Broza on board

January 19, 2012 - 1:53 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Art, Entertainment, General, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Music, Pop Culture, Travel 

It’s clearly video week for me, but this does not mean I spend all my time on YouTube. That said, here is an absolutely fabulous one, of singer/songwriter David Broza giving an impromptu, private performance to a group of El Al flight attendants in the back galley kitchen.

A little background: From posts I’ve gathered from Facebook, emails and YouTube comments, Broza was flying to New York — his fiance, clothing designer Nili Lotan, also Israeli, lives in New York — on January 3, and one of the flight staff, who are all generally young, out of the army, sometimes simultaneously in university, asked him for a song. And as he has before, and as he does in his often intimate concerts, such as one he recently did for
the Masorti center in Tel Aviv (he belongs to Kehillat Sinai, a Tel Aviv Conservative synagogue), he sat himself down in the galley, and sang an old favorite, Sigaliot, Violets:

Here are the lyrics, in English, for edification.

VIOLETS

She got married and she is happy
in spite her husband being wild
all the time he is in a bad mood
and even doesn’t know why
for the last three years, she receives
under the door, from an unknown man,
letters of poetry to her
they lighten up her youth.

Who is writing to you, girl, who sends you flags
a bunch of purple flowers when spring comes
who, every ninth of November,
with no name, greetings or hint,
sends you a wreath of violets tied with a bow

The whole night she can’t fall asleep
she day dreams about him
probably a man with a romantic heart,
good soul and simpatico smile
for three years she has been suffering in silence
yes sometimes she nearly screams
and what if her husband found out?
she hides her letters

When her husband comes home from work
throws a questioning glance
He doesn’t say anything,but he knows,
if she knew she would go crazy
Yes, it’s him that writes to her,
he is the lover, he is the subject of her dreams
And what if her husband found out?
She hides her letters.

Who is…

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Nostalgia Sunday – Commercials Go Way Retro

March 7, 2010 - 10:17 PM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Life, Music, Nostalgia Sunday, Pop Culture, tv 

We are awash in a flood of nostalgia that shows absolutely no sign on abating. As part of that trend, our commercials and TV shows are populated by the stars of yesteryear, trying today to earn some of the cash-o-la they couldn’t back in those modest days.

Take, for example, singer-songwriter Mati Caspi, seen lately endorsing Bituach Yashir direct insurance. Other unlikely singing insurance pitchmen include David Broza and Boaz Sharabi.

And here, just to remind you of why we loved them — Riki Gal and Mati Caspi in concert televised by Channel 2, then in its infancy. (Check out Riki’s single lace glove!).

Gal, by the way, is still a force to be reckoned with (she judged the first two seasons of Kohav Nolad, the Israeli version of Pop Idol), and will be performing in Jerusalem on Monday night this week at a benefit for Tsad Kadima, the Israeli organization dedicated to the rehabilitation of children, adolescents and young adults with cerebral palsy and other motor dysfunctions. (Tickets are still available. Contact anat@tsadkadima.org.il or call 02-6540062).

But back to nostalgia: even stars who no longer walk this earth are getting into the game. Israel Discount Bank revived a commercial from the 80s that starred the late great actor Shaike Ophir.

The ad’s revival highlights the fact Discount Bank was Israel’s first to offer telebanking-a revolutionary concept back then, especially in light of the poor quality of our phone service (“poor” being a polite substitute for the other four letter word I was considering using). Ophir actually offers the cop an asimon phone token so he can make the call. The commercial has proven so popular, there’s a follow-up where today’s comedians pay homage to Ophir:

Even Maccabi Health Services has climbed on the retro bandwagon, launching a radio campaign that employs the use of this catchy jingle for powdered orangeade Zip. The connection between HMO and beverage is tenuous — something about “We’re not in the Eighties anymore, so why should your health organization be?” — but it’s fun to revisit the era and that peculiar but sweet Israeli institution of the family whistle. Enjoy the original.

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“Israel Stops”

November 26, 2008 - 1:42 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: General 

Yesterday (November 25) was “Israel Stops” day – a day dedicated to promoting road safety in Israel. It was the culmination of a month-long ad campaign, in which several well-known media personalities (including one guy known for his promoting a traffic safety system) urged Israelis to take it easy on the road. At 7:30 PM, there was a “moment of silence to commemorate victims of the tragedies on the road,” followed by a concert in Tel Aviv, starring pop singer David Broza.

The event was sponsored not by the Transportation Ministry or police, but by a private group called “Or Yarok” (Green Light), which works to raise consciousnesssafety1125.jpg among drivers to develop safe driving habits. Prior to the concert, Or Yarok outfitted the Nokia Arena in Tel Aviv with 11,000 paper doll cutouts, stand-ins for the 30,000 Israelis who have been killed in road accidents since the state’s creation.

Things have been getting better on the road safety front, Or Yarok says, thanks to new, modern highways, like Road 6 (“Cross-Israel Highway”), and new road infrastructure projects in the center of the country. Israel Radio reports most accidents on Israel’s roads, and the majority are not on the nice, new roads around Tel Aviv, but in outlying areas in the Galilee and Negev. There, narrow two lane roads without streetlights are the norm, and drivers in a hurry are tempted to take foolish risks, passing slower cars ahead of them in the oncoming traffic lane. Sometimes drivers calculate wrong and aren’t able to get back into their lane in time – and that’s when you hear about the accidents where drivers and passengers are injured, or worse. Add to that the usual percentage of bad drivers, like drunk kids and sleepy truck drivers, and you have a recipe for road tragedy – which is why, unfortunately, we need events “Israel Stops,” and visual reminders of all we have lost (like in the photo).

The most dangerous roads, based on accident statistics, really are country roads that have become inundated with drivers, due to the expansion of Israel’s population. Part of the latest economic rescue program (yep, Israel has them too!) includes billions of shekels to upgrade road infrastructure, which will presumably include some of these unsafe roads. Meanwhile, there are systems like this one, which help keep drivers on track with hi-tech sensors and wi-fi alerts. What if the government were to give a tax credit to everyone who installed a system like this in their car? Any Knesset members out there reading this blog?

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