A celebration of young Ethiopian musicians
Avraham Terifa
Avraham Terifa is in the eighth grade but he looks like he’s only nine-years-old. A tiny dynamo of a boy, he stands before an audience of several hundred at Jerusalem’s Mishkenot She’ananim concert hall and begins to play his violin. All around the room you can hear jaws start to drop as the music that emerges from his diminutive frame suggests someone twice as big and three times as old.
Avraham is just one of 30 children from the Ethiopian community in Jerusalem who is studying at the Jerusalem Conservatory Hassadna, a unique institution whose mission is to provide music instruction to children between the ages of 3 and 18, “regardless of physical or mental ability, socio-economic level, ethnicity or religious affiliation.”
Avraham is part of a program called “From Risk to Opportunity” which grants full scholarships to children of Ethiopian descent who, more often than not, come from very difficult home environments, rife with poverty and sometimes even abuse. Many of the children are referred to the program by social workers at Jerusalem’s Municipal Welfare Department.
The program was founded by Ruth Mason and Bob Trachtenberg, who have been active in supporting the Ethiopian immigrant community and were disturbed when they realized that, at a friend’s daughter’s dance recital, there were no Ethiopian children represented. Ruth says she thought “what if there are Ethiopian kids with musical talent? Can they develop it? The vast majority of their parents don’t have money for that.”
They established the “From Risk to Opportunity” in 2005 which, in addition to the scholarship, covers rental of a musical instrument, transportation costs and home tutoring.
Meron Moola
Avraham wasn’t the only Ethiopian-Israeli musician to perform at the concert held last week to celebrate the program’s success. Ronit Taklo was equally impressive. Even smaller than Avraham, one might expect this 10-year-old girl to be intimidated by the grand piano in front of her, but her confidence was stirring and the audience was once again riveted. The same for Meron Moola who belted out (in English) the lyrics to “When You Believe” from the animated film “The Prince of Egypt.”
While the music performed was primarily Western classics (Brahms, Mozart and the like) along with that Steven Schwartz movie pop tune, there were also two traditional Ethiopian numbers sung (and danced) by Molokon Patego, a guest performer.
The evening had two celebrities in attendance. Former Supreme Court president Dorit Beinisch’s husband is on the Conservatory’s board and some of the program’s participants played at the swearing in ceremony of the new chief justice. Beinisch presented the children with certificates of appreciation. Belaynesh Zevadia, the Israeli ambassador designate to Ethiopia (and the first Ethiopian-Israeli to become an ambassador) was also in the audience.
The “From Risk to Opportunity” program is exemplary in another way: It does not segregate the children into a separate track for disadvantaged youth as too frequently happens with the Ethiopian community elsewhere in Israel. Rather, the young musicians are fully integrated into the Conservatory’s mainstream program, which provides instructions for 550 talented young people.
The results show: three students have been accepted to the Jerusalem Music Academy High School – the first Ethiopian-Israeli students to be accepted to the prestigious school’s music track.
As for Avraham, he is one of them. His fiddling days, it seems, are just beginning.
In Israel’s troubled south, apathy is our enemy
Filed under: General, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life, News, War
I just came across this video on Facebook, posted by a friend, from her friend of a friend, of a grad rocket landing next to the ‘videographer’s’ apartment in Ashdod.
The video is actually several years old, but the experience is the same now as it was then: The siren comes, people scatter, trying to get into bomb shelters or shelter of some kind in the few minutes they have between hearing the sirens and the fall of the rocket. And there they remain, waiting until the calm to emerge into their lives again for a few hours until the next round.
I was upset to hear about the renewal of rockets landing in the south over the weekend, and immediately spent some time reading up on what had happened over the weekend and what it all meant. I thought about it all, and then I turned to something else, since I can, living in Jerusalem where we’re not disturbed by those kind of incidents at the moment. But as a friend of mine pointed out in a Ynet article he read, our apathy is our enemy. The article was written by a 24-year-old Ashdod resident, Nir Tal, who writes:
“What’s most bothersome is our apathy, the apathy of us all. It allows us to play the tragic new game of the southern cities, where we try to guess where a rocket landed after hearing the siren. It allows us to get used to the new situation over the past few years. The apathy is our new enemy, without a doubt. But what are we guilty of? It’s natural.”
I guess so. I know that when I think about what I can do, the only thing I come up with is opening my home to residents of the south, but no one I know down south wants to come here. They want to stay home, even if home may mean a bomb shelter for several nights running. And when I think about going down south for a story later this week, a story that has nothing to do with the current volley of rockets, I consider not going, as it doesn’t make sense to go down south for something that doesn’t have to be written right now, as it isn’t about the current situation, but is more concerned with the non life-threatening matters of culture and life.
When this kind of situation is taking place, you don’t want to be apathetic. But you also wonder what you can actually do to help.
Driving in the fast lane
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life, Technology, Travel
The seven shekel sign
Why not indeed? We exited off Highway 1, right near the airport, veering around the curved road into the parking lot of the fast lane center, so to speak. This is where you can 1) Register for the fast lane (also doable online, but this is actually more convenient) 2) Park your car for free and take a free shuttle into Tel Aviv 3) Pay at the turnstile to enter the fast lane.
Luckily, as we were short on time, as usual, my friend had already registered for the fast lane on a previous trip. That left us the task of entering the two-lane turnstile in order to pay our seven shekels and enter the fast lane. The turnstile, however, did not make sense. If this fast lane is considered the most advanced in the world, why is it that it is impossible to get the car close enough to the self-serve turnstile without having to actually get out of the car in order to pay? And once you do start getting out of the car, a cranky man comes over to take you to task for not getting close enough. He appears to be a tollbooth operator, but not the kind that I’ve ever experienced in my toll booth situations.
Nevertheless, we paid the seven shekels — the price seems to be calculated based on number of passengers in the car and traffic on the road — and headed toward the fast lane entrance. As usual, signage was a little confusing but we figured it out and got on our way. Luckily, we didn’t need to get off at Kibbutz Galuyot, the first exit on Tel Aviv’s Ayalon Highway, as the fast lane doesn’t allow you to exit there.
We arrived at our final destination, just off the LaGuardia exit, with minutes to spare. Were we saved by the fast lane? Probably. But I was not impressed by the system or service. Just to juxtapose it with our next transporation-related segment: We entered a parking lot only to find that all the spots were reserved for the various insurance companies in the building (why did they let us in if there’s nowhere to park?) We finally made our way to the exit, and the parking operator told us he had a parking spot just for us. Where? In the non-authorized spot behind his booth, between the entrance and exit lanes to the parking lot. Quixotic? Yes. But the car was waiting for us four hours and forty shekels later. At that point, we just drove home slowly.
The Gutman shul
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.
Nostalgia Sunday – What all the fuss was about
Filed under: Environment, General, History and Culture, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, News, Nostalgia Sunday, Picture of the Week, Pop Culture, Travel
Excepting the city’s residents, everyone is very disappointed in Jerusalem today. That is because, despite the dire weather predictions, it did not snow in Jerusalem on Friday night, thus putting the kibosh on everyone else’s Saturday plans. We are a people with a short attention span and it is much quicker to drive the mere 50 minutes up to view the Holy City, instead of the 3 to 4 hour-long slog to gawk at the Hermon.
To understand what had the entire country looking hopefully eastwards, let’s take a look at snowy Jerusalems gone by.
One of the nicest photo-essays about coping with Israel’s bad winter weather can be found at none other than bus company Egged’s website. Oh, the irony! We may complain bitterly about their “the customer is always wrong” company policies, the drivers’ rude and aggressive behavior on the road and inside the bus, their tendency towards strong-armed monopolistic practices (with a healthy dash of nepotism thrown in for good measure) and horrible taste in bus depot design but when the going gets tough, we get going — to Egged.
According to the Egged essay (in Hebrew), the winter of 1950 was a particularly bad one, especially because many new immigrants to the young State of Israel were still living in makeshift shanties. “Nonetheless, it was a memorable experience for both children and adults and looking back, they remember it with a smile and longing.”
Hmmm… perhaps. Happier documentation may be found in this pre-State film from news service British Pathe, which captures the Jerusalem winter of two years earlier, in 1948.
Jerusalem in White aka Jerusalem Under Snow
A very sweet photo essay (in Russian) about the 1968 snowstorm describes the adventures of three friends who brave the storm in order to visit a snow-clad Jerusalem.
News Report: Snowy Day in Jerusalem, 1980
And the most recent big storm, which was in 2008.
Jerusalem in Snow from All About Jerusalem.com
Yes, Jerusalem did let everyone down this year but snow buffs can take heart: there are still a few more weeks of this miserable weather so maybe you’ll get your wish. As for me, I’m holding out hope for an early thaw.
© Леонид
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