This post is about a hangover. No, it’s not what you think. I haven’t taken to the bottle. Well, not in excess, anyway.
Living it up on safari in South Africa.
No, it’s about a hangover from childhood. And the town of Akko, called Acre in English.
I first discovered this ancient and modern town from a book I read as a teenager. I think the book was The Source by James A. Michener, a fascinating story of a fictional archeological dig and the ancient stories it uncovers. For some reason, at that young and impressionable age, I couldn’t accept that a town would have a name that I knew to be a unit of measurement. (It’s about 4047 square metres, which I didn’t know then and won’t remember now). Every time I came across that name in that book, I thought how weird it was.
After moving to Israel, I learned the Hebrew name for the town, and I’ve always used it, even when speaking in English. I wouldn’t say Yerushalayim in English, or Natzrat. I’d use the English names: Jerusalem and Nazareth. Yet Akko remains Akko because, in my mind, Acre is a strange name for a town.
(Last time I was Nazareth, there were no digital cameras.)
Recently, because this town appears in the novel I’m currently writing, the sequel to Style and the Solitary, I asked a group of authors which name they thought I should use. None of them had a problem with that name: Acre. It’s just me, then.
That led me to wonder about hangovers from childhood. I’m sure I must have a lot more. Do you? I’d love to hear about them.
Miriam Drori, Author 
2 replies on “Hangovers”
That is a beautiful image, Miriam. I have often thought about how our homes are the centre of the world for us.
Thanks, Sue. It’s on an outside wall of our municipality. Yes, our homes are at the centre of the world for us. That’s why it’s so devastating when they’re destroyed in some way.