Living in Israel
This week I am preparing for Passover, a joyous holiday in which we commemorate our people’s journey from bondage to freedom. Freedom is a theme that resonates for me, not simply as a philosophical topic for discussion at an upcoming seder, but as a down-to-earth ideal that motivates my daily actions. These days, I spend my time working with a group of people who have tasted the bitterness of slavery, torture, and hardship, and who long for freedom, the African asylum-seeking community in Israel. Seven years ago, when I moved to Israel with my three daughters and my husband, who served... Read More
As Pesach approaches, Jews around the world are busy preparing for the chag (holiday). We are searching for chametz (leaven), sweeping, vacuuming, scrubbing — it’s Jewish spring cleaning. Like so many Jewish holidays, Pesach follows the Jewish trope of “They tried to kill us, we prevailed, let’s eat!” One of the things we eat on Pesach is a "Hillel sandwich," which combines the bitter maror (bitter herbs) with the sweet charoset (apple and nut mixture) between two pieces of matzah. This symbolizes the need to take the... Read More
Two weeks before Passover, everything in Israel comes alive as if awakening from a coma. After a broiling summer, a short fall, and a dry winter, everyone enters a Pesach state of mind: Store windows are dressed in white, fields of wild yellow flowers fill the outskirts of the cities, kindergarten children practice the Four Questions, and donation centers overflow with goods. The one question everyone asks is, “Where are you going for seder?” But in the life of a Jewish community that is always planning events in advance, Passover marks the imminent arrival of the heavy, suffocating, and... Read More
I’m in Machane Yehuda – the big shuk or market in Jerusalem – just like I am every week. The “oznei Haman” have arrived. In Israel, hamantaschen are called “Haman’s ears” and with a bit of imagination, I can almost make sense of that. Every year, I wander from bakery to bakery during the weeks preceding Purim, and I end up carbohydratedly disappointed. My search for the hamantaschen of my youth are nowhere to be found. The bakeries in Jerusalem, and especially in the shuk, make amazing hamantaschen. You want hamantaschen filled with halvah? We have that. Chocolate dough hamantaschen filled... Read More
I had the opportunity to visit the Western Wall in Jerusalem on my first trip to Israel through the Reform Movement’s Sci-Tech Israel program. Jerusalem was one of the most anticipated stops on our tour of numerous factories and tech-startups located throughout the nation. My soul was swelling with excitement; I knew I was footsteps away from a place I had merely visited in childhood daydreams. As I walked through the women’s courtyard for the very first time, I noticed that a stark barrier stood distinctly to my left, separating me from the male friends I had met on my science- and... Read More
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