Shavuot

Israelis have been known to have cactus-like exteriors but I think the stabs you get are less prickles and more elbows in the ribs at the market. Outside of shopping and lining up in the airport when the elbows are in full force, the truth is, the Israelis we have met have been exceedingly kind and generous people. To prove my point, a labmate and his wife kindly invited us to a family holiday dinner at his mom's house in Ashdod.

Starting last night and into today is Shavuot. According to Wiki, this holiday hearkens all the way back to Noah and is a celebration of the harvesting of the first fruits of the year. Then it was forgotten, but Moses brought the holiday back. Now the holiday also celebrates the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai.

I was a little confused. I though the burning bush was at the same time as the ten commandments, but my friends here, who studied all this stuff in school, got me straightened out. The flaming shrub told Moses to get the people out of Egypt. Mt. Sinai was later. (I blame the VHS bible stories we had as kids that someone taped off the TV. I think someone forgot to press record after one of the commercial sets and we were missing a bit of the story. Hence the confusion. I am lucky I don't think Noah survived a flood of locusts)

To add to the symbolic confusion, for some odd reason dairy products are eaten this day, so we pigged out on cheese, quiche, rice pudding, pizza, creme caramel, cheesy pasties and these awesome things called blintzes which are like crepes with a sweet cheese in them. (Blintz are a 10 out of 10 on the awesome cultural food scale; the passover fish blobs rate a 2.) To the Christians, this is also the beginning of Pentecost (who knew?) which in my apple pie experience is not a big holiday. I am all for bringing this tradition home. Just like Pancake Tuesday, I am going to start Cheesy Thursday!

There is one part of the holiday that I cannot see myself transferring back to Canada. Last night the religious folks in the city spent an all-nighter studying the Torah. Indeed, as we were driving back into the city we saw flocks of people filing into a synagogue at 11 pm. Then this morning they walked to the western wall before dawn. Although walking to the western wall for sunrise would have been cool, I am not into all nighters. No thanks. I survived all of undergrad without a single one.

Anyway, back to the party.

Our Hostess has an amazing apartment with a view out over the Mediterranean and the sunset was spectacular. Each of her children brought some friends so there was a lively crowd chatting about. Since the family has spent a lot of time in Africa, they had some items made out of an animal that rates high one the don't-kill-me-cause-I'm-cute scale. I asked how they got the items in the country and I mentioned my seal skin slippers that I wisely left in Canada. This dead-seal slippers comment got silence with couple of shocked gasps from the crowd. Oops. Clearly, not a good way to make friends. It turns out our Governor General's recent seal heart snack even hit Israeli media. So now they probably think that all Canadians are seal killers.

Ashdod is a new city, the most of which is only forty years old or so. It has a HUGE port, and James is dying to see it. Our hostess has invited us back so we can go see the port and go for a swim in the Mediterranean.

One more thing. After royally screwing up the "touching taboo" I got one right last night. I wore a skirt and a white T-shirt. Apparently white is the festive color in Israel. And that was all by accident.