I can’t believe how much time has gone by since I uploaded photos. Lag BaOmer (33rd day of the counting of the barley offering when the Temple still stood) was two weeks ago. Work’s been insane, so I haven’t had much energy for other activities in the evening.
Lag BaOmer is accompanied by frenzied burning of bonfires. Israeli children deforest the country, gathering scrap wood, shipping pallets, old furniture — if it burns, it’s not safe to leave outside during the weeks after Passover!
The photo of the two girls meeting on the street with their collection of tree branches, old chairs, and a plastic baby seat (doesn’t seem very good to burn) is a bit blurry because I was across the street and had to take the shot very quickly when cars weren’t in the way.
Other years I’ve photographed the bonfires. This year I stayed indoors because I prefer breathing clean air.
The Bnei Akiva (youth group) in our neighbourhood takes its contribution to local air pollution very seriously! They gathered an amazing quantity of wood for burning. The boys are unloading one truck while a car is driving up with another load.
My husband and I went to the annual fun day at Superland (amusement park in Rishon leZion), which my company holds every year. Our son didn’t come because he had activities at his pre-army academy that day. I didn’t take my big DSLR this time, just a small point&shoot. This photo was taken from the ground.
One of our annual traditions is the Congo raft ride. I held the small camera by the seat as we spun around. It reminds me of old computer games, so I chose an electronic audio track. Must be the feeling of spinning around and bouncing off such obviously fake rocks.
The Jerusalem Light Exhibit begins in about ten days but for the first time I won’t be photographing it. I’ll be in Italy for 10 days with the family!
This is something that almost no one does — bake their own matzah for Passover. Lots of people do matzah-baking demonstrations and educational classes before the holiday, but this family is actually baking their own matzah for the Seder, in a home-made wood-burning oven. I walked up to their house at noon to take a few photos. I also recorded some video footage but I won’t have time to edit it until after the first day of Passover. Too much to do!
Matzah must be made in 18 minutes, from the moment that the water and flour are combined until the baking is finished. A timer is used. The water has to be mayim shelanu, water that has “rested.” It’s poured into jugs the night before and rested in a cool place until it’s needed for baking. (For an overview of the details, see this site.) You’ll notice that all the utensils are steel: table cover, rolling pins, mixing bowl.
Mixing flour and water in a steel bowl:
Rolling with a steel rolling pin on a steel-covered table:
Handing a raw matzah to the baker:
Preparing to put it in the oven, made of cinder blocks and metal plates (the upper compartment is for baking. The lower compartment is filled with burning wood and there is a plate in front to protect the baker from the heat):
Finished matzah drying on a cloth:
OK, back to the kitchen with me. Only a couple hours left before we start Passover!
I took these photos this morning of the burning of chametz. Something about fire fascinates kids. They don’t seem to mind the heat (and it is hot today!).
We burned the last of the leavened food around 10:30 this morning. It’s tough coming up with interesting menu ideas when you have a bunch of house guests, can’t eat bread, cakes, rice, legumes, or matzah (our custom is not to eat matzah for the month leading up to Pesach in order for it to be more special when we have it), and the thought of one more potato makes you sick…..
Breakfast menu, day of Seder:
Leftover chametz (as long as it’s before the cut-off time, which is 10:09 this year, according to our custom)
Cheese slices
Rice crackers
Hard-boiled eggs
Lunch menu, day of Seder:
Tuna salad with lots of cut up vegetables in it
Vegetable salad
Potato-kohlrabi kugel (I didn’t have enough potatoes for a kugel, so I added a large kohlrabi; it was really good)
Cheese slices
The whole neighbourhood smells like a forest fire, which makes drying the laundry a bit problematic. Oh well, no one’s going to notice a bit of smoke on their bath towels, right?
Ever wonder what 750 grams of horseradish looks like? A caterer friend had some extra and was giving it away. I thought she’d give me a couple roots but her husband handed me the whole lot. So I’ve dried it, wrapped it in newspaper, and put it in the back of the fridge, for when I have more time.
The evening before the Seder, we perform the ritual of bedikat chametz (Search for Chametz), searching our house for chametz (leavened food) using candles and flashlights. I wrapped ten pieces of cake (normally we use a pita but I threw out the last one while cleaning the freezer) and my son distributed them around the house.
This piece took us a long time to find. He attached it to the pull-chain of the ceiling fan.
I didn’t take the photo then and there. We recited Kol Chamira and I asked him to re-attach the foil-covered cake to the chain.
We’re getting there — the end is in sight! The kitchen has been switched over and I did a lot of cooking today. I am so glad we put an air conditioner in the kitchen. The dish kashering station is right outside my building and the sound of religious pop music and propane torches has been non-stop for a couple days now. (On the other hand, I am very glad not to have that job! Torching oven racks and boiling dishes must be horrible in this sharav ( “scorchingly hot, dry desert wind which blows from the Arabian Desert from May to mid-June and from September to October. It last for two to five days at a time” on this site).
There must be a universal law that when you’re kashering the kitchen (cleaning the oven, turning the stove on full blast) and kashering dishes (waiting in line beside huge propane burners while yeshiva students dunk your dishes in boiling water) that the weather shall turn hot. It’s hot in Maale Adumim. I live next to a mikveh where they set up the kashering station. I hear the propane burners start at 9 a.m. and they burn all day, until around 10 p.m. I’m lucky — I have a strapping teenage son who does the hot, dirty jobs for me and carries home the heaviest groceries. (I won’t be so lucky next year, when he goes into the army.)
Kids always hang around to watch. They’re bored, too young to help with much cleaning, and they have to eat outside anyway, so they gather around the steps of the mikveh.
Here’s something I haven’t seen before: pre-cut celery for Passover. For the truly busy hostess….
When I went for a run this morning, before the heat became intense, I saw two gazelles grazing among the purple flowers (desert rocket). I only had a little point-and-shoot camera with me, so this has been cropped and is a bit grainy.
As of today I’m off work for the Passover holiday. This week we had a celebration in the dairy cafeteria. I didn’t have any wine because I was working on some financial documents but the nut tarts were good.
This “Fiddler on the Roof” costume has got to be the most original one I’ve seen in a while. The “legs” are a stuffed pair of pants. Even his violin was homemade. Maybe it’s a stage prop.
I was visiting a neighbour, when these children came by with mishloah manot (basket of food). The chips costume was made by the girl’s mother. The chip box was a cardboard carton hanging from straps on her shoulders, covered with coloured paper. The “chips” were blocks of yellow-painted foam, attached to the inside edge of the chip box. She also had foam blocks on her head.
I really, really want this chicken hat. It sits on top of the head with a tail in the back and legs over both ears. Sheryl bought it in the US. The writing on her shirt is the stamp that the Tnuva company puts on eggs. So clever!
This is me, trying to decide which hat to wear. So hard to find the right hat for an outfit….
And then there’s my son…. He came home from mechina (pre-army academy) today. This is not a wig. This is his real hair. A friend helped him bleach it with hydrogen peroxide.
I took this photo in the morning, just before they were about to start the megillah (Book of Esther). The megillah scroll is much smaller than a Torah scroll. Only the reader needs to have a kosher scroll; listeners can follow along with a printed booklet. It is traditional to unroll the entire scroll and then fold the folios upon themselves because the Book of Esther is referred to as a “letter” (see Est. 9:29; this was said to be the way that letters were read). The cylinder on the bima, above the books, is the megillah case.
It’s almost 7 a.m. and I’m getting ready to go to the synagogue for shacharit (morning prayer) and to hear the reading of the megillah (Book of Esther). I hope to have a few photos to post later today of the street dance or interesting costumes. In the meantime, here’s one of the first videos I ever made, from Purim 2009 (I’ve posted it here before). The resolution is crappy, but I love the scene with the bus driver whose bus is blocked by dancers. I shot it with a Canon PowerShot S5 IS.
Tomorrow is Ta’anit Esther, the fast that falls the day before Purim, so schools hold Purim parties today. Purim is a Jewish festival that commemorates the foiling of Haman’s plot to kill the Jews during the Persian period (see the Book of Esther). Sudden reversal of fortune is a theme that runs through the story of Esther, Mordechai, and Haman, so that things are not what they seem. This aspect of Purim is commemorated in the custom of dressing up in costumes. It is a bit reminiscent of Halloween, except that the children are giving food to their friends (custom of mishloach manot), rather than collecting it. The brides are Queen Esther. Since few girls can resist being princess for a day, white dresses and veils are everywhere.
These photos were taken from a minibus in the Sanhedria neighbourhood of Jerusalem on my way to work. They’re just snapshots and had to be colour-corrected because the van’s windows are tinted. I was sitting in the second row and some of the photos were taken between the seats, through the front windshield.
I think he’s an artist. I once dressed my son as an artist and drew a mustache on his face.
A Chinese girl and a nurse speak to Minnie Mouse at the bus stop.
Grocery store displaying the baskets of food that people send to their friends on Purim. You have no idea how much junk food one can accumulate! I’m so glad that we have communal mishloach manot. You check off, on a computerized list on a Web site, the families in the neighbourhood that you want to send mishloach manot to. Each family gets ONE basket of food (donated by the local mini-market and packed by local teenage volunteers) with a list of names of the senders. The money goes to charity. Most years, more than $10,000 is raised by our neighbourhood. It’s a good cause, saves a lot of headaches and shopping, and it reduces the mountain of cheap candies that used to appear in our kitchens, only one month before we have to get rid of everything for Passover. We still give a few portions of food, but the expense and effort are kept within reasonable bounds.
Yesterday was Tu b’Shvat (= 15th day of the Jewish month of Shvat), the Jewish New Year of Trees. The earliest reference to this new year is post-biblical (Mishnah RH 1a). It was developed by the kabbalists in Safed, Israel, in the 17th century. That seems to be when the custom of holding a Tu b’Shvat Seder (modelled on the Passover Seder) began. Nowadays, schoolchildren plant trees on Tu b’Shvat and everyone eats fruit. Lots of fruit.
The custom of holding elaborate Tu b’Shvat Seders seems to be fairly recent. Unlike the Passover Seder, which has stringent requirements, the Tu b’Shvat Seder is not standardized (here’s an example). Not all families hold a Seder. Some prepare a festive meal with the Seven Species of Israel (wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives and dates, according to Deut. 8:8). Others eat a few pieces of fruit and call it a day. Still others hold long, elaborate communal seders. My husband really enjoys these, so this year I agreed to go with him to a Seder organized by the Nachalat Yehudah congregation (Carlebach minyan) in our neighbourhood. I stayed for 2 hours, up to the second cup of wine. My husband came back at 11:30 and said they were still going strong.
Everyone walked around the table at the beginning of the Seder, a custom that is inspired by the Sephardic custom of the leader of the Passover Seder carrying the matzah wrapped in a napkin on his shoulder and circling the table. (By the way, there’s also a Rosh Hashanah Seder at the New Year.)
I don’t often post humourous videos, but Chanukah is only two weeks away and I thought this was cute. It’s a medley of pop song parodies, around the theme of Chanukah, created by the Aish haTorah Yeshiva. The credits are on the download page of their site. The production itself is quite impressive.
