Will Israel beget weekend warriors?

March 5, 2011 - 7:58 PM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, Business, General, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Life, News, Politics, Religion 

Will this become the standard scene for Sunday's in Israel?

One of the hardest aspects of living in Israel at the beginning for immigrants from the West is losing the concept of weekends.

The week is centered around Shabbat – a frenzy of activity through Friday afternoon, 25-30 hours of leisure, and then Sunday morning, when you’re just beginning to feel relaxed, it’s back to the start of the work week.

There have been legislative attempts over the last decade to turn Sunday’s into a day of leisure, without much success, but that hasn’t stopped Vice Premier Silvan Shalom from picking up the two-day weekend mantle once again.

According to The Jerusalem Post, Shalom has been discussing the issue with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer and Histadrut labor federation chief Ofer Eini, as well as representatives of haredi parties.

According to the proposal, Saturdays and Sundays would be designated as days of rest. Work hours would be slightly extended during the week and on Fridays to make up for lost work time.

Backers of the idea are convinced that having a two-day weekend would help the Israeli economy, give families more leisure time together, and make Israeli society less stressful.

According the Post, two-day weekends would especially help Shabbat-observers, who currently do not have a full day that they can travel without missing work or school. Opponents are worried that the measure would cause severe damage to the economy.

“This would cause a revolution in Israel,” Shalom said in a statement released Thursday. “This would make our country more normal, give people more leisure and allow them to return to the work week on Monday a lot more rested.”

In addition to Shalom’s efforts, the two-day weekend warriors have launched an online petition drive has begun and two Facebook groups have been formed.

I’m undecided on the issue, after having somewhat gotten used to the Friday-Saturday weekend, even though Friday is anything but leisure. On the other hand, the idea of spending Sunday outdoors, working in the yard, playing sports or heading to the shopping complexes, isn’t too shabby at all. How do you say ‘Sunday brunch’ in Hebrew?

Tags: , , , ,

Finding friends on the trail

November 20, 2010 - 6:18 PM by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, Environment, General, Israeliness, Life, Travel 

I really like going hiking on Shabbat at one of the multitude of wonderful nature sites within a short car ride of Jerusalem. It’s not so much for the sites, the beauty, the communion with nature, but rubbing shoulders with the Israelis who choose to do the same thing.

Unfortunately, the religiously observant among us are unable to join the pack on Shabbat, usually cramming their outdoor excursions into hol hamoed Pessah or Succot. That leaves secular, or somewhat traditional, Israeli backpackers on the trails on Shabbat.

There’s something about these hearty, trailblazing Israeli who decides to get out in the sun for the day instead of sitting around the house glued to mobile devices or cable TV that warms the cockles of my heart.

And it turns out that, for the most part, they’re really nice – not loud, pick up after themselves, respectful of their surroundings. It’s as if the shuk didn’t exist in this country!

Today, we were hiking Nahal Arugot at Ein Gedi, and stopped at one of the many pools on the way for some shade, swim and water. Among the others at the oasis was a group of eight or nine couples in their 50s who apparently go hiking together regularly. Sitting nearby was a young family with one or two small children, about three or four years old.

One of the veteran hikers called out, “Is there a little girl named Tali Hagar here?” And it just so turned out that one of the small children called out, “That’s me!”

“Then if you close your eyes, you’ll get something that you’re missing,” the man replied. Tali’s parents looked quizically at him, while Tali closed her eyes, and the man produced a hat out of his pocket. “Is this yours?”

The hat she had evidently lost near the beginning of the trail was now back on her head, and the parents effusively thanked the manand they got to talking. Turns out the group of veterans were actually veterans – former IDF career officers living in Kochav Yair who regularly go out together on Israeli trails.

The two new groups of friends bade each other farewell, and set out on their respective routes. In the gorgeous surroundings of Shabbat in Ein Gedi, everyone’s just a little kinder and friendlier.

Tags: , , , ,

Rosh Hashana table talk

September 11, 2010 - 7:49 PM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, Food, General, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Politics 

The Rosh Hashana/Shabbat three-day marathon has come and gone, with the only casualty being a slightly expanded waist line.

We Israelis are somewhat spoiled, with the rest of the holidays on the Jewish calendar lasting only 25 hours – so a two-day Rosh Hashana folding over into a Shabbat was indeed a long haul.

But between visits to our synagogue, delicacy-laden meals with friends, hanging out at home with family and a good book (Yehuda Avner’s The Prime Ministers – shout out to Sheryl Abbey), and a couple trips to the local sports field for a batting and catching session with my son on one day and the resumption of the local touch rugby Shabbat neighborhood game on the other day, the holiday move along at a fast enough clip.

At a first afternoon lunch at good friends near our Jerusalem shul, we were surrounded by an interesting group – our two families, another good friend with his lady friend, two high school graduates from the US who are in Israel for nine months on a Nativ program, and two other American college students – one here studying at a Conservative yeshiva and the other just having finished her first visit to Israel via a birthright program and extending the stay by visiting her friend for a few days.

The topic of conversation touched on a myriad of topics, ranging from what is the Israel equivalent of Walmart (the answer is – there is none) to the length of the Rosh Hashana musaf service (the consensus – too long) what are the prospects of the peace talks launched in Washington bearing any fruit (the answer is – almost none).

However the debate than enused did elicit a hearty give and take which enabled our American visitors to witness that vigorous democracy at practice in Israel, included raised voices and good natured jabbing. But most of all, it showed that Israelis care very deeply about what’s happening in their country, and what better time than at the Rosh Hashana table to express it?

I’m sure it was a scene repeated in various forms in hundreds of thousands of home over the last three days and is probably the originator of the phrase ‘two Jews and three opinions.’ Here’s a toast to all of us potential prime ministers on this launch of this new year.

Tags: , , , , , ,

Poland and getting away from technology

September 3, 2010 - 1:39 PM by · 2 Comments
Filed under: health, Israeliness, Technology 

A student on a class trip to Poland

I wrote in an earlier post about how human beings aren’t built to truly multitask – an action we increasingly rely on to parse all the data coming at us from the web or our mobile devices. New research is trying to figure out not only what happens psychologically when we try to do two things at once, but whether our brain neurology is being re-mapped by our incessant use of technology.

You don’t have to go much further than our teenage daughter Merav, who just came back from a school trip to Poland this week, to gain critical insight. Merav voluntarily disconnected herself from the Internet for a week. Did this make a difference to her experience? I’ll get back to that in a moment.

First, I want to look at research being done by New York Times technology journalist Matt Richtel who participated earlier this year in a similar journey to the technology wasteland – a backpacking trip undertaken by a group of scientists where gadgets were banned and their itinerary took them far out of the range of cell phones.

Would these highly connected researchers act – no, think – differently in such a situation, he asks?

The scientists were split, according to Richtel in an interview with Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air program, with some feeling that “the constant stream of data was making it increasingly difficult to focus and concentrate” and others saying “the benefits of having constant access to information far outweighed any consequences.”

But all of the scientists noticed that they began to feel more relaxed and more engaged in the world. They slept a little better; waited a bit longer before answering a question. “You don’t feel in (such) a rush to do anything, your sense of urgency fades,” Richtel says.

But only after three days – that was the amount of time for the disconnect effect to kick in. This might explain why we feel more relaxed after a three-day weekend as opposed to a “normal” two-day break from work.

Why is this the case? A laboratory study had rats learning new tasks. When the rats were given time away from the task to process it, the action moved into memory and real long-term learning took place. Without that down time, the rats were more prone to forget what they’d just done.

We can extrapolate that, Richtel says, to our contemporary lives, where we rarely give ourselves a break. If we’re waiting in line for cheese at the SuperSol supermarket and there are three people ahead, what do we do? We pull out our smart phone and check email, browse the Internet or play a game. Even people without smart phones may listen to music on an iPod (I know I’m guilty of that).

What we need to do, Richtel claims, is simply “be,” to not fill every moment with something electronic, to let the learning consolidate in our brains. To have “down time.”

Which brings me back to Merav. Our daughter’s experience in Poland, visiting lost Jewish communities and crying at the concentration camps, was intense – “difficult but meaningful” is how she described it upon her return home. Was her level of engagement different than her peers, many of whom were texting away at the dinner table?

While the research suggests yes, it would be presumptuous for me to make such a claim. But it’s undeniable that our use of technology profoundly affects us. I, for one, am looking forward to the Jewish holidays this year – Rosh Hashana and Shabbat coincide in such a way that those who observe the High Holy Days according to a more strict interpretation of Jewish law will have a full three days of enforced technology deprivation.

I wonder how I’ll feel on the other side?

Tags: , , ,

A protest is born

August 23, 2010 - 8:09 AM by · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, coexistence, General, History and Culture, Holidays, Israeliness, Life, Music, Politics, Pop Culture, Religion 

A Star is Born finalist Ohad Shraga'i gets ready for the Jerusalem showdown.

When does a pop culture song contest become turn into a religious altercation? When it takes place in Israel apparently.

It’s going to happen when the final telecast of the popular singing competition A Star is Born (based on the American Idol format) takes place on September 4th on a Saturday night from Sultan’s Pool outside the Old City walls in Jerusalem.

The decision to hold the finale in Jerusalem only and hour and a half after Shabbat ends has raised the ire of the religious establishment in the country’s capital who insist that the preparations for the show will require Shabbat violations.

They also are upset that the heavy traffic expected will block the road for those planning to get to the Western Wall for the first night of selichot (penitential prayers said before the High Holy Days).

According to the Jewish Chronicle in London, the coup of staging the show in Jerusalem for the first time was due to the efforts of Mayor Nir Barkat, over the stauch opposition of some of his coalition partners.

“Quiet talks with the mayor did not result in anything,” said United Torah Judaism city councillor Shlomo Rozenshtein. “We are moving from quiet activity to open demonstrations of pain and protest at the desecration of Shabbat.”

Yossef Rosenfeld, the chairman of the Committee for the Holiness of Shabbat, promised that there would be big demonstrations backed by all the main leaders of the Charedi community. “Seeing such a serious desecration of Shabbat we will not remain quiet, but take to the streets.”

Both the producers of the show – Keshet – and representatives from City Hall are reassuring the protesters that all the preparations for the show will be completed on Friday, before Shabbat begins. And since the show won’t begin until 90 minutes after Shabbat ends, there’s nothing to worry about, right?

It seems like, though, with all the hoopla surrounding it, it’s unclear what the real show will be – the crowning of the new singing champion of Israel, or the protests leading up to it.

Tags: , , , , ,

Page 1 of 3123

 

© 2012 ISRAELITY | Site by illuminea | Sitemap