Eddie Cantor in "Moe The Tailor" (1929)

Israeli Song Contests Feature Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah"

Israeli Song Contests Feature Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah"

by Al

Hallelujah, the song Leonard Cohen wrote in 1984, was not a big hit when it was first released. But over the years, it has been the choice of a large number and broad range of artists, who performed cover versions in recordings and in concert. The song has also seen significant use in film and television soundtracks, including Shrek.

In the last two years, it's been the choice of some very talented young singers participating in Israeli television talent shows. 

In 2011, eleven-year-old Shalev Menashe rode it into the finals of the School of Music talent show, singing it in Hebrew.

Earlier this year, Inbal Gershkovitz did the same for another TV talent show, The Voice, singing it in English.

Here are both versions, as performed on TV. Enjoy!

 

Borekas

Borekas

A crunchy Israeli classic.

By Leah Koenig

Borekas are nothing short of edible perfection--heavenly little parcels of dough crisped with hot oil or melted butter and stuffed with any number of delicious savory ingredients. Nutritious and filling, they make a satisfying meal any time of day. And like Italy's calzone, Spain's empanada, and India's samosa, these pastries are self-contained, which makes them the perfect portable snack to power an afternoon spent browsing through the shuk, or just about any other activity. More >>>

Categories:Appetizer, Cheesy, israel, Israeli food, Lunch, Vegetarian, Hanukkah, Purim, Rosh Hashanah, Shabbat, Shavuot, Simchat Torah, Sukkot, Yom HaAtzmaut, Yom Yerushalayim, Meat, Rosh Hashanah Ingredients Filling 1 10-oz package frozen spinach, thawed, squeezed of excess water a 1 egg, lightly beaten 1 cup ricotta cheese 1 cup grated mozzarella cheese 1 clove garlic, minced 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg Salt and freshly ground black pepper Dough 1 16-ounce package of phyllo dough, thawed 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted 1 large egg, beaten Toasted sesame seeds for sprinkling

Directions

---

	Yield Prep Cook Total	about 3 dozen borekas 40 mins 20 mins 1 hr 0 mins

Combine spinach, egg, ricotta, mozzarella, garlic, and nutmeg in a bowl and mix well. Season with salt and pepper to taste and set aside.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and lightly grease the bottom of a baking sheet with butter or cooking spray.

Place the thawed phyllo dough on a flat surface and cover it with a lightly damp dishtowel to keep it from drying out when not in use.

Remove one sheet of dough and place it on a flat surface. Cut it lengthwise into 4 and a 1/2-inch wide strips (you'll end up with 2 or 3 strips per sheet of dough). Working quickly, brush the dough strips with melted butter. Fold one side of the strip over lengthwise to meet the other (like closing a book) and brush again with more butter.

Spoon 1 teaspoon of filling at the bottom end of each buttered strip. Fold the bottom right corner of the strip upwards, towards the left edge to make a triangle. Then fold the triangle over to the opposite side. Continue folding upwards in this manner until you are left with a fat triangle with the filling tucked safely inside.

Brush the outside of the triangle with a little more butter and place on the baking sheet. Repeat with additional pieces of phyllo until all of the filling is used up. Just before baking, brush the filled borekas with the beaten egg and sprinkle with sesame seeds. Bake until golden brown, about 20 minutes.

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How ‘Hava Nagila’ Took Its Place on a Global Playlist

By SAM ROBERTS

“Hava Nagila” was born in Eastern Europe, but became emblematic of Israel. It went global as a universal anthem of celebration and was recorded by performers ranging from Allan Sherman to Lena Horne. It evokes strong emotions — it has been denounced as “the kudzu of Jewish music” and hailed as “a profound haiku of Jewish history and identity.”

Multimedia

A Portal Into History

Enlarge This Image

The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee Archives

A hora, which is a circle folk dance that "Hava Nagila" often accompanies, at a displaced persons camp in Germany.

Can all those reverberations from a single song be captured in a spare 900-square-foot octagonal gallery?

Well, why not?

The Museum of Jewish Heritage, a Living Memorial to the Holocaust, in Lower Manhattan, has done just that. Its curators and designers have created a jaunty aural and visual exhibition, “Hava Nagila: A Song for the People,” that portrays the song in virtually all its exponential iterations.

Few songs have proved so ubiquitous and transformative — “Amazing Grace” and “Strange Fruit” immediately come to mind — that they merited the scholarship that has been lavished on “Hava Nagila” in the exhibition and in a 73-minute documentary. The film is excerpted on one of the gallery’s two video screens (the other features an eclectic pastiche of  YouTube performances from around the world).

Yes, the museum’s Rotunda Gallery is more compact than some New York studio apartments. That it is so self-contained, though, amplifies the power of the buoyant beat that resonates under life-size aluminum “umbrellas” suspended from the ceiling and activated by motion detectors to provide cones of salience for visitors.

The exhibit was designed for the museum by two Brooklyn-based practices, Situ Studio and MTWTF. (Flor provided multicolored carpet squares, which help isolate the sound so visitors hear only one version at a time.) The goal of the designers was to meld aural, tactile and visual effects into a single experience — “to communicate the diversity of the song’s infinite embodiments while also conjuring that particular joyous fervor that the melody imbues,” as Bradley Samuels, a Situ partner, put it.

A clockwise tour of the gallery begins with the history of this folk anthem, from its roots as a nigun — a wordless tune — in the court of Rabbi Yisroel Friedman of the Sadigora Hasidic community in what is now Ukraine.

During World War I, expatriates exported the melody to Jewish Palestine, where, in 1915, it was transcribed by Abraham Z. Idelsohn, a musicologist. Apparently inspired by a verse in Psalms (“This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad on it”), he is generally credited with the Hebrew lyrics.

Not long after Idelsohn’s choir recorded the song in 1922 (its rendition can be heard under the gallery’s first umbrella), “Hava Nagila” (translated as “Let Us Rejoice”) was embraced as the inexorable musical accompaniment to an imported circle folk dance, the hora, which spread to Palestine from Romania.

Depending on the tempo, the tune can be bittersweet, which transformed it into a song of remembrance and of hope (“Awake brothers with a happy heart”) embraced by Holocaust survivors and by pioneer Zionists committed to a Jewish state. Photographs in the exhibit depict children dancing the hora at the Jewish Palestine Pavilion at the 1939 World’s Fair in New York and at a displaced persons camp in Germany after World War II.

It didn’t take long for the song to resonate in America, where the beat and the joyous lyrics made it a staple of weddings (with the bride and groom precariously hoisted on chairs) and bar mitzvahs — to the point that some Jews shunned it. (Enough, already!)

“I want them to suspend their original feeling, whether they love it or hate it,” said Alice Rubin, the museum’s project manager. “When you unpack it, it has connections for everybody.” Those connections are apparent in photographs and other personal memorabilia that visitors have submitted online, through social media and in person since the exhibit opened in September.

What is so striking about the exhibit and “Hava Nagila: The Movie” by Roberta Grossman and Sophie Sartain is the song’s global crossover reach. (The film is scheduled to open for theatrical release in New York next March; the exhibit runs through May.)

Harry Belafonte discovered “Hava Nagila” in Greenwich Village coffeehouses and his recording of it at Carnegie Hall in 1959 bridged ethnic and cultural boundaries. He says it quickly became his second most popular song, just behind his signature “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song).”

“The most moving experience I ever had singing ‘Hava Nagila’ was in Germany,” he says in the video. “An African-American, an American, standing in Germany, which a decade earlier had been responsible for mass murder, these young German kids singing this Hebrew song of rejoicing.”

The exhibition demonstrates how interpretations run the gamut, from a  bhangra festival of Indian dance in Vancouver to a klezmer concert in Wales, from a celebration at B’nai Jeshurun in Manhattan of the legalization of same-sex marriage to the musical accompaniment for the gold medal performance of Aly Raisman, the American gymnast, at the London Olympics.

“Everybody knows ‘Hava Nagila,’ yet few people know the song’s long journey — from Sadigora, to Palestine, to the global jukebox,” said Melissa Martens, the exhibit’s curator and the museum’s director of collections and exhibitions. “Its familiarity since the ’60s positioned it for new uses: as comedy, protest, politics and parody. Today the song is still often played with a purposeful nod and wink to the listener. New versions surface daily on YouTube from people all over the world who find pride, humor, nostalgia, identification or momentum in the melody we know as ‘Hava Nagila.’ ”

Chubby Checker performed it and so did Elvis, Josephine Baker, Celia Cruz, the Muppets, Dalida in sultry French and Glen Campbell on the flip side of his recording of “True Grit.” The Barry Sisters (née Clara and Minnie Bagelman) recorded “Hava Nagila” and so did Connie Francis. (“I’m 10 percent Jewish on my manager’s side,” she says in the film.) Lena Horne sang the melody to a civil rights anthem (“Now!”) in 1962 (lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, the setting by Jule Styne).

“As ‘Hava Nagila’ and American Jews gained acceptance in mainstream culture, self-humor, reflection and parody came into the remix,” one caption explains. Allan Sherman sang “Harvey and Sheila” about the Jewish exodus to the suburbs. The Simpsons went caroling and sang it to neighbors with the lyric “Hava Nice Christmas.” Larry David downloaded it as a ring tone. Nowadays, you can buy a Harvey Nagila singing and dancing doll and even find the recipe to a Halvah-Nagila smoothie.

And Bob Dylan deliberately mangled it in “Talkin’ Hava Negeilah Blues” after introducing the tune as “a foreign song I learned in Utah.”

“Nothing is more Jewish than that performance because it is both an embrace and a refusal,” Josh Kun, a professor of communication at the University of Southern California, says in the film. “And, to me, that’s Jewishness at its core.”

Chicken Breasts Stuffed with Pareve Ricotta Cheese and Olives with Balsamic Glaze

Serves 4 but doubles easily
This chicken is great warm or at room temperature. It works so well with the new Tofutti Pareve Ricotta Cheese. It is great accompanied by garlicky spinach or green beans.
4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves (about 1-1/2 lb. total)
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 ounces pareve tofutti ricotta cheese
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped pitted Kalamata olives
2 teaspoons finely grated lemon zest (from 1 large lemon), divided
1-1/2 teaspoons minced fresh rosemary
1/2 cup flour
6 tablespoons margarine, cut into 6 pieces
1 tablespoon olive oil
3 tablespoons minced shallots
1-1/2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons chicken broth
With a boning knife, cut a wide pocket into the thickest part of each chicken breast half, taking care not to cut all the way through. Season the chicken evenly on both sides with 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper.
In a small bowl, mix the tofutti ricotta cheese, olives, and 1 teaspoon each lemon zest and rosemary. Stuff the pockets with the ricotta mixture and pin each shut with two toothpicks. Spread the flour in a shallow bowl and dredge the chicken in the flour, shaking off the excess.
Heat 1 tablespoon of the margarine and the oil in a 12-inch heavy-duty skillet over medium-high heat until the foam from the butter subsides. Add the chicken and cook, flipping once and adding another 1 tablespoon margarine halfway through cooking, until golden-brown and cooked through (reduce the heat to medium if necessary), 14 to 16 minutes total. Transfer to plates and remove the toothpicks.
While the chicken cooks, melt 1 tablespoon margarine in an 8-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Add the shallots and cook, stirring, until softened, about 3 minutes. Add the vinegar and boil until syrupy, about 3 minutes. Add the broth and boil for 1 minute more. Off the heat, whisk in the remaining 3 tablespoons margarine, remaining 1 teaspoon lemon zest, and remaining 1/2 teaspoon rosemary. Serve the chicken drizzled with the sauce.

"Judas Asparagus":

"Judas Asparagus":

(This is amazing and should bring tears of laughter to your eyes. I wonder how often we take for granted that children understand what we are teaching?)

A child was asked to write a book report on the entire Bible. Here is what was written: The Children's Bible in
a Nutshell

In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, ‘The Lord thy God is one,' but I think He must be a lot older than that.

Anyway, God said, 'Give me a light!' and someone did.
Then God made the world.

He split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because mirrors hadn't been invented yet.

Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden.....Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.

Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel.

Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something.
One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check.

After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat.

Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable.

God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then he gave them His Top Ten Commandments. These include: don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's stuff.
Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother.

One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.

After Joshua came David.. He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me.

After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of these was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed up on the shore.

There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.

Alef to Tav

 

 

Peanut Butter Pareve Cheesecake Pie with Chocolate Whipped Cream

Peanut Butter Pareve 

Cheesecake Pie with 

Chocolate Whipped 

Cream

Serves 8
At GKC we believe you can never have too many chocolate peanut butter desserts to try. I tested this one for yom tov and it was voted a keeper. I made it and kept it in the freezer for a week until I was ready to serve it. Defrost it in the refrigerator though and be careful about covering the chocolate whipped cream.
Crust:
1-1/4 cups salted pretzels or graham cracker crumbs
6 tablespoons margarine, melted
1/4 cup brown sugar
Or you can use a store-bought graham cracker crust
Filling:
1/2 cup Tofutti cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup smooth peanut butter
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup pareve whipping cream, whipped
Chocolate Whipped Cream:
3/4 cup roughly chopped dark chocolate
2 cups pareve whipping cream
Chocolate shavings
For the crust: Pulse the pretzels in a food processor until finely ground. In a large bowl, combine the pretzel crumbs, margarine and brown sugar. Mix with your hands. Press the mixture into the bottom and up the sides of a 9-inch pie plate. Cover and refrigerate. 


For the filling: Combine the tofutti cream cheese, peanut butter and brown sugar in a medium bowl and beat with a mixer until smooth. Fold in the pareve whipped cream. Spoon the filling into the pie shell, cover and return to the refrigerator. 


For the chocolate whipped cream: Put the chocolate and pareve whipping cream in the top of a double boiler over medium heat. Whisk until melted. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours. Once cooled, beat the chocolate cream with a mixer until thick and spreadable (do not overmix). 

Cover the pie with the chocolate whipped cream. Garnish with chocolate shavings.

Curried Parsnip and Apple Soup

Curried Parsnip and 

Apple Soup

Serves 8
Apple season is in full swing on the east coast and I am always on the lookout for new recipes and ideas to use these fresh and delicious apples. This one is best made a few days ahead of time and uses some great seasonal parsnips too.
1 pound (about 3 medium) tart apples that soften easily when cooked, such as Empire, Jonathan, or McIntosh
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 tablespoon olive oil
2 large leeks (white and light-green parts only), chopped
1 medium yellow onion, chopped (about 1 cup)
1-1/2 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 teaspoons chopped garlic (2 medium cloves)
1 teaspoon curry powder
1/3 cup dry white white (not a sweet wine)
2 large parsnips, peeled, quartered lengthwise, cored, and chopped (about 2 cups)
1 medium Yukon Gold potato, peeled and chopped into 1/2-inch pieces (about 1 cup)
4 cups chicken broth
Kosher salt
1/3 cup pareve whipping cream
Freshly ground white pepper
3 tablespoons thinly sliced chives
Cut 1 quarter from one of the apples. Wrap the unpeeled quarter in plastic wrap and reserve. Peel, core, and quarter the rest of the apples. Chop the peeled apples into 1/2-inch pieces and toss with the lemon juice in a medium bowl.
Heat the olive oil in a heavy-duty 4-quart saucepan over medium-low heat. Add the leeks and onion and cook, covered, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until just tender, 6 to 8 minutes.
Stir in the ginger, tomato paste, garlic, and curry powder and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the wine and cook, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until the liquid has almost evaporated, 2 to 3 minutes.
Add the chopped apple, parsnips, and potatoes and stir to coat well. Add the chicken broth and 1-1/2 teaspoon salt and bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce the heat to medium low, partially cover, and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the apples and vegetables are very tender, about 30 minutes.
With an immersion blender, purée the until completely smooth. Stir in the pareve cream, and season to taste with salt and white pepper. Bring the soup to a simmer over medium heat, stirring often. Cut the reserved apple quarter into small dice. Serve the soup sprinkled with the diced apple and chives.
This soup is best made a day or two in advance. Store in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

Kosher Easy Chocolate Mousse

Easy Chocolate Mousse

Okay, we aren’t quite sick of cooking any longer and we are back in the kitchen. But the creative juices aren’t exactly flowing and our desire for “easy” is at its peak!! Here is a great and versatile chocolate mousse recipe that is an easy dessert, an elegant dessert and a popular dessert! What more could you ask? It is guaranteed to become one of your favorites.
Easy Chocolate Mousse
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
2 tablespoons margarine
2 egg yolks
2 cups pareve whip
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
In a small bowl, melt the chocolate and margarine together in a microwave. Stir until smooth. Rapidly whisk in egg yolks so they don’t have time to cook. Set aside to cool briefly.
In a mixer, beat pareve whip until stiff peaks form. Beat in sugar and vanilla. On low speed, add chocolate to whip until completely combined. Store, covered, in the refrigerator until ready to use.
Serve in martini glasses with a cookie on the side or spread across a batch of brownies (use Duncan Hines to make this super easy!)

Jewish Ghetto Life in Color From 1939 Poland

As part of his job as ‘special military reporter,’ Hugo Jaeger got to use advanced color photography during World War II. His work includes unique documentation of Jews in Warsaw, Kutno ghettos
Gili Gurel
Smiling made-up women, a man
wearing a yellow Star of David talking to German officers. Unusual color
photos from World War II ghettos in Poland shed light on Jewish life in
1939-1940, shortly after Jews were imprisoned in ghettos and before the mass
destruction began.


The pictures were taken by senior photographer Hugo Jaeger, who received
unprecedented access to the area and to the Nazi regime’s upper echelon,
including Adolf Hitler, and got to use the most advanced technology of
that time – color photography.

The photos were released to mark the 72nd anniversary of the official
establishment of the Warsaw Ghetto in October 1940.

In one photo from 1940, people are seen queuing for water and vegetables,
under a sign reading, in German, “Typhus area.”

Warsaw Ghetto, 1940 (Photo:
Getty Images)

LIFE magazine, which bought the photo archive from Jaeger, describes him as
Hitler’s personal photographer and has published photos he took during the Third
Reich leader’s 50th birthday in the past.

But Dr. Daniel Uziel, a historian from Yad Vashem who also deals with photos
from that era, doubts the title, describing Jaeger as “a special military
reporter” who received rare access to places regular photographers were no
allowed into.

“Jaeger was a famous photojournalist in Germany in the 1930s. He was drafted
at the beginning of the war as a reservist to the Wehrmacht propaganda units.
Because of his status as a photographer he received the status of a special
military reporter,” explains Uziel.

“He was given uniform and weapons and received access to wherever he pleased.
Because of his special status he also got two unusual photography technologies:
Kodak color film and a stereoscopic camera which creates images in 3D. He would
shoot the same scenes with both cameras.

“He was supposed to hand the pictures over to the Nazi propaganda office, and
apparently never did. These photos did not pop up at the time.”

Justyna Majewska, a curator at the Holocaust Gallery in the Museum of the
History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, notes in an article on Time magazine’s website
that there is virtually no German military presence at all in the pictures.

Dr. Uziel explains that “the German army was preparing to invade the
Soviet Union at the time. So in those areas, taking pictures and conveying
information on the army were strictly prohibited.


“The propaganda units had nothing to do. They began looking for subjects and
found the ghettos. This is the reason why there is series of newspaper articles,
photos and films from that time showing the ghettos in Poland.”

Women in
Kutno Ghetto in 1940 (Photo: Getty Images)

Jewish man speaks with German
officers in Kutno, 1939 (Photo: Getty Images)


As opposed to other propaganda photos from that time, these pictures do
not appear to be hateful or dehumanizing, although Jaeger is described in the
article as an “ardent Nazi”.


It is quite possible that Jaeger had asked the people for permission to take
their photos, and thereby documented a young woman smiling for the camera in the
Kutno ghetto in the Łódź province, a photo which stands out against the
background of her miserable surroundings.

According to the Yad Vashem website, some 6,700 Jews lived in Kutno before
the Holocaust, making up more than one-quarter of the city’s population. The
Germans set up the ghetto in June 1940, after many more Jews arrived from the
area.

“The color photos don’t seem to match the Nazi stereotype of Jews,” explains
Uziel. “The Jewish women are pretty, and they would usually choose ugly motifs.
It doesn’t look like a propaganda photo.”

The photo of the three made-up women was presented in Yad Vashem’s “Spots of
Light” exhibition, which describes the different experiences of Jewish women
during the Holocaust and has been displayed around the world.

Jewish man and children in
Kutno, 1940 (Photo: Getty Images)

Jews in Kutno Ghetto, 1940
(Photo: Getty Images)

Jaeger did not hand these photos over to the propaganda office, but he did
transfer the 3D pictures to a German publisher, which was part of the propaganda
systems and had a monopoly over this technology.

“They published fancy albums with empty spaces to glue the pictures in, like
cards,” says Uziel. “The thick cover had a pocket with a stereoscope, a device
used to view these photos.”

Jaeger’s pictures were likely designated for an album on the war in the east,
part of which was to be dedicated to the Jews. The album was never published,
perhaps because of Nazi Germany’s defeat.

• Click here
  to view additional color photos
  by Hugo Jaeger from ghettos

The Time article describes how Jaeger’s 2,000 photos reached LIFE in the
1970s:

“On that spring day in 1945, during a search of the house where Jaeger
was staying, the Americans found the leather satchel in which the Führer’s
personal photographer had hidden literally thousands of color slides. What
happened next, however, left Jaeger staggering.


“Inside the satchel that held the compromising pictures, Jaeger had also
placed a bottle of brandy and a small, ivory gambling toy — a spinning top for
an old-fashioned game of chance known by, among other names, ‘put-and-take.’

“Happy with their find, the soldiers sat down to a session of put-and-take
while sharing the bottle of brandy with Jaeger and the owner of the house where
the photographer had been living. (Jaeger’s own apartment in Munich had been
destroyed in Allied air raids.) The leather satchel, and whatever else was
hidden away in it, was forgotten as the brandy dwindled and the game of
put-and-take spun on.

“After the Americans left, a shaken Jaeger packed the color slides into metal
jars and, over time, buried them in various locations on the outskirts of town.
In the years following the war, Jaeger occasionally returned to his multiple
caches, digging them up, drying them out, repacking and reburying them.”

In 1955, he dug them up and hid them in a bank vault in Switzerland. A decade
later he sold them to Life magazine.

Humor for today

==================

It was a terrible night, blowing cold and sleeting rain in a most frightful manner.

The streets were deserted and the local baker was just about to close up shop

when a Jewish man slipped through the door. He carried an umbrella, blown inside out, and was bundled in two sweaters and a thick coat. But even so he still looked wet, freezing, and bedraggled.

As he unwound his scarf he said to the baker, "May I have two poppy seed bagels to go, please?"

The baker said in astonishment, "Two bagels? Nothing more?"

"That's right," answered the little man. "One for me and one for Sherry."
"Sherry is your wife?" Asked the baker.

"What do you think," snapped the man, "my mother would send me out on a night like this?"

=======================

A KGB officer is walking in the park and he sees and old Jewish man reading a book.

The KGB says "What are you reading old man?"

The old man says "I am trying to teach myself Hebrew."

KGB says "Why are you trying to learn Hebrew? It takes years to get a visa for Israel. You would die before the paperwork got done."

"I am learning Hebrew so that when I die and go to Heaven I will be able to speak to Abraham and Moses. Hebrew is the language they speak in Heaven." the old man replies.

"But what if when you die you go to Hell?" asks KGB.

And the old man replies, "Russian, I already know."

===============================

Moscow in the 1970s.

Deepest winter.

A rumor spreads through the city that meat will be available for sale the next day at Butcher's Shop no. 1.
Tens of thousands turn up on the eve of the event wrapped up against the cold, carrying stools, vodka, and chessboards, they form an orderly queue.
At 3 am the butcher comes out and says, "Comrades, I've just had a call from the Party Central Committee:

it turns out there won't be enough meat for everyone, so the Jews in the queue should go home."
The Jews obediently leave the queue.

The rest continue to wait.
At 7 am, the butcher comes out again, "Comrades, I've just had another call from Central Committee. It turns out there will be no meat at all, so you should all go home."
The crowd disperses, grumbling all the while, "Those bloody Jews get all the luck!"

=====================================

"I am Jewish" - What it means to be a Jew

I am the collective pride and excitement that is felt when we find out that that new actor, that great athlete, his chief of staff... is Jewish

I am the collective guilt and shame that is felt when we find out that that serial killer, that Ponzi schemer, that wife beater... is Jewish

I am the Jewish star tattooed on the chest of the teenager who chooses to rebel against his parents' and grandparents' warnings of a lonely goyim cemetery by embracing that same Judaism and making permanent his Jewish identity

I am all the words in Yiddish I've been called all my life that I still don't understand.

I am going to all three Phish shows this weekend.

I am my melody of Adon Olam. I am my melody of Adon Olam. The words may be the same but I am my melody of Adon Olam.

I am not getting Bar Mitzvahed. I am a Bar Mitzvah.

I am a concept foreign to the rest of the world. I am not Judaism. I am sleep-away camp.

I am your grandmother who's seen Chortkov and Auschwitz, who's seen '49, '67, and '73 and whose tired of trying to make peace with those people who just want to blow up buses and destroy her people.

I am the 19 year old who's seen Budrus, Don't Mess With the Zohan, and Waltz with Bashir and who thinks -- who knows -- peace is possible.

I am the complicated reason you take the cheese off of the burger you eat at the Saturday morning tailgate

I am constantly struggling to understand my Jewish identity outside of religion.

I am the Torah and not the Old Testament

I am a Kepah and not a Skull Cap

I am a Jew and not an Israeli

5,000 years old... not 60

A religion, not a country

I am never asked if I have horns or a pot of gold, if I rule the world or why I killed Jesus. I am asked where my black hat is, if I really get 8 presents on my Christmas, why my sideburns aren't super long, and if I've really never tried bacon.

I am asked what a Gefilte Fish is. I say, "I don't know. I don't like it. Nobody does. But we eat it because its what we do."

I am asked if my dad's a lawyer. I say "no... my mom is... my dad's an accountant."

I am asked if my grandparents were in the Holocaust as if it were a movie. "Yeah, they were. But luckily they were also on Schindler's List."

I am on JDate and not Match.com because, well, it's just easier that way.

I am that feeling of obligation to buy the Dead Sea salt at the mall kiosk because you know the woman's Israeli.

I am an IDF sweatshirt and the Chai around your neck. I am a $100 Challah cover you will never use and a 5 Shekel piece of red string you will wear until it withers away. I am your Hebrew name. I am your Israeli cousins. I am your Torah portion and your 13 candles. I am your Bat Mitzvah dress and the cute Israeli soldier on your Birthright trip.

I am 18 when I discover that Israel is not actually a garden of Eden of milk and honey where Jews of all backgrounds, ethnicities, and styles of worship come together -- eternally happy and appreciative -- to do a constant Hora in the streets of the promised land.

I am still confident it will be.

I am the way your stomach forgets to be hungry and your lungs forget to breathe when the Rabbi commands the final Tekiah Gadolah and an entire congregation -- a congregation that is not any one synagogue but an entire people -- listens to what on January 1st is a ball dropping in Times Square, but today -- any day in late September or early October for the 5770th time is a Ram's horn being blown into for what seems like 10 minutes, like the 8 days the oil burned, and how David defeated Goliath, and how Moses parted the seas -- it would have been enough, dayenu -- how we won the war, and how your grandparents survived, Nes Gadol Haya Sham -- Shana Tova -- time for bagels and lox. I am Jewish.

Jan Peerce - "Rozhinkes mit Mandlen" ("Raisins and Almonds")