Talking to Haredim (badly) about coronavirus

Disgusting... horrifying... sickening...
I’m sure you’ve noticed all the pictures in the media, in Israel and beyond, of haredim ("ultra-orthodox Jews") defying lockdown orders, congregating in public, hanging out in minyans and yeshivas, not wearing masks?

I have.
I've been shocked, horrified, disgusted.

But then I sat down with it for a bit and really thought things through.

One of the things I had to learn during my Master's degree, and for some of my other writing, is seeing the missing pieces of the puzzle.  Who or what aren't you considering in your sweeping generalizations?

This is called academic honesty, and the media could seriously use some of it these days.

Why are we so bad at talking to strangers?

Another thing making me rethink this is Malcolm Gladwell's recent book Talking to Strangers (affiliate link), which is all about how we have trouble communicating with people who are unlike "us" -- however we define "us" at any given moment.  And about how these communication problems lead to bigger problems, possibly even the spread of pandemics.

(My conclusion, not his; his is

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

My vacation in Mecca, or why I’m saying bye bye to Airbnb

I’ve always loved Airbnb, a site that made it super-easy for anyone and everyone to rent out their place and make a little money on the side (or a lot – I know for lots of people it’s an actual business at this point). 

But I abruptly quite loving them today, following the announcement that they’ll be blocking listings from Jews in disputed areas of the West Bank.

Why?  According to NGO Human Rights Watch, who undoubtedly has advised Airbnb every step of the way, it’s mainly because “Palestinian ID holders are effectively barred from entering” these areas (just as they can’t enter many parts of Israel).  Because the Palestinian Authority have utterly failed, since the initial hope of Oslo, to reach any kind of peace agreement – not tried and failed, but simply failed due to power hunger on the part of their leadership.

When I read about all of this this morning, frankly, I was astonished that I had an opinion at all.

I didn’t used to.

You have to understand that I was a very bad prospective olah, in that I didn't really know anything about Israel before we came here.

I probably couldn't have found Haifa on a map.  Let alone Beer Sheva, Netanya, Ramat Gan and a whole bunch of other towns that I now know as well as the suburbs where I grew up.

Which also meant I couldn't tell the difference, politically, between Chevron and Rechovot, between Efrat and Eilat, between Kochav Yaakov and Kochav Yair (okay, to be fair, even born Israelis get those two mixed up!).

I always figured that if I lived in Israel, the "situation" here would make a lot more sense.  I would know what "settlements" people were talking about and understand whether they were right or wrong and which were the good bits of the country and which weren't.

I’m a lot less naive now. 

But even so, I certainly couldn't claim to know more about how to fix the situation than anyone else.  So the fact that Airbnb, like the EU, is announcing that they have the answer, and that the answer is to label different parts of the country in different ways to call attention to the political situation… well, that’s astonishing. 

• It’s astonishing that they

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

Comparing healthcare systems–Israel vs Canada

I got a great question from a reader today – I love hearing back from you! – and I thought I’d share it once I was done writing back.  The reader asked, based on my experience with healthcare in Canada and Israel, how I’d compare the two.

It’s actually something I haven’t put a lot of thought into.

As Canadians, socialized health care wasn't such a big transition for us.  American friends have had a variety of reactions, from giddiness that they wouldn’t go bankrupt trying to stay healthy to… well, I don’t think I’ve heard of any who really had a hard time adjusting, so I don’t know what the worst-case scenario is.  I suppose for people coming from the U.S., there may be longer waits and more of a “socialized” feel to things here, if that makes any sense.  But most, as I said, are far too delighted that the safety net exists here to worry about the nitpicky details.

Also, full disclosure:  baruch Hashem (ptoo, ptoo, ptoo!), we haven't had to have a lot of contact with the healthcare system.  However, although we’ve had no major health problems, we have all seen a variety of specialists, done the basic urgent care visit for little-kid stitches, non-emergency hospital visit, and routine health things as well.  Mostly, if it has been harder here, it is because of difficulties with the language, not the system.

A few particulars that I’ve found are different here:

• Israel is more complicated in terms of choosing a kupat cholim (healthcare plan) and package. 

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.

Israel NGOs: Riding tigers down the road to hell

A stabber got loose in Tel Aviv this week.  An 18-year-old man ran amok and stabbed some people and thank God, nobody died, but please don't think that's the point and the incident is over now because nobody died.  Four people were wounded, which is important to remember, but there's an even bigger lesson to be learned here.

The man - 18 is a man, I guess, technically - was a Palestinian man.  He was brought to Tel Aviv.  He was brought there by an NGO called "Natural Peace Tours," which honestly, I would have sworn was a made up name, it's so hokey.  It was their mission, apparently, to bring Palestinians to Israel for what this article calls "grassroots negotiations."

Grassroots negotiations?

First of all, let's be very clear:  "grassroots negotiations" is nothing, because anyone "grassroots" isn't in a position to either offer anything or give anything in return.  So through this NGO, let's face it, you're not negotiating.  At best, you're having coffee with someone, and that's very nice, I support that, but maybe - just  maybe - they could have thought about whether it was safe to do what they were doing.

(“grassroots negotiation” in action)

When I mentioned this incident to a dear friend who lives outside of Israel, complaining about starry-eyed and idiotic NGOs, she said that at least they mean well.  Which I am absolutely sure they do.

But to be honest: I have less patience these days with people who mean well. 

The moral high road to hell

I always used to think the expression "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" meant that people were innocently trying their best and somehow missing the mark.  I thought it meant that nice people who had good intentions were sometimes ineffectual.  But how could you really blame them?  After all, they're NICE people.  And they mean well.

What I believe these days about the expression is different. 

Things that are weird in Israel #17: Bread, bread, everywhere.

This picture is sadly pretty typical for our neighbourhood.   There is bread on the ground, on sewer covers, almost literally everywhere.

Luckily, I knew about this before I came to Israel.  According to halacha, you’re not supposed to throw away useable bread – which is defined as anything bigger than a kezayis (olive-sized piece) worth.  (This may apply to other food as well.)

What this means, in practice, is that all over Israel, instead of throwing away bread, people leave it out (as seen here), or leave it in plastic bags, hanging from recycle bins, dumpsters, and other public spots while the contents get moldy, slimy, and disgusting.

Ostensibly, if it’s laid out like this, then people are feeding animals (presumably birds?) with it, rather than wasting it.  But the birds here are kind of picky, and judging from the mold on these rolls, not all that interested in everybody’s cast-off crusts.

I believe it’s a very good thing to think of bread as something special, as something holy, even.  We should put in time and effort to make it.  We should make it as healthy and delicious as possible, and savour it while we’re eating it.  Bread is absolutely one of the holy things.  Mahatma Gandhi said “There are people in the world so hungry that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.”

But you know what’s holier than bread?  Israel.

Duh.

Who Israel has instead of rock stars and supermodels (and why I’m glad)

Sure, supermodel Bar Refaeli captures her share of headlines here.  But you know who's a real celebrity in this country?

I'll tell you.

I was sitting down this afternoon in a little cafe in the mall, revving up my voice recorder, buffing up my pen & notepad, or whatever I do before an interview… when I noticed a woman standing outside the cafe, staring intently. 

After a second, she started waving - at the guy I had come to interview.  She waved timidly at first, shyly, and then a little more crazily when she saw that he'd spotted her there.  "Todah," she mouthed at him.  "Todah."  Thanks.

"He's like a rock star here," said the translator.

I nodded, numb, amazed.

Who was this instantly-recognizable mega-star that I had come to interview?

It was this guy:

What’s that you say?

Exactly!  Yeah, this guy.  (The one in the vest.  No idea who the guy in the white kippah could be.)

Yup, him.  Desmond Tutu’s buddy.

Haveil Havalim: Bye-bye, Beha’alotcha

Yup, I’m super, super, super… late.  This will be my last time hosting Haveil Havalim, but I apologize to those who submitted posts for my lateness; it was not intentional.  I was supposed to post motzaei Shabbat, and it totally slipped my mind.

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.

• Next week’s carnival will be hosted by the indomitable Batya over at Shiloh Musings

• 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!

 

How is 2015 different from 2005?

The good (?) news is that there aren’t a lot of people participating in HH, or any other collective bloggy endeavour, these days.

Is this because personal blogs are “over,” at least in some way?  It’s possible.  It’s hard to believe that people in 2015 aren’t as interesting as they were in 2005, the heyday of blogging.   In fact, I don’t believe it.

Haveil Havalim, the Emor Extravaganza

Well, no, it’s not an extravaganza at all. It’s me being a day late and probably also a dollar short, but there it is and here we are with my monthly (but it happens weekly!) roundup of All Things Good in the Jewish blog world.

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 hosted by Batya over at Shiloh Musings

• Next week’s carnival host is TBD

• 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!

It’s actually been kind of a busy week, as Jewish bloggers around the world start waking up again after Pesach.  Shavuot is not the same kind of scary spectre… a quick 1-day (or, here in Israel this year, 2-day) experience rather than the full 8 days, and no significant cleaning or kashering to be done. 

And, of course – spring.  Spring is here, for however long it decides to stick around.  Despite the mournful overtones of sefirah, I really do enjoy this time of year.  Hope you’ll enjoy this bloggish roundup!

Essential phrases you must know in Israel: Chafetz Chashud / חֵפֶץ חָשׁוּד

Stop!  Before you put that backpack down for a second… don’t.

Israelis are, shall we say, just a little bit touchy about unattended luggage, purses, backpacks, of any kind. 

Leave it alone for more than a few seconds and it’s automatically reclassified.  It’s no longer your stuff… it becomes a חֵפֶץ חָשׁוּד / chafetz chashud = suspicious object.  And that is something everyone here takes very, very seriously.

Here is the entire Kotel / Western Wall complex shut down because of a chafetz chashud:

Can you spot it in this picture?

Some moron put down a backpack and walked away… and the entire place had to be evacuated.

When you do leave something behind by accident, Israelis are very vigilant.  It starts so quietly you might not notice, but the reaction is almost immediate:  “Whose bag is this?”

If it’s your bag, you’d better claim it, and fast, because soon enough, everybody will be chiming in trying to figure out which dummy has left a potentially suspicious object lying around.

Ultimately, the chain of inquiry can lead to your bag being exploded for you

Beyond required reading: REVIEW of Catch the Jew, by Tuvia Tenenbom

Catch the Jew! by Tuvia Tenenbaum (Gefen Publishing House:  2015) is not only required reading, it's enlightening reading.

Did you ever wish there was somebody who could talk to ANYBODY who would run around making sense of the Middle East so you don't have to?

I know I have.

And then, did you wish they'd make it fun to read so reading all about it didn't feel swallowing taking some kind of dull, boring medicine?

I’ll tell you the truth:  I wasn’t looking forward to reading this book.  I picked it up in a bookstore because it was only 70nis.  For an English book of this size, that’s a great price.  “That’s a lot of book!” I thought, excitedly.  But then I realized that it was about Israel, and politics, and it had a goofy cartoon on the cover, and I groaned inside.

(The cover for the Hebrew version is a little less goofy, but also strange…)

But once I started reading it, reluctantly, once I’d read everything else I had on hand, I was immediately sucked into Tenenbom’s world.

You might not like what Tuvia Tenenbom has to say, or who he rubs shoulders with in his new book Catch the Jew!, but if you're interested in Israel and Judaism today, you'll want to read it anyway.

Tenbenbom, born and raised Hareidi in Israel, but who has lived as a non-religious Jew in the U.S. and Germany most of his adult life, is a modern-day chameleon. 

If this is Sunday, it must be Monday: getting to know the days of the week in Israel.

I dreamed I was back in Toronto. 

My mother was driving me to her house and I was trying to tell her she was allowed to turn right, which you're only allowed to do in her area when traffic isn't busy.  But I couldn't find the word - in English.  Finally, I blurted out, "It's not... a weekday!"

The word I was trying to remember?  "Weekend," of course.

I said a while ago that this is just something you have to get used to here.  And that we actually DO have something like a weekend, except on Fridays.

But that doesn’t make it any easier to start the week on Sunday.  There’s something abrupt, almost rude, about “putting away” Shabbos the minute it goes out. 

In Canada, we could maybe leave the dishes, not sweep up, whatever it was, until the next day.  The next day was Sunday, and we knew we’d have time to do stuff.

Sunday = Day One

Here, Sunday is not only a regular weekday… it’s the first day of the week.

That may seem obvious.  If you went to Hebrew school, you’ll know already that instead of fun Norse god-based names like Friday and Tuesday, the Hebrew days of the week are droningly simple:  Day One, Day Two, Day Three and… you get the picture.  The only exception is Day Seven, which is called “Shabbat.”

Trouble is that in Canada, in the back of my mind, the days of the week ALSO had numbers.  Very powerful number associations that I really never thought much about. 

Haveil Havalim, the Yikes-it’s-Yitro (Yisro) Edition

Parshas Yisro (Parashat Yitro) already???  Know what that means? 

Yes, the firecrackers going off every 15 minutes in our neighbourhood tell us that even though Tu b’Shvat is just over, the Purim train is on its way… with the inevitable “caboose” that is Pesach. 

(Love the Israel quote up above?  Find it and 8 other mind-blowing quotes about Israel here.)

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 hosted by Batya at Shiloh Musings 
• Next week’s carnival host is Paula, at A Soldier’s Mother.
• 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 (huh?  really??).  Stop by and visit some of the blogs listed here.  Leave a comment to let them know you came from HH!

This week’s roundup is kind of rabbi-heavy and a little on the eclectic side… but all Jewish.  Just the way I like it!

Jewish Food & Books

Yes, there’s a Kosher Cooking Carnival (KCC) coming up in Adar (and I’m hosting it over at my Adventures in Breadland site), but just in case you’re hankering in the meantime…

Haveil Havalim – the Vayechi Vantage

Welcome!  If you’ve never enjoyed Haveil Havalim before, it’s a fantastic Jewish way to end/start your week.  This quote is a terrific way to start of the month of January, which brings (on the 19th, in the U.S.) Martin Luther King day.  Find this and 8 other mind-blowing quotes about Israel here.

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 hosted by Paula, at A Soldier’s Mother.
• 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!

This week’s selections are completely awesome.  Sharing what’s great about Israel and Jewish life in a way I’m sure you’ll love.

 

Trivial pursuit? Humiliating Hebrew fail.

For most people, Shabbos is a time to relax after a crazy week. 

But not for my husband Akiva!  Not since I started challenging myself to read and translate the Hebrew trivia questions at the back of the weekend paper. 

I’m terribly bad at trivia, and Akiva isn’t much better, though he knows almost anything to do with movies.  So naturally, we go at it now every single week. 

I read the questions in Hebrew, translate them the best I can, and he attempts to answer.  Often, the questions are some obscure Israeli thing like “who is Moshav Kipnitzky named after?”  To which he’ll answer “Shmuli Kipnitzky,” which is never the right answer. 

Wanna see something cool? (hint: it's a book, but it's not by me)

Know what this is?

It’s a book.  But more importantly, it’s OUR book.  Well… I will actually bow out here and admit that it’s my husband’s book.  All I did was edit the thing and write an intro. 

It’s like the difference between being a midwife and actually giving birth yourself.  The lines get blurred a little; you’re both exhausted and covered in goop by the end of the process, but ultimately, I must hand the credit back to him.

Here’s the book description:

How do you write a book about something as momentous as moving to Israel? One Facebook post, one bus ride, one limonana at a time.
In this remarkable journal of one family's transition to a new land, you'll see the daily side of the holy land revealed for all its laughter and tears.

9 mind-blowing quotes you’ve never heard about Israel and aliyah.

What is the world saying about Israel??  Those who are brave enough to admit the truth are saying exactly what they’ve said all along. 

Here are 9  quotes, arranged from oldest to newest.

1. “The Jew - is the symbol of eternity. ... He is the one who for so long had guarded the prophetic message and transmitted it to all mankind. A people such as this can never disappear.” – Leo Tolstoy, 1908 (read the full quote here)
2. "The road to national rebirth is a hard one, but there is no other.” – Aaron David (A.D.) Gordon, 1920 (read more quotes here)
   
3. “I had faith in Israel before it was established; I have faith in it now.” – Harry Truman, 1948

Picking an Israel-friendly name for your Jewish baby.

Quick!  Think of the first three Hebrew names that come to mind.

Maybe Sara?  Rivka?  Or, for a boy, Aharon or Daniel?  Uri or Riva?

Lots of Jews outside of Israel are looking for either an edgier or more contemporary Israeli name, like Eitan or Ma’ayan, Alon or Ariel (for a girl or boy), Gil or Carmi.

Having had a lot of Jewish kids (okay, four) of my own, I thought I knew a lot about Hebrew and Jewish names.  And I was pleased that we had picked names that would “fit in,” Naomi (NR) and Gavriel (GZ), both slightly traditional but modern enough (I thought).

Turns out I know nothing.

Nothing in North America could have prepared me for the deluge of real, modern Israeli names.

The most popular name in GZ’s class is “Nehorai” (נְהוֹרַאי) a name I had never, ever heard before.