Nostalgia Sunday – Children’s Song Festival

December 21, 2008 - 8:32 PM by · 5 Comments
Filed under: General 

Channuka… let’s make that Hannuka… is upon us. Tonight the first candle on the menorah is lit and the country enters into a week-long frenzy of “Omigod, what are we going do with the kids?” That is because Hannuka in Israel means seven days of vacation for the kiddies and their teachers, (and yes, the parents still have to work).

For this reason, Hannuka in Israel also means Festigal, a high-priced, must-see music contest and show for the little ones, their siblings and long-suffering, short-fused parents. A one-time upstart competitor from Haifa to the Israel Children’s Song Festival, a song contest that had its heyday in the 1970s, Festigal got started in the early 1980s and became the juggernaut of Hannuka kiddie shows by 1987, the year the Children’s Song Festival up and died.

Festigal is the yardstick by which all other Hannuka children’s shows are judged – they pay to get the biggest and most beloved stars – meaning that talent ranges from the hottest Children’s Channel babes and boytoys, to others currently residing in the ‘where are they now?’ bin, and those in between. In short, no other show is louder, more garish, more obnoxious or more in demand. You can’t get tickets for love or money by now. Honest.

In contrast, a medley of festival songs from more innocent days.

Okay, I really have to link to the full clip of Zvika Pick, Israel’s then-answer to David Bowie, Alice Cooper or Peter Frampton, depending on who he was channeling that year. (Today with a reality show, he’s currently Ozzy Osbourne). In this song, “The Soap Cried A Lot,” he tells a tale of woe about some bathroom accessories and a little boy who won’t wash. Enjoy at your peril – and Happy Hannuka!

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Paper boats for three solstices

December 19, 2008 - 12:42 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Art, coexistence, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Religion 

Origami encounterEvery year, Chanuka is arguably the biggest week for children’s entertainment offerings across Israel, with options ranging from lavish pop stage productions like Festigal to museum activities to themed expositions at shopping malls.

Somewhere in-between all of the above is the free Origami Festival set to take place at the Jaffa Port tomorrow and a week from today. The festival explores the nautical theme inherent to its setting by offering workshops on how to fold square pieces of paper into sailboats according to Japanese craft traditions. Participants will also be given the opportunity to race their boats against one another on a specially prepared track, complete with fans to help replicate windy conditions, and prizes will be awarded to the victors.

The other theme to the festival that resonates with its setting is coexistence. Jaffa is home to sizeable Jewish, Muslim and Christian communities that live side by side, so the festival is a celebration of the winter solstice holidays of all three faiths – hence the justification for its pre-Chanuka launch.

Origami actually has a tradition of being tied to coexistence-themed initiatives. Famed Hiroshima atomic bomb victim Sadako Sasaki, who died in a hospital in 1955 of leukemia, spent her final days folding paper in to cranes, inspired by an old Japanese adage that those who fold 1000 cranes are entitled to a wish. Since then, Sadako and her folding efforts have been employed as a symbol for mankind’s longings to get along, and it was based on these teachings that Miri Golan founded the Israeli Origami Center, based in Ramat Gan, in 1993.

Golan and the IOC have held many ethnic-encounter workshops and events, including a major convention in Jerusalem’s Old City this past July, which was attended by many of the world’s ambassadors to Israel, many of the superstars of the international Origami scene and 1500 folded works of art sent as blessings for peace in Jerusalem by craftsmen of many faiths. The organization’s activities have also included Folding Together, a series of workshops bringing Israel’s Muslim and Jewish youth together via origami since 2002.

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