For a good time call. . .

Before I tell this extremely short anecdote, a much longer introduction is required, which I will begin thusly: In Israel, prostitution is legal. Did you know that? Well, it is, although every few months it seems like another embattled MK in the Knesset starts a short-lived crusade to outlaw it, a crusade that is usually timed to distract from a criminal charges of corruption or malfeasance (occasionally involving patronizing prostitutes).

Anyway.

The principle way the ladies seem to advertise in Tel Aviv are with business-card sized photo, complete with contact information. Which, I guess, makes them just plain business cards. Although, unlike the ones handed out by a systems analyst or a HR rep, these cards feature glossy color photos on front and back, usually og one or more of the following subjects: 
--Smiling naked lady
--Naked lady with eyebrow raised invitingly
--Pensive naked lady shot in black and white, occasionally behind gauzy curtain
--Grimacing naked lady with bullwhip (for the bdsm crowd)
--Shy naked lady
--Excited naked lady
--Sort of mean looking naked lady
--Naked lady holding single red rose
--Chunk o' naked lady (boobies)
--Chunk o' naked lady (butt)
--Chunk o' naked lady (legs)
--Chunk o' naked lady (feet)
--Two or more naked ladies

These cards litter the sidewalks, and if you park your car anywhere besides a private lock, you will come back to your vehicle to find a couple tucked into the edge of the driver side window, and another two or three stuck underneath your windshield wipers. I have only seen these cards being placed on cars once since moving to Tel Aviv, by a sheepish-looking young dude with ipod headphones jammed into his ears and a downcast expression. It can't pay that well, being a Prostitute-Card-Hander-Outer, and even if it's just a second job, I imagine it has a devastating effect on your social capital.

All of this is just to say that these little cards are a constant fixture in the visual landscape: the photos and names and fonts change (which graphic design firm handles these sorts of assignments?) but they are always around.

SO: Now I can relate the anecdote, which is starting to seem less and less piquant with the passage of time, but here we go--I was walking to work in the early morning behind a little girl who lives on my street, her wiggly border collie, and her mother. The border collie was bright-eyed and busily sniffing at earlier dog's morning leavings,the little girl was producing a non-stop stream of chatter with the energy and vigor that placed her mother's lack of the same in very sharp relief (evidenced by the large cup of coffee she was clutching in her leash-less hand like a life preserver).

When the dog stopped to do her own business, the girl's eye was caught by one of those aforementioned cards, tucked handily into the sideview mirror of a dusty silver peugot parked half on, half off the sidewalk, in a red zone, it's back bumper not so much kissing the front bumper of the car behind it, as in a full-on embrace (or as I liked to call it, parked "Israeli style"). The card featured two ladies photographed against a neon yellow backdrop, one a generously proportioned brunette laying on her back in a sort of body stocking with cut-out panels in all the right places, the other totally starkers, with her platinum hair done up in pigtails, sitting astride the brunette and using her friend's bosom much like an inexperienced rider might use her saddle horn. That is to say, clutching it for dear life.

The girl flicked the card with her little thumb and index finger, then, just as her embattled mother was juggling the dog leash, coffee cup, and freshly-used plastic baggie, asked her pointedly, "What are they doing?" The mother, craning her neck to find the nearest trash can, replied distractedly, "Who, sweetie?"  "The ladies." "Who?" "The ladies in the picture." The girl plucked the card from the window and proferred it to her mother. She took it from the girl, holding it with just as much distaste as the plastic bag in her other hand, and gave it a look.

For a moment, there was no reply.

But then, the mother explained, "They are dancers." "Dancers?" "Yes." A pause to consider. "But not like ballerinas." "No." "Like  the Dallal Center?" [this is the city's famous modern dance theatre in Neve Tzedek, home to the Batsheva troupe] "Yes, more like that." Another pause, then the monologue stream resumed as if it had never been interrupted.

At the corner, both card and plastic baggie were dumped into the trash.

For Immediate Release: Alhareezi Primary School English Press, Ltd. 2011 Update

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Alhareezi Press Marks 2011 Jerusalem Book Fair with Winter/Spring update

For all media inquiries, please contact the Public Relations spokesperson, who can be found in the Alhareezi library. Unless she is in the English Department Hallway. Or sucking coffee directly from the machine in the teachers room. Or having a brief, cleansing cry in the staff bathroom.
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As the Jerusalem International Book Fair officially kicks off tommorow, I am sure the many devoted readers of the fine writing published the Alhareezi Primary School English-Language Press, Ltd are eager to hear the latest news on our most recently completed and ongoing projects. Although we at the press prefer to let our writers speak for themselves, the authors of our current projects are all very busy with school, basketball practice, ballet, equestrian showings, french lessons, violin practice, and orthodontist appointments this week. As such, they will be, regrettably, unable to speak at the fair. However, so as not to dissapoint their followers, they've asked that I update you all in their stead. It is a role I am especially suited to fulfull, as I also serve as the amanuenis for a number of the authors.

4th grade classes are producing illustrated guides on how to spot witches inspired by Roald Dahl's book The Witches, which we are reading together in class, and which contains much salient information on the subject. Some of these primers also include information on how to combat witches, while others strike a less martial tone and give advice on how to avoid them completely once the witches have been spotted. Art book conniseurs will be delighted to know that several of these books integrate papercraft into their texts, specifically in the form of pop-up and accordian effects. As usual for the writers, the books have been created with a combination of mediums including craft board, brass fasteners, ribbon, staples, oil pastels, ink pens, and fruit-scented markers.

The 6th graders just finished writing their own murder and/or mayhem-filled mystery stories (including "detective notebooks" with suspect dossiers, fingerprints, crime reports, wanted posters, and other important crime-solving documents), and now they're beginning a new project in which they're designing their own superhero alter-ego. They're going to come up with names, call signals, costumes, and logoes (with accompanying explanations), choose sidekicks, describe their arch-nemesis, and document the training exercises we're going to be doing in class to muscle up, as it were. This training is going to include riddle-crafting and decoding lessons (because bad guys are always trying to stump super-heroes with nefarious puzzles), tests of how much pyschokinetic/psychic potential they might have, and practice-time to develop heroic poses and catch-phrases. Once their individual super-heroes have been created and fully-documented, the portfolios will be combined into a Super Heroes of Alhareezi [ed: working title]. Featuring such memorable characters as FartMan, Princess Cola, Captain Crush, and the Amazing Guy, the anthology will be available just in time for the Pesach gift-giving season.

A multidisciplinary project by one of the press's second-grade clients is still in the works, but promises to be an exciting addition to the imprint. The writer was inspired by his reading of the William Pen du Bois classic, The Twenty-One Balloons, and is currently doing his own research on the history and engineering of hot-air balloons and other dirigibles. Right now, he is sketching and building models of new air-craft, and these will be evantually accompanied by detailed diagrams and technical explanations of the concept vehicles' inner workings and potential applications. For those who remember the writer's last published work, Pumpkin-Head Terror :Parts I, 2, and 3, released on October 31st of last year, this work will come as an exciting departure from the horror/thriller genre.

Of course, no report on the press's latest work would be complete without an update on the upcoming released from our third-grade writers. After the surprise success of the small poetry collection inspired by such disparate topics as the Titanic disaster, Ann Frank, and french bulldogs, which received much acclaim after it was displayed on the English-Speakers bulletin board , that collection's writer is back with a new project. Turning her pen to the world of botany, she is on the brink of completing her first non-fiction offering, entitled simply The Venus Fly Trap. The book offers advice on caring for the eponymous plant, in addition to a short history of the plant and its carnivorous brethren, a comic strip depiction of the plant's eating mechanism, and the piece's centerpiece--the lyrics of a rap song soon to be recorded by the writer. She has been gracious enough to allow us to share the complete lyrics with you now:
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The Venus Fly Trap Rap: The Soon-to-be Smash Hit Single

If see a plant who just goes "snap"
You're looking at a venus fly trap

Snap!

There we go!
Another insect down below.

Oh!

A ladybug went near
The only thing left was a single tear

Single tear! Single tear! Single tear1

[bridge and dance break]

I'm a venus fly trap and I'm here to say
All you boring plants get out of my way

I'm living large, yeah, I'm on the scene
My appetite is large and my leaves are green

Give me some flies, they sure are sweet
But don't feed me no hamburger meat!

Yeah!
[fade to finish]
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With that sentiment as a fitting coda, we at Alhareezi Primary School English Press, Ltd. wish you a very happy Book Fair, and encourage you to visit this site for further information on our literary offerings as they develop.


Becky Perlman
Publisher/Editor-in-Chief/Head Amanuensis/Master Book-Binder/Translation Dept. President/Public Relations Spokesperson/CEO, Stickers and Treats Division

Alhareezi Primary School English Press, Ltd.

--------------------------------------------------------------
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For all Media inquiries, tell the armed school guard standing at the locked front gates that "Anee rotsah/rotseh ledahbear im Becky ha more-ah ah-mare-ee-kai may-shoo-gaht" (I would like to speak with Becky, the crazy American teacher.)

Recess Duty

Although I am still an object of considerable bemusement and (slightly-veiled pity) at the primary school where I teach, my nacscent Hebrew skills and growing understanding of the school's rules and disciplinary policies have now been deemed sufficent to qualify me for a shift as recess monitor, a responsibility I was excused from last year on the grounds of what was referred to at the time as "unmitigated cluelessness" (yes, that is the exact translation from Hebrew).

All the teachers on staff take turns watching various quadrants of the sprawling school yard during the two daily recesses. Hahfsahkah gadol, or "the big break" takes place at 9:50 after first and second period and includes ten minutes to eat breakfast and fifteen minutes of outdoor/indoor free play. Hafsakah katan or the "little break" takes place from 11:45 to 12:00 and is reserved for free play only. The recurring, cyclical recess monitor duties are determined by the head "morah sport" (literally "sports teacher," or what American kids would call the PE teacher), an energetic blonde lady who walks around with a wireless microphone pac strapped round her waist and a headset microphone that gives her the air of a roving pop star, circa 1998. Only in Israel would a teacher employ a tool to make her shouting even louder than it is in its unaltered guise. The sport teacher composes the recess duty roster in a process that seems to rival the seeding of college basketball teams for the NCAA tournament, and renders this roster in an spreadsheet-like matrix that is printed out and tacked to the bulletin board in the teacher's lounge, where it is set upon at once by the other teachers and heavily annotated with the details of swapped days, adjustments to the schedule because of field trips or assemblies, and requests for clemency due to upcoming maternity leaves.

I typically do not even notice the new schedule's existence until its miniscule type has been smeared, crossed-out, and written over, whereupon it becomes nearly impossible to read. Consequently, I can frequently be found before 1st period stranded in front of the bulletin board, with my eyes screwed-up and an index finger tracing along the schedule's tiny boxes, reading the names out loud softly under my breath in the manner of a preschooler with "Hop on Pop" on her lap. My search for the three letters that spell out of my name-Bet, Koof, Yud--is complicated by the fact that often, although not consistently, my name is spelled as Bet, Tet, Yud (or "Betty") instead.*

Figuring out my alloted recess duties every week pales in comparison to the actual job. First of all, my school is comprised of several buildings on one central, large campus (the main school building, that also houses the principal, registrar, secretaries, and medic's offices, a freestanding gymnasium, art studio, and theatre classroom, two banks of classrooms, the school garden, and the school zoo. This is in addition to two small playgrounds with the usual assortment of swings, slides, and monkey bars, a soccer-field, and two basketball courts. There's also a security guard hut near the locked front gate and outdoor smoking area adjacent to the teacher's lounge, natch). Consequently, teachers are strategically scattered across the campus to ensure no area goes unmonitored. To minimize fighting, the athletic fields are each reserved for the students of different grades--the play areas are assigned from youngest to oldest in orders of increasing desirability. You have to pay your dues to move from the playground equipment to the second best basketball court and so on (as you might have guessed, the football field is the most coveted location). This means that each teacher can count on a finding the same crowd of kids in her territory every recess--a helpful asset when it comes to mediating fights, staunching tears, and other diplomatic efforts. For example, I'm always sent to the "Gimeleem yard," or the area where the third-graders play, so I've gotten to know a lot of the kitah gimel students who aren't in my classes, and become privy to the intricacies of their social ties and recurring conflicts.

The girls seem to be the ones with the perennial rivalries and problems. Noe is always upset with Shira for being too bossy, and Lior, Gaea, Heela, and Tamara are always incensed by the copycat choreography of their hip-hop dance rivals: Oren, Savion, Zoe, Roenni, and Corahl. The girls are also the ones who come up for advice, commiseration, and validation, and in my case, to teach me Hebrew necessary to fill in what they see as the most alarming gaps in my general knowledge--in other words, Hebrew riddles and jokes (these tend to require a committee of girls to provide a translation that is nonetheless nearly always completely incomprehensible), idiomatic phrases, and slang. A lot of the girls also like to cruise by to see if the breakfast *I* packed seems more interesting than their own, and if so, to cadge the majority of it with sustained, high-pitched whining.

Overall (and unsurprisingly), the attitudes of Israeli kids and teachers towards recess are markedly different than those of their American counterparts. First of all, there is a more cavalier, less stringent regard for child safety, with the attitude that the kids need to learn to avoid dangers by themselves, rather than simply obeying a passel of rules blindly without context.

So, unlike in my childhood elementary school, no one is halted from scaling any of the tall trees that dot the campus, or from attempts to shimmy up the poles of the basketball court baskets. No teachers intercede in arguments among students, no matter how heated they become, or how outnumbered one side might be, unless the kids are on the brink of blows. Industrious kids can be found digging massive holes, and attempting to booby-trap playground equipment. Requests from students for arbitration of athletic disputes is met by most teachers with the trenchant (well, in Israel at least) and deadpan hypothetical, "Ma lehsoht?" (literally "what to do?" or "What can I do?") or its cousin, "Ehn mah lehsot" ( literally, "there isn't what to do" or "Nothing can be done about it"), and even serious offenses like purposeful hitting, kicking, and the like, still do not rouse the other teachers to move from their benches. Instead, the emit a strident "Boh!" or "Buena!" ("COME!") to the offending party, who is compelled to separate himself from the herd and slink shamefacedly torwards the teacher for his commeupance. Just like David Caruso in CSI: Miami, teachers will puncuate a particularly pointed remark by removing their sunglasses for emphasis. The offenders tend to respond to punishments with sullen silence and aqcuisence or, more commonly, with heated invective and finger-pointing, sort of like tiny acolytes of John McEnroe.

 Children are let loose in the school zoo during both recesses, under the capable, but far from constant supervision of the "nature teacher," Daphna (she teaches the kids about, basically, life science: i.e. botany and zoology, environmentalism and ecology, and animal care. she also manages the zoo and cares for the animals (along with two assistants). As some of you know, the "teaching and touching zooological garden" at my school is sort of an amalgam of a children's petting zoo and a home for the typical classroom pets you see in any elementary school. So, there are the usual suspects like abundant bunnies, guinea pigs, hamsters, mice, rats, turtles, crabs, and fish. But there are also ferrets, a very depressed and dyspeptic looking fennec-fox (native to Israel), one sheep, five goats, a family of ducks and a pair of geese who share a small pond, several parrots, a terrarium full of stick bugs and another full of praying mantises, newts, two large aviaries filled with finches, parakeets, canaries, and doves (one in the zoo, and one in the main school building), and two extremely grumpy peacocks. Students are allowed to help feed the larger animals and clean their homes, and that's done with Daphna or another adult. They are also allowed to play with any of the smaller animals they can clutch in their grubby little hands.

Therefore, I'm sorry to say that the school's guinea pigs, bunnies, lizards, hamsters, and every other living thing small enough to be held or cradled are all subjected to two brief but probably dreaded fifteen minute periods daily of  the loving, well-meaning, but not always especially gentle minstrations of the schools apprentice zookeepers. Though the animals are supposed to stay in the zoo area or around its perimeter, I will occasionally be visited by enthusiastic students who thrust bunnies, hamsters, or guinea pigs into my laps, or who visit me toting a plastic box full of mice and play equipment (you know, tunnels, wheels, those sorts of things) or with a parakeet on their shoulder, affectionately nibbling the child' ear.

Recently, a massive tractor with a cherry-picker like attachment was driven into the school yard by a cadre of tree-trimmers (to the fascination and excitement of all male students in grades one and two). They stopped their work to take a coffee break during the first recess and watch unfazed as several of the boldest students clambered into the cab of the tractor and mounted its huge back wheels. The kids uninterested by the heavy equipment instead occupied themselves by collecting the felled branches (ranging in length, girth, and weight from "appropriate for roasting marshmallows" to "can not be physically lifted without the help of two additional buddies"). Now, in my culturally-myopic, quaintly American view, I was horrified to see the kids let loose on the tree trimmings. In fact, combining a bunch of hyper children (rooted in a culture that is not known for an emphasis on reserve or restraint) with a bunch of pointy, long, sharp, spear-and-bayonet-shaped objects in an outdoor free-for-all is basically my idea of a complete clusterfuck. I was not alone in this view: Trevor, one of ny newest and sweetest students; a butterball of a first-grader who (not coincidentally) recently emmigrated from South Africa, huffed and puffed up to the bench where I was sitting two minutes after recess began. He plaintively asked me, "Why are all the big boys playing with the sticks?" I told him that I didn't know, and he looked at me quite seriously while echoing the dire prediction that no doubt both he and I (decades earlier) had heard from numerous sources--teachers, moms, and grandparents included:

"They could put their eyes out!"

Of course, I concurred, but the general consensus from the adults in power seemed to be that a few detached retinas, a handful of minor puncture wounds, and innumerable wicked splinters were all a judicious outcome to risk in exchange for the pedagogical and social value of allowing the kids the chase, hit, poke, and whack each other with tree branches.

And that, for both better and worse, seems to typify Israeli-style recess!





*This is not an isolated event. "Becky" isn't an Israeli name, although Betty (don't think "Betty Draper" so much as this phonetic rendering: "behh-TEE") is, albeit an uncommon one. Nearly every time I introduce myself, in spite of special pains to really spit out what one of my first-graders winningly refers to as the "Kih, kih, kih, kay!" sound, the receiving person squints a little and asks, "behh-TEE?" Then, I repeat myself, and explain that it is the nickname (literally "small name") of "Rebecca," which I usually have to also translate from its anglocentric form back into the original Hebrew, or "Reevkah." Reevkah, of course, while one of the oldest female names in the Jewish tradition (remember Yitzak/Issac's wife?), is not currently very au-courant, nor has been for decades, making it somewhat incongruent to an Israeli meeting me for the first time, in the same manner that an American might stop short upon being introduced to a 25-year old named ""Estelle," "Evelyn," or "Lenoir"). All lovely names, to be sure, but  ones more readily associated with a member of the AARP.

Some of the Best* Things my Students** have Done or Said so Far During this Year: The First Installment in an Ongoing Compendium

*And by "Best" I mean "Most Amusing"

**All names changed to protect privacy, natch.

--I introduced  the concept of "compound words"  (remember? butter+fly=butterfly, rain+bow=rainbow, etc) to some of my extremely precocious third-graders, via a game of "Compound Word Dominoes," during which I explained that "compound" is not just a "describer word" (the word we use for adjectives") and a "P.P.T. word (people, places, and thing word, i.e. noun), but also an "action word" (the term we use for verbs) that means "adds to/adds together" or "makes stronger." We then went around in a circle and made up sentences using "compound" in one of those three ways. A week after this lesson, during a recess break, one of my third-graders marched up to me, extremely affronted, towing hs offending friend behind him by the hand, and announced by way of introduction, "Tomer (the friend)  says he doesn't think "Dover Anglit" (English-Speakers) class is hard, even though we read chapter books (emphasis his) and everything!" I gamely tried to mediate this conflict, agreeing that English Speakers class is, indeed, very challenging, but that "regular" English classes are also very demanding, and that placement in one or the other is not an indication of general superiority. Satisfied, my third-grader released the now chastened Tomer, but lingered momentarily to tell me, "Sometimes Tomer really, really compounds my being mad at him."

 ---As we waited for the rest of his classmates to arrive in the school library, one of my second-graders leaned across the table convivially to tell me: Becky, you know what I really like about you?"
Me: No, what?
3rd-grader: You don't shower. I really like that.
Me: (horrified pause) Roi, I shower every morning! (internally: Do I have some sort of body odor problem I'm not aware of? Oh god! I'm the weird stinky teacher! Noo!)
3rd-grader: No, no, I mean you don't shower at us! Like Ravital (one of his other teachers) does!
Me: (slightly less horrified pause) Roi, do you mean that I don't *shout* at you guys?
3rd-grader: Oh.  Maybe. Yes. I get those two confused sometimes.

---I have an independent tutorial with one of my third-graders, Gabbi, who is a native English speaker from South Africa. .This self-described "history fan" has a sunny demeanor, ever-present gap-toothed smile, preference for ostentatiously large hair bows, and deep affection for Hannah Montana, all of which belies her intense interest in the Shoah. Per her request, we spent the bulk of last year learning more about the Holocaust, diligently putting new vocabulary words to use in our discussions of genocide, and using (the very small sub-genre of) child-appropriate stories on the subject as practice texts for independent reading and the like. For example, we read about Ann Frank and her diary, and learned about the Jewish resistance movement. Heady stuff for a third-grader whose other hobbies include tap-dancing and sticker-collecting.

This year, Gabbi sat down with me for our first one-on-one lesson together, and produced a thick children's book, dense with illustrations and photos . Opening the book to a two-page color diagram of a colossal cruise liner, she announced that this year she, "wanted to do English projects about all of this!" The title of her book?The Titanic Disaster.

Really.

---We are doing a theatrical adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are in one of my classes, a project the kids are embracing with great industry and enthusiasm. After completing the script together (which entailed, for clarity's sake, giving individual names to all of the "Wild Things," who the kids dubbed "Goathead," "Snowy," Stinkyteeth, and (for some reason), "Barney.") the time came to divide the parts. In spite of the fact that I had carefully edited the script to make sure *every* part had the exact same number of lines, everyone (EVERYONE) wanted to be Max, and this casting conflict  almost dissolved the class into complete anarchy. After several entreaties for order, I finally bellowed, "IF EVERYONE DOESN'T QUIET DOWN RIGHT NOW, NOBODY WILL GET TO BE MAX!" This outburst had the desired effect, but in its silent aftermath, one of the boys in the class, Tal, meekly raised his hand and quietly pointed out with a worried look on his face, "Becky, the play isn't really going to make much sense if Max isn't in it."

---We are doing a Greek Mythology unit in several of my 6th grade classes, and one of the early projects called for each student to imagine themselves as a demi-god, choose a God parent, then describe their special abilities, their heroic quests(s), and their weakness. The day this assignment was due, we went around the table and shared our work. The first boy to reveal his demi-god alter ego excitedly explained his parentage (as a son of Zeus), then proudly explained that one of his half-blood talents was, "Super Farts." Before he could explain the martial power/destructive capabilities of these farts, no less than three of my other male students screwed up their faces in dissapointment and interrupted to say that power-farting was one of *their* demi-god abilities. A brief argument ensued in which each boy accused the others of copying their idea for godly super farts.Meanwhile, one of the girls in the class locked eyes with me and gave me a classic Jim-Halpert-from-"The Office" combination sigh n' shoulder shrug.

---During a read-aloud session with our current book, Matilda, I asked my students to make "illustrations" (new vocab word) of their favorite moments from the book thus far. Almost everyone in the class chose to draw one of the episodes in the book involving Matilda's frightening giant of a school headmistress, Miss Trunchbull. But only one of my kids, Ido, decorated his Trunchbull portrait with speech bubbles coming from her mouth that said, "I hate all children,""I am ugly and fat,"  "I eat childrens' ears," (a detail not mentioned in the book, but certainly within the realm of possibility) and the funniest/saddest, as it seemed to typify human evil for my student "I am from Iran!"

One of Ido's buddies, meanwhile, had drawn Trunchbull with enormous, pendulous breasts, each topped with a graphite-colored nipple *and* a long. . .. um. . . phallus. . . that he had carefully colored with a yellow highlighter. To prevent any ambiguity, he drew an arrow toward her crotch and wrote, "Trunchbull has the thing of a man!" This was, obviously, a big hit with his classmates.

Another student in the same class, who is a huge sci-fi fan, drew a neon-saturated picture of an alien, and when I asked which part of the (completely space alien free) book he chose to illustrate, explained that he had drawn Miss Trunchbull, based on his hunch that someone so awful and mean could not truly be human, and so was almost definitely a visiting alien. He denied  that the development of this literary theory had anything to do with his love for drawing aliens.

--Upon listening to me ask the non-English-speaking school janitor to unlock one of the classrooms, in what, I flattered myself, was pretty darn fluent Hebrew, my 4th-grader Talia laid her hand on my arm in a very kind, affectionate, and only slightly condescending fashion and told me, "Becky, maybe you should ask one of *us* to ask him for you."

--A request from one of my fourth-grade girls, who is a (very rare--in our school) only child: "Becky, will you be my big sister?" I answer in the affirmative, telling her I'd be delighted. Her response: "Good! But this doesn't mean you can come live in my house, we don't have room."

--During a pre-class discussion of the various maritual statuses of everyone's parents, and a partial inventory of everyone's half and step-siblings, one of my students turned to me and asked, Becky, are you divorced?"
Me: No.
Another student: She's not even married yet!
First student:  (after carefully considering this information) Well, are your mom and dad divorced?
Other student again: (butting in before I can answer and in the process revealing a somewhat limited understanding of  history and possibly demonstrating an erroneous belief in some type of statute of limitations on parental divorces?) Maor, when Becky was our age, divorces didn't even EXIST. 


--One of my 2nd-graders, upon learning that I am a vegetarian: Well, I don't eat meat from
animals I *like.*
 Me: What animals are those?
Second-grader: (Without pause): Horses, cats, puppies, parrots, monkeys, lemurs, and hamsters, and bunnies, and kangaroos, and turtles, and "yaelim" (Israeli mountain goats) and baby animals. Except for baby snakes. (Small pause to think) Oh, and also lions, and zebras. And giraffes.
Me: (Hastily, knowing this list could go on for a very long time)So I guess you don't like chickens, or cows, then, huh?
Second-grader: (With the greatest amount of condescension a second-grader can muster) Of. COURSE. Not.
{End of Discussion}

One Year In: Weathering Cultural Differences

I've lived in Tel Aviv for a little bit over a year now, and with this much time under my belt, I feel like I'm starting to glimpse some of the key cultural differences between the United States and Israel. In the name of international relations, I've compiled a partial list of these below:

1. Honey comes in glass jars. When you ask the grocer in halting Hebrew if he has, "The honey that is in a bear of plastic," he will say no, and then treat you with the bright, slightly condescending kindness he reserves for the mentally handicapped.
2. Sidewalks are for pedestrians. . .and bicycles, and electric bicycles, and electric scooters, and s egways, and vespas, and motorcycles. Also, for parked cars.
3. Movies theatres have assigned seats and intermissions. But they do not have Milk Duds.
4. There are two kinds of state-sanctioned gambling: the national lotto, and the national postal service. (Your odds are better with the lotto)
5. Pizza can be delivered to your door via motor scooter.  So can dog food, kitty litter, potted plants, air conditioners, and kegs of beer.
 6. Lines are for suckers.
7. You can always count on honest opinions of your hair style, clothing choices,  makeup job, and weight. Whether you ask for them or not.
8.If you sleep with your windows open at night, you might be awoken by three a.m. caterwauling cats or three a.m. caterwauling Mizrahi music . (The Mizrahi music is worse)
9. In Israel, as in Europe, the date is written as day/month/year: you will need to remember this when you check the expiration date on the carton of milk in your fridge.
10. Don't be disappointed when a boy you like introduces you to his male partner. "Partner" is the literal translation of the Hebrew term for "roommate."

Sushi in a Sukkha and Krembo Season

It's that time of year again here in Israel. The new year of the Jewish calender has just begun. The fasting  that accompanies Yom Kippur has been broken. Perhaps more significantly in secular Tel AViv, the scabs and bruises incurred by bike-riding, skateboarding, and skating kids who spent that holiest-of-holy days temporarily occupying the closed streets have all started to heal. We're halfway through the week long Sukhot holiday, and palm-topped Sukkhas can be sighted on small high-rise apartment building balconies and in the dusty courtyards of neighborhood shuls. The largest, most lavishly-decorated Sukkhas line the wide streets in the city center, where they shelter diners at almost all of the cafes and restaurants. They are, with barely an exception, lovely--their roofs supported by bamboo poles and their makeshift walls formed by blond palm fiber mats, their roofs a grid of green palm fronds, and the interiors decorated with ruby-red pomegranates and apples hanging on strings from the ceiling, sprays of golden date branches bound to the corner supports, and garlands of paper chains and crepe paper pinwheels, brightly-colored foil stars and strings of fairy lights. Of course, the rationale for the temporary transformation of these establishments' outdoor patios and streetside seating is based on worldly, not spiritual concerns. By providing a Sukkha, the restaurants and cafes ensure that Israelis observing the scriptural instruction to sleep and take all their meals in a sukkha for the duration of the holiday can patronize their businesses.

It's all old hat for native-born Israelis, who think nothing of brushing aside curtains of plastic beads, or ducking under rainbow-striped bunting to sit inside these little palm huts and calmly consume a cappucino (no doubt, their 8th or 9th of the day thus far) and biscotti. But I still have to giggle when I see steaming hot pizzas and lacquer bento boxes full of sushi being served inside the confines of the sukkhas. It goes to show that the Conservative and Reform Jewish sects have a point when they argue for the necessity of interpreting Jewish scripture in light of contemporary mores and concerns. I doubt Moses, in even his wildest dreams, could ever have imagined a contingency for the far-ahead in the future day when the descendants of his wandering people would survive to practice their religion (well. . . in a fashion) in their own nation-state, and furthermore would  faithfully mark the start of fall with a week spent in little forts designed to honor the improvised shelters that housed the 12 tribes of Israel he ledduring their 40 years of wandering, and furthermore would want to maintain that tradition even when satisfying a hankering for Japanese food.

Now, the advent of Sukkhot happens to roughly coincides with the annual arrival of the Krembo. No, Krembos are not a type of rare migrating bird, and they're not a band of Eastern-European avant-garde clowns. They are, in fact, a seasonal chocolate marshmallow cookie, but to describe them merely as such is the same as calling the Beatles "some British rock band." Krembos are nothing less than an Israeli icon--the confection has been popular in the country since before it achieved statehood. In pre-Israel Palestine, Jewish mammas would make homemade version of this treat--topping thin vanilla biscuits with sweet marshmallow fluff and enrobing the whole thing in a thin shell of chocolate. The treats began to be mass-produced in Israeli candy factories in the mid-sixties. Today, they comprise, along with savory n' salty Beesli snack mix, and air-puffed peanut-flavored Bamba, the holy triptych of Israeli snack foods.

Adding to their appeal is the limited production window. Scattered cardboard cases  begin to arrive in bodegas and grocery stores in mid-September, they can be seen in every kiosk, street stall, and candy shop by the beginning of October, and the supply is exhausted sometime in late January.  During "Krembo Season," they become a form of child currency. Temper tantrums and meltdowns are quelled with promises of a Krembo, they are served as classroom treats for student birthdays, and many enterprising student council candidates are known to increase their constituency through the schoolyard distribution of Krembos bearing home-computer printed campaign stickers.On college campuses, earnest petition-clutching student activists coax otherwise apathetic fellow students over to their informational booths with the promise of a free krembo, and the Magden David Adom paramedics who man on-campus mobile blood-donation trucks reward blood donors with krembos in order to restore their depleted blood sugar levels.

They are the ultimate impulse buy--speaking from personal experience, it's hard to resist adding one to a grocery purchase every so often when your sweet tooth calls out. The Ha'aretz newspaper claims that the average Israeli eats a dozen every year during the 4-month window of availability, and I regret to say that my Krembo consumption seems to be on par with that statistic. It could be worse, at 115 calories the delicate little foil-wrapped domes aren't as deleterious to one's diet as, say, a pistachio ice cream cone, a hunk of halva, a chocolate rugelach, or a Kif-Kif candy bar, all of  which are a few of the other constant favorites in the Israeli sweets rotation. And, despite their diminutive size, the little Krembos pack a sugary wallop. In fact, tne of my friends eats them with a wince, since the super-sticky marshmallow filling makes the unfilled cavities in his molars throb with pain. Interestingly, this does not appear to curtail his consumption.

There are only a few risks associated with the treat. Of course, anyone who hazards a Krembo binge will end up with a stomachache and the frantic rush of a sugar high, and the consumption of more than one or two Krembos in one sitting should be strictly avoided. Additionally, it's crucial to do a thorough inspection of any child who will be in close contact with you post-Krembo consumption. A quick scan of the child's mouth and hands is not enough. If you are lax, you will inevitably find yourself combing a knot cemented by a little bit of hardened marshmallow out of the back of your hair or blotting at a smear of chocolate on the side of your formerly clean shirt. But if you an steer clear of these two dangers, I recommend you seek out the elusive Krembo for yourself. They're a very popular export, and I'm told they can be found during the fall in many kosher delis and bakeries.

Just remember that there are two schools of thought on the proper consumption of the Krembo: one that advocates eating the biscuit first, and one that recommends sucking up the marshmallow fluff and leaving the cookie base for last . Like the conflict over which direction to hang the toilet paper roll and whether to place forks in the dishwasher tines up or tines down, this argument has divided many a household and created untoward tension in romantic relationships. Some Israelis, almost universally boys between the ages of 8 and 10 years, diplomatically avoid the entire question by embracing the practice of shoving the entire Krembo directly into their mouth, sort of like the hippos I saw at Hamat Gader who consumed entire melons in one saliva-stringed chomp. I do no recommend this practice in polite company.

Tel Aviv Celebrity Sighting!

Within this tiny country, Tel Aviv is the home of most Israeli television and movie studios, and the city of choice for many Israeli musicians, actors, politicians, and other noteables. Friends are always pointing out the celebrities and other well-known personages who we see in the CellCom store, walking up Dizengoff, and stopping for falafel at the Schwarma Agenda. It's hard to get too excited about catching a glimpse of the Israeli Eurovision contestant, or someone recently kicked-off the Israeli version of "Big Brother," or the winner of last year's season of Israeli "Survivor." Not all the sightings have been of reality TV contestants, of course. My colleagues love to tell me about the famous parents who send their kids to our well-off primary school, and it seems like every time I'm at the Cinematheque or one of the big theatres ,my friend and I share a row with some soap star or comedian or musician . And though the Israeli attitude towards celebrity is to politely ignore the famous person and let them eat their meal/walk their dog/purchase their mattress/pay their cell phone bill in peace, my Israeli friends are always disappointed when I can't share in their (discreet) excitement. Whispered explanations of the famous peoples' accomplishments do nothing to spark my enthusiasm. Often, the frustrated friend feels the need to later send me several YouTube clips showing the star we spotted at work, as if to prove my apathy was misplaced. Well, after almost a year of failing my friends, you can imagine the happiness I felt when I had my first bona fide celebrity encounter today!


GUESS WHO I MET TODAY IN MY NEIGHBORHOOD? I was walking the dog home from the beach, and I saw two (Israeli-looking) guys walking toward us, one of whom was wearing a "New Yorker Festival 2008" t-shirt. So, just like a sports nut who encounters a like-minded fan far from home, as I walked past I gave him a big smile and said, "וואו! IThe ניו יורקר ". זה המגזין האהוב עלי! (Wow! The New Yorker! It's my favorite magazine!") Only when I heard the short, t-shirt wearer hesitantly respond, "Thank you?" in English did I add his American accent to his poufy hair and slight build and realize: OMG! It's MALCOLM. FREAKIN'. GLADWELL!*

Slight fan girl freak out ensued, during which I told him how much I covet the packages of New Yorker back issues that get sent here from home, complimented him on his cancer therapy article from a few few weeks back), told him I loved "What the Dog Saw," and informed him that his books are in the English sections of all the Israeli bookstore chains.

Perhaps slightly overwhelmed by my effusion, Mr. Gladwell was nonetheless extremely kind, gracious, and modest. He also complimented Michael, who,in a miraculous display of good behavior,permitted himself to be pet by the poufy-haired stranger and even condescended to lick the man's proffered fingers.

All in all, it was a thrilling encounter. The only thing that could have made it any better would have been to see Malcolm Gladwell while in the company of an Israeli friend, so as to have the satisfaction of rolling my eyes and giving them a hushed, abbreviated bio of the famous writer when met with my friends' bemused indifference.



*In retrospect, I have to add that Malcolm Gladwell wearing a New Yorker festival t-shirt in public is sort of like seeing Thom Yorke in a Coachella t-shirt. . .Do famous people really do this?