Well, I am leading quite a cushy life right now - just dealing with minor issues that come up with the Israeli applications, lull with Farber before the storm of the juniors starts in two weeks. I am on Ulpan hiatus until after Pesach; I could have continued in March but we have so many visitors coming that I felt I needed to take a little break to appreciate the visits. So going to the gym, doing ulpan homework and prepping for Farber with no pressure.
No one else in my family is so stress free. Hannah is in the middle of finals, which are nerve wracking and difficult, but she is doing really well. In Israel, they let you retake your finals so, while that might seem to lighten the burden in the abstract, in reality, you really don’t want to retake them and so don’t think that way. Hannah is operating in Hebrew and English at Tel Aviv University. She has written a paper in English and has some reading assignments in English depending on the subject. Lectures and exams are definitely in Hebrew. She has nine classes. ONE OF THE HIGHPOINTS OF MY LIFE was helping Hannah study for her Intro to Renaissance Art final. She aced it.
Seth is really busy with Pardes because he is working on a big project for them so he might be out of communication for a while. And Zoe is plugging away in school.
And so I am enjoying my time. Some of the wonderful visitors we have seen over the past two weeks have been LeahAnn Kleinfeldt, the Kornblums and Deb, Dalya and Jacob Apap. More people in town still and we will try to see them.
And last Sunday was a treat. There was a Hillel teachers’ trip in town and Seth had arranged for us to go out together on their night off. There were 8 of them -- Cathy Fridson and her husband, Howard, Pam King and her husband, Chris, Marisa Hernandez, Melanie Weber, and Dana Levy with her husband, Bruce -- and we really looked forward to seeing them. They left the restaurant choice up to us and we chose Crave in the shuk.
We figured they would want a very Jerusalem experience and Crave is the hot restaurant in the shuk, if not the city right now. They don’t take reservations and, like all restaurants in the shuk, it is really small. So I decided to show up early and camp out at the front door which did help a bit and we got a table for ten just as everything was filling up.
We figured they would want a very Jerusalem experience and Crave is the hot restaurant in the shuk, if not the city right now. They don’t take reservations and, like all restaurants in the shuk, it is really small. So I decided to show up early and camp out at the front door which did help a bit and we got a table for ten just as everything was filling up.
The food at Crave is very fun; very casual street food and the space has great energy with lots of Anglo help. Supposedly they have the best kosher Reuben sandwich in the world (people who have eaten it have concurred) and great pulled brisket and fish tacos. Seth and I split two things and we were tivoni (vegan) for the night. Then we walked around Ben Yehuda for fun. Here we all are. 
Plus there is the very happy picture of me and Dana, the very first employee at Ruby’s Balm, 
who is now a teacher at Hillel so Seth and I get to share her. She came with her husband, Bruce and we had a blast catching up.
Plus there is the very happy picture of me and Dana, the very first employee at Ruby’s Balm, who is now a teacher at Hillel so Seth and I get to share her. She came with her husband, Bruce and we had a blast catching up.
Some recent cultural highlights. Went to see a showing of Singin in the Rain (the movie) at AACI (Association for Americans and Canadians in Israel). Allison was my date and we brought the average age of the room down quite a bit, but it was fun. They have a movie maven who introduces classic movies that they show there as part of a series. We ended up liking his intro which had great anecdotes about the making of the movie and the perfectionism of Gene Kelly. Of course, we had seen the movie. It was just fun to see it again. I was reminded of an experience I once had when I was in Paris right after college. I saw a matinee of Bringing Up Baby (which is one of my favorite movies and also happens to be the source for George’s name) on a rainy day and felt very homesick for the USA. I did not feel homesick this time but when you are watching Singin in the Rain in a foreign country, you cannot help noticing how American it is. Is there a country in the world that makes such positive movies as old Hollywood? A fun time was had by all.
We spent a beautiful Shabbat at the Italian Synagogue. We met Batsheva Hadar and her husband, Avraham there upon their return from two months of summer in South Africa. We had arranged this date months ago during a dinner at the Italian Restaurant, Agas V’Tapuach. The owner is a friend of theirs and had mentioned that he reads Torah every year at his shul on the anniversary of his Bar Mitzvah. We were all invited to come hear Parshat Yitro and for the Kiddush following, with food provided by the restaurant. We saved the date because...well, why not?! It gave us an excuse to go to the Italian Shul without feeling like complete tourists. After all, we had an invitation.
The synagogue is beautiful and so unique
It was transported from Italy in the 1950’s and reassembled here to be used by the Italian community of Jerusalem. Here is a link with information. The women sit upstairs behind beautifully painted gold baroque wood work and we pushed out the screens during the Torah service to get a clear picture of everything below. I was not at all familiar with Italian traditions; Italian Jews are pretty rare and they have their way of doing things. It is not Sephardic; it is not Ashkenazi; it is Italian. As Seth explained, the Roman Jewish community is 2000 years old and has not been influenced by outside communities because things were just so good in Italy why would you do things differently?! In general, the tunes were not anything wonderful (Seth would disagree) except I did like the reading of the Haftorah which does sound substantially different and the Birkat HaKohanim (Priestly Blessing) was definitely different; the pressure is on the kohanim to really sing. They do Yizkor every Shabbat and read names of the deceased handwritten in a large book designating each Shabbat. Batsheva told me they actually say Yitzkor everyday but I do not know about that. As you would expect, they had the best dressed Torah I have ever seen. It wore the most gorgeous damask velvet covering and it takes a long time to undress it because it is wrapped in a wimpel (something else I have never seen). The highlight for me was when they opened the ark; it is over 350 years old and stunning. First there is the fabric covering which is pushed aside to reveal wooden doors that are BEYOND.
Someone then has to open these doors with a large old-fashioned key and then more fabric is revealed. This key is actually used during the service. As Batsheva said, “Very Old School.” The Gabai made the announcements in Hebrew and then Italian where there was much discussion of defibrillators. Zoe did some sleuthing at Kiddush and found out that someone had choked on lasagna the previous week and was recovering in the hospital.
Yonatan did a splendid job reading Torah (you might remember he has an amazing voice from the Chanukah blog where he lit candles in the restaurant) and an equally good job with the Kiddush: mini pizzas, fresh mini rolls with mozzarella and anchovies, mushroom and spinach quiche, caprese salad and delicious mini tartes of all sorts.
The Kiddush took place downstairs in a room covered in frescoes which doesn’t look like any synagogue I have ever been to. I wondered if the people there were really Italian. The first sign that they were is that when services ended, I heard the echo of “Ciao’s” around the room. Then we had the opportunity to speak over treats to someone who was a member of the community. He was an older gentleman, born in Florence, whose father was killed in the camps and he was a hidden child. I asked about the size of the community and he said there are about 500 Italians left in Jerusalem and around 10,000 in all of Israel. He said there are only about 40,000 Jews left in Italy so that puts the world population of Italian Jews at around 50,000. I felt as if I was talking to a rare African Rhino. And then I started thinking about how things would be different if Italian Jews had dominated early twentieth century immigration instead of Polish and Russian shteltl Jews. Think of the food and the architecture and the language! But, of course, that is ridiculous. Italian Jews were not leaving because life was good there. They weren’t stupid. So here we are with our cholent and gefilte fish. Sigh.
Guess who went to Bezek (the cable company) to return a router and deal with extraneous charges on our bill? Me. Ta da! In Hebrew. Ta da! The things that can make you happy on this kind of adventure, huh?
Apropos of nothing, I had my teeth cleaned. Nothing exciting but just as annoying in Israel as the States. Now I have been to a podiatrist, general practitioner, dentist and walk-in clinic and found all these experiences to be perfectly fine. Just saying.
It has been heating up here but the rains return later this week. Winter is not quite over yet.
Be Happy. It’s Adar ! / משנכנס אדר מרבין בשמחה
What Happens in Israel...
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