On strike again...

we hesitated to by AF tickets. Every French citizen knows that school-holidays means strike. Employees at AF thinks, that if hundreds of families get stuck at the airport, they will have a raise. Well, if it works they must be very well paid, since they're on strike at least four times a year. This time they are striking because of future negociations in January.

They want to put pressure on the company management in advance...Sometimes it's hard to find reasons, it makes me think of my husbands grandmother quoting arab proverbs ; Hit your wife, if you don't know why she does...

Why oh why did I hesitate to buy tickets from that Eastern European State airline...

We're supposed to leave in the evening but I feel it's going to be a long night.

The jewish potato peeler

My mother is here.

She came yesterday.

I'm already exhausted.

Of course everything is wrong in my house. My French oven for example, it H A S to be French, it is far too bad to be a swedish product. In Sweden ovens like mine are waiting to be eliminated because of their lack of efficiency and will, when time comes, be executed on the public square in front of all perfect swedish women and men with perfect swedish ovens.

This morning I heard her talking to my elder son asking if we only had one lamp upstairs, she said

- oh, I see, so you have to walk around with this lamp because there is no other, it must be complicated when you are in different rooms...

I was listening downstairs, amazed. The lamp in her room broke yesteraday afternoon and I just put the childrens lamp in her room because I couldn't find a bulb... we do have lamps in France, french lamps that works.

This afternoon she shouted from the kitchen - Don't you have a swedish potato peeler?

No, I answered - but take the black one, it's Israeli, I'm sure you'll love it... inside I was smiling. I'm carrying a bomb behind my back, I wonder when I should let i go...

I'll tell her when we get back from Israel.

Yesterday I took the train into the capital to for my hebrew lessons. Once at the train I found out that I didn't dare to take up my hebrew book and read.

It is completely taboo to talk about this and it would probably pass for jewish paranoïa but it is a fact that it is dangerous.

I asked my husband later, if he dared to open his hebrew vocabulary in a public place.

He said no, I don't, I am too afraid it would provoke people.

You can read Chinese, Arabic or Greek books, no-one would bother. Hebrew though, is provokative...

Even if they polls are showing that antisemtism is decreasing it is very present in our lives.

A scientific proof that "aynara" does exist!

I crashed the car...

The other morning when I was leaving from the speach therapist with child number 2 I succeded in going straight upon a lump of concrete.

To be honest, I surpassed myself!

The front of the car got up on it and when I realized what I had done and reversed, the whole bumper fell off.

Fortunately my husband didn't ask the question until I had calmed down; how on earth did you do that?

Yesterday evening my Spanish neighbour ( nothing against the Spanish) asked me where my Ford was. I told him I had an accident and he said ( here it comes); "Aah, I looked at you car the other morning and then I looked at mine thinking how come my car is full of scratches and not hers? here he starts grinning, and continues " the same evening I saw you had a little accident, what a coincidence"!!

Yeah.

Aynara.

Today I will buy some "pror" and walk the "kanun" around the house!

Psht, psht, psht.

Chiour mispar 1

Lesson number one...

Yesterday we started our Aliyah Oulpan. We are going to study hebrew five hours a week.

The group of future Olim is funny; Three young boys, a religious couple, a father with his daughter, another retired man and us. It's really surprising when you know that there are hundreds of families leaving in July, I really thought there were going to be a lot more people than that!

I wonder what all these people will be doing in a year or two, where they will live, if they will not regret...

Now I can say "Lo, ani lo Nati ani Sarah" which means, No, I'm not Nati, I'm Sarah, it's a beginning...

The thought of the day...

The Solidarity in the diaspora is very strong and increases of course as the antisemitsm rices, the feeling that you are apart makes it more and more important to know WHO is jewish. For example, if you need to choose between two doctors that you don't know you would maybe chose the one with a jewish name, because you'd feel more safe that way. For some people this sounds very sectarian, almost racist, but it is a common way to react.

Imagine a Norweigan family in Oman, wouldn't they be happy to find a doctor with Norweigan origins?

When European jews are moving to Israel this is a big chock, EVERYONE is jewish!No more glances saying "are you"? no more discrete smiles or nods to tell the person "yes I am".

Lot's of olim feel they lose their footing and they miss the solidarity in the dispora which was provoked by the reason they left; the feeling to be apart and not belong a hundred procent to the nation.

In a certain way the olé goes from being a member of little group a part in a country to a citizen in nation apart in the world. If you feel no one understands you in your European contry today, tomorrow in Israel you will experience the whole world (almost) misunderstands you.

This is quite clear in my head and I think I will be able to handle it, I want to be a part of Israel, I am aware that no one is waiting for us or will say thank you for comming, and even more important, that the sionism probaly stops at the border.

Speaking letters, a beatiful jewish legend among thousands...

When Hachem cretated the world all the 22 letters stood up in front of him.

The "tav" was the firts letter to speak.

Please use me for the creation of the world, I am the first letter in the word "Torah"

In three thousand years, Hachem answered, a "tav" will appear on the front of all well-deserving men. When all humans will meet death these men will be spared.

The tav went away, very sad.

All letters stood up, one after the other and asked Hachem to use them for his creation and finally it was Beth's turn.

Beth said, proudly; All your children start their prayers with "baroukh hachem"...

Hachem looked at Beth and said, all my children do, and therefore the creation will start with a beth, Berechit...

As you are closed on top, behind and beneth and open in front no-one has the right to investigate what was above, behind or beneath except from the creation...

The most common answers

We want to do our Aliyah!
If you think that the person standing in front of you will react with a smile, a friendly hug and some nice words like " that sounds lika a great idea" you are completely wrong.
The first answer is without any doubt "It's very difficult over there" The person explains that you will have to learn hebrew (make sense to me) and also that summer holiday on the beach is not the same as "everydaylife" ( make sense too)
If you show no weakness and that you still want to go, even if you will not lie down on the beach the whole day and that you are actually willing to learn hebrew you will have to get ready for answer number two. You know, G*d forgive me, the Israelis are... (in general the person doesn't dare to finish the sentence immediately) this summer we were really disapointed... they are very bad-mannered and really rough, they cannot queue!
Well, if they can't queue we will reconsider our decision!! It's funny, I always thought they were very natural, maybe they are not... We'll see in november when we're going there, maybe love is blind...
The third argument for not going to Israel is the salary, unfortunately I do believe it's true that you earn less than in Europe. What will that mean, will I only have six skirts instead of ten? Maybe the kids will be able to tell me what they would like for a birthday gift, now when I ask them they never know...
The only thing that really worries me is that I will not be able to see my parents as often as now, but that is a problem I will have in common with all families living on differents continents...
These three arguments are the most important for not doing an aliyah. Ofcourse, if you continue to say you still want to go you will hear about the war, schools finishing at one o'clock in the afternoon, hospitals, how expensive cars are.
Maybe we are insane, because we think we can do it, we still want to do it, and we are still proud that we will (bli neder) become olim hadashim next year.

Simha Torah!

I remeber our first time in Israel for Simha Torah, so amazing to see people dancing in the streets showing and sharing their joy!

Our Synagogue was full, the AC still doesn't work so the heat was almost unbareable.

The children were so excited and so were the parents. The Rabbi didn't have the time to finish begging the parents NOT to throw sweets from the balcony before all women, their hand in plastic bags started throwing. One sweet even hit rabbi's head. Our comunity is sepharadic and I sometiems wonder if it is calmer in ashkenazi synagogues.

The Rabbi got really angry, not because of the sweet that hit his front but because the children were trying to catch the sweets on the floor while the men were dancing and jumping, it is very dangerous, he is right.

Our beautiful succah

He made it!! My husband, aka MR HANDYMAN, together with a friend and his parents built it and to be honest no-one believed it would stand up more than 4 hours...
The most experienced of them all was the father who speaks arabic, his wife was sitting on chair repeating that a succah should be made of wood and not of those plastic tubes the "boys" found at the "handymen shop".
My husband who doesn't understand arabic except from those classical "granny words" like mnaïchal'k, douralli'k etc just nodded and told me not to contradict them.

We had a great time with much laugh and little work, it took the whole afternoon.

Believe it or not, we have been able to eat in it, the days without rain ( which have been very few).