Skip to main content

Melle Mel and Sukkot.....

Unemployed, all non void, walking 'round like a pretty boy Floyd, turned stick up kid, but....Well no, not really. But unemployed indeed since a couple of months - by my own choosing and no real excuse for only using my blog as a means to get 3 people at best to read my poetry. Supposedly a blog should be updated at least once a day, no? I had this grand scheme that I would do just that after I took the consequences of no longer standing three layers of incompetence above me at my place of work and hence resigning - I was going to dub it "The dole diaries" -but it never materialised. Maybe because I as of yet don't know if my dear ol' union intends to actually pay me any dole or if I shall have to live on fried rice for the remainder of my savings.

So anyways - I overslept this morning and was awoken by a phone call from Chip demanding that I was to immediately get in a cab and get my sorry behind to Shul as they were a man short of a Minyan (the quorum of 10 Jewish men necessary for service), so I called a cab and arrived just in time for Kriat Torah - half an hour late. After service we had breakfast, I had a smoke with Chip and was informed that Dale is badly depressed and will probably not show for some time. I had already figured as much as he doesn't even answer the phone but I miss the man. Still - at least he is talking to his closest friend. Then I was off to the JCC to meet up with P to explain to him the ABC's of his new computer, one of them worthless notebooks that are really small and reeeealy sloooow. How he has achieved to reach the age of 60 without knowing how to save a word document in a folder of his choice I have no idea. So that's about how much I managed to teach in 1,5 hours.

Yesterday I spent most the day building Sukkoth - first the Chabad Shaliach's and then Shul's. Sukkoth is my probably my favourite holiday - a lot of singing, the wonderful scent of Etrogim filling Shul in the early morning, the rattling sound of shaking Arba minim, 50 Jews crammed up in the Sukka under the pine roof, great food, and then staying late with the Israelis, the yeshiva bocherims and the rabbis - singing and talking Torah and getting drunk on Whiskey. Doesn't get better.

Comments

  1. Keep writing even if your reader statistics stink. You are really good at this, and someday the reader count will start to multiply. Your poems are fantastic and your prose meaningful and dynamic.
    /B

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What is the problem with men?

I'm in a bad mood. Fed up. With men. To be clear: I'm not a feminist, I don't believe men to have a rape gene or to be incapable of acting decently due to sociological constraints, general upbringing or an in general evil manhood into which we are socialised. Never the less, I'm truly fed up with the way certain men behave towards women. Part of the reasons are purely egoistic: I'm fed up with being treated like a potential moron, molester or rapist. I'm tired of noticing how women ahead start speeding up when I'm quietly walking home at night, and having too slow down or change sidewalks not to scare her. And a few months ago in New York City I was unable to get a girl to date me, to even meet me in a restaurant, partly because of her previous encounters with inconsiderate schmucks and madmen. Instead we talked on the phone for some 8 (!) hours, half of which was devoted to her interrogating me as to whether I was a stalker, madman, alcoholic or something o...

Khaybar, Khaybar ya Yahud!

In Sweden there is a monthly Magazine called The Jewish Chronicle. It´s partly funded by The Jewish Congregation, and hence, as a member, I receive it every month. This month they have a theme on the Anti-Israel protests during the Operation Cast Led in Gaza. During these demonstrations, signs were carried with the text "Khaybar, Khaybar ya Yahud!", a slogan that was also chanted at mass demonstrations in Malmoe, the third largest city in Sweden, with the largest percentage of newly arrived Muslim immigrants from the Middle East. Now what does this slogan mean? Is it something about freedom to Palestine? Ending the "occupation"? Not so. Khaybar was a small city in present day Saudi Arabia, where Muhammad clashed with Jewish Bedouins in the year 629, as it seems primarily for political reasons. The fight ended up with 3/4 of the Jews being slaughtered. And this is now chanted in a protest against the Davis Cup match between Israel and Sweden? This is a demonstrati...

Hebrew grammar

So yesterday went by fairly uneventfully. In keeping with my self-diciplinary ideas I cooked my own dinner instead of going for Schwarma, and then ate it with Quentin. I also managed to spend large part of my post Ulpan day in the company of the future tense verbs of binyan Paal. And I'm starting to grasp them which means I'm back where I was the last time I took my Hebrew studies seriously, 5 years ago. I also waisted my time debating a fairly nasty letter that the NGO Women at the Wall had directed to the Israeli government and the general public. They were basically describing Orthodox people as a screaming, feces-throwing mob, while disingenuously seeking monopoly for their own brand of Judaism. I fail to understand why feminist Reformniks, who make a point of breaking every Hallacha they come across, feel it absolutely necessary to imitate prescribed Orthodox and male behavior in the one place in the world where it will be seriously hurtful - the Western Wall. Then again...