I found myself in the bookstore in Ben-Gurion buying the book The chicken is over (but the couscous is also delicious) של Ziv Cohen, who will accompany me on the return flights.

If you board an El Al flight, as I was in 2008, and read this book, you are in for an interesting experience. There is a lot of similarity in the "Ofek" airline company in the story and its characteristics, to the Israeli blue-white company and not without reason, since the writer was an air steward in the company, as written on the back cover. The book has many characters and with each chapter a Gordian connection is woven between them all.

As befits a soap opera, the characters get in and out of bed in different and surprising directions, regardless of religion or gender. When reading this book on a flight, it's hard not to think about the flight attendants and wonder about their actions during and outside the flight and whether the author's fiction is really there. Above all these, Ziv Cohen manages to maintain tension and interest throughout the 390 pages and, in a somewhat scripted way, unties the Gordian knot at the end.

I kept the book with me for 16 years. Because I had him as a friend on the flights, because the vacation in New York with my champion girlfriend was something out of the realm of dreams. When I landed in New York it was night time and I arrived exhausted in a taxi to my friend's house and I was not really impressed. But from the moment I woke up in the morning, my first visit to the city of skyscrapers of Ayn Rand in her book as the rising spring And more books and movies and series for the most part, became a visit to a realistic-dream set.

When I went out to explore the city in the morning, across the street from my friend's apartment, they filmed an episode of Law and Order (!) And when I crossed the road, I got a smile from the main actor. At the corner of the street is the restaurant whose shop window is the one photographed inSeinfeld And she serves strictly American meals.

We did a tremendous tour of sex and the city, which seems to me on the next visit I will do it again. And for dessert, on Friday evening I met in the elevator (!!!) you Mandy Patenkin, AKA Inigo Montoya, which turns out to be a non-Spanish avenger of his father's death in the film the magical princess, he is actually Jewish and even has family in Israel. Above all, I had quality time with good company. Thus, the book was tied to the visit and I was ready to release it even if I hadn't touched it since.

This week, in order to justify its existence with me and to examine it for the private library, I read the book again. My man always reminds us that we can't really trust our deceptive memory and indeed, as far as the plot is concerned, over the years I have romanticized both the story and some characters, who didn't really deserve to be remembered fondly. 

Anyway, although it was nice to read again, I decided that as far as New York and that trip are concerned, I have enough memories in my heart and regarding the question Stay or free? - The chicken is over (but the couscous is also delicious) loose. Together with an apartment in Paris it will arrive today on the dining room library shelves.
Book details: The chicken is over (but the couscous is also delicious) by Ziv Cohen, Sela Publishing, 2008. 

If a book does me good, then it is worthy

I know they don't call them "travel books" but "flight books" but, I use the name I chose because the phrase flight book is said in diminutive terms, as if it is an inferior book, which is only worth passing the time with and is not really considered high literature. but I? Don't call me a snob, because I'm not condescending - certainly not about books. If a book does me good, then it is worthy. True, I chose to release these two, but I do so with love and thanks for the beautiful moments we spent together. 

Pleasant reading and may good words be by your side always,
Lily