Twice a year, there is a mass bircas cohanim at the Kotel. This time, we were there. It was pretty moving, though there were not as many cohanim as I was expecting.
Walking down into the plaza.
Here’s a bit of video I took of the last bracha:
Leaving the plaza… right past the “No Exit” sign.
Although we left, a few people apparently elected to stay for the second bircas cohanim of mussaf.
With Succos coming up quickly (it starts Sunday night), the Rova is a flurry of activity. Palm fronds seem to be the schach of choice. Lulavim and esrogim are for sale around every corner.
People just go ahead and put up their succahs in the public square. Note also the construction activity up on the rooftops.
Carrying the schach up to the succah.
Schach delivery.
Schach for sale by the parking lot, with the Churva in the background.
Engineering around hazards in the landscape.
I got my esrog from a fellow at the yeshiva who was selling them. Here’s some of what he had to choose from.
Lulavim on his table.
Seasonal flags look a little different over here.
In the heat of Succos prep, look who shows up again.
It’s been suggested that Yitzi do a “guest post” on the blog, to relate his experience so far. I’m not sure that’s a good idea. Yitzi’s written work is a bit… surreal. For example, here’s a recent email exchange he had with my Dad (using Debbie’s email account):
From: Debbie Kovel Shmikler <dxxx@xxx.com>
To: Robert Shmikler <xxx@xxx.com>
Sent: Tue, September 11, 2012 8:01:22 AM
Subject: JokeDear Grandpa
Why did the snacks cross the road? To get to the zoo!
I love you and miss you very very much.
Love,
YitziOn 11 בספט 2012, at 05:05 אחה״צ, Robert Shmikler <rxxx@xxx.net> wrote:
Dear Yitzi,
Hummmm…I’m still trying to understand the joke. Was somebody carrying the snacks?
I love you too and miss you. I think about my trip to come and see you and your brothers every day. I look on Facebook and the blog for news about you.
Maybe we can Skype tomorrow (Wednesday)? I’m very busy today because I have to drive Grandma to the doctor in downtown Chicago for her annual heart check-up.
Love,Grandpa
From: Debbie Kovel Shmikler <dxxx@xxx.com>
To: Robert Shmikler <rxxx@xxx.net>
Sent: Tue, September 11, 2012 12:04:53 PM
Subject: JokeDear GRANDPA
the snacks were going to the bag in the zoo. Nobody was holding the snacks.
Love,
Hitting
From: Robert Shmikler <rxxx@xxx.net>
Date: 12 בספטמבר 2012 02:14:23 לפנה״צ GMT+03:00
To: Debbie Kovel Shmikler <dxxx@xxx.com>
Subject: Re: JokeNow I’m really confused. Who is “Hitting”?
“Please. Send. More. Brisket.”
When it comes to the High Holidays, the common perception is that Rosh Hashanah is fun, while Yom Kippur is the hard one. After all, Yom Kippur is when we fast and repent, spending all day talking about how bad we were last year, begging for forgiveness, and promising that next year will somehow be different. As a kid, I definitely dreaded Yom Kippur. Spending a big chunk of the day in synagogue brought it to another whole level of affliction.
By contrast, Rosh Hashanah is all apples & honey, warm wishes for a sweet new year, the shofar, much shorter services, and even fish heads. If not for the fact that it is an ominous portent of the Day of Atonement to come just 10 days later, Rosh Hashanah would be just about perfect.
But that isn’t quite how it really is. Rosh Hashanah is, in truth, the Yom HaDin – the Day of Judgment. Our fate for the next year is being determined, at least preliminarily. Yes, we’re supposed to be happy and enjoy all of the special observances of the holiday, but we’re also supposed to be in awe of the King and His judgment.
Nonetheless, back home in Chicago, Rosh Hashanah tended to feel more celebratory than trepidatious. Not so here. Much of that is because I’m not just in Jerusalem, but in yeshiva. We’ve been hammering away at teshuvah (repentance – literally, “return”) for all of the Hebrew month of Elul, including careful study of a classic work on the topic (Rabbenu Yonah’s Sha’arei Teshuvah) and formulation of practical exercises to implement the concepts therein. Public speeches by the rabbis of the yeshiva have been teshuvah-focused, and the topic has been hanging heavily in the air since I got here.
Still, Rosh Hashanah itself was at another level of intensity from what I’m used to. Part of it was that the yeshiva davens (prays) vasikin on Rosh Hashanah. Vasikin means that the service is timed to hit the shmoneh esrei exactly at sunrise. To do this, we started a bit after 5:30 a.m. each of the two days. (We’re also going to daven vasikin for Yom Kippur, which is after the time change here in Israel. Looks like a roughly 4:30 a.m. start time.) It seems vasikin is far from unusual on Rosh Hashanah, because there were plenty of people out when I was walking to yeshiva in the morning.
Even aside from vasikin, there was a much stronger flavor of “Yom HaDin.” For example, the speaker before mussaf (the part of the service in which, among other things, the shofar is blown) was Rabbi Krieger, the yeshiva’s Shoel U’Meishiv (a rabbi who is available during the day to answer the students’ questions), who also happens to be a great-nephew of Rabbi Meir Simcha HaKohen, a.k.a. the Ohr Somayach or the Meshech Chochma. He talked about how hard it was to speak at that moment, in light of the impending shofar blowing, and related that Rabbi Isser Zalman Meltzer was once asked to speak in the same slot. According to Rabbi Krieger, Rav Meltzer got up, and promptly began crying uncontrollably. He cried for 10 minutes, and sat down… that was his speech.
Another difference from Chicago is that there is far less uniformity in the community-wide schedule. At home, aside from the occasional vasikin minyan, the various synagogues start and and at similar times. The whole neighborhood seems pretty much on the same rhythm, with people coming & going between home, synagogue, and meals at basically the same time. Here, there is much more variety. Starting and finishing times vary wildly. Even for those who daven vasikin, some (like my yeshiva) do a lot of singing, etc., and so don’t finish until after 11:30 a.m. By contrast, our lunch host also davened vasikin, but his private minyan goes pretty straight through, and they were done hours earlier. Our houseguests went to services at Aish Hatorah, and didn’t get back until 2:00 p.m. Some kabbalists have a shul around the corner from here, and I can only imagine when or how long they davened (a friend of a friend reportedly once went there for evening Shabbos services, but left after it took about 15 minutes for them to say the first line of Krias Shema). And I have no idea what it was like down at the Kotel.
G-d should cast our sins into the depths of the… sewer?
On Rosh Hashanah afternoon, there’s a custom to perform tashlich, a ceremony done next to a body of water. In Chicago, we go to the nearby North Shore Channel of the Chicago River. It’s your classic, preferred venue for tashlich – flowing water, fish swimming happily. There no such open water in Jerusalem, much less in the Old City. So, here, they do tashlich in the square near our apartment… next to two big sewer grates. I guess there might be water down there somewhere, but I sure didn’t see any. Jerusalem usually has it all over Chicago in matters of spiritual ambiance, but the Windy City takes this particular contest going away.
I have to say that, overall, I found myself a little homesick over Rosh Hashanah, pretty much for the first time since we got here. On the High Holidays, you’re kind of going to battle spiritually. I missed not only the familiar surroundings of my synagogue, and our star chazzan, but especially the tight bond among the mispallelim (those praying). We’re not a kehilla (congregation) of convenience, but one of choice, with similar goals and strong friendships. There’s a bond among the people in yeshiva, for sure, but I’ve only been here a month. Also, most of the guys here are significantly younger. In all, it feels weird to be going to war without my platoon.
Adding to the weirdness of this Rosh Hashanah was the stomach bug that went through the family. My turn came just after mincha (the afternoon service) on the first day, which put me in bed until I made it to synagogue early the next morning. Both Yitzi and Shalom had it pretty bad, but Mordechai, thank G-d, avoided it entirely. Debbie got it the worst by far, but I’ll let her tell her tale when she’s ready.
Even with the sickness, of the stomach and home- variety, Rosh Hashanah here was an amazing experience. People talk about the kedushah (holiness) of Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel), of Jerusalem, and of the Old City, but it doesn’t hit you over the head like a sledgehammer – at least it didn’t for me. Instead, it is like a quiet background hum that slowly grows in intensity over time. By the time of Rosh Hashanah, I could feel its momentum, and it was part of what made this an intense experience. We’ll see how it feels as our year progresses…
Wishing everyone a g’mar chasima tova and an easy, meaningful fast.
A few things I noted while out & about in Jerusalem.
Israeli cluelessness when it comes to Christianity/Christmas is something of a running joke in American Jewish communities, and it seems it isn’t all hyperbole. I took this in a housewares/toy store in the middle of the famously “Ultra-Orthodox” Meah Shearim:
Look who came to town
This is an ironic bit of graffiti. It says “Derech Eretz Kadma L’Torah,” which translates roughly to “good character/proper conduct comes before the Torah”:
How do you say “cognitive dissonance” in Hebrew?
And this one is from the square right by our apartment. This is a bench that really doesn’t want to be sat on, and has done something about it:
Unfathomably low, but the trump card of discomfort is the irresistible forward tilt.
Received this report from Derek, Shpilkes’ foster daddy:
Hello Dan and Family!
I hope you are doing well in Israel. I wanted to let you know that all is well with Shpilkes: he is happy and well fed. I have broken new ground, as he now lets me rub his tummy without getting a face full of claws.
Just wanted to drop you a line letting you know I have yet to lose the cat again.* See attached picture of Shpilkes sleeping with his monkey. He loves his monkey.
Maybe the weirdest thing about being here is that, oddly enough, I have to keep reminding myself that we’re far, far away. For all the differences, there’s a lot that’s familiar. The streets of the Old City may be stone, but you’re as likely to hear English on them as Hebrew (maybe more likely). Americans abound, including the constant tour groups streaming through the squares. Other than the texts themselves, and the “Yeshivish” jargon, everything at my yeshiva is in English (most of the “foreign” flavor comes from the large number of South African students there). I get my news the same way I did at home – from the Internet – and from generally the same sources. I glance over the online Chicago Tribune, the Wall Street Journal, Facebook… I look at the Jerusalem Post site more than I used to, but most of its online stories seem to be geared for the international audience anyway. My media mix is largely unchanged, with the exception of being unable to stream WXRT (VPN, I’m looking into you soon!).
Also, when you’re a Torah-observant Jew, there are lots of familiar standbys. A shul is a shul. We’re used to services being all in Hebrew anyway. Shabbos is Shabbos. The familiar rhythm of frantic Friday errand-running, hurried showers, setting up timers, hot water, hot plate, crock pot, etc.; the sudden, forced peace that comes with lit candles and swaying brachos; family Shabbos dinner at a formal, clothed table with songs and parsha sheets; morning davening at shul, followed by lunch at home or as guests, with the usual discussion of the Torah portion, current events, and our journeys in Yiddishkeit; the leisurely afternoon, mincha, the simple-but-satisfying seuda shlishis of challah, hardboiled eggs, etc., the too-soon end with ma’ariv and havdala, bringing that back-to-work feeling… all of it transcends place.
When shul, yeshiva, and Shabbos all feel like home, it can be difficult to remember how far we’ve come. Debbie’s and the boys’ experience is totally different, as they deal much more with Jerusalem as a new, foreign place. But I find myself sometimes jarred when I look up past the stone and catch a view of the Mount of Olives or a similar, undeniably foreign landscape, and remember that I am There.
Because I know you want to know everything about my day, here’s my weekday (Sun – Thurs) schedule:
7:20 a.m.: Shacharis (morning prayer service) at Yeshivas Bircas HaTorah (5 minute walk from our apartment)
8:15-ish a.m.: Breakfast at home
9:10 a.m.: Mussar (Torah-based character development) class at the yeshiva
9:40 a.m.: Begin chavrusa (study partner) learning; start with a daf (front & back of page) of Mishnah Bereruah, followed by gemara (Meseches Kesuvos, in which we’re learning a daf per week, including the commentators Rashi, Tosafos, and the Maharsha)
1:10 p.m.: Mincha (afternoon prayer service) at the yeshiva
1:40-ish p.m.: Lunch at home, often followed or preceded by errands
3:00 p.m.: Vaad (sort of a group workshop) at the yeshiva, to work on implementing concepts from mussar class
3:20 p.m.: Resume chavrusa learning
5:15 p.m.: Class on part of the gemara we have been learning
6:30-ish p.m.: Return home for dinner, etc.
I haven’t yet scheduled my evenings, though I’m considering finding a (modern) Hebrew tutor. Other alternatives would include getting another chavrusa to learn something else with me, or choosing something to learn on my own. I’m trying to take “sitting on my tush, blogging” off the menu.
Hey it’s Debbie making my blog debut. We’ve been here two weeks now. This does not qualify me as an expert on life in the Rova, but I can give my first impressions.
Surreal. It is a real community in a small town kind of way, a tourist destination, an ancient city with deep spiritual roots. It took awhile for me to realize that even though everybody was a stranger to me, they all knew each other and I was the stranger. Fortunately, it is a very kind and generous community. Which is good since we live on top of each other. No joke. It is the most densely populated area I have ever lived in. We have a small patio space (a mirpeset) in the back that is completely enclosed by our neighbors. There are no windows that I know of that do not open up onto someone’s mirpeset. Living in a warm climate as we do, the windows are often open and we can always hear the hustle and bustle of our neighbors.
The small town feel also comes from the fact that we are a bit isolated from the rest of Jerusalem. It takes about 10-15 minutes to walk out of the Old City. There is a bus and we can take cabs, but the traffic can make it a long way as well. Most of the Old City is not accessible by car (though a few come in and out sporadically, and there are a fair number of motorcycles/scooters) so getting goods in and out is tricky. Still there are several makolets (better than a convenience store but not quite a full grocery store), produce markets, and other shops. And like any good Orthodox neighborhood, enterprising families run businesses out of their homes from a grocery to a stationery shop. Many people also have meat, groceries, and produce delivered into the Rova.
The Rova is also a major tourist destination. It’s sort of like living in the middle of Disneyland. While I am out picking up some veggies for lunch I have to navigate around tour groups and other itinerant travelers. I am often asked the way to the Kotel (the Western or Wailing Wall) or change my route since the way is blocked by a tour listening to their guide expound upon some historical feature. I love the people watching. Nuns in light blue dresses, muslim women covered from head to toe, groups from Brazil, Italy, the U.S. and everywhere else. Teenagers on an adventure, families vacationing, seekers searching. It is totally fascinating. And wondrous – one small spot that can draw so many people.
And why do they come? That’s the third layer of living here. As an American it is mind blowing how old the city is. Layer upon layer of history. Modern – the courtyard in front of Yitzi’s school has a sign describing the role this neighborhood played in the Israeli War of Independence. Ancient – every day I pass above the Cardo, ruins from Roman times, and farther below are tunnels revealing earlier eras. Dan is getting a tour from an Israeli neighbor and can speak to the historical aspect of the Old City better than I can.
Of course it’s not just the history that draws people. This is a spiritual center for three major religions. There can be so much distraction from the tourists and the hustle and bustle, but very quietly pulses a deep spirituality. Hiding outside the limelight of the everyday tourists are the folks who come to connect to God. I have been so busy getting us set up, ready for school, and tending to an infant, that I haven’t been able to dig to deeply into this aspect of the Rova. But I am sure that will come in due time.
I was very pleased with myself that I already knew my way around the Rova (Jewish Quarter = “Rova Yehudi” = “Rova” for short) pretty well when we got here. Having had virtually no sleep in a full day prior to our late night arrival, it didn’t take too long to get over jet lag, either. We spent the time before the beginning of the zman (school term) buying housewares, setting up services like cell phones and home broadband, and otherwise getting settled.
If you know how to set the time on these, please contact me ASAP!
Learning to use our appliances has been a humbling experience. E.g., we discovered that we do have a dishwasher, which we plan to use sparingly, but I’m embarrassed to say how long it took us to figure out where to put the detergent. Not to mention how long it took to figure out which product at the makolet (sort of a mini-mart; somewhere between a convenience store & a real grocery store) was dishwasher detergent. We still don’t know how to use the ovens. Other surprises:
Shhhhh! Don’t tell the Iranians, but Israel has secret, advanced Muppet Chicken Rocket technology.
Going around town shopping for housewares is… how shall I put this? … not the kids’ favorite thing in the world to do. Dragging them from mall to shuk to storefront was not the most fun thing we’ve ever done as a family. We tried bribery, like the cheesy rides at the mall and treats of all kinds. On our trip to the shuk (market) at Machane Yehuda, Debbie had the excellent idea to put on a scavenger hunt. She made a list of things to find there, of which the boys could take digital pics. The plan backfired when it devolved into crying fits over the composition of teams, and who was taking some sort of unfair competitive advantage.
Another thing you don’t see at home: a synagogue inside the mall. With a 400-year-old Italian Ark, to boot.
We eventually accumulated pretty much everything we need. A few observations along the way:
They’re transparent, but at least they’re kosher for Pesach.
Debbie shopping for spices at the Machane Yehuda shuk.
Another treat of shopping — felafel for lunch.
There’s always more stuff to get, but the major shopping is done, and we hope we can focus on the reasons we’re here. With so much to do, it is easy to get the idea that getting settled is our principal focus, and to forget the real mission. Time to aim a little higher.
