Happy Purim!!

Well Purim is here, the first holiday since Chanukah and and we wanted to share something with you.

Among the many traditions that are celebrated for the holiday, the custom of dressing up is taken to a whole other level in Israel. It seems that every Halloween store in the US sends extra stock in March to Israel, it's very strange watching Haredim in Mea Shearim shop for costumes for their children with Scream masks in the background.

Tonight was the first Magillah reading (the book of Ester), with a Purim shpeil to go with it prepared by the students of my Yeshiva. It was a riot, one of the students in my class is a budding-film maker and showed some of his films (His big film can be seen here http://hamansong.com/).

The three other major traditions of the holiday are:
1. Matanot L'evyonim (money/food for the poor)
2. Mishloach Manot (sending food to your friends for them to use in their Purim meal)
3. The Purim Seudah (festive meal, much like the other festival meals, but with Hamentashen)
Basically the idea is to remember other people while we are enjoying the holiday. That and the Megillah itself mentions these concepts.

Tomorrow morning is another recitation of the Megillah and then we are off to Ramat Beit Shemesh for the weekend. On Sunday, Jerusalem celebrates Purim, Shushan Purim, (actually it's all weekend long) so we are going to one of Naomi's Rabbi's house, to celebrate with his family. Jerusalem does it on the day after the rest of the world because it was/is a walled city.

It's a pretty special time in Israel, the whole country has been eagerly anticipating the holiday. I'm sure during our previous descriptions of the holidays, you've understood that there really is nothing like holidays in Israel, and Purim might be the most radically different of them all. It's a holiday that reaches across religious boundaries, it doesn't matter how observant one is, it seems that the whole country is celebrating together.

On an unfortunately sad note, today Naomi's great-uncle Billy (grandpa Julie's brother) passed away. Uncle Billy was a very special man to the entire Oppenheim family, having never married or had children, his nieces and nephews, and great nieces and nephews were a huge part of who he was. I (Naomi) have great memories of him laughing and making fun with us during all sorts of occasions. It seems very appropriate for Uncle Billy to pass away near Purim, despite that he was not religious, because Purim is a time of making fun and "turning things upside down" and in all my memories of him that is what he did. He always had the funniest smile on his face and always made what seemed straight, sound hysterically crooked. Uncle Billy was also a decorated WWII veteran who had lost much of his hearing as a result of an explosion going off too close to him, sometimes making conversations with him even funnier- and I promise you he would not have had it any other way. Uncle Billy we love you very much and we will miss you greatly. (His funeral will be this coming Monday in Virginia in our family plots.) Baruch Dayan Emet.

I hope to post again on Sunday catching up a few posts I've been meaning to write with some pictures of our adventures in the past month of so.
So till then, Purim Sameach (Happy Purim)!

A Great Israel site

I recently found a wonderful website that really shows some of the picturesque sights we see when touring the country.

http://israelthebeautiful.blogspot.com


Maybe I'll eventually learn how to take pictures like these:

Israel to Mass-Produce Electric Cars

I just saw an article on the Jerusalem Post website that Israel announced a plan to mass-produce electric cars, and hopes to be fully on electric cars by 2020. In a country that has no oil and imports 100% of it, I can't believe it's taken so long.

If you can watch the video on the website, you should. Go to jpost.com and underneath the main picture should be a link to the article. If not, you can read about it here.

I'm very excited about it. We currently (not that we own a car) pay close to $6.00 a gallon (though since the Dollar's been dropping it's probably closer to $5.00/gallon.

Birthday Fun

Today was quite a day for me (Naomi), I turned 23 years old, and despite the fact that 23 is an odd number and not usually an exciting birthday, it turned out to be great!

For those of you who think I am crazy because I am saying it is my birthday, but you know it is February 19th, let me first explain. You see here, in Israel and in the schools Nate and I are in, we use Hebrew Dates, as apposed to the Gregorian Calender. The Hebrew Calender is a lunar calender that is influenced by solar. My birthday, on the Hebrew Calender is the 28th of Shevat, the date which started last night (since it is a lunar calender the day starts when the moon comes up) and ended about an hour and 10 minutes ago. Here we use the Hebrew Calender. We use it to date papers, date checks, even date contracts.

Because of all this, Nate and I have a tendency not to know what the English date is, so we decided this year, since it was difficult to keep track of the English dates, we would start celebrating birthdays, and anniversaries on the Hebrew dates. The truth is that this is how we will most likely always celebrate it, even when we go back to America, because the Hebrew Calender is the calender to which our lives revolve. We celebrate every holiday, every beginning of the month, and even every week based on this calender, so it makes sense to add birthdays, etc. to our celebrations as well.

Back to my great day! As I said the day started last night, when Nate made me dinner and even made birthday cake for desert. He did a great job, and I greatly appreciated the dinner because I know that he really has little time to cook, which is why I do most of the cooking, because he has class until 6 and then again at 8pm. Further, unfortunately, yesterday one of the Rabbi's at Nate's school lost his father, and the funeral was last night, yet Nate still fit in making me feel special.

The day continued this morning, when one of my friends, Janice, made cookies and brought them to my Gemara class, and had the entire class sing happy birthday to me in Hebrew. It was very cute! On Mondays we only have half days, to give each of us time to do volunteer work in the afternoons (I actually do mine on Wednesday night) so when I left and went home to do my usual babysitting jobs, I thought the celebrations were over. Right as I was about to finish babysitting, when the mom came to pick up her kids, all of the moms and kids in the neighborhood showed up, and Nate of course, at the door with cupcakes that were lit with candles, cards, and singing happy birthday in English. As soon as they finished singing the kids decided to all sing together in Hebrew (they are all between the ages of one and a half and three years old). The cupcakes were absolutely amazing, and the gesture was really very nice. Of course to finish off my day, I came home to find emails and cards from other family and friends sending their birthday wishes.

It was really quite a nice day for just another birthday. I really appreciate all the hard work all my friends put in, and especially Nate!

SNOW IN ISRAEL!

We have officially reached our seven month mark of living in Israel, and oh boy is it different then when we first arrived. For starters, for those of you who did not know, we got over a foot of snow this week. It is very cold here (although you would not know it was cold if you walked into our caravan, which we have learned to heat very nicely) and well, it is quite white. Last week, starting on Monday there were reports that it would snow throughout most of Israel (even in Eilat). We were told that when there are reports like this that where we live usually gets one of the hardest hits. Tuesday night Naomi rushed home from school, to try and beat this "blizzard" we were getting, and she made it just as it started to snow in Jerusalem. It did not start to snow in Efrat until midnight, however once it started, it did not stop until Thursday afternoon. The snow was mixed at some points with sleet and hail, but most of it was just beautiful white snow.

The snow we got was perfect, it was beautifully white, firm enough for snow-balls, snow-men, and slaying, and soft enough that you did not have to worry about slipping on ice. We had a great time, as the pictures below will show you, with our snowball fights, and helping the kids build their first snow-men. Unfortunately we did not get to go sledding due to the lack in a sleigh, however Adam R. tried to go on a kitchen trey, but lets just say his bum has been doing a lot of complaining ever since.

Israel is so not used to having snow that when we get it, the country basically shuts down. The stores were closed, the busses did not run, and there was no school (well at least for Naomi, Nate had optional classes given by the people who lived on the campus).
As you can see we had a really great time, and it was quite beautiful. Maybe next time though we will prepare enough in advance and buy a sleigh (oh and we think a shovel would be nice to have too)! Happy winter everyone!

A Birthday and a Trip to Jerusalem

Last Wednesday was my birthday and what a birthday it was. Naomi had just gotten home two days before but still managed to out do herself. I knew that we would be going out to a restaurant that night so it was basically just another day here, class, lunch, more class. During lunch someone made an announcement that it was my birthday - so everyone sung to me; it was nice.

After classes I was supposed to go down to our apartment and then we'd leave for dinner, well a few of our friends had come up with their kids so I - unsuspectingly - spent a few minutes playing with them; one of them, Chochava (her name means star in Hebrew), really likes it when we play football with her, using her as the ball.

When I finally went down to the apartment Naomi was waiting and after a while we decided that we'd leave for dinner, but that we had to go up to the Dinning Hall to get her jacket which she had left earlier that day. Well I walked into the Dinning Hall totally unsuspecting and there were 25 people there waiting in the dark for me to show up with cake and balloons. I've never had a surprise party before and I was totally blown away. She even made an Eagles cake for me.


After the party we went out to dinner at the nearby winery and had a very nice meal with some wine tasting. It's a great place, nice atmosphere, good wine, good food, and affordable. Did I mention you can see it from our window too? What could beat it?

I've got my work cut out for me come February.

Now on to the trip to Jerusalem. We go there all the time - Naomi every day, while I go probably once every two weeks - so they're not usually special; but this one was. Every month (on the lunar calendar) is a Rosh Chodesh the first of the month. Our good friend Yair asked if I'd be intersted in joining him for morning prayers at the Western Wall for vatikin. Vatikin is the aramaic word meaning the earliest time you can pray on any given day, in the winter because the days are short it happened to fall out at 6:37am. But since we have to drive there, I got up at 4:45 and we left at 5:15 to pick up his brother and students.

We got to the wall at 6:00 and it was pouring, but I did find some time between downpours to take some pictures.

This is how dark it was when we arrived.

If you've ever been to the Wall you know that on the left side of this picture is a cavern for when it's wet. It's a massive place and because today was a special day, despite the early hour, there were thousands of people there.


We prayed the first service with Rabbi Yaakov Yosef leading - the son of famed Rabbi Ovadia Yosef - it was very interesting. On a few parts of the service which are sometimes sung in a happy way, he was literally crying; it forced me to view what we were saying in a different way. So many times you can read a sentence one way and if you'd only read that same sentence with a different idea you'd understand it so differently.

Since we wanted to do our own service for the Hallel (singing of certain psalms for the day) we tried to find a good place for it to happen. Just then, this is after sunrise, the skies cleared and the rain stopped. But since it was still wet, and quite cold, most people stayed inside. So the 15 of us were the only ones in the entire plaza, singing at the top of our lungs, we could hear our own echoes. Very nice.

Very few other people managed to brave the chill and the rain.



This picture is taken (the same flag from above) but looking the other way at the far side of the plaza, so you can see why Jerusalem is called the City of Gold.



After we finished, and Yair did a beautiful job of leading, it started to drizzle again so we went inside for Torah reading and the Musaf (additional) service.

Despite the rain, the fog (it felt like a blizzard without the snow), the traffic, and the time at the wall I still made it back in time to get breakfast before class.

A great but very long morning.

Chanukkah and My visit to America

So It has been a crazy past few weeks with Chanukkah and then a few days later I (Naomi) left for America for a two week visit. Chanukkah was absolutely beautiful in Israel, so nice to see the decorations everywhere that were not Christmas but all Magen Davids and Menorahs, etc. Chanukkah in Israel is very different also because it misses the Hallmark aspect that it has very much taken up here. Presents are not the priority, but rather the priority is the lights and celebrating the lights. Nate and I learned many new explanations to the holiday, all of which are too long to explain here, but one day we will share them.

Nate and I were both off from school for a few days so we did some trips to the old city to do some touring- through the Arab shuk and to the Holy Sepulcher. Nate gave me a great deal of information about where we were and the history of it, information that was (and rightfully so) left out of my private Jewish day school education. We also went to a number of chanukkah celebrations including a party at each of our schools and a party at family friends.

The most exciting thing of all was shabbat chanukkah I would say when our friend Doni who has been in the army for almost a year now was given leave and came for a visit. It was completely an unexpected visit (he called midnight the night before) but we were so happy to see him and to have the time, although short (he left Saturday night about 30 minutes after shabbat ended), to spend with him. We also had another friend, a new friend, Janis who I had met at school, and who we instantly have seemed to click with. It was a calm shabbat but just fun because we were with friends.

After shabbat that week I was very lucky to finally meet Nate's Kibbutz Ima (mother) Rosie. She is the woman who made our beautiful ketubbah. It was really a great honor and a lot of fun to finally meet the woman who I had only spoken on the phone to once before, yet who had ment so much to Nate while he was living in Israel on Nativ. We concluded chanukkkah with a lot of rest which was absolutely necessary- our last day we spent watching movies in our house and not really actually getting out of our pajamas. It was rest much needed.

As I said, a few days later I left for America for a two week trip. The original purpose of my trip was to come in for a very close friend's wedding- Tamar Sterling (now Katz). I have known Tamar since I was about 4 and a half and I really could not ever picture missing her wedding, so I didn't! I came in about a week before the wedding and spent some time with Nate's parents which was really nice. They took me shopping to buy a "few" things Nate and I needed and they had a really nice dinner and desert to see family and friends. They also gave us a really nice gift while I was there, our new camera. It is really cool, although I have to say I do not know how to fully use it.

From there I went to my parents house. It was so exciting to see my mom (and the rest of my family of course) and to be able to spend so much time with her. We also did a "bit" of shopping (including a new suitcase so I could fit all the new things), and we got to see a really great movie which I highly suggest- National Treasure: The book of secrets. I am actually still in America for the end of my trip and will be flying back to Israel on Sunday. I am very sad to go and will miss mine and Nate's family very much but I unfortunately was on this trip alone, and that has been very hard. I am missing Nate a lot and I can not wait until Monday when I get to see him (I land on New Year's Eve at 5pm). I have really started to enjoy living in Israel, and even though I know I am supposed to call it home I have not yet felt that attachment to it (other then it being my home as a jew). But being here in America, away from it, I have learned a very important lesson. Growing up home was always where my family was, and it still is today, except now my immediate family is Nate, and my home is where he is, whether in Israel or in America, or anywhere else in the world. I can not wait to go home!

It looks like Nate and I will be lucky enough to come visit America this summer among some other traveling, and this trip will be again to go to a wedding- Nate's college roomate Josh Rabin, and of course to visit our parents. We very much look forward to this trip and hope we will get to see some friends as well.

Thats all for now, it should catch you all up on what we are up to. Sorry it has been so long since we have written. We will hopefully write soon. I will post pictures of my trip when I am back in Israel.