Making the Matza

Last weel I participated in a women's matza baking at the yeshiva near our house.  What an interesting experience--sort of like a Model Matza Factory but WAY more intense.  To start, only boys and girls one year post bar-/bat mitzvah were allowed to participate because, said the supervising rabbi, "this is not a joke.  You've got to be mature to do this right".  Younger kids were allowed to help, though, in things like washing equipment.

To begin, all rings, watches and bracelets were removed and gloves donned.  As we said out loud "l'shem matzo mitzvos" (for the sake of the mitzvah of matza) and three electronic timers were synchronized to 18 minutes (beat the clock.  If you don't, your matza is chametz and not fit for use during Pesach), water from a local river was added to flour that had been watched since the time of the harvest  We watched as a "matza pro" (seriously, his finished matzos were things of beauty.  Unlike, say, mine) mixed them together.  As the rabbi noted, this was very different than mixing something like challah dough, as there is an extremely small amount of water added to the flour, so getting a dough is much more of a challenge.

Love the gloves!  Reminded me of those stories James Herriot wrote about being a country vet....
All photos in the blog today are from www.daliaart.com

Then on the finner, which was like an extraordinarily heavy metal rolling pin attached at one end to a small metal table.  The dough was pounded with the finner, while constantly being folded and re-folded by a helper who was veeery careful of his fingers.  I took a try at finning (or whatever the word is) and found it very similar to performing CPR (which, thank Gd, I have never had to do "for real"): you have to put your whole body into it, it's hardest on your arms and, in about two minutes, you are quite ready for the next person to step in and take your place....

I recognize my elbow!  That's me finning!

Next on to the rolling.  I think this is where we women thought we'd shine.  It was a LOT harder than we/I anticipated, though.  The dough tears easily and get little folds in it that mess it up when it gets in the oven and make it chametz.  All the while (from the beginning of the process) the dough must be kept in constant motion, as when it stops moving it can start rising.

we are poised to grab the dough and start rolling!  

The last process before baking is "redling", where the dough gets perforated with rollers that make little holes in it (I once tried to buy one to use in making my "matza soaps" but couldn't convince any Model Matza Factory rabbis to sell me one :)).  Baking is done in a super hot oven, this one built from scratch with bricks and a propane tank.

The matzas get laid over a long stick that's covered with paper and rolled over into the oven so that the matzas roll off onto the oven floor.  The stick is then thrown on the ground, to be picked up by the kids who remove the paper and recover it.

Faster, faster!  Once, my dough just made it into the oven when the timer went off.  So I learned that just making it into the oven is enough before the 18 minutes is up 

Every single thing used gets cleaned before being used again.  Gloves used only once.  All paper covering the work areas is changed between rounds.  We did four rounds, which took 2.5 hours.  I understand better the high price of shmura matza: it was very labor intensive (I didn't sit down for the entire time) as well as a spiritually-intense procedure.

Delightedly, we had three complete pieces in the box I took home and those were the matzas at our Seder (boy, is it weird to write that in singular, not plural; Only one Seder now that we live in Israel!).  The matzas were light and tasty and I am glad that I had the experience.

Happy Birthday, Ilana!

Wow--double digits!  Today is Ilana's Hebrew birthday and we are (finally) done celebrating.  We noted her English birthday.  And Shabbat HaGadol.  And she had a party in school. And a party here.  Party, party, party!

home party.  Thanks, Grandma Rhoda, for remembering to send candles with your present!

School party.  Ilana's in the back holding up the butterfly-shaped cake she made.  She's with her "birthday buddy" Tamar, who made Aliyah on the same day as us.  So nice they had a joint birthday party!

For her party, the girls made tote bags from T-shirts.  Tamar said she was like the Jewish story character Savta Simcha, who has a never-ending handbag

They also played "pin the olah chadashah tag on the Ilana".  Every year, we have a themed "pin the....".  Were we still in Malden, my guess is that we would have had "pin the glasses on Ilana", since wearing glasses is a big new thing in her life.

We brainstormed and she chose this theme.  When we arrived in Israel, all the new olim were given tags saying "oleh/olah chadash/ah" so that it would be easy to identify who, in the vast crowd at the airport, was new.  I hadn't thought about it until Purim, when someone from my class came to ulpan wearing a costume of their aliyah t-shirt and it had the sticker on it.  Brought me right back!

It was certainly different having a party without the ol' beloved Malden crowd of girls, but I am glad that Ilana has made such good new friends here.  All the girls above speak English (as well as Hebrew).  The girls on the far right and second from left made aliyah this past summer, and the middle girls have been here since they were toddlers.

Partying While Pre-Pesach Purchasing

The whole country seems to be in a pre-Pesach FRENZY.  The mall has pop-up kiosks full of housewares, and the grocery stores have huge displays of cleaning products for sale.  Ulpan and the kids' schools got out for Pesach break this past Wednesday, which is a full week earlier than the Boston calendar for this year.  While I appreciate the extra time in my schedule, it does seem a bit excessive.....What are your kids supposed to do with all that time off (let's assume they're not going to clean right alongside the parents)?  Ah, here comes the "Pre-Pesach Kaytana" (day camp) to the rescue.  Ilana is signed up to take a sewing camp for five hours/day from Sunday through Thursday.  Nothing similar for the teens, but Penina has become a very popular babysitter in the neighborhood  (amazing girl got four kids to bed on time the other night!).  She has also been helping our pregnant next door neighbor, who is past her due date, with Pesach cleaning and with their other kids (Chana and Penina even slept over there last Shabbos in case our neighbor needed to go to the hospital during the night).

We rented a car and went to Ikea.  (Amusing side note: here it's pronounced "EE-Kay-Ah" because "Eye-Kee-Ah" sounds like the word for vomiting.  Similar pronunciation with Kia brand cars).  It was....incredible....to see the whole store decked out for "the Holidays".  For Pesach.  Amazing.  Every table display was set up for a seder (seder plates for sale, too!):

couldn't resist taking a bite of the cardboard matza (no jokes about how could we tell it was different from the real stuff, please)

While we had the car, Penina and I did our large Pre-Pesach shopping trip to the big supermarket in the area.  The entire store was changed over to only Passover products within 48 hours of Purim ending.  We're at the point that most stores, if they sell chametz at all, have it on display racks outside the store, or in a very small section of the store with big signs all around warning that you are about to buy toxic waste.  Or something.  The general minhag seems to be that people shouldn't eat for the week or two leading up to Pesach, but we're not going to follow that one :)

It's funny to have a whole huge store Kosher for Passover and still feel like there's not much to eat.  That's because the vast majority of food items I have found are only certified for those who eat kitniyot (like beans and rice) on Passover.  Works in a country with so many Sephardim in it, but not for us Ashkenazis.....I do think it's cool that many people here can eat their beloved Bamba even on Pesach, though (peanut butter corn puffs.  It's like the ultimate "anti-Ashkenazi" food).

There were some unusual things that were kosher for Passover.  Like clear tape.  And paper napkins.

All in all, it's a very interesting time here!

Does This Count Towards My 15 Minutes of Fame?

Our neighbor, who is originally from Hungary, is very involved in campaigns that encourage greater understanding of Israel by non-Jewish Europeans.  So she asked if I would be interviewed by people-who-work-with-people-she-works-with for a Finnish documentary.  Okaaay.....

I asked some questions to try to ensure they were above-board (i.e. that I wouldn't get ambushed with anti-Israel questions) and I was interviewed yesterday.  The three people in the crew were extremely earnest in their desire to get their country-folk to have a better view of Israel and those of us who choose to live here, and it was very sweet to meet such people.  They are traveling all over the country doing 3 or 4 interviews a day.  The documentary will hopefully be finished (Finnished?!) before the end of the year.

Funniest moment: there was a knock on the front door as Shlomo, the young man who started working with my husband, came to "the office".  I was all hooked up to the microphone and stuck where I was, the kids were upstairs with the bedroom door shut and Shalom Shachne was in the office on a phone call, so the interviewer went to answer the door.  The look on Shlomo's face as he came in was priceless: "Umm, I just wasn't sure that I was even in the right house!" (Poor guy thought he had walked into an alternate universe--a blond in jeans and a t-shirt answers the door and then our living room is transformed with big lights and a video camera on a tripod!).

I hope I gave coherent answers about why we are here and the specialness of the land and the honor of being able to live in it.  Then again, if I didn't, what are the chances I will ever see a Finnish documentary?!

Batsheva left ;(

And the house is too quiet and the table seems too big.....Ilana was setting the table tonight and commented on how odd it is to just put out four plates again (Chana's also been here for most of the past 5 days).  It was a great visit and we look forward to her return!

about to leave for the aiport

Here are some unusual things noticed over the past few days:

--I asked about setting up an appointment for a dental cleaning and was offered one within 24 hours. This is the 3rd dental cleaning I've set up for family members and they always seem to ask if I want one within the next day or two. If your US dentist is anything like mine, appointments are booked 6 months in advance and, should you need to cancel that appointment, say, 5 months ahead of time, you will wait another 2 months (after the original 6 month date) to get a new appointment.   Pleasant change!

--Batsheva pointed out that a meal at McDonald's costs about the same as going to a nice, sit-down place!

The "Original Big America" is 44NIS--about $11!
p.s. don't worry, we weren't going to eat there (no matter what the prices were).  Just snapped the photo as we went by

--We had a great time on our last tiyyul--going to the Israel Police Heritage Center, conveniently located about ten minutes from home.  Very interesting tour of the history of the profession in the country and definitely food for thought about many things (for example, while I knew that the population of Israel went up a lot once Independence was announced in 1948, I didn't know that the population of the country *doubled* in the first year.  All in a country severely lacking in infrastructure.....We are so blessed to be here now....).

Here is a picture with our guide in front of an early Israeli police car.  I was really stymied when he started to speak.  He looked like an Israeli, had an Israeli name, and spoke Hebrew like an Israeli but he had a perfect accent when speaking English and a very high-level vocabulary.  I was so confused I even asked him if he was from the US.  Turns out his father was stationed for the Israeli Air Force in Utah for a few years, starting when our guide was 5.  No other Israelis anywhere around.  When the family returned to Israel they had to put him in a program with new olim so he could learn Hebrew again!

--Final thought on Batsheva's visit: Israel is a very sweet country.  In every place we went to that had a kid's- or family rate, they charged us the lower rate for Batsheva.  I would say something like, "no, no she is my child, but she is 20, so she's not a child for tickets" and the clerk would say, "no, she's your daughter!  Family rate"  :)

Purim! (Part Two)

Well, we made it!  And it was fun and not too overwhelming :)  Here are more random thoughts:

--I went to the early minyan at the BIG shul and committed a faux pas when I shook my grogger on the *second* "Haman".  Oops.  I guess it's a custom at more than one shul to only make noise on the first and last "Haman"!  (I wasn't the only one.  There were maybe 4 of us in the crowd of, umm, 150).  My kids went to the next minyan at the BIG shul and  they made noise on each "Haman", so I guess you just need to know what you're in for.

--We did our usual morning scramble for costumes (Ilana, at least, was prepared ahead of time) and ended up with

a giraffe:

Rosie the Riveter

a cat (or two cats, once Liat and her family showed up)

and an olah chadasha

--the bus stop was full of people in costume;

--And the bus said "Purim Sameach" (Happy Purim) on the front:

--We were *not* overwhelmed with tzedaka collectors and no one came dancing in our door :)

--I sent Batsheva and Chana on what I thought was a reasonable walk to deliver mishloach manot, not realizing that my phone did not have Google maps on it, which was how I planned out the delivery system.  Since our city has many stairs, there are shortcuts that Waze (the only similar app I had on my phone, which I gave to guide them) did not know.  So it sent them hither and yon on a driving route that did not help much since they were walking ;(.  5 miles later (oops) they collapsed back home.  They were very good sports about it, thankfully.

--Liat's family came for our festive meal as well as Ariella B, which added a lovely "bit o' Malden" to the day :).  Jerusalem celebrates Purim a day later than everywhere else, so, for everyone who ate with us, it was really just a regular day for them.  It seems like the custom is for people in Jerusalem to go someplace where it IS Purim the day before to celebrate then, and, when it's Shushan Purim in Jerusalem, vast amounts of people from the rest of the country descend on J'lem to party there as well (it's hard to get enough Purim).

--Friday morning, BIG shul put together an amazing volunteer event.  As soon as Purim ended Thursday night, there was a collection of unwanted items that people had received in mishloach manot.  Since Purim in Jerusalem was Friday, there was (a brief amount of) time to repackage those items into new mishloach manot for kids in Jerusalem.  GENIUS!!!!

in case it matters to you, I didn't take these photos :)

There were four tables FULL of stuff--one of chips, one of candy, one of drinks and one of cookies.  It was stunning to see the plenty that we are privileged to live with, and made me so glad this huge amount of items wasn't going to end up in the garbage (at least, not *that* morning....)

In the end, over 1000 bags were packed for Girls Town and other similar organizations in Jerusalem. Deliveries were made by people who were already going to Jerusalem to experience Purim there. The whole thing was genius from start to finish!

--Friday morning we turned our clocks ahead.  Interesting that the day chosen for the time change is a Friday!  For an interesting read, check out a Wikipedia page (specifically the 2005-2012 section) that Batsheva pointed out to me about how the vagaries of exactly when the time change would happen each year so frustrated Microsoft that "Windows stopped trying to track changes and just made Israeli time be Greenwich Mean Time plus two hours" (!)

Purim! (Part One)

We're right in the middle of the wild, wacky, fun and (yes) spiritual holiday of Purim.  Purim started last night.  Or about three weeks ago, depending on whether one is looking at the calendar or judging by the number of children walking around wearing costumes.  In no particular order, here are some random thoughts on Purim in Israel:

--MANY tzedaka collectors come to the door.  While this is a general Purim custom, in Malden we always had exactly zero collectors.  Here it's a whole new ballgame.  Starting about three days ago, we began getting several each evening (we do oftentimes get one or two a night, but that's a different blog post.  So interesting!).

This is a big time for young men to collect money for their yeshivas.  I have heard that it goes to their Rebbis/teachers to supplement their salary.  If so, I see that they do need to go to many houses, since the standard donation is 5 or 10 NIS, which equals about $1.25-$2.50.  Shalom Shachne went to the bank to get rolls of 5 and 10 coins (and may I just take this opportunity to say how lovely having a coin that is worth real money is?  The 10 shekel coin is my favorite.  Also because it's pretty :)).  He came home empty-handed, though, because the bank told him he should have PRE-ORDERED his coins!  "Wait, let me get this straight: you went to the bank and they didn't have MONEY?!?!"  Luckily, he went early enough in the week that he was able to get our coins in time.

--Last night, we heard the megillah reading at the BIG shul in our neighborhood (we decided that Matthew in Malden is the best megillah reader, though.  If you have the opportunity to hear him, please do!).  The small shul that we normally go to has a custom that people only make noise on the first and last "Haman" (booooo).  The Rabbi there explained that the important thing is to hear every word of the megillah, not to make noise when hearing Haman's name (booooo).

Afterwards, everyone went home to get dinner started while I went to deliver mishloach manot to a family that is collecting them to bring to soldiers who are training nearby.  Unfortunately, I misplaced the paper with the family's address on it.  I thought it was building 34 apartment 5.  Building 34 is a very typical Israeli apartment building: first I went upstairs.  Nope.  Then I went to the apartments downstairs.  Nope.  Then I ran into someone I know who lives in the building.  He didn't know the family or where the exact apartment was, but suggested that I look to the right and left of the main building.  Nope.  By the time I gave up and went home (it was 34/4.  argh) the streets, which had been thronged only 7 or 8 minutes before with people leaving all the shuls at approximately the same time, were almost empty.  Guess the thought of eating after the Fast of Esther was pretty tempting ;)

--Our mishloach manot continued the theme of being new olim.  After searching and searching I found a container that looks like a suitcase.  We put in the iconic Israeli snack foods Bamba (peanut butter flavored corn puffs.  Likely the biggest reason that peanut allergy is rare here because people give to babies as a finger food) and Bissli (MSG-laden salty snack), along with biscuit cookies I dipped in chocolate and covered with blue and white sprinkles.  The cookies were packaged in a sandwich bag and tied with a knot, which is a very Israeli thing to do (I used to wonder how the Israelis tied their bags.  I never had enough bag left to do that.  Then I bought my first box and discovered that Israeli sandwich bags are bigger than American bags!).  Everyone got a keychain (either the Israeli flag or one of Israeli currency for people who are less Zionistically-inclined).

We even made a poem for the front:

With our suitcases packed

We made Aliyah

Thanks for joining us

We've come so fah! (sorry, we're from Boston....)

Ilana and I put the "suitcases" in a pile and then commented on how much it reminded us of before we left for Israel (Deb, Frank and Noreen, I hope you don't have PTSD looking at the photo!).

--There was a parade of cars yesterday for a big charity campaign in town.  The locals (especially a few at our house) were excited when a sign went up last month that implied that Starbucks was coming to town.  Despite the disappointment that the signs turned into "Give Bucks", it is a cute campaign and enjoyable to see how people decorated their cars.

--We had a play in ulpan on Monday.  Shalom Shachne had a star turn as Mordechai, here seen overhearing the guards plot to kill King Ahashverous:

And I made a wonderful (if I do say so) monkey in the Hebrew version of "Caps for Sale" (we also did another piece where we all had to speak).

My class.  We're a very diverse group in age, native country, etc, but what a great bunch of people!

--Ilana, with Penina's help, made a really cute costume.  She's going as Fluttershy from My Little Pony:

--Kids were playing balloon ball on a bus the other day!  The driver didn't get angry when it went into his area, just waited until the next stop and batted it back to them.

--So things are a little crazy and likely to get a lot crazier as the day goes on and people drink more.  Penina got a text to her class list asking another girl if "10 guys with red shirts just danced into your house?!"  It is, evidently, not uncommon for yeshiva guys to just walk into people's houses today.  I think that, for once, we'll lock our door :)


Off to shul!  Happy Purim!