Chol haMoed - The Rest of Passover
First, a bit of explanation. Passover is a long holiday. In Israel, it lasts seven days, throughout the rest of the world, it's eight days long. The first night (or two) is the night of the seder, a festive meal retelling the exodus of the Hebrews from slavery in Egypt. The last day (or two) is also considered a festival. The middle days are somewhere in between. "Chol" means mundane and "Moed" means festival, so the middle days of Passover are called Chol haMoed, the intermediate festival days. Therefore the holiday of Passover is actually: festival, chol hamoed, festival [1:5:1 in Israel, 2:4:2 outside Israel].

I returned to the kibbutz on Thursday for the rest of Chol haMoed, and immediately got back to gardening. On Friday, after work, I joined a group of people for a class on Song of Songs. Song of Songs (or Song of Solomon) is the book of the Bible associated with Passover. It is read in its entirety during the Shabbat of Chol haMoed, so this class was in preparation for the reading. I'm somewhat familiar with the book, but the class was to be given in Hebrew so I was a bit nervous and had no idea what to expect.

We met outside the garden that I work in every day. We briefly went over some of the major themes in Song of Songs and then started walking. First we arrived at the vineyard. Our teacher took us over to the vines which were crawling all over each other and interconnected for nearly as far as the eye could see. Spreading back the leaves he showed us these tiny clusters of buds, explaining that these were the blossoms that would become grapes within a month. We smelled their sweet scent and then he directed us to Song of Songs 2:13,15 where we read, "the blossoming vines spread their fragrance....our vineyards that are in bloom."

How cool! We were walking through the setting of a book of the Bible! We were going to see all the places we read about, growing here on our very own kibbutz. The fields that we saw every day were straight out of the Bible! With enthusiasm we walked along a dirt path between the vineyard and the pomegranate grove. He stopped us and pointed to the pomegranate trees, just beginning to show their bright red flowers although the main harvest was months away. We read "Your plants are an orchard of pomegranates with choice fruits," (SS 4:13).

We continued walking and then suddenly, both the vineyard and pomegranate grove ended. He stopped us in that very spot, facing very tall cyprus trees. We read together, "The beams of our house are cedars; our rafters are cyprus," (SS 1:17). Next our teacher oriented us. We were standing in the Beit She'an valley, behind us to our left was the vineyard and to our right were the pomegranates. In front of us to our left were walnut trees and to our right were the cyprus trees we'd just read about. And then we read Song of Songs 6:11. "I went down to the grove of nut trees to look at the new growth in the valley, to see if the vines had budded or the pomegranates were in bloom." Three in one! How incredible!

Walking along the cyprus trees, we noticed the beautiful and colorful wildflowers newly blooming alongside the path. We read, "Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come," (SS 2:12). Before we turned down a smaller path our teacher showed us the Jordan mountains I face every day while weeding. The hills and mountains are so beautiful in the early mornings with the sun rising above them. But this time, it was late afternoon and all the separate hills were quite clear. He pointed to a particular mountain and explained that it was Gilead. Song of Songs 4:1 says, "Your hair is like a flock of goats descending from Mount Gilead."

Next we stopped by our favorite spring on the kibbutz property. When it gets too hot to work, we often take a short break and bike over to this very spring to sit in the shade and dangle our feet in the water. This time, we read "You are a garden spring, a well of fresh water," (SS 4:15). As we left the spring, we headed back to the kibbutz to get ready for Shabbat. On the way, we past the acres and acres of date trees, palm trees seeming to stretch for miles and we read, "I will climb the palm tree; I will take hold of its fruit," (SS 7:8).

As the trip ended I was in a daze. I had read Song of Songs many times, including for the past three year right before Passover at UF. Yet I had never imagined that right now, here on this kibbutz, here in Israel, I'm living amongst it all. It reminds me of how, often while weeding in the garden, I'll come upon shards of old broken pottery. What farmer in Nebraska can say the same? This living, breathing land is at the same time the land of our Bible and the land of our people. I can pass a setting straight out of Song of Songs, with shards of ancient pottery in my pocket, as I bike along a dirt path to take a break in shade of a natural spring. At times like these, I am filled with such wonder and amazement for the land I have been calling home for the past eight months.
- posted by sarah @ 4/15/2004 11:36:00 PM

 
Leil haSeder and more Jerusalem
A couple weeks ago, Becky (remember Becky? former roommate currently having adventures of her own in Israel) mused to me on the phone, "Had you ever heard the _expression 'leil seder' before you came to Israel?" I admitted that, although I had already integrated it into my Heblish, the _expression itself was new to me, too. Perhaps because outside of Israel, Jewish families have two seders (ordered, festive meals) for Passover, while in Israel there is only one. Leil Seder, therefore, is literally Seder Night. Since here there is only one, Israelis easily refer to the seder night as Leil haSeder. This year, the seder fell on Monday night so I decided to head down to Jerusalem on Friday after work and spend the preceding Shabbat there.

I was able to get a 'tramp' to Jerusalem from a kibbutz family on Friday afternoon which was very convenient (and a lot more affordable than taking a bus). [Tramping is a cross between hitch-hiking and getting a lift, so you 'take a tramp' whether or not you previously knew the drivers.] In the van packed full of kibbutzniks and assorted volunteers, we sang Passover songs for most of the two hour ride down to Jerusalem. I later learned that the driver of our noisy van, a seventeen year old kibbutznik, was quite annoyed with all our singing but didn't want to disrespect his mother, who was playfully singing along, by asking us to quiet down.

Saturday morning I hadn't made plans for a Shabbat lunch but I decided to go to services anyway and see what would happen. As it turned out, a friend of mine who usually prays at a different synagogue was there also. When I asked him why, he said that he was going to a big picnic and invited me along when he learned that I didn't have any other plans. I gladly joined and saw that of the thirty people at the picnic, I knew many of them previously. Two people I met there were Avi, a student at Pardes where most of the picnic-ers were from, and his sister Adina, visiting from a semester abroad in Spain. The main food item of the picnic was definitely chametz. Chametz is basically a huge grouping of food (any of the five grains which has come into contact with water for more than 18 minutes) that cannot be eaten during the week of Passover. This includes both items you would obviously consider chametz (like cookies and crackers) as well as food you might not immediately consider chametz (a previously opened container of olives or cottage cheese, for example). Therefore, at a pre-Passover picnic, everyone is trying to get rid of their chametz and no one wants to take home the leftovers which may have to be thrown out the next night anyway. Lots of good eatin'.

Monday morning as I was walking to the central bus station in Jerusalem, I realized the air smelled of smoke. Upon closer reflection I realized many of the sidewalks and parking lots contained small bonfires. On the day preceding seder night, there is a custom to burn remaining chametz in small fires. In a Jewish country, these small fires can be found everywhere, tended by children definitely too young to be playing with fire.

I then took a bus to Beit Shemesh to join a family I met during my time there. The mother worked at the children's library where I volunteered and I had spent some time at her home when I lived there. I was greeted by the oldest son pushing me to the side as he squeegeed mass amounts of water out the front door as their home got a final pre-Passover cleaning. The four children were a homemaker's dream, all politely following directions and cleaning the home and finishing the cooking for the following day. Their father insisted that they're not normally this well behaved, but I can only vouch for what I saw. I can't ever remember my brother and sister and I working that hard to prepare for a holiday at home. Sorry Mommy!

That night, we began the seder each seated around the table with a different haggadah in hand. (The haggadah is the book containing the order of the meal, the story of Passover, and all the prayers and readings said throughout the night.) We went around the table reading from the haggadot in whichever language we preferred, English or Hebrew. The children, mostly born and raised in Israel, read in Hebrew, while those of us above age twenty mainly read in English. I was amused by the reading of familiar sections and songs read in a true Israeli accent, such as Ma Nishtana with properly rolled R's and guttural Ch's. However, after three hours the seder was already over! Seders are infamously long, easily reaching six and seven hours in length. However, we managed to read through the whole haggadah, eat a huge meal, sing songs, and still be done by ten thirty.

Around one in the morning, as I was reading on the couch, I heard the melody of the Star Spangled Banner through the wall. Immediately I assumed it was a Hebrew song of some sort, sung to that melody. After all, one of the most popular melodies for the Shabbat song Dror Yikra is the Beach Boys' Sloop John B, so why not something to the Star Spangled Banner? However, immediately following this patriotic rendition I distinctly heard the neighbors singing God Save the Queen. A bit later I heard yet another melody through the wall, HaTikva, the Israeli national anthem. By now it was nearing one thirty and I headed off to bed to leave the neighbors and their drunken patriotism to sing to an empty wall.

The next day was filled with lots of naps and reading. Towards evening many of the neighborhood children and couples bopped in and out to wish each other a happy holiday. One of these neighbors, I was informed, was the man who lived on the other side of the living room wall. I mentioned to him that I had enjoyed his singing and that I was planning on including it in my upcoming email. He said that he didn't know why they had started singing (four glasses of wine as prescribed by the seder can do that to you) but once one national anthem was sung, the other ones had to come as well. In fact, I was informed that not only were the American, British, and Israeli national anthems sung that night. One of their guests was South African and insisted on his anthem being sung as well. However, it was in Afrikaans so not only was he the only one singing it, but no one else had any clue what it meant. After a few more laugh and some egg juggling (same neighbor), I thanks my hosts and got a ride back to Jerusalem.

Jerusalem during Passover is absolutely stunning. Walking down the streets, nearly all the restaurant doors are open. Now you have to keep in mind the the vast majority of these eating establishments take the opportunity of not selling food for a week to remodel their interiors. However, there are still dozens of restaurants around that are open and kosher for Passover. Don't expect to see any of the special-for-Passover menus including pizza or sandwiches, but the salads are incredible not to mention the potato-dough pasta dishes. Yum for gnocchi!

The parks are filled with families having Passover picnics on the grass. Children are running around crazy while parents try to tempt them with matza covered in sugar and kosher-for-passover popsicles. The entire scene just seems so foreign to me. Eating out during Passover? Fancy restaurants? Family picnics? Where is the broken matza wrapped in a brown paper bag for lunch? Where are the restaurants all my friends can eat in but me? Where is the suffering? Oh right! Passover is supposed to be about freedom. The Israelis got it right after all!

On Thursday I went to the Western Wall in the morning for Birkat Kohanim. Birkat Kohanim is the priestly blessing recited by the priests (kohanim) to the Jewish people. In America this only occurs a few times a year. In Israel it occurs everyday, but usually in synagogues. During Passover (and other pilgrimage holidays), huge masses of people gather at the Wall for the Priestly Blessings to be recited upon them. When I got there in the morning I was surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of people. Yet somehow, within the crowd I was able to pick out a few old friends, an Otzma staff member, and even the housekeeper of the dorms we stayed in while Otzma was in Jerusalem. The mingling and small talk stopped immediately when the kohanim were called forward. During the blessings, the crowd of over a thousand was hushed to near silence as the voices of the kohanim rang out in unison the blessings that have been passed down to them by their fathers since biblical times. Women bowed their heads, men wrapped themselves in their tallit (prayer shawls), and some men even wrapped their wives and children within their own tallitot as the priests cried out the ancient Hebrew words. And then, just as soon as it started, the blessings were over. Some people returned to their private prayers, others called out to old friends, mothers tried to round up their children and teenagers checked their cellphones which had been put on silent for an unbearable five minutes. Life returned to normal.

And then, as I was leaving the Old City I ran into Avi and Adina who I had met a few days previous at the pre-Passover picnic. Their parents were in town and they were about to drive up north. I mentioned that I had planned on heading back to my kibbutz that day and they offered me a tramp up. Of course I said yes! So I stuffed into their car with them and they drove me not just to Beit She'an, but actually to Kibbutz Sde Eliyahu and inside the main gates. Door-to-door service, incredible! And now it's back to work.
- posted by sarah @ 4/11/2004 02:21:00 AM