Datelines

October 21, 2010 - 1:25 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life 

David’s post and all the newspaper, web and radio pieces about Rabin got me thinking about my own relationship to dates, particularly the Hebrew and Gregorian calendars, which are the two calendars we use regularly around here.

I myself was at a friend’s 30th birthday dinner the night that Rabin was shot. I remember feeling very adult at that gathering, which was at a Jerusalem restaurant, and being somewhat consumed with what was happening around me. When we heard the news, we quickly paid the bill and went our separate ways. Having moved to Israel only a few months earlier, I was still living with my parents and we gathered around the television set, waiting for news.

And so, for me, Rabin’s death is always wrapped up in my first months here, when I was figuring things out and deciding whether I wanted to stay here. The date that I think of is November 4, not the 12th of Heshvan, and the current remembrances and ceremonies seem almost early to me. The length of time, however, 15 years, corresponds with how many years I’m living here. Long, and yet not so much time.

But as I settled into life here, I not only got used to the army clock — i.e., it’s 13:00 right now — but have certain dates in my own life that I think of according to the Hebrew calendar, and not the Gregorian one. While I still don’t really know my Hebrew birthday date, and yes, there are those who only celebrate their birthday according to the Hebrew calendar, the dates that I instinctively think of in Hebrew are my wedding anniversary and the birthday of my twins.

Why? Probably because my anniversary is on Lag B’Omer, which is a big celebration day around here, and we specifically chose that day for our marriage, liking that we’d be one of many celebrations that day, including bonfires and cookouts. So sometimes we celebrate on Lag B’Omer, and sometimes on the ‘loazi’ date of (meaning, roughly, Gregorian), May 27, which basically just gives us more than one option for marking the day.

As for my boys, they were born on Erev Sukkot, the eve of the holiday, about six weeks before their due date. They were not what I was planning to do on that particular holiday, but now that they’re very much here, I like remembering that day during Sukkot, as well as weeks later, on October 13.

Then again, there’s something to be said for commemorating a moment, happy or sad, on two different dates. The perspective changes, but the memory remains the same.

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Where Bob and Obama meet

November 10, 2008 - 2:23 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: General, Politics, Pop Culture 

Can we fix it? Even my two and a half year old knows the answer to this one. “Yes we can!” Is he a political genius who has been following the Barack Obama election campaign closely. No of course not. He’s a fan of Bob the Builder.

Everyone is talking about Obama’s new slogan “Yes we can”, the new “Just do it”, of our era. Teamsters Union President James P. Hoffa even had thousands of Israelis chanting it at the memorial to Rabin on Saturday night, which was a piece of political engineering if ever there was one.

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But I’d just like to point out that the much loved animated character, Bob, the head of a construction team of assorted tractors and diggers, was already saying “Yes we can”, when Obama was probably still thinking about a career in law.

The British-made show emphasizes conflict resolution, co-operation, socialization and various learning skills – and (translated into Hebrew) helped teach my kids the value of working together to solve a problem. Can we fix it? Yes we can.

In the UK the theme song – Can we fix it? Yes we can, became a million-selling number one hit, which, coming from the birthplace of the Beatles seems a little sad.

Anyway, I’m clearly not the only one to see the connection. I came across this video on YouTube – excuse the swear word at the end.

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Lessons from The Rabin Murder

November 4, 2008 - 12:35 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: General 

Israel can surprise you – in the most surprising ways. One thing I’ve learned in some 15 years of living here – nothing, but nothing, is what it seems on the surface. There is little, if any, black and white in Israeli life – it’s a rainbow, with lots of shades of different colors in the mix. Take my Rabin experience, for example.

I was at home with my wife and some friends, watching a movie, when I heard the news – “Four Weddings and a Funeral.” Not focusing too closely on the video (men will understand why), I overheard a couple of neighbors talking outside in the courtyard. Rather rare for a Saturday night, I thought, and especially those two, who didn’t generally fraternize, going on at length. Sauntering out of the room (I think it was around the time of the second wedding), I went out to the porch to find out what was going on.

Needless to say, we turned the movie off and watched the proceedings.

At the time, I worked for a publication owned by a major Israeli newspaper in Tel Aviv. You could count on one hand the number of observant people in this organization (to their credit, the very avant garde, very politically left people at this publication were extremely respectful to my religious principles – for example, they always made sure kosher food was served at staff meetings, etc.).

But not only was I religious – I was a “settler,” too, living in a community east of the green line. This, too, had never been an issue with these people, and my views on politics and Jewish life in Judea and Samaria were well-known. But now, with Rabin killed by a Jew wearing a kippah, and his alleged connections to residents of Judea and Samaria – this was different. With all the talk of how “the right and religious” were behind Rabin’s killing, I walked into the office that Sunday morning with great trepidation, ready for anything – dirty looks, insults, verbal confrontations, or worse.

But either the folks working at this publication were exceptions to the rule, or the very yellow character of the Israeli media had reared its ugly head again, with the tiny minority of loudmouths dedicated to ruining the fabric of Israeli society trumpeting ideas about putting right-wingers in internment camps in the Negev being given a solitary platform. Even the “star” of this publication, who today is famous for his American talk-show shock-jock style radio call-in program where he argues with everybody, and who has extremely left-wing views, didn’t speak to me any differently than usual (gruffly, like he talked to everybody). Astounded, I asked one of the editors of the publication what was going. Where was all the blame, the anger, the “we will not forgive and we will not forget” I was expecting? After all, I was a pretty convenient target!

He just looked at me like I was crazy – and asked: “Why would we want to do that to you? You may be a settler, but you’re ‘our’ settler!”

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