treppenwitz

Other

If you are an American and/or a Jew, there is something about meeting and being around Americans and/or Jews abroad that makes you feel immediately at home... among friends.

I have been in Israeli and American Embassies and Consulates in more than half a dozen countries around the world.  In nearly every case, once I was through security and inside, I felt like I was on home soil... among acquaintances, if not friends.

In nearly every case, that is, except in the American Embassy and Consulate facilities in Israel.

Zahava and I had to visit the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem (don't get me started on the fact that the U.S doesn't have its embassy in our capital) on Friday to renew Yonah's American passport.

The security to get inside is understandably tight.  Much tighter than boarding a plane for an international flight.

When you arrive, you present your proof of appointment and are allowed to go into a holding area where they search your bags, take away your cell phone (and any other electronic devices), empty your pockets and finally have you walk through a metal detector.

Once that is done you are allowed to enter.  But not really.

You are only allowed into a covered courtyard which is open to the elements; not a pleasant place to wait on a rainy, windy winter day.  There you wait for G-d knows what.  But after 20 minutes or so we were invited inside (one at a time) to be searched again, and for our bags to be fed through an X-ray machine, and finally for another walk through a metal detector before being shown through an armored door to the inside.  But not really.

At this time you are technically inside the building, but all of the people you need to see are on the other side of a reinforced concrete walls and bullet proof glass. 

First you check in at one bullet proof window and give them all your paperwork.  Then you take a seat and wait.

Finally you are called to another bullet proof window and have your private details squawked over a tinny speaker for everyone in the waiting room to hear.  Then you are sent to buy a mailing envelope upstairs and you wait to be called to another bullet proof window where you will be quizzed on the details of your application (again over a loud tinny speaker) to make sure you are who you say you are.

Once everything has been checked and verified, you are told that your passport (or whatever you came for) will be mailed in a couple of weeks.

The interview (and your visit) is over.  You leave through a different guarded door and collect your confiscated phones and assorted electronics via another bullet proof window and armored slot.

Stepping out onto the street I realized that there wasn't a single moment during the entire time I was inside that I felt like I was on U.S. soil.  All of the guards I encountered were Arabs (presumably from east Jerusalem), and all of the staff inside were either Arabs or Americans, both of whom seemed to be relating to me as a foreigner.  

I can't say that anyone was rude or openly hostile.  On the contrary there was a distinct politeness that prevailed.   But there was a certain air of unfriendliness and suspicion that surrounded the entire experience, and as I said, at no time did I feel as though I was among people with whom I shared so much as a spec of commonality.

I've had to visit other countries' Embassies to apply for visas and such, and have never felt the kind of cold distance that has been the hallmark of every visit to the U.S. facilities in Israel.

Of course, maybe it's me.

Some random political thoughts

I should really know better, but I allowed myself to be drawn into a political 'discussion' with a lefty from the center of the country this week. [face palm]  I've used scare quotes around the term 'discussion' advisedly since there was very little real exchange of ideas... just broadcasting of firmly held views.

It never ceases to amaze me that such people often espouse hypocritical, and even racist views in the context of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict that they would consider extremely politically incorrect, and even offensive in any other context.

For example, if I were to suggest to this person that Arabs are essentially infants, incapable of controlling their emotions and of reacting to non-violent acts they find objectionable with non-violent responses, they would call me a racist (BTW, I do not hold this view).  Yet, when confronted with endless acts of Arab violence (i.e. terror), they will invariably blame only the settlers or the Israeli government for enabling/sustaining them, while excusing the Arab terror as inevitable. 

Another example that comes to mind is the extreme deference shown to Arab sensibilities and claims made on the basis of their Islamic beliefs (such as the absolute and inalienable right to Jerusalem as their capital), and the lengths to which many will go to avoid giving offense to Muslims (e.g. non-Muslim female journalists wearing head-scarves when meeting with Muslim leaders or visiting Muslim areas).   But claims based on Jewish texts / history are dismissed with the easy slur; 'Messianism' (and much eye-rolling), and requests to cover knees and shoulders when visiting Jewish holy places are considered offensive and antediluvian.

On an unrelated topic, I saw a great quote over at one of my regular reads which perfectly sums up Israeli politics (and likely the political landscape in most places in the world):

“If pigs could vote, the man with the slop bucket would be elected swineherd every time, no matter how much slaughtering he did on the side.”

Orson Scott Card *

*  It is worth noting that Mr. Card (the source of the quote... not the site-owner of my regular read), and I see eye to eye on very little... yet I heard the ring of truth in this bit of wisdom.

... but don't take my word for it

Some of you may recall that after my trip to Limmud in the U.K., I wrote a less-than-sunny post about my impressions of Jewish life in England.

Nearly all the commenters on that post who agreed with me were either former British Jews or had never lived there.  When I pointed out that I found it odd that no Jews currently living in the U.K. had commented, several people weighed in with one or both of the following objections:

1)  That as an American / Israeli I couldn't possible know what life is like for Jews living in the U.K..  I conceded this point in my post, but it shouldn't have completely invalidated the value of my observations.

2)  That I was only in the UK for a week... not nearly enough time to make a valid assessment of the subject(s) about which I had written.  I also admitted this point, but tempered it by pointing out that the Limmud experience offered a unique opportunity to observe an unusually large representative sampling of the U.K. Jewish community... so again, some of my opinions were not entirely unworthy.

I accepted the criticisms that had been offered and went on with my life.   But deep down I was convinced that my first impressions about life for Jews in the U.K. had been largely correct... even if my observation methodology had not been exactly scientific.

Then last night a long-time treppenwitz reader (Hi Drew!) emailed me a link ot a piece entitled "The Outsiders", written by a Jewish attorney (who had represented Princess Dianna in her widely publicized divorce from Prince Charles), about his own experiences with British anti-Semitism. 

Not only did his well-written essay completely support the hypotheses I had espoused in my post, but he spoke from the depths of several generations that his family had lived as Jews in the U.K.

I strongly recommend that you take a moment and go read this excellent piece.

So happy to be back home...

Fix that while you're at it...

The last few days of a two week trip are always the hardest for me... especially if there has been a lot of airline travel involved.

I landed in Delhi this evening (for the second time this trip!) after a long delay on the ground in Goa, and promptly fell asleep in the courtesy limo sent by the hotel to pick me up. 

I never do that.  I am a suspicious person by nature, but I am especially vigilant when I am abroad since there is no way of knowing who has access to my itinerary.  So when I woke with a start as the car pulled to a stop in front of the hotel's stairs, I knew I was both lucky and exhausted.

My company has a special check in on the top floor (on the hotel's 'Corporate Club' floor) but for some reason, even though I explained this to the bellman, he insisted on steering me to the front desk.

When I tried to explain to the woman at the front desk that I preferred to check in upstairs where they knew me, she ignored me and began processing my check in.  Being too tired to argue, I just handed her my passport and credit card.

She asked me if I preferred a smoking or no smoking room and I began getting annoyed.  It was past my bed time and I'd been in transit all day... and the damned hotel had my profile on record.  All she had to do was read the freaking screen.  But I didn't say this... I just gritted my teeth and said. "Non-smoking please".

She handed me the electronic room key card and wished me a mechanical and entirely insincere good evening.

This hotel is one where you need to flash the room key across the elevator panel or it won't take you to your floor.  Naturally she had neglected to program the key so I stood there in the elevator unable to do more than wave impotently at the panel and stab the button with no result.

I stormed back to the front desk, and when she was finished with the person she was checking in, I politely explained that she hadn't programmed the key.  She took my key card, programmed it and returned it without so much as an apology... as if this second act was part of the check-in ritual.

I went back to the elevator... successfully accessed my floor... and finally found myself outside my room. 

The doors in this hotel are such that you have to push a little button above the handle and then wave your card in front of the reader to activate the lock.  However, when I pushed the button (with the card nowhere near the reader) the door swung inward revealing a darkened interior.  It had been open.

I generally pay attention at the de rigueur security briefing I get before each trip abroad, so as the door was swinging inward on the meager force of my button push, our security officer's instructions rang in my ears as if he ware standing behind me:

"Under any circumstances you should open the door all the way before entering the room to makes sure nobody is behind it.  But if you are entering your hotel room and anything feels 'wrong' about it, push the door all the way open to the stops with all your strength and step quickly back out into the hall.  If someone is behind the door or waiting inside, that should throw them off balance long enough for you to get away easily."

I shoved the door as hard as I could and heard a satisfying 'bang' as it hit the stop.  I looked at the darkened doorway for a moment and decided I wanted a new room.  If the door hadn't latched for the last person who had been there (presumably the hotel staff who had cleaned the room), it might not latch properly for me. 

When I went back to the front desk I was beyond annoyed.  I went to the woman who had checked me in and asked her to call the duty manager, and stood studying the crowded lobby until he arrived.

I explained about asking to check in upstairs on the club floor and being ignored.

I explained about being asked about my room preference when I had gone to the trouble to join the hotel chain's member club and had specified all of my preferences in advance (including an additional time when my secretary had made the reservation).

I explained about being given an un-programmed key card and standing like an idiot in the elevator.

I explained about arriving at the room and finding it unlocked/unlatched.

The duty manager apologized and offered me an upgrade to a suite for my trouble. 

Now, I sometimes get upgraded for being a frequent guest or because of the company I work for.  But I really didn't want him to think I was being a petulant @sshole just to get a better room.  I just wanted what I was supposed to get.  No more and no less.

So I turned him down.  I told him I just wanted a room with a door that locked when it closed.

He turned to the woman behind the counter and said something to her in Hindi and she quickly programmed a new key and handed it to him.  He then escorted me to my new room.

When we arrived, he opened the door, taking pains to ensure it was locked properly before activating the electronic key... and waved me inside to inspect the room.

It was the standard room (which is really very plush) but the first thing I noticed was the smell of stale smoke.  I quick look around the room confirmed my suspicions... there were ash trays everywhere.

Now I was beyond any semblance of politeness.  I told him to have my bags taken back outside and to have me checked out.  I told him if the suitcases were not outside by the time I got a taxi, he could send them to the (insert name of another hotel chain).  I was too tired for any more crap.  With that I left him in the room and took the waiting elevator to the lobby.

He must have caught a faster elevator, because by the time mine reached the lobby he was waiting for me, wanting to know what was wrong.  I told him that even though my profile had specified a non-smoking room, I had humored the desk clerk and repeated this request.  Yet she had still put me in a smoking room.

Then a thought occurred to me and I asked him if the first room I had been assigned had been a smoking room too.  When I told him the room number he said yes, it was.

That's all I needed to hear.  I wished him a good night and went out to the front of the hotel to get a taxi.  If I wasn't asleep in the next hour I was seriously going to lose it.

The duty manager chased me outside and literally begged me to come back and let him give me a new room.  I knew I was being unreasonable, but muscle fatigue from the flights, lack of sleep and hunger had ganged up to deprive me of my usual good humor.

After a moment of meditation on just how big a jerk I must have appeared to him, I forced a smile and told him that I would give him one more chance to make things right.

He took me back inside and instead of asking the desk clerk to do it, he want around and began programming things himself.  I interrupted him and reminded him that I did not want an upgrade.  At that point it was more about proving to him that I wasn't fishing for better conditions with my tirade.

He must had been doing just that because I watched as he canceled something and began a new series of typed commands.  Within a minute he had my new card and had taken me up to my room.

The new room was just fine.  Locked door, sweet smelling, no ash trays... everything I needed in a hotel room. 

While he was still in my room, he made a call on his cell phone to arrange to have my bags transferred from the original room (where, by this time they had been delivered) to where I was staying.  I listened to his side of the conversation, not understanding the Hindi, but following the context when he mentioned the old room number and the new one in English.

After a brief pause he turned to me and told me that the bellman had confirmed that the door lock was not functioning properly... and that the door seemed to have been kicked open because the door stop had broken off and the handle had gone through the wall. 

He then dialed the engineering department and began giving instructions to someone in Hindi.

I could have played dumb, but interrupted him and explained that I had probably broken the doorstop when I got spooked by the door being unlatched.  He looked at me for a moment and said, "Oh right... you're Israeli.  I guess I can't blame you for that... especially after 26/11 [what they call the Mumbai terror attack here].

I explained that I would be happy to pay for any damage, but he shook his head and turned his attention back to the phone conversation.  Now he switched to English and instructed the engineer to have the lock replaced... and finished up with, "... and fix the doorstop and wall while you're at it."

He wished me a pleasant evening (and seemed to mean it) and let himself out.

I've just had my cup-o-noodles, a granola bar and two bottles of water... and I aaaaaaaaam outahere!

Goa Haiku

floating at sunset

in the arabian sea

gentle blood warm waves

Like a box of chocolates...

Dinner at the Mumbai Chabad house on Shabbat is a very Forrest Gumpian experience in that you really never know what you are gonna get in terms of company.

This past Friday night I found myself sitting next to /across from two Members of Knesset and the Israeli Consul General (stationed in Mumbai and her family).  There were also a lot of students, post-army pack-packers, and assorted businessmen spread around the gigantic table... and of course the requisite friendly Chabadniks.  But the dinner discussion was even more lively than usual due to the addition of some political primary sources to the mix.

It didn't hurt the liveliness of the table talk that one of the MKs was from Kadima and the other from Israel Beteinu.  :-)

On a sadder note, after several trips to Mumbai since the attack, I finally got up the nerve to visit Nariman House, the site of the original Chabad House.  Having left india just a few days before the attack, I wrestled for months with a minor case of survivor's guilt.  And when I came back to Mumbai afterwards, I just couldn't bring myself to go have a look.

But since I was going to be in the Colaba Market (in which Narriman House is located) picking up some gifts, I decided I really had to go put my ghosts to rest.

As I turned the corner onto the narrow street where the former Chabad building sits, the first thing that caught my eye was a series of bullet holes on the wall of a bakery across the street.  Each bullet hole was circled in red paint... and above them on the wall was the following hand-painted message in English and Hindi:

Taped on the gate of the house is the following note:

                                     [click to embiggen]

The Hebrew says (roughly) :

Beit Chabad Mumbai Shalom

We are currently operating in a different location.

Please write your name and email address in the guest book that is held by the guard.

Our email address is....

For information or to make a donation visit www...

Thank you, Yossi.

Clearly, while they want to make Jews feel welcome and direct them to the new (temporary) location, they are being very cautious not to publicize the address.  So if you want to visit, you sort of have to be able to work out the Hebrew... and you have to contact them via email so they can call you to speak to you before telling you how to get there.

Nariman house itself still sits locked up and under 24 hour guard.  The Chabad organization is still fund-raising to restore it, but it isn't clear whether the Indian government will make it easy.  Apparently there is a prevailing sentiment in political circles here that Chabad was the primary target in the attack and had acted as a magnet for the terrorists.   This is the same logic that is widespread in Europe which posits that Israel's presence is the biggest obstacle to peace and stability in the region.

The Indian Government has even gone so far as to deny the request of the current Chabad couple to have their visas renewed, forcing them to return to Israel for the time being until things sort themselves out.  while they are away, a rotating crew of Lubavitch students is holding down the fort at the make-shift Chabad house... welcoming a mixed lot of local and traveling Jews every day of the week.

Needless to say, donations to Chabad of Mumbai are always appreciated.

Nice to know, but...

I'm in Goa for the next couple of days at a resort that can best be described as making the Garden of Eden look threadbare and limited.

I rarely get to take advantage of the facilities when I'm here, but since I arrived early on a Sunday I figured why not check out what's availible.  So, as I was sitting out on the poolside veranda of my room (yes, you read that right) perusing the resort facilities brochure, a little tidbit of information jumped out at me.

In among the mouthwatering description of the six international-themed restaurants, private beach, spa facilities, gyms, organized activities (meditation, yoga, pottery, cricket, volleyball, henna design, cooking classes, etc.), I noticed the following paragraph:

"The resort houses a fully functional laboratory with a professional microbiologist and quality analyst on staff 24/7 who ensure international norms are maintained at all times.  All consumable items are of the utmost international quality and are prepared and served within the highest hygienic standards."

You know, while that is certainly comforting (I mean, who really wants to contend with a raging case of 'Delhi Belly'?), I have to think the folks in marketing could have found an unobtrusive spot in the back of the booklet for that information... alongside, say, the schedule of mosquito fogging and what to do in case of a fire. 

Seriously, I don't ever want to see the words 'microbiologist' and 'Cuisine' on the same page.  I'm just saying.

Not so comfortable with that...

Once in a while my travels in India will bring me into contact with members of the older generation who remember life under the British Raj.

WhIle there is ample evidence that the country as a whole has no problem referencing and even actively channeling certain cultural touchstones from that era, I can't imagine that anybody is particularly keen to recall or relive the level of subservience that was common (even obligatory) between the local people and representatives of the colonial power.

So it catches me off guard - and honestly makes me uncomfortable - when a taxi driver, shop attendant or doorman calls me 'Sahib'. 

It happened again last night as I got out of the cab.  When I poked my head into the window to pay the fare, I responded with a modern phrase I learned recently; 'Jai Hind' (roughly, 'Victory India').  Probably equally inappropriate for a foreigner to say... but I wanted to convey a soft protest that in this day and age, a white foreigner shouldn't be kowtowed to... especially by someone who is old enough to recall meaner times.

File this one under cultural confusion.

Huh? wha... ?!

My flight from one coast of the Subcontinent to the other landed after midnight, followed by an hour drive to my hotel in a suicidal taxi.   I think drivers here use their car horns the way dolphins and bats use sonar (i.e. for echo-location). 

I checked into the hotel, showered, and finally fell into bed by 2:00AM (after making sure to arrange a wake up call so I wouldn't miss my morning meeting).

The neat thing is that when I asked for my wake up call, the hotel clerk asked if I would also like a follow-up call in case I fell back to sleep (they must know me)... as well as how long a delay I wanted before the follow up call.

Kewl.

The next question was even kewler;  "Would you like a pot of fresh brewed coffee and a newspaper delivered to the room with the follow-up wake-up call?"

Aaaaand the survey says: Yes.  Yes I would!

I went instantly to sleep, confident that my morning would be pleasant, albeit too soon.

After what felt like 30 seconds I was jarred awake by a knocking at the door.  I couldn't see my watch in the darkness (the heavy drapes were still drawn), so I got out of bed and stumbled to the door to peek through the peep hole.

Standing there in the hallway was a uniformed room service attendant with a coffee tray and a folded newspaper.  All I could figure through the fog was that I must have slept through two wake up calls, so I let the guy in... gave him a small tip and sat down to have my coffee and figure out how late I actually was.

When I could finally focus on my watch (two cups later) I realized that it was still 20 minutes before my first scheduled wake-up call! 

Apparently they are still working the kinks out of the coordination between the wake-up service and the room service folks. 

Oh well, it was a nice thought.  And the coffee is actually excellent.  But I really could have used that extra 20 minutes (plus the 15 minute roll-over period before the second call).

I guess I'll check out the Cricket scores and Bollywood gossip in the 'Hindustan Times'.

A sure-fire cure for self-pity

This morning I was feeling a tad sorry for myself.  Here I was not even two days into a two week business trip and I was already starting to feel congested and sniffly.  Not only that, but I was tired and sore from the two flights I'd already endured (with a prospect of at least another nine to go before I sleep in my own bed).   

And on top of it all, I was hungry.  Not hungry, as in I haven't had anything to eat... but rather hungry, as in, I haven't had anything good to eat.

Road trips are kind of a culinary desert which kosher-eating Jews have to cross.  Everyone has their own formula for surviving the desert... but I usually bring along (or send ahead) Manot Chamot (cup-o-noodles), Cabanos (kosher peperoni stix), tuna, granola bars, etc. 

But by the second day of must trips, all I can think about is the luxury of being able to stand in front of my open refrigerator in my own kitchen, running up the electric bill while deciding between four different kinds of yummy left-overs.

So, this morning as I was having these self-pitying hungry thoughts, and thinking to myself how truly unsatisfying a cup of coffee and granola bar were, I spotted a plate of clementines on a glass table by the window and happily peeled one for myself.

I took the peeled clementine, sat down on the crisp, high thread count cotton sheets of the king-sized bed, and leaned back into the stacked goose-down pillows to watch the morning news on the large screen plasma TV on the wall... all the while grumbling to myself that the vitamin C in the fruit might help keep my cold from getting too bad... but these sure weren't as good as Israeli clementines.

When I stood up to get another piece of fruit, I happened to glance out the window of my well-appointed suite and noticed a little make-shift shanty-town in the park across the road where literally hundreds of people were living in shacks made of cardboard, wood scraps, plastic sheeting and other stuff salvaged from who-knows-where.

 

Here's a closer look (as if you really needed one to know where this post is headed):

 

These people aren't living like that for a week or two.  They aren't enduring that mess with the smug assurance that in a few days a soft bed and the good life will be waiting for them.  For them (and for a big chunk of the world's population), this is it.  That's as good as it's gonna get.

Heck, if any of those people across the road could afford a TV set or the electricity to run it, they'd probably look at the news coming from Haiti right now and think to themselves, 'Holy cow, I may not be rich, but at least I'm not there!'.

I sometimes forget how ridiculously fortunate I am, and how different my life could be in the the blink of an eye.

So if anyone is looking for a sure-fire cure for self-pity... I have a little something that will snap you out of your funk in a hurry.  Don't thank me... I'm a giver.

And speaking of giving, forget all those websites popping up like mushrooms after a rain asking for donations for Haiti.  Give to the organizations that have been around in good times and in bad... providing disaster relief around the globe and taking a bare minimum of overhead for themselves.  I don't need to paint you a picture... you know what to do.

So this should be an interesting couple of weeks...

Posting from an Internet kiosk in the Bangkok airport.  Am exhausted due to flying on a red-eye flight full of people who were so jazzed about being on vacation that sleep didn't enter into the equation.  Just as I finally drifted off I was tapped on the shoulder by someone to let me know they were about to start Shacharit (morning prayers) in the back of the plane.

My section of the plane was pretty evenly split between young scantily clad Israeli back-packers and over-dressed Israeli Haredim.  I actually had to switch seats with someone to keep a little 20-year-old hottie with a belly shirt, navel ring and body art, from tripping a middle-aged Hassidic couple's circuits.  Don't ask.

The Haredim are apparently part of an organized tour of Thailand.  The funny thing is that they were all given bright green ball caps to wear so they won't lose track of one another during the tour.

I'm guessing that they won't have much trouble spotting each other... although I have to say, the ladies propping the baseball caps on top of their already stacked sheitel (wig) and pill-box combo makes a nifty trifecta.

I'll check in later... must.  find.  coffee.

Ouch!

I don't know whether to be relieved, insulted or confused.

After a lot of soul searching and reflection, I wrote (and rewrote!) a post about my impressions of what is going on in the UK.

Again, the thoughts presented in the post were not truths, accusations or anything more than what I personally felt after visiting with a lot of different Jews in the U.K..

Since the post was published, many former Brits (and an assortment of other people) have weighed in with their impressions.  But unless I've missed someone, not one single British Jew (i.e. someone actually still living in the U.K.) has commented on that post.

I honestly don't know what to think about that.  Either I'm so far off base that my post doesn't deserve to be dignified with a response... or I've hit so close to home that everyone wants to simply sit quietly until someone changes the subject to something a tad less awkward.

Everyone has their own version of a rain dance

A cowboy proverb of long standing that would be pretty hard to dispute (based on empirical evidence, anyway) goes as follows:

'Timing has an awful lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance' 

With all due respect to the 'Great Father' of Native American religions, I have a little fathering experience of my own... and I can assure you that my mood at any given moment has as much to do with whether my kids' requests get granted as the content and/or framing of their requests. 

So I have to believe that when we beseech G-d for rain, his current disposition towards us probably has as much to do with whether the skies are going to open up as the specifics of whatever fancy prayers or dances we might offer up.

Gilad and I studied all of the section of the Talmud dealing with fasts (Masechet Ta'anit) during the year leading up to his Bar Mitzvah, much of which deals with public fasts in times of drought.  It contains lengthy discussions and debates over when fasts should be declared, what types of rain are good and bad, who should fast, how long fasts should go on, what happens if someone wants to end a fast early, etc..

Fascinating stuff, but I treated it as purely an academic exercise since I couldn't imagine modern Rabbinic leaders declaring a public fast over lack of rain in our day and age.  Silly me.

It seems that Sephardic Chief Rabbi (Rishon LeTzion) Shlomo Amar has declared tomorrow to be a public fast due to growing signs that another winter is about to pass with far less rain than is needed to provide the country with desperately needed water.

Personally, I think that encouraging Jews to treat one another with just a modicum of 'Derech Eretz'  (i.e. with respect... and maybe even love) would go much further to appeasing G-d in the face of withheld blessings such as rain. 

But then, who am I to argue with a Chief Rabbi?

So yes, I'm planning on fasting... and I encourage others to do the same if they are able. 

But I have also taken an additional step to bring on the rains:  Last night I had my car detailed.  That, more than other single thing I know, has been proven to bring precipitation within 24-48 hours.

Everyone has their own version of the rain dance.

A week in Egypt England

[A potentially offensive post.  I apologize in advance.  You've been warned]

Every week the table outside my synagogue is cluttered with 'parsha sheets' and other printed material dealing with the Torah portion of the week.  This week has been no exception.

In one of the sheets, a gentleman named Yosef Y. Jacobson makes a fairly obvious point that those who read the Bible in translation miss the multi-dimensional nuances of the meaning-rich Hebrew text.  As an example he draws the reader's attention to a line in this week's parsha (Va'eira) which is typically rendered as follows in English translation:

"Therefore, say to the children of Israel:  I am G-d, and I shall take you out from under the burdens of egypt;  I shall rescue you from their slavery; I shall redeem you."

Mr., or perhaps Rabbi (he wasn't identified with an honorific), Jacobson points out that the Hebrew word 'Sivlot' which is usually translated as 'burdens', can also be translated as the plural of 'tolerance'... as in "I am G-d; and I shall take you out from [having to] tolerate Egypt".  He goes on to say that "burden and tolerance are connected, since tolerance is a form of burden carrying; of accepting a challenging reality."

His point is that while we usually view the story of the Exodus from Egypt as a tale of redemption from physical slavery, it is also very much (maybe more so) a tale of deliverance from psychological bondage. We lived for generations having to tolerate our status as a hated minority in Egypt, having to go through the sort of mental gymnastics known to all hated minorities in order to tolerate our dismal placement at the very bottom of society. 

If you think I'm wrong, then why was it so hard for Moses to convince the Jews to leave Egypt?  If you were in prison and someone opened the door and told you to run, would you ask questions? Would you need to be convinced???  And even after the Israelites were out, why did so many of them rebel against Moses and suggest to him that they had it better when they were in Egypt?

Although I am woefully ill-equipped to offer any original scholarship on religious texts (which is why I seldom do so), I have offered this preamble because it gives a perfect a lead-in to my thoughts after having interacted with a very wide cross-section of the British Jewish community for a week.

First of all, I should point out that I am writing this in full knowledge that this post, like any sweeping generalization, will be fundamentally wrong on a number of levels... and will offend many who read it.  

I freely acknowledge that a week is really insufficient to gain more than an initial impression. But impressions - especially first ones - have value, and are often to be trusted.

I also need to mention that having grown up in the U.S., I have absolutely no idea what it's like to live in a country with a relatively small Jewish community.  Even if you happen to live in a small American Jewish community, the overall American Jewish population is numbered in the millions, and is extremely vocal about political matters... especially where relations with Israel are concerned.

Any time an election rolls around in the US, if there are even a few Jews among the potential constituents, it is incumbent upon the candidate to give a full public accounting of his past voting record and current views vis-a-vis the State of Israel. 

In places where there are large blocks of Jewish votes at stake (think New York, Florida Illinois and California), American candidates actually go to embarrassing lengths to prove their unqualified support for the Jewish State... even to the point of peppering their speeches with Yiddishisms and Borscht-belt humor (picture gray-haired Presbyterians and Quakers trying valiantly to pronounce Chutzpah and Tuches).

In short, being pro-Israel in the U.S. is seen as having political value.

So it came as a bit of a surprise when I found the tiny U.K. Jewish community (less than 300,000 strong as of the last census), to be absolutely absent from public discourse in support of Israel.  In England, there seems to be a political price to pay for being pro-Israel... and if anything, there seems to be value on the side of those who are critical of Israel.

As I mentioned in a previous post, Jews in the U.K. seem to be fairly equally split between being actively critical of the Jewish State, and being apologetically supportive of it (albeit in the safe privacy of their homes and synagogues). 

Those who are apologetically supportive often utter phrases like "Of course I love and support Israel, but...", at which point they will list off Israel's real or imagined human rights abuses and crimes of occupation, all of which, they will tell you, make it extremely difficult for them to defend Israel to their non-Jewish friends and co-workers. 

Those who are openly critical of Israel simply dispense with the preamble about supporting Israel and launch right into a barely controlled rage about the apartheid-like imprisonment of the Palestinian people, and present thinly veiled justifications for all manner of terror against Israel by the Arabs.  This is all the more shocking because it is delivered in extremely cultured, terribly polite, perfectly constructed paragraphs that only well-educated Brits seem able to manage.

For the most part, the British Jewish community seems to keep their collective heads down and try to fit in with their countrymen as best they can.  Sadly, in many cases this means trying to be more British than the Brits.  

Not only is there a serious problem with passive anti-Semitism in the UK, but active anti-Semitic attacks seem also to be quite prevalent and on the rise. 

While I was at Limmud I noticed that security was being handled by an organization called CST.  They were literally everywhere on campus, guarding all the doors, wandering the grounds, checking IDs of everyone going in or out.  On the one hand, it was nice to see them taking security so seriously.  But on the other, we were in the middle of Coventry on a closed university campus during Christmas break.  Did anyone even know/care that there were Jews in the area?!

When I asked someone about this they explained that CST was the organization that guarded the synagogues all over London (and presumably in other places in the UK) and that 'normal' life for British Jews was not something an American or Israeli Jew could easily understand.

I was shocked.  In the US there are occasional hate crimes against JCCs and synagogues... mostly of the spray-painted Swastika sort.  But in England I was seeing a relatively small Jewish community where blanket security was required everywhere that Jews gathered in any numbers.

I was further shocked when I got to London and started wandering around Golders Green.  No, I'm not talking about the Salt Beef Sandwich at Blooms (which was a crime of a different sort... don't get me started!).  No, I'm talking about the fact that in literally every Jewish shop, restaurant, bakery, Judaica store, etc. there was a little display on the counter next to the cash register where customers were encouraged to take one of the following cards:

[Front of Card]

[Back of Card]

This kind of card could only exist in a community that feels threatened and vulnerable. They may not be in imminent physical danger (although the need for cards such as these suggests otherwise), but you'd have a hard time convincing me that the U.K. Jewish community isn't experiencing a social, emotional and psychological threat.  They are clearly tolerating a great deal of anti-Semitism as they go about their daily lives... trying to act as if everything is fine.

I hate to make the comparison to pre-war Germany, because the analogy is patently unfair.  Certainly England is not going to start loading her Jews onto cattle cars anytime soon.  But at the level of anti-Semitism that German Jews were forced to tolerate in the late '20s and early '30s (i.e. well before the really physical threats to their safety materialized), they reacted by keeping their heads down, and managed to convince themselves that they were more German than the Germans... that everything was basically okay.

Which brings us back to Egypt and Mr. (or Rabbi) Jacobson's observation that the difference between a physical and psychological burden hangs on the nuanced translation of a simple Hebrew word.

Personally, I think that much of the left-leaning, knee-jerk anti-Israel rhetoric coming from the UK Jewish community today can trace its source as much to British Jewry's need to fit in (i.e. to be more British than the Brits), as to any of Israel's real or imagined misdeeds.  England's Jews seem (to me) to be captives of anti-Semitism ... forced to tolerate an oppressed status without fully acknowledging it to themselves. 

When I left the U.K. I did so with a profound appreciation for the relative freedom I have experienced throughout my life; both in my American youth, and in my Israeli adulthood.  Once one has tasted such freedom, the barest whiff of oppression can't be mistaken for anything else.

I'm going to stop here because I sense I've probably already said far too much.