Gaya

Today Alanna Sklover and I went on a spontaneous study session at Tmol Shilshom downtown. We had a good time, and our waiter was hilarious; Alanna gave him a good tip. (She also wouldn't let the poor college student pay for the bread she ate :( ) On our ways home, we stumbled upon another cool little place called Gaya: The Art of Thinking. Basically, it's a store that sells wooden games and puzzles, but they also have a lot of games out for people to play. We played a few things, but I think the best were definitely our game of Tumica and the wine bottle puzzle. Alanna and I both joined their customer's club, and I'm definitely going back there. This is another time when I can't even explain how much fun it was.

Rosh Hashanah (part 2)

There was a rather stark contrast between the first day of my Rosh Hashanah and the second. First, I had two very different meal experiences. Saturday night, Sarah and I were paired with six girls from Neve, a women's seminary, at the home of an older couple, the Bornsons. The meal was very long--lasting from 21:00 - 23:30--but it didn't seem long at all. It was really my mental image of an Orthodox holiday meal, with the man sitting at the head of the table giving little bits of Torah thoughout the meal, but interactively. The meal was calm, everyone was nice, and the food was wonderful. It was also dairy, which made it even better for me because I didn't have to feel guilty for not being able to eat the food that the family had prepared.

Lunch today was also dairy, but otherwise it was a very different experience. Our hosts were also older, but four of their nine childen were there (ages 15 and up) along with two of their grandchildren (12 and 15). Before the meal one of their daughters (19) was teasing her nephew (15) and mock-arguing about whether girls were smart enough to learn Gemara, which (as Sarah pointed out) was even more amusing once you remembered that she's his aunt. There was also a lot of Hebrew being spoken there, since our hosts' son-in-law doesn't speak English. I was rather proud of my ability to catch a lot of what he was saying, even though I missed a key word that changed the meaning of the whole thing. On the other end of the table, the (grand)mother was telling us family stories--how she made aliyah, why she had kids, etc. There was still Torah, but it wasn't so prevelent and the meal was much shorter. Once again, the food was amazing.

I did decide to go to the Kotel for davening this morning and there was a ruach-filled group of guys there, but at 8:00 they were already davening mussaf. However, I did get to hear U'netaneh Tokef, which I love depite--or even because of--it's powerfully morbid translation. I had my moments of connection at the wall, but I also discovered that it doesnt have the same power over an extended period of time as it does over a short visit. As shocking as it may seem, I think I had a more meaningful Rosh Hashanah at Brandeis than I did in the Old City.

And now, it is bedtime. Dev has a test at 8am and needs to sleep whether she is tired or not.

Rosh Hashanah (part 1)

Rabbi Marcus said that the goal of the Heritage House Rosh Hashanah in the Old City was to make it “the best Rosh Hashanah of your life.” It’s not doing it for me. It’s just not. Several points which are making this the case:

- The mechitza. I’m usually okay with mechitzas, but this one is a solid grey curtain going all the way to the front. It doesn’t bother me so much that I can’t see the guys—well, except for when the guys are singing and no one on the women’s side is. But what bothers me is the fact that I can’t see the Torah, or the ark for that matter. How can I stand in front of an open ark when I can’t see the ark in the first place? What goes does hearing the Torah reading do if I can’t see the actual Torah. Forget for a moment that it would never happen in an Orthodox synagogue, but how do I know they’re not just reading out of a chumash? I need to make a connection to the Torah and the ark in order for Rosh Hashanah to be meaningful. I need to see these things, and it’s not happening there.

- Last night we were set up in pairs with families for dinner, and the wife of the family I was with didn’t get side down for dinner! “NAME, we need two more plates.” “NAME, water.” All the time she was bringing things in and out, and it wasn’t just the husband who was acting like this, it was the other guests, the friends of the family! When I asked her if she ever got to sit down, she said “Maybe once the kids go to bed, but it’s fine. I like it this way.” She didn’t look happy, nor was the majority of her in-and-out due to kids. Her husband never offered to help, nor did the other guests. What is this? Why can’t she sit down to her own Rosh Hashanah dinner? It bothered me.

- I’ve also been hearing a lot of bigoted opinions this Shabbat. A couple times a Muslim family walked by and the guest who sat next to me muttered as soon as they walked by. “I’m fine with them, but I don’t want them as my neighbors! Why can’t they stay in their own quarter?” (Sound like 50s/60s era America, anyone?) A couple of times they mocked Conservative Judaism, but those comments were at the other end of the table so I didn’t quite catch what was being mocked, other than a rabbi taking a tourist group to see a church. Sarah, the other student, and I got asked if we wanted to make aliyah, and one person asked me why I didn’t want to, but I didn’t feel like I could reply. This was the first time I’ve ever felt that I had to be closeted about being Conservative--let alone everything else I have to be closeted about!

There are also smaller things. There are also classes upstairs during the repetitions of the amidah—“when the service seems like it goes on forever”—and the entire women’s section empties at that point. Until then, it’s too crowded. Pages are called whenever they change, and if we get reminded to say “Adonai” instead of “HaShem,” or to stay out of the aisle during the Amidah so women can get out (which doesn’t happen, btw), I’m going to scream. I don’t know what I’m going to do about tomorrow. I can’t concentrate in there. I’m thinking of going to the Kotel and davening by myself. Maybe I’ll be lucky and there will be a group of particularly loud, ruach-filled men there and I can follow along with them.

Shopping in Israel

Shopping in Israel is a cultural experience in itself. I never thought I'd say this, but the salespeople here make Jim--our most enthusiastic salesperson at FDB--look like a kitten. (Meow.) They're pushy! I keep saying that I'm not going to buy anything that I don't really love, but twice now I've felt pressured enough that I couldn't really say no. Both involved sellers bringing down their prices--a skirt from 60 to 45, and a pair of shoes from 100-something to 80. I'm left questioning both purchases.

I'm basing this post on two experiences, a trip to a Druze village on the way to Kibbutz Hannaton and my first visit to the Machane Yehuda shuk today. "Good quality, good quality." "Take two, I give you deal." "Here, here, take, take." "Come, come." "Follow me." They like to repeat things, and if you start pulling away, they just insist more. It's so hard! Devorah Kramer, another RIS student, said that it's what makes them good salespeople, but I've never seen anything like it in the US. I thought Jim was pushy!

The shuk needs an entry of its own, but I'll have to make due with someone else's youtube video. One street, thousands of people, more fruit than I've ever imagined in one place:

(I didn't spend that much time near the fish. I was having trouble with the smell alone!)

I couldn't have been there more than an hour, but I left exhausted anyway. For $47 I managed to buy: ten pitot (5 NIS), a pomegranate (2 NIS), a large container of grapes (13 NIS), two dragonfuit (one red, one Costa Rica) to bring to my Rosh Hashanah hosts so I can be selfish and save my challah for myself (10 NIS), a pair of off-white pants (20 NIS), a pair of Wal-mart quality white, non-leather shoes for Yom Kippur (40 NIS), and a pair of black sneakers (80 NIS). The sneakers are my second questionable purchase because they only had them in velcro. I'm not sure how I feel about having velcro shoes--sort of like I'm back in elementary school--but it is true that my shoelaces won't come untied this way, and it's got to be better than shoes with holes in them (read: my current pair). And if worst comes to worst, 80 NIS is only about $21 and there are about a million shoe stores on Yaffo street (which the salespeople made me forget in the moment, of course).

There's also a store across from the shuk that looks to have some pretty good skirts for 30 NIS, but by the time I got back there I was exhausted and my hands were full of packages. Next time.

Overall, I would call today's trip successful. I am very glad to have found a place where the rotten exchange rate doesn't make everything too expensive for Walmart-price-cheapy me. I do wonder, though, whether time will make me resistant to Israeli salespeople or whether I'll always be this much of a push-over.

Challah baking

This afternoon, Rebbetzin Tspora Dahan from the JSSC invited students to her house to bake challah. I am thoroughly exhausted, and there were seven of us working on it! I can't imagine how the rebbetzin--or anyone else, for that matter--does it alone. Granted, we did a double batch, but in order to do the challah blessing you need 2kgs of flour worth of dough. That's a lot of challah. That's a whole lot of challah.

We made challah at Brandeis once, but it was interesting to do it in an Orthodox setting. We learned about sifting the flour, checking the eggs for blood, putting the raisins in water so that any bugs float to the top, and of course the challah blessing. This is all stuff we didn't do at Brandeis. Oh, the complexities of religious life...

I made two round challot with cinnamon sugar on top for a sweet new year. One will probably be my breakfast over Rosh Hashanah, and the other will go to my Rosh Hashanah meal hosts.

Update on Naftali

When I got to Hebrew University today, I found that someone had already fed the cats—as it turns out, the librarian that my law librarian was filling in for that time. I asked her about Naftali; apparently he was his regular self today. He’s not healthy and they know that—he has his good days and his bad days. Yesterday happened to be one of his bad days. The librarians have know him for years; I’ll have to trust them.

There’s another cat here, a small black kitten, who’s also rather affectionate. She purred for me this morning, and the librarian told me that she is sick (though, I couldn’t tell) and has been taken to the vet and given some antibiotics. She’s going to be adopted by someone because she’s not suited to life as a stray. Lesson learned: the law librarians really take care of these cats. I don’t need to worry about them. Right?

Kibbutz Hannaton

I spent this weekend at Kibbutz Hannaton, the only Masorti kibbutz in Israel, on a Shabbaton sponsored by the Fuchsberg Center for Conservative Judaism. Overall, I enjoyed the Shabbat. I met a few new people--a girl named Beverley and Eitan Marks, the brother of an acquaintance from Brandeis--and had a pretty relaxing Shabbat. Services were a lot better than last week. I led weekday Mincha for the first time since high school, and the guy who led Kabbalat Shabbat used the Carlibach melodies, which I love. The food was pretty good, too, if a bit spicy. I discovered rice with raisins in it (not one of the spicy things) and had my first ever Shabbat where seuda shlishit had the best food.

I don't quite understand what is kibbutz-like about Kibbutz Hannaton. The kibbutz recently privitized, so everyone has their own income and owns their own home and people don't eat together in the Chedar Ochel anymore. A dairy farm provides the kibbutz's income, but only one member of the kibbutz works at the farm. As far as I could see, the only communal thing is the land, and the kibbutz just happens to own this dairy farm.

Speaking of the dairy farm, we were given a tour of it on Saturday afternoon. Overall, I was impressed. When I think of farm animals I imagine those stories of chickens who can't even move their wings, but these cows had lots of room to move around. Our guide said that the cows are kept happy, if only because those commercials are true--good dairy products come from happy cows. (And happy cows come from Kibbutz Hannaton?) The only thing that really bothers me is what they do with the calves. A calf was born about twenty minutes before we got to the farm, and the workers took him away from his mother before he could even stand. Since he's male, the kibbutz won't keep him--he'll be shipped off to become somebody's hamburger or veal dinner. The poor little cow! He didn't even stand a chance. Of course, after the tour of the dairy farm, we all throughly smelled like cows. I think the bugs also thought we were cows; I have five bites on one arm alone.

I also learned a bit about teaching styles this Shabbat. Rabbi Romm, the rabbi of the Fuchsberg center and a founder of the Masorti movement, invited a rabbinical student named Adam to join us for the Shabbat. Since it was a shabbaton, there were multiple learning sessions. Before Adam started his, he said something really interesting. I've been having trouble with Rabbi Romm's lectures, and Adam pointed out why: while Adam teaches about things he finds problematic, Rabbi Romm teaches about things he finds interesting. That's why Rabbi Romm's lectures are so light, and he can go off on so many tangents--it's not that he's really wandering off topic as he's providing more "interesting" tidbits about an "interesting" subject. This is the first time I've encountered this kind of teaching; I'm used to--and I think I much prefer--shiurim about the things that are problematic.

If this trip happens every semester, I think I'd like to go again next time. I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Next Shabbat--Rosh Hashana in the Old City!