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.

Chanukah in Israel: why it’s simply better here

"Do they really celebrate Chanukah in chu"l???" (Outside of Israel - see this post!)

This Sunday, I brought English Chanukah songs for the girls I tutor.  One of them was amazed and asked me this outright.  She couldn’t believe that even in Canada, we celebrated Chanukah.

She knew that Jews everywhere celebrate most holidays, but Chanukah is so tied up in the Israeli psyche, our most nationalistic holiday besides Yom HaAtzmaut (Independence Day), that it must have seemed impossible to celebrate anywhere else.

And I have to admit: she’s right. 

Sure, you can celebrate Chanukah in chu”l, but you can’t feel it the way you do here.

I've always been humbug about Chanukah.  It's not that I hated it, but when we lived in Canada,

Haveil Havalim, Behar / בְּהַר Post-Party Edition

 

If you weren’t in Israel, you missed Yom HaAtzmaut.  Sure, you may have celebrated even if you don’t live here, as I did for many years before we made aliyah.  But I’m going to take the self-righteous leap and say that you haven’t truly experienced it if you haven’t been here.  It’s not just a party… it is a celebration of national pride, on a spiritual and physical level.  Awesome.

Now the party’s over, but don’t worry – there’s more fun coming, in the form of Lag b’Omer and then Shavuot.

So what are we doing here?  Hosting Haveil Havalim, of course!

This is a weekly roundup of what’s new and great in the Jewish / Israel blogging world.  If you haven’t checked out these great blogs yet, you really should. 

• Last week’s was hosted by Batya over at Shiloh Musings
• Next week’s will take place at Esser Agoroth.  Submit your posts to esseragaroth “at” gmail “dot” com.
• For more details and a complete schedule, please join the HH facebook group.

So while we’re recovering from the party (and waiting for the next one to begin) let’s check in with what’s late & great from around the Jewish World!

Normally, I split the links up into categories… but absolutely everything this week was about Israel, from start to finish.  As is probably fitting this week.  So I made up  my own “categories.”  Enjoy!

Setting off Fireworks

Before we came here, I always assumed there wouldn’t be fireworks in Israel.  I guess I figured there was too much stuff exploding as it is.  But as Batya points out in Yom Ha'Atzma'ut Explosion of Joy 66!, there’s also a spiritual side to the celebration.

Lemon Lime Moon comments on tensions that broke out during Prime Minister Netanyahu’s presence at a Yom HaAtzmaut ceremony over his decision to free prisoners in Netanyahu ' Honors' the Dead, saying “In what far out universe does one honor the dead by freeing their murderers?” 

The Spiritual Side

Yerushalayim wasn’t the only location liberated from Jordanian rule in 1967.  The ancient Biblical site of Shiloh was also reclaimed in the 6-day war, as Batya explains in Women, Join Our Rosh Chodesh Prayers at Shiloh HaKeduma, Tel Shiloh.  Join her each month in the monthly women’s Rosh Chodesh tefillah on Tel Shiloh, the site where the ancient Mishkan (tabernacle) rested for almost 400 years.  (I did!  It was great!)

Fascinating historical fact:  “it is no idle coincidence that the Treaty of London, which would drag Britain into the conflict after 75 years, was signed on Friday the 5th of Iyyar 5599 (19th April 1839), the same date and the same day of the week on which Israel would become independent 109 years later.” writes Devash in Restored-Jewish-Sovereignty-in-the-Land-of-Israel Day.

 

Getting Your Facts Straight

Still believe that “Israel was brought into existence by the European powers in order to ease their consciences after the horrors of the Holocaust were revealed”?  It’s a myth, says Brian (a fellow Feb 2013 NbN Go North pilot tripper, now living in the north!) in Misconceptions Concerning Zionism and Against Founding of Israel.  What are the other misconceptions?  Read it and be forearmed against those who would delegitimize Israel.

“The… adversarial statements by United States Secretary of State John Kerry…could be a harbinger of troubling times,” writes Brian, yet in Would Loss of American Unquestioned Support Destroy Israel? he says he’s unafraid.  Whether you agree or disagree, it’s worth a read.

As a victim of a past terror attack, Esser Agoroth also takes issue with the abuse of the rhetoric of terror in the recent death of 20-year-old Shelly Dadon, saying in his post Believe it or Not, Shelly Dadon was Killed by Arabs, not Jews, “To refer to graffiti, even to the slashing of tires and other vandalism as an act of terrorism is more than ludicrous; it is truly offensive.”

 

Simply Proud

Sure, we’ve all heard of SodaStream (now!), but I had no idea that Fiverr and many other companies are based in or were started in Israel.  Naomi Goldberg shares her favourites in 66 companies that make me proud to be Israeli.

Interested in exploring one of the country’s natural wonders?  The Eilat Coral Reef Reserve is a great place to start, writes tour guide David Ben-Sira.  It’s not overrun with tourists, he says, but there’s a snack bar and on-site gift shop, as well as changerooms with showers, so you’re never too far from civilization.

For me, being Israeli is still a strange, new thing.  Mostly good-strange, but sometimes disconcerting.  Two posts this week deal with different aspects:  one, Learning patriotism, for Canadian beginners., is all about my adventures in discovering patriotism (relatively) late in life, and the second, When chummus comes a-knocking… is a lighter comment on my distaste for this beloved national “dish.”

(Or Not)

“I do not celebrate the birth of the State of Israel, because I despise it,” writes Rafi Farber in Why I do not Celebrate the Birth of the State of Israel.  An unpopular sentiment, perhaps, but it’s seems that it’s more statehood that he opposes than Israel.  I’ll let you get the details from him – you may still disagree, but do read the piece before forming an opinion based solely on its (inflammatory) title.

Ariel ben Yochanan writes, “Let's call a spade a spade and say that these are pogroms!” in reply to some discouraging news in This Is Terrible!

The media here has been abuzz with an incident concerning the trial of David HaNahalawi, mainly because so many soldiers and civilians have reacted in unprecedented numbers through the semi-anonymity of social media.  Esser Agoroth stands with the soldier, saying “There are plenty of additional injustices being executed by the Israeli Government against its own constituents,” in I Stand with David the Nahal Brigade IDF Soldier!

The Israel Prize is the country’s highest honour, handed out once a year on Yom HaAtzmaut to to an Israeli citizen or organization who has “displayed excellence in their field(s), or have contributed strongly to Israeli culture.”  In The State of Israel Awards One of its Loyalists a Prize: Big Deal!, Esser Agoroth takes issue with one of this year’s selections.

The Sting with the Honey

The flipside of happiness is sadness, and there is plenty of it in Israel on Yom HaZikaron.  This country which we celebrate with joy was won with tears.  “All of the pain, all of those wonderful people dead,” says Batya in Understanding Israeli Independence, No Fairy Tale.

Sometimes, celebrating Israel comes down to the small “everyday” moments, touching ones and happy ones, as Mrs. S. asks, “What small yet meaningful moments defined Yom HaZikaron/Yom HaAtzma’ut 5774 for you?” in A Tale of Two Moments.

Hope you check out at least a few of these posts… and tell their authors HH sent you!  Remember to submit your posts for next week to esseragaroth “at” gmail “dot” com.

[photo credit:  Chris Young, via flickr]

When chummus comes a-knocking…

Ya know, it’s the worst cliché about Israeli society, but like many bad clichés, it turns out to be a true one: 

Israelis love them their chummus.

When I saw this truck parked outside our building this morning, I called Akiva to take its picture.  Just too funny to think about chummus being delivered to your door in just about the biggest truck I’ve seen since moving here.

I got so excited when I saw this. I imagined some sort of spigot at the back where you could just get the stuff on tap, but Naomi Rivka said, very seriously, "no, you need olive oil." Hmm... maybe from a separate tap?

In the crazy Adam Sandler movie, You Don’t Mess With the Zohan, he plays a chummus-obsessed former Mossad agent who moves to America and reveals that all he wants to do is style women’s hair.

And he LOVES chummus, at one point even going so far as to use it as a hair styling product.

In that, he’s a typical Israeli, which I suppose was the idea in the first place.

Me, I don’t even like the WORD chummus, because, in English-speaking countries, they call it “humus.”  Little suspecting that there is ALREADY a word “humus” in English, and this is what it looks like:

(photo credit:  Wolfgang Berger, via flickr)

Ew.  Just a little too close for comfort.

So even back in Canada, I made an effort to pronounce it right:  “chhhhhoooo-mooos.”  With a topping of “techeeeeena” - no Anglicized taheeeneee for me.

When we did our little home matzah-baking workshop before Pesach, I bought a variety of condiments for the kids to enjoy on their homemade matzah:  butter, cream cheese… and, as an afterthought, chummus.

Let me tell you, there was no other condiment in the WORLD, as far as the Israeli kids were concerned, that could top the chummus.   They didn’t even glance at the butter (my kids’ choice) or cream cheese; just shmeared their matzahs with great generous dollops of chick-pea lotion. 

Like, I had to bring out more knives so they could devour it with greater rapidity.  Children don’t lie:  they are the true harbingers of Israeli culture.

So this might be a good time to mention that I don’t like chummus? 

Not just the word, the foodstuff.  It’s not exactly true; I’m coming around and will tolerate a streak of it in a falafel or wherever.  Even better if it’s tinged with roasted red pepper or something else to give it an actual non-grimy taste.

You heard me – grimy.  And don’t tell me you can “brighten” the flavour with lemon juice, garlic, olive oil, paprika, hair tonic or puppydog toenails.   I have MADE chummus that other people have told me is fantastic, and I still didn’t like it.  So don’t tell me I haven’t met the right chummus yet.

My favourite homemade “chummus” back in Toronto, when I still had a food processor, was made with black beans.  Second best, kidney beans.  Actual chummus made with chummus aka chick peas aka garbanzo beans (ew, garbage-o beans!), came a very distant ninetieth.

Like humus, chummus is not particularly photogenic.  If you ask Wikipedia what it looks like, you’ll find out soon enough…

(photo credit:  Donovan Govan via Wikimedia)

(I love the looming shadow on that picture, as if the chummus is evilly plotting to kill you in your sleep.)

Various attempts are often made to disguise it with condiments.  These often end up just making things worse.

(photo credit:  Gilabrand via Wikimedia)

It seems that there is even no word for chick peas in this country – it’s all just chummus.  The bagged chick peas in the freezer section of the grocery store:  chummus.  The dried beans lurking on the shelf:  chummus.  I imagine if you could find them in tins, those, too, would be chummus. 

It’s all just chummus waiting to happen.

I know it’s ubiquitous throughout the middle east, but really, there is no more Israeli food than chummus.  It’s cheap, plentiful, supremely nutritious, savoury and goes with almost anything (if by “goes” you mean, “contributes a grimy taste”).

So in honour of Israel’s 66th birthday, let’s raise up a glass… of this quintessential Israeli food!  Or just style our hair with it and say le’chaim.  Oh, yummy yum.  I just can’t wait!

Learning patriotism, for Canadian beginners.

  To say I’ve been surprised by Yom HaAtzmaut isn’t quite true. 

All the chagim have been so much more vivid here that it stands to reason.  And this is THE chag, the Identity Festival that celebrates exactly what this little country stands for and all it’s accomplished in 66 short years.

Back in Canada, I noticed that I only really started taking Canada Day, the July 1st national holiday, seriously after we decided to make aliyah.  With a great big dollar-store flag flapping out front and crafts and activities for the kids (like this Canada Flag activity), we did more than most people I knew. 

Okay, we also did the obligatory Big Family BBQ.  Everybody does that, but it’s more about kicking off the summer than celebrating Confederation.

Every time we’d drive south of the border, even when it wasn’t July 4th, I was always struck by the number of flags and the sheer shamelessness of Americans, hooting and hollering about living in the greatest country in the world.

Canadians don’t do that. 

Oh, sure, I think most of us secretly believe it.  It’s a great country:  second-biggest in the world, unspoiled, beautiful, friendly. 

But in general, we will not crassly stick our nationalism in your face – even if your face is marching up and down the streets of our biggest city on our national holiday.  Fireworks and beer, yeah; flags and hoopla, no.

Face it:  Canada just doesn’t do patriotism very well.

We have earned our reputation as the meek among the nations of the world, never offending anybody (except people who don’t like beer or socialized medicine).  Standing in line.  Accommodating.  Apologizing.

I like to tell people here of the time I went shopping, shortly before making aliyah, and in the supermarket, my cart almost made contact with the cart of a woman going in the other direction up the aisle.  Almost; we almost touched carts.  And as we passed each other, like strangers in the night, we whispered to each other that most Canadian of utterances:  “Sorry…”

Yes, we both apologized, instantly and automatically – for NEARLY entering each other’s personal space.

Quebec is like Canada’s crass little brother in this regard.  Even though it’s technically part of Canada (and so, not a nation at all, really), each year on June 24th, they make a big blue and white to-do over their “Fête nationale” (national holiday), St. Jean Baptiste Day (its origin as a saint’s day reflects the province’s Catholic beginnings).

Outside of Quebec, the actual national holiday on July 1st gets considerably less attention.  Like I said, there seems to be the prevailing idea that if you like the country, you should keep those feelings tastefully pent-up inside. 

Oh, sure, buy a bunch of made-in-China flags and merch (hats, beer cups, tacky garden ornaments).  But don’t go too far overboard into thinking you or your country are something special.

Israel is a horse of a different colour.  A soos b’tzeva acher (סוס בצבע אחר = “horse of a different colour”), if you will… and that colour is firmly, starkly, proudly KACHOLAVAN.

Flags are everywhere.  Not just on government buildings, although they are all dolled up, of course.  Even the normally pretty dumpy streets of Kiryat Yam are all fancy, with that bunting stuff that flaps and rustles in the breeze.  Here’s Batya at me-ander blogging about setting up the flags at the store where she works.

(Flags are even on the challahs!  See this post for more.)

Passing through the Herzliya train station the other day, just an ordinary train station, and being literally stopped in my tracks by the beauty of the flags everywhere and what they stood for… goosebumps.

The whole country is covered in flag upon flag
The nation is dancing in wave upon wave
The nation is happy, the nation is glad
It is a festival today in Israel

כָּל הָאָרֶץ דְּגָלִים דְּגָלִים,
עַם רוֹקֵד גַּלִּים גַּלִים
עַם שָׂמֵחַ, טַף צוֹהֵל –
חַג הַיּוֹם לְיִשְׂרָאֵל.

Read and listen to a scratchy 1956 recording here.

Or watch it as part of a mix of Israeli “chag” songs here (starts at 2:15).

For one day, it seems, for all its flaws and hiccups; for all the bickering and disagreement, for all the pressure from every possible direction to be something else entirely… for one day, Israel is proud of Israel and all it stands for.

It’s nice.

In case you were hoping for something shocking, or controversial or au courant political insight (do you know me???) or at least a mild-mannered kvetch, don’t worry; all that will resume again in a couple of days.

In the meantime, I’m just proud to be Israeli… at last.

(Photo credit:  אורן פלס, Wikimedia)

Things that are cool in Israel #4: The Dude and the Drainer

Yom HaAtzmaut is coming – Israel’s Independence Day!  So it’s time to sing her praises.  Tra, la, la… here I go!!!

Praise #1:  Going Solar

In terms of natural resources, one thing Israel’s got plenty of is sunlight.  In the summer, probably TOO much, but that’s not entirely a bad thing.  Israel got into the solar water-heating thing very early on, and now you can’t go up and down a city block without seeing water heaters bristling on the roof of just about every building.

Apparently, 90% of Israeli homes have a solar water heater – or, in Hebrew, a “dude shemesh” (דוּד שֶׁמֶשׁ).  And now, so do we!

(The plain old word for water heater is “dude” / דוּד – you pronounce it just like he English word “dude” – phonetically, dood, to rhyme with “interrupting the post like this was very rude.”)

In the Merkaz Klitah, our electric dude was right in the apartment, and if we wanted hot water, we’d have to turn it on and wait 10-15 minutes.  It took me a few days to figure this out – when we first arrived, it was WAY too hot to think about heating up water, even for a shower (it wasn’t freezing cold out of the taps, anyway).

Here, we have a switch.  In the winter, like when we moved in, there isn’t quite enough sunlight for a steady supply of hot water.  These days, we don’t have to think about the switch… which means we’re saving a ton of money.

I love being part of a country where something like this – which would be revolutionary in Canada – is just a mundane feature of even the most junky, run-down apartments.

(Granted, in Canada, there’s not as much sunlight, so it would probably be silly to rely on it to heat a family’s entire water supply… for oh, about ten months of the year.)

Praise #2:  What’s this about Drainers?

Because so many people have raved about their dudes in past, and thus it has become kind of cliché, I thought I’d throw in a “bonus” rave, and here it is:  two-level dish drainers!

I bought a new one yesterday, having grown tired of our one-level drainer and wanting to move up in the world:

 

(excuse our post-Pesach kitchen “balagan”!)

This one is a sturdy plastic model; there are also metal ones available, but to me, the idea of metal and dripping water don’t mix.  No matter how “stainless” it is, I know at some point, there will be rust.

(Weird Word o’ the Week:  stainless steel in Hebrew = nee-rosta / נִירוֹסְטָה, a word I just figured out a few days ago is actually a non-Hebrew word combining the Latin-ish parts, “nee” (no) and “rosta” (rust).  Blah.)

Yeah, it’s kind of a yucky brown/beige colour.   I don’t know exactly why I think this is so cool, except for the fact that I’ve spent my entire life trying to fit stuff into a measly single-layer dish drainer, creating an effect my family refers to as the “Jenga” when anyone tries to get any one item out.

With this one, the layers are switchable, so if I decide I want cutlery and plates on the bottom, and pots / glasses on the top – la-bri’ut (“to your health” / לִברִיאוּת), as they say here when you sneeze.

Draining the Drainer

The only thing about this that is not cool is that it’s nearly impossible to buy a dish drainer that actually drains.  Unlike just about every model I ever saw in Canada, most come with a “tray” that sits underneath and catches the water.  Ew!  Why would you want to leave the water sitting to go moldy and make your cutlery stinky???

(I understand the utility of it if you’re drying dishes, say, on your bed or on a bookshelf… but in a kitchen, there’s almost always access to a sink, right?)

So if you peek underneath this new drainer, you’ll see that I have replaced the tray with one that actually drains, into the sink.  It’s not quite the right size, but given how long and hard I had to search for it, it will do for now.

Wow!  Usually, I only share ONE thing that’s cool in Israel… but this time, you’ve gotten not one (the dude), not two (the drainer), but THREE (the little language lesson about stainless steel).

To show your appreciation for this tremendous generosity, please Like, Share, Comment… let me know I’m not alone in my admiration for this great land of ours!