What every parent must know about youth groups in Israel (with handy vocabulary list!)

If you grew up outside of Israel, you may think you know what a youth group is--but you probably don't, at least not until you've experienced the Israeli variety.

And if you’re too old to experience it yourself, maybe it’s something you can look forward to for your kids.

(For those of us too old to be part of a youth group ourselves, I’ve put together a list of vocabulary below that you might find helpful – if anything’s missing there, let me know and I’ll add it in!)

I personally was a Brownie and then a Girl  Guide, which is the Canadian version of Girl Scouts, with all the same ideas, mainly that it’s kind of military group of kids who are corralled and brought places and taught principles of healthy living and woodsmanship by adults.  Hmm… now that I put it like that, it really doesn’t sound much fun at all.

This is literally what we had to wear to do these activities:

(except I didn’t have nearly so many badges!)

Our weekly meetings were held at a set day and time, following an agenda set by our adult leaders, who in Guides were known as Tawny Owl and Snowy Owl, for whatever reason – again, the woodsy theme, even though we were all actually sitting in my junior high school cafeteria.

During the summer, I went to Girl Guide camp, which was basically like one long Girl Guide meeting, with an emphasis on woodsmanship and a little more singing.  Oh, and we got to wear the “camp uniform,” which was slightly more casual.

So what do kids do in Israel?  And how is it different from what I grew up with?

Here, there have what are called תנועות נוער / tenuot noar, which literally means meaning youth

Israel: It’s for the birds (and for you)

When I met my first husband, I told him about our family's annual camping trips to provincial parks where we'd drive in, park on the site, pitch the tent, and head to the beach or river or forest or whatever to enjoy nature.  Sometimes, those campsites would have running water, other times, you had to walk somewhere else to get water.  My father's strategy was sending the kids to wash dishes in the bathroom -- strictly forbidden according to all provincial campground rules, but you know.  Someone has to be an exception to the rules.

So that was camping.

But my first husband quickly declared, "It doesn't count if you can get to it with a car."

He would have had a hard time with Israel.

Here, camping sometimes means that your tent is just a few feet away from the next person's…

(© Tiberias municipality via Wikimedia)

… and hiking usually means taking one of quite a few well-used routes, like the Israel Trail, a 1025 km. (look it up!) route – nothing to sneeze at, really, given that National Geographic has called one of the world's 20 most "epic trails."  But there certainly isn’t the variety, and from what I’ve heard, you’re very likely, in most stretches and hiking-friendly seasons, to bump into a number of fellow travellers.

(It’s also perhaps the only one that apparently features a lending library so you can pick up reading material along the way -- People of the Book, indeed.)

(photo credit © royisoko via Wikimedia)

Finding a nature getaway definitely isn't hard in Israel.  But as with so many things when you make aliyah, you may have to (slightly) redefine what you mean by the term. 

Since almost every spot is within half an hour's drive of a big city, and there are factories and processing plants of all kinds everywhere from north to south, you're probably not going to get total solitude and silence to commune with nature unless you take to the deep south.

But that has its upside, too, like the fact that you can hop in a bus in Nahariya and within not very long, be standing in the middle of one of the world's most extraordinary bird sanctuaries -- the Hula Valley.  A crucial migration spot between Europe and Africa (and back), the Hula Valley hosts about 500 million migrating birds every single year, and an incredible range of birds as well.

And it happens to be crane season RIGHT NOW.  Well, okay, as our guide explained, these days, it's crane season all winter long, at least until March.

That's because of the Strange History of the Hula Valley, which I'll sum up here very briefly.
Maybe in Hebrew school you learned how

Nine (9) things I wouldn't have to tell a Canadian neighbour

I get alarmed sometimes, living in Israel.  There truly are moments when I just look around and realize we’re living somewhere utterly foreign, and I ask myself what we think we’re doing here, when it is so, so painfully clear that we don’t belong… such as when we have less-than-pleasant encounters with various neighbours in our building.  Sheesh.

This is a neighbourhood full of “characters,” and sometimes it’s fun and you can laugh it off.  But sometimes, you just want to cry and wish everybody could be Canadian, so you wouldn’t have to fill them in on the basics, such as…

1. Turn off your music -- it's 2 a.m. and I'm trying to sleep.

Israelis are sometimes strange about noise.  I have a personal theory that because it's such a small country, and you really can't get away from other people, they don't even bother trying.  There are no boundaries.  "If I feel like listening to music, then you feel like listening to music," is pretty much how many Israelis feel about their tunes. 

Also, this particular neighbour is a weird, too-thin skittish little guy who you just figure has got to be on a pile of something addictive, though obviously, we have no proof.  His behaviour has been pathological in the past. 

The fun part is him trying to convince us that this is what Israel is like, and if we don't like it, we should go back to Canada, where people are quiet and polite.  Which brings back memories of calling the police on inconsiderate neighbours in a few different situations... and, yes, of having them called on a party I held at one point.

But I think one difference is that this guy doesn't care, he'll just turn it right back on after the cops leave, just to show me he can.

2. That's not music, it's cats yowling.

I may not be the best candidate to move to the Middle East.  Some people really enjoy "Mizrachi" music, the swirling, wailing sound of notes that go up and down seemingly at random.  Then again, some people like chummus, which tastes like dirt paste.  Okay, to be honest, everybody here likes chummus—with a passion.  Except me.

I want to show up outside this neighbour’s door at 7 a.m. with

Do you know how to protect yourself on Jerusalem’s sidewalks?

This is actually more of a public service announcement than a blog post.  Know what the biggest threat is to pedestrians in Jerusalem?  From what I’ve learned this week it definitely isn’t terrorism… it’s slippery sidewalks.

Yup, those fabulous shining stone walkways that make Jerusalem look so lovely for so much of the year… are apparently (almost literally) deadly.

If you’ve ever walked through the Old City at night in the rain, you probably figured that already.  But maybe, like me, you thought you were the only one.  Nope, nope, nope.  If you’ve ever stopped yourself from running for a bus in our nation’s capital because you were scared you’d slip and fall and break your neck… it turns out you’re not alone.

Except some people aren’t just afraid of falling.  They’ve actually fallen, and maybe not suffered

Did you forget to call us on our special day? (Please call!)

It’s not too late, in case you were thinking of picking up the phone.  You’ve still got a few more days.

What?  You weren’t??  Why not???

If you’d normally call someone on their birthday or anniversary, why not call all your Israeli friends and family on Yom HaAtzmaut and/or Yom Yerushalayim?

Go on, pick up the phone.  It’s easy, cheaper than ever; it only takes a few minutes, and means so, so much.

Usually when I speak to family back home in Canada around these special events, which always fall between Pesach and Shavuos, and I mention a holiday, they usually say something like, “Oh, yeah… it’s, um, is it Lag Baomer?”  (Which, to be fair, it sometimes is and sometimes isn’t.)

And they’re absolutely right to be ignorant about what’s going on here.  You really don’t feel Yom HaAtzmaut or Yom Yerushalayim outside of Israel unless you’re immersed in a tremendously Zionist context where people are going to extremes to deck the halls.  That “Oh, yeah,” reaction – well, I don’t blame them.  If you’re just going about your life, it’s a little much to expect you to remember a minor, modern holiday in a country far away.

And yet… every year, I wake up on March 1st knowing it’s my sister’s birthday.  There’s no sign of it in the weather, in the air, posters on the walls, sales in the malls, or fireworks anywhere I go.  (I picked this sister deliberately, and not my mother, who was born on Bastille Day, the French national holiday, or my other sister, who was born on Valentine’s Day…)

And because it’s my sister’s birthday, I think about her, plan a gift (okay, I don’t always get around to sending one – I’m not the BEST sister!), send her some kind of e-greeting, make a phone call.  I sort of think about her all day, and the amazing things she does that I never could.  It’s her special day.

(See?  Very special!)

Now, you’ll probably admit that we’re not limited to ONE special day per year per person.  People also phone loved ones on their anniversaries, Mother’s Day, graduations, and other special occasions, so this isn’t limited to birthdays at all.

So why not extend the love to include, oh, an Independence Day (or two)?

Things that are weird in Israel #18:What’s with all the HAMMERS? (Yom HaAtzmaut Edition!)

If this is a hammer, it must be… Yom HaAtzmaut!  Yes, it’s time for our country’s national Hammer Day celebration, the day when children young and old head out at night to buy huge inflatable HAMMERS.

Great, big, blow-up hammers in all sizes, shapes, and colours… okay, just kidding.  Not ALL colours.  Just blue and white.  Blue and white hammers to proclaim freedom throughout the land.  Everywhere you go, kids are bopping one another with these things.  Am I missing something???

Now, I have never seen giant inflatable hammers for other occasions, but I figured it couldn’t be a unique Israeli thing, so I went and Googled other holidays.

I started with the obvious:  “Fourth July hammer.”  Let’s see how the Americans do it.

Not with hammers, apparently.  Okay, there IS one inflatable in this batch:

Getting even more specific, I tried “fourth july hammers inflatable.”  I figured this one couldn’t miss.

A little more on the money, but really… this is a disappointingly generic lot.  Is “Bang, Bang, Bang, High Striker” the message you want to ring out loud and clear on YOUR Independence Day??

Being a proud and patriotic Canadian – we’re turning 150 this July 1st! - I figured that if independence and hammers were a natural pairing, Googling ““canada day” hammer” would be sure to find something.

Top 5 non-touristy things to do with your mother in Israel

My mother left last week after a too-short 2-week visit before which she insisted that all she really wanted to do was “take the grandchildren to school.”  Fair enough.  It can’t have been easy coming back to Israel after the vacation of a lifetime she spent here with my father 9 years ago.  Basically, she didn’t want to do anything touristy… so we didn’t.

Instead, here are five of the activities I enjoyed most during her visit:

1. Haifa – why not?

I think this was the first full day my mother was here, and it was basically a “Why not?” inspiration.

My mother had spent about a week in Haifa on her trip with my father, so she was already familiar with the city, unlike 95% of tourists, and actually liked it… unlike me.  Okay, yes, I technically live in Haifa, but I’m kind of ambivalent about the city.  But we were sitting home one morning, it was a sunny day, and the shuk is literally one bus ride away.

So there was practically nothing to lose.

Oh, the other reason was that I’m crocheting a blanket and I needed a ball of yarn to match one I already had because otherwise I would have run out mid-project.  And there’s a yarn store I go to quite close to the shuk. So off we went, hopping on the bus and paying our 10 shekels or so for the pleasure.

The yarn store was actually a minor hit – nothing like the fancy stuff my mother buys, but it was mundanely familiar and she bought a little stitch-counter accessory for another 10 shekels.  Down the street was a store selling socks that actually go over the knee, which I desperately needed, and we each picked up a couple of pairs. 

(Though I confused my mother by asking the shop lady for “tights,” and she said they didn’t have “tights,” and my mother kept insisting they had tights right over there, until eventually I had to explain that “tights” in Hebrew isn’t the same as tights in English.  In Hebrew, it means leggings or bicycle shorts, depending on the length.)

While downtown, I also introduced her to Cofix and the pleasure of 5-shekel coffee, which we took with us to the shuk. 

And the shuk, as it turned out, was more charming than I’d remembered. 

I hadn’t been in over a year because I avoided it during shemittah – most of the vendors are Arab and I wasn’t sure about the produce there.  Also, all the citrus stuff was in season and every single vendor was offering samples.  I think my mother managed to eat the equivalent of about 5 oranges, just from samples.  I bought some small stuff, including local garlic, because more and more stores are just carrying the stuff in nets that comes from China, for no good reason that I can tell.

The best part was that with a short walk out of the shuk, we were back on the same bus, headed home, and inside of 25 minutes, we were here lounging on the sofa.

Or, perhaps the best part for you reading this, is that there are NO pictures.  I brought my phone, but it remained a phone for the entire time.  In Haifa, I guess, I’m not really a tourist at all.

2. Get your mother lost in Akko

This one was another “why not?”

Definitely not for everybody, but it’s super-close to here, so I figured it would be nice for a sunny-day wander through the Old City.  Unlike Jerusalem’s Old City, it’s easy to get to and on a weekday morning, there was plenty of parking (don’t try that on Shabbat, as I understand that Israelis from all over the country travel up there for hummus and more). 

Dear Family: she is safe, so please stop asking

Hi, all!

Just wanted to let you know that although we are all worried about E_____ when terrible things happen in Jerusalem, it doesn't help to email her to let her know about them or to ask if she is safe. 

Telling a person in that situation to "stay safe" implies that anyone who gets hurt is simply not making an effort.

If you want to send her a note, try something constructive, like, "I'm praying this will end soon," "I hope you're still finding ways to enjoy life," or simply, "we love you."

Please remember that, in Jerusalem as in any other place in this world, a person is safe until the moment they are not - whether that moment comes in a car, on a city street, in Canada's parliament buildings, in a hospital, or at the hands of a terrorist.

Statistically, her life expectancy here is higher than in most countries of the world, including the US. Though none of us know when our moment will come, for this moment, right now, she is safe.

I spent last Tuesday afternoon with her in Jerusalem.

Don't forget! Nine things to remember before you fly

Even with the best-laid plans, there are some important things that can fall through the cracks.  Here are 9 of the most important reminders – things you’ll want to take care of before you pull on that spiffy new Nefesh b’Nefesh ballcap and hop on the plane to Israel:

 

1.  Medical Check-In

 

Sure, health care in Israel is free.  But you’ll be sitting in front of a doctor who doesn’t know you, doesn’t have your records, and perhaps doesn’t speak English.  (Medical clinic receptionists will insist that “all the doctors speak English,” which means they know the names of medical conditions, but many still can’t carry on a conversation.) 

 

There’s also a different cultural approach and you may not have the confidence as a dripping-wet oleh to be pushy enough with Israeli doctors to make your concerns known.

 

If you have any medical worries, even little niggling things that you’re concerned might get bigger before your Hebrew gets better, get them taken care of ahead of time.

 

2.  Prescriptions

 

This could have been part of #1, except it’s so important I’m giving it its own bullet point.  Get a copy of all prescriptions, and a six-month supply of any medications you take on a regular basis. 

 

Keep these prescriptions in your carry-on baggage along with a few days’ supply, at least.  Checked baggage does get lost, and stuff gets lost inside checked baggage (especially if you’re bringing a dozen or more huge suitcases!). 

 

You don’t want to deal with a medical crisis immediately on landing.

3.  Dentist

Read everything I just said about doctors and multiply it by ten.  Then take out the part about it being free – you will have to pay for dental care in Israel, after you’ve figured out how to find it and how much it’ll be. 

 

How to survive the most brutal 6 months of your life

Here’s the truth that nobody is going to tell you:  you may just be in for the worst 6 months (or so) of your life.

That’s the side of aliyah that you don’t see in the ads, or the videos, or the posters or the shots of smiling, happy families at the airport.

My family’s not in those shots.

You won’t see my son, lying kicking and wailing on the floor of the airport.

You won’t see my daughter, weeping because she misses our family in Canada.

You won’t see me in our apartment at the merkaz klitah, screaming and crying in the middle of the night because my husband cannot make the cruddy Israeli beach karaoke – literally the loudest music I’d ever heard, and I’ve been to more than a few concerts – go away at 3 a.m. on Shabbos morning until I finally fell asleep with a pillow over my head.

Or the kids lying in bed calling out, “Juke! Juke!” (cockroach, cockroach)

I don’t know if I’d call it the worst six months, but it was definitely a difficult period.  A very difficult period.

Friends of ours spent 6 months in Israel a year or so before we came.  They'd just had a baby, so he had parental leave, and they’d always wanted to spend time here.  Everything went wrong - absolutely everything.

How to choose YOUR OWN best destination in Israel

How up are you on your Israeli geography?

One of the things I found most maddening before we moved to Israel was place names.  Beyond Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Haifa, I had barely heard of other places here.  Maybe Beersheva, because it’s in the Torah.  Some places were in the news (Chevron), so they were somewhere in my consciousness.  Others, not so much.

That quickly became a problem when we started planning to move here.

Maybe this is something you’ve experienced? 

Anyone who has been anywhere in Israel, even if they’ve never lived there, has anywhere between three and a dozen places to recommend.  They’ll come up to you anywhere, anytime, and spout this list like it’s gospel (or, you know, the Jewish equivalent).

Telling Kiryat Arba from Kiryat Shmona

These places are not all cities.  Some are cities, some are neighbourhoods within cities, some are kibbutzim or moshavim, some are, I don’t know, hilltops somewhere with a few idealists in trailers parked on top.

Home Sweet Home: Sorting us all out

Did you have one of these shape sorters as a child?  (Maybe your kids did!)

Look at all those shapes.  Some of them are very similar - the pentagon and the hexagon; the trapezoid and the square; the triangle and the little rounded cone-triangle (is there a name for that shape?). 

(Babies were smarter in those days, I guess - newer shape sorters are much simpler.)

The fascinating part was that no matter how similar the shapes, they wouldn't slide nicely into the wrong hole.

So I think I'm like that, a bit.

We're back in Israel now.  We got home at midnight last night. 

And so now, I can tell you my secret:  I was half expecting to hate it here.  Maybe more than half.  My daughter was in tears as the plane was taking off, leaving behind so many of the people she loves in Canada.  I braced myself, just in case I got here and felt SO depressed to be back.

Cooking Toronto soup–notes from a vacation in chu”l

Here in Toronto, the celery is normal.  The carrots are normal - all year round.  The onions are clean; how awesome is it to peel open an onion without the nasty surprise of mould or flaking dirt tumbling every which way?

I'm cooking in my mother's kitchen, and this isn't the first time this visit.  It's odd, because, growing up, I used her kitchen very rarely. It was HER kitchen, and trespassers - even kids - need not apply.

These days, I'm more bold, I suspect she's more tired, and there is my hungry family to feed.

And even though we've never lived in my mother’s house before this month of vacation, I feel myself slipping into old, familiar patterns. 

For one thing, we are only 2 blocks from where we used to live.  Our old house has been torn down to build a monstrosity, but the view doesn't look too different from my mother's front porch.  Neighbours walk past with their dogs, their kids on bikes.  Police swoop past on bikes or in patrol cars.  No horses sighted yet, but it feels like they could be on their way any time.

We're also back to recycling, the Toronto way.  Recycling, the Israel way, involves rounding up any bottles that don't have deposits and dumping them in the big communal recycle bin across the street. 

Why do Israelis hate you so much? Dealing with the cold shoulder.

Aliyah is hard work.  As far as I’m concerned, you deserve a medal just for considering it.  And hey, so do I.

But as far as the average Israeli is concerned… well, nope.  Nothing.  Silence.

Most Israelis are just going to give you the cold shoulder.  They won’t care that you’re an oleh.  They won’t be handing out hero cookies at the airport.

Many olim have been griping about this lately, and in a way, they’re right to complain.

Once you’ve been in Israel for a while, a refrain like this, from a fellow oleh, will start to sound very familiar.  I spotted one person’s sad message on Facebook this morning:

All our lives, we kept hearing “Come make aliyah”, “It’s your place, you belong here”... And than, once you arrive... “You made aliyah. Mazal tov, I’m busy.”

“Israelis you meet are nice and curious of your life and life decisions,” he wrote, “but that is it. Before each holiday. .. silence. We end being among other olim hadashim, because Israelis are busy. 

I’ve been here a year and 4 months. Every day, someone asks me why I made aliyah.  More and more, when I’m asked, I don’t remember the answer... I wish the same people would ask, “Do you want to join my friends and come to a movie, the theater, the beach, on a trip...?”

One man agreed, “It’s not easy to break into Israeli society.”  He’s been here for nearly 40 years, and most of his friends are still other Anglos.  (The blanket term for English speakers, no matter where they come from.)

5 ways Facebook will save your sanity during the aliyah process

If you're not using Facebook, I don't blame you.  I know a lot of people who have quit using it in the last couple of years - with great reason.

But I believe that Facebook, for all its evils, is a Very Good Thing to have in your life while you're making aliyah.

What are the evils?  Maybe you know about them already.

Facebook offers a weird combination of intimacy and distance.  I read a quote recently:  "I hate learning about major life events buried in a timeline between photos of fresh pedicures and pictures of lunch. When someone close to me has a baby or goes through emergency surgery, or suffers a loss, they deserve more than a Like."  (It's from the otherwise-blah memoir I Regret Nothing, by Jen Lancaster.)

Sound familiar?

The bad side of Facebook is that it gives you just enough superficial glimpses of a person's life to make you believe you know them... but not enough actual interaction to actually understand what they're all about.

"Facebook friend," you probably realize now, is something far, far less than a real friend.  It could even be shorthand for “someone I don’t know at all.”  So why keep it around at all?  Good question.

12 of the most surprising, tantalizing gifts from Israel–dirt cheap

Are you sick of all the standard, cliché Israel souvenirs:  olive wood plaques, “SuperJew” magnets, cheap metal kiddush cups?  Do you feel like a sucker every time you walk into a souvenir shop and pay too much money?

I know I do, and I’m not a tourist – I actually live here.  (Maybe you live here, too, and you wish there was something different you could bring back with you the next time you travel back to visit family and friends?)

I bet you wish there was something original you could bring them instead without spending a fortune.

Why not gift your friends and family where their stomachs are - with the gift of special foods from Israel? 

Here are twelve tantalizing suggestions to tickle their tummies:

1.  Bamba

These are Israel's most beloved snacks.  If you live in a major Jewish centre, then forget this one, because you can probably buy them closer to home.  If not, share the crazy novelty of Israel's beloved "peanut-flavoured cheesies," now also available with a variety of fillings.  There's also Bissli and other crunchy snack aisle faves to round out the gift basket.

2.  Olive oil

They're all local and delicious, so just pick the most beautiful or unusual bottle.  If you know someone who's in the know about olive oil, get them to introduce you to a truly special "vintage" or artisanal producer, or to an organization like Galilee Green, which is working to revitalize a regional economy.

3.  Fancy salts

Even the "plain" table salt we buy says it's from the Red Sea,

Bug OFF! More creepy crawly critters I’ve known in Israel.

If you're easily creeped out, maybe you'd better not read on.

Still here?

Good.  Because if you’re planning to move to Israel, you’re going to have to think about insects.

As I write this, I am literally pecking ants off my computer screen.  It's ANT SEASON here in Israel.

The first year we were here, a friend told us, "After Pesach, the ants come." 

I didn’t think she was lying to us, but really?  In Toronto, insects don't have a schedule.  Sure enough, though, days after Pesach, they arrived.  Right now, we’re in our second year, and, yes, in the middle of our second invasion by ants.

My 7-year-old son loves this, because it lets him make up rude rhymes for the song "The Ants Go Marching," in various multiples.  Me, not so much.

Ants, of course, are not the worst of it when you live in a hot desert-type country like Israel.  I guess the worst-case scenario would be the friend who got stung by a scorpion moving some furniture in his house.

Haveil Havalim, Parshat Shemini, the Fed-Up-To-Here with Matzah Edition

Yes, I am, and so are you.  I totally haven’t blogged this week (okay, month), and few other Jewish bloggers have been taking their blogs as seriously as they should.  Here are a few of the good guys who have kept at it against all odds…

By the way, if you’ve never enjoyed Haveil Havalim before, it’s a fantastic Jewish way to end/start your week.  And/or year, if you hold by the Torah perspective that the year actually begins in the month of Nissan!

What is HH?

It’s a weekly roundup of what’s new and great in the Jewish / Israel blogging world.  I host once a month to give you a taste of what other great blogs are out there that you might enjoy.  Hopefully, you’ll find some new favourites.

• Last week’s was skipped due to Yom Tov timing.

• Next week’s carnival host is still TBA.

• For more details, a complete schedule of future issues or to host an upcoming issue, please join the HH facebook group.

Don’t forget – the point of social media is… SOCIAL.  Stop by and visit some of the other blogs listed here.  Leave a comment to let them know you came from HH!

Normally, I divide these posts up by theme, but this week, let’s sort them by blogger.  Why the heck not???

Who knows ONE??

One is… Batya of Me-ander and Shiloh Musings, pretty much the Number One driving force behind Jewish blogging today.

What’s she posting about this week, in between seder preparations?

This… is how you should welcome olim

How will you be greeted when you finally arrive here in Israel?  Or, if you’re already here, how were you greeted?

Was it a depressing, bewildering, lonely aliyah story (I’ve heard my share of those) or an upbeat, thrilled, amazing aliyah story?

I really hope your story is as beautiful as that of friends of ours from Toronto (let’s call them Chana and Shlomo), who just arrived last week.   What made the difference for them? 

When you read her email, I think you’ll figure it out right away.

Happy Aliyah to me

Happy birthday to me .

Happy Aliyah on my birthday !

.........Happy Aliyah to me ‎!!!..........

Gift ideas for friends and family in Israel? Look no further!

How dumb is this post topic?  Who writes about gift-giving in January?

Right.  Yay!  Can you see my hand up, waving proudly, from all the way over here?

If I was a better, smarter blogger, more interested in dollar signs (and shekel symbols), I would have posted this in December.  Hmm… guess not.

And I could save it for December 2015, but really…?  The way my brain works, it’ll never happen if I put it off.

Anyway, I’m reminded of gifts today because our winter-holiday-seasonal gift arrived from Akiva’s sister in Canada. 

She mailed it on November 24th, and today it is January 27, so that’s a little over 2 months.  And I’m not saying what it cost to mail.  We’ll open it when the kids are home from school, and I can’t wait to see what’s inside.

So that’s one kind of gift.  Don’t get me wrong.  One of the highlights of living here is GETTING STUFF.  I love receiving packages.  Our local post office knows us well and I’m sure they have our number on speed-dial.

But there are other ways to send something special that feel just as “gifty” without breaking the bank on postage charges.

Giving or getting gifts to and from Israel can be a huge challenge, which calls for a little creativity.

Try an “intangible” gift that won’t take up space

If you’re in Israel and want to send gifts back to North America… (if you’re sending the other way, read on anyway)

Instead of buying something bulky and overpriced in Israel and paying more than you spent on the gift to ship it to North America or Europe, think about "intangibles" you can buy and ship for nearly free.

Some good ideas: