Nostalgia Sunday – Adloyada-yada-yada

March 5, 2012 by · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, Art, education, Entertainment, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Israeliness, Movies, News, Nostalgia Sunday, Picture of the Week, Politics, Pop Culture, Religion, Social Justice, Travel 

Could it be true that the Adloyada Purim parade is returning to Tel Aviv? According to Ahbar HaIr (City Mouse) weekly, there’s a grassroots movement forming among last summer’s Social Welfare Protest organizers to bring the legendary celebration back to its birthplace and natural habitat. Finally! A concrete aspect to the nebulous Protest — and one that I can back one hundred percent.

Briefly put, the phrase “Adloyada” comes from “ad lo yada” or “unable to differentiate”, referring to the Purim tradition of drinking until one is unable to tell the difference between evil Haman and good Mordechai. The first Adloyada parade was held in 1912 in Tel Aviv and continued until 1936. It was reestablished in the 1950s and shut down again in the 1960s. In the early 80s, the Sheinkin Adloyada came and went — fast and furious like the punk music that inspired it — and that was it. Until now.

(The full background to the Adloyada’s historic Tel Aviv roots — and its relationship to debonair choreographer and filmmaker Baruch Agadati — may be found here).

Last week, the organizers of this latest incarnation put in a request to make the renewed Adloyada an official Tel Aviv municipal event but received no response. No matter. “We don’t need permission from the establishment to go out and party,” city council member Sharon Louzon told Ahbar HaIr.

Well said — and probably the right attitude as it doesn’t look like municipality is going to back the revival any time soon. “The Adloyada was cancelled for two principle reasons,” ran the official municipal statement quoted by Ahbar HaIr, “budget and logistical complications that shut down the city almost entirely on a day of heavy traffic. In addition, it should be noted that the city of Holon hosts a very successful event, and we think it would not be right to enter into a competition as there is a concurrent event only 10 minutes driving distance away.”

Holon! Sacrilege!

The public procession is scheduled to start this coming Thursday at 11:00 AM at the end of Ibn Gabirol Boulevard (corner of HaYarkon Park) and will proceed southwards towards Rothschild Boulevard, Allenby Street, Levinsky Park and the New Central Bus Station, ending at Hatikva Park at around 3:00 PM.

More photos of Adloyadas gone by may be viewed here – plus see below for some rare footage from the Steven Spielberg Jewish Film Archive. You can check out the Holon Adloyada from last year (also below) — it looks very fun, actually, and I think Agadati would have appreciated the Rio carnival dancers.

Purim Sameach! Have a happy Purim holiday!

Adloyada 1932

Adloyada 1960

Holon Adloyada 2011

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Foto Friday – Jerusalem Ice Festival

March 2, 2012 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Art, design, Entertainment, Foto Friday, General, News, Picture of the Week, Pop Culture, Travel 

It’s zero degrees Celsius here in Jerusalem right now. Commonly known as the temperature at which water freezes, the weather is also a perfect backdrop to the Jerusalem Ice Festival which opens this coming Sunday.

A team of 20 Chinese ice sculptors came to Israel to create the exhibit which is divided into four sections, starting with Jerusalem of Ice where visitors walk through the ice version of Jaffa Gate…

Visit famous Jerusalem sites, like the Tower of David…

Sir Moses Montefiore’s windmill…

…and Montefiore’s carriage (that’s Mayor Nir Barkat inside)…

Or slide down the pride of Kiryat HaYovel, the “Golem” by Niki de Saint Phalle, now recast in crystallized H20!

After the Jerusalem section there are Animals and Childhood Stories, the Fantasy area, the Ice Bar, which features ice-works by local artists and an ice skating rink.

Here’s a quick look at how it all got done…

The Ice Festival takes place from March 6th- April 30th 2012 at the old Jerusalem Train compound. The festival will showcase dozens of ice sculptures, skating rinks and a variety of family-oriented activities. Admission fee is 65 NIS and yes, visitors will receive coats on entering the complex, which will operate at a temperature of -10 degrees Celsius. For more information: Jerusalem Ice Festival.

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Nostalgia Sunday – From Hollywood to Holyland

February 26, 2012 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Art, coexistence, education, Entertainment, General, History and Culture, Movies, News, Nostalgia Sunday, Picture of the Week, Politics, Pop Culture, Travel, tv 

Someone recently sent me a link to one of those time-wasting yet fascinating Internet slide shows, in this case, snapshots of unexpected celebrity combinations. For example, Walt Disney and Salvador Dali. Who’da thunk it? Vivien Leigh and Ringo Starr — who put them together? You wouldn’t have expected to see Charlie Chaplin and Mahatma Gandhi in the same room, let alone in the same frame, would you?

Or would you…? After all, it has long made political sense for leaders in government to cultivate relationships with high-profile celebrities, such as movie stars.

In honor of tonight’s Oscars, we dove into the Israel National Photo Collection and came up with a fistful of pearls, like this shot (by Moshe Pridan) of singer-actor Eddie Fisher chowing down on falafel while on a 1957 visit to the young State of Israel.

Frequent visitor Danny Kaye was snapped clowning around with Arab schoolkids in Nazareth.

While on a visit to Universal Studios in 1964, Prime Minister Levi Eshkol and wife Elisheva chatted with movie stars Rock Hudson and Gina Lollobrigida.

Photo by Moshe Pridan

Frank Sinatra made an appearance in an Upper Nazareth kindergarten.

Prime Minister Golda Meir had a tete-a-tete (and a smoke) with actor Gregory Peck and wife Veronique at a 1969 gala dinner hosted by entertainment industry heads in LA.

Photo by Moshe Milner

And the ever-glamorous Elizabeth Taylor met with Prime Minister Menachem Begin and wife Aliza in 1977.

Photo by Yaacov Saar

This above photo was taken at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City, but the National Photo Collection has many others of Taylor visiting Israel, including one of her and husband Richard Burton at the Western Wall. There’s also a deer-in-the-headlights shot of Sophia Loren, engulfed by the local paparazzi as she lands at Lydda airport to shoot the movie Judith. Diana Ross serenading Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin? Who’da thunk it?

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The Gutman shul

February 20, 2012 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Art, education, Entertainment, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life, Religion 

I’ve always liked the Nachman Gutman Museum in Tel Aviv’s gentrified Neve Tzedek neighborhood. It’s small, just two floors, and exhibits just a portion of this well-known artist’s works, many of them related to Tel Aviv and the pre-state period. The paintings, many of them oils, are of subjects that feel so familiar and close by, and I’m not even from Tel Aviv. It’s also in what was formerly known as the Writer’s House, as from 1907 to 1914, the building was used as the editorial offices for the Ha-Poel Ha-Tzair newspaper, as well as the residence of editor Yosef Aharonovitch, his wife, author Dvora Baron, and author Joseph Hayyim Brenner. So clearly it has a familiar feeling to the writer in me.

Why am I mentioning the Nachman Gutman Museum? Because of a happy coincidence that took place last weekend. We were in Tel Aviv for Shabbat with family and friends, and had spent time Friday at the Carmel shuk, eating hummous and buying treats and then hanging out and relaxing. On Shabbat morning, some of us wanted to go to shul, while others were happy to walk on the beach or in nearby Neve Tzedek (it was next to our hotel and is considered to be the first Jewish neighborhood of Tel Aviv outside Jaffa). We knew that there was a Masorti synagogue, Kehillat Sinai, in Tel Aviv. (Full disclosure: My BIL is a Conservative rabbi.)

We also knew that said Masorti shul was supposed to move to new digs in Neve Tzedek, at the new Schechter Center for Jewish Culture, which is otherwise known as Beit Lorenz, an historic Templar building where writer S.Y. Agnon once sat and drank coffee.

But as these things happen, the building wasn’t completely ready yet, and Kehillat Sinai is temporarily meeting at the Nachman Gutman Museum, which is just across the street from the rabbi’s house. I could not have been happier. This way, I could get in some shul, visit the museum and show it to my friends, and be in Neve Tzedek.

We strolled over, enjoying the narrow streets and gentrified but still elegant architecture of the neighborhood. When we got to the museum, I realized that the shul is using a meeting room, but the museum is open on Saturdays — this is Tel Aviv, not Jerusalem — and you have to buy tickets to get in, as usual. Clearly, it would’ve been too easy to go to shul and get to see a favorite museum. So I sat in shul in any case, enjoying the mixed crowd that Kehillat Sinai draws, including some tourists, some transplants and a few Israelis who have clearly returned to religion the Masorti route. And what was most amusing was seeing the odd-museum goer walk in, buy tickets (at the gift shop next to our ‘sanctuary’), and then stick their heads in to the shul to stare and clearly wonder, “What is going on in here?”

To be a Jew, in shul, in a public manner, in Tel Aviv, can be awkward. Particularly when it’s viewable to those who are not doing the same. But the flip side was how right it felt to be using this building for yet another purpose, and that it all works. You can spend your Shabbat strolling, museum hopping, praying or some combination thereof. I felt Gutman would have approved.

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Mozart vs. Madonna

February 9, 2012 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Art, Entertainment, General, Israeliness, Life, Music, Pop Culture 

With news of Madonna‘s return visit to Israel, I cranked up the stereo with The Material Girl’s hits. I was not expecting the reactions my kids gave me.

My eldest son asked me what “that noise” was. My youngest son said “is that music?” Fortunately my daughter said nothing (which means she did not hate it).

Feeling defeat, I slid a ‘Mozart for the Young’ CD into the slot instead. The little ones started to dance – a sign they approved.

My mother – a great fan of classical music – would be delighted to know that her grandchildren in Israel prefer Mozart to Madonna, Bach to Blur.

Then again, I suppose I’m partially to blame.

You see, when we go to concerts with the kids we prefer a quality performance to the nonsense often served up to toddlers.

My two older children (twins aged 4.5) adore Magical Sounds at the Israeli Opera. Actress Nitza Shaul introduces little ones to the lives of the great composers in a sort of combination play-concert-opera. She is mesmerizing, captivating and interesting.

My kids role-play the classical masters long after we see the shows.

Nitza Shaul dedicates a performance to Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian. (Photo: Yossi Tsevker)

After hosting Bach, Mozart and Beethoven in her studio, Shaul is set to launch a production dedicated to Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian (March 6-8), in the theme of Purim, at the Israeli Opera in Tel Aviv.

The Israel Stage Orchestra (ISO) is another adult-oriented company that has taken it upon itself to attract the future generation of classical music lovers.

In its current production, The Four Seasons and One Sheep (Feb. 18, 21), the ISO tells the story of Italian composer Antonio Vivaldi with a twist.

The music takes center stage but the ISO adds a story of a sheep to the production which helps the young audience identify the different seasons in the music based on what the sheep encounters. At first my children were a bit frightened by the sheep’s Commedia Dell’Arte theater mask but soon got used to it.

To “put the higher arts in first place, one has to make an effort, and to combine them,” ISO musical director Roni Porat said in the past. “I have no problem with the audience being entertained a little along the way, if the goal is listening to good music.”

The Four Seasons and One Sheep at the ISO.

Indeed, my children liked watching the sheep’s antics on stage but when we came home they were imitating the violinists.

I know there’s nothing wrong with raising classical music devotees, but I wouldn’t mind if they’d let me listen to my music as well.

 

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