Observations about life in Israel from a Canadian immigrant's perspective.
Come spring, our food forest is flourishing. Delicate, fragrant blossoms from March have since transformed, gifting us with tiny apples, apricots, almonds, plums, and juicy mulberries. Because the Torah halacha of orla proscribes no eating of the fruit for the first three years of a tree’s planting, we look at this fruit with great anticipation… Continue reading The Barn Swallows’ Picnic Lunch
Photo by Roman Kraft on Unsplash. I started this blog upon making Aliyah in 2005. I kept writing for close to 15 years, annotating the many enlightening experiences I had in this special land. From golden desert to oak forested mountains, I was inspired by the beautiful landscapes, dazzled by the brilliant sunshine, and fascinated… Continue reading I am reaching out, please take my hand.
As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease. Genesis 8:22 Although we have been living in Israel for 15 years, our relationship to The Land continues to grow deeper and more profound. We recently moved from our home in central Israel and… Continue reading Working the Land
We just had our 13th aliyah anniversary. After all these years, I am still not habituated to life in Israel. Maybe it is because life is never hum drum, boring or predictable here. Maybe it is because Israelis treat each other like family (for good and for bad.) And, maybe, it is because Israelis’… Continue reading Magical Israel Moments
I was recently struck by a headline “Bicycle Responder Who Saved 2,500 people Recognized by Community.” 2,500 people? Did this good news story make it outside of Israel? Meir Farkash, an EMT volunteer (emergency medical technician), has been to 2,500 calls in the past four years – all on his personal bicycle! Of these calls,… Continue reading Loving Our Neighbours
In Israel, life could become clamorous with negative headlines and doomsday politics. We read the news, dismiss most of it as inaccurate and hope one day the world will wake up and understand the truth. Our personal antidote to this dissonance is to walk the trails of the country we love. We take out a… Continue reading Resetting the start button
How beautiful are your tents, Jacob, your dwelling places, Israel! Numbers 24:5 In the Torah, as the Jews encamped in the desert, the prophet Bilaam looked at them from a mountaintop and bestowed this praise. This very line from the Torah is also said in combination with a verse from the Psalms to form the… Continue reading How beautiful are your tents
Facing each other and clutching a plate between our hands, we hold our arms out, lift gently, then lower. I take a deep breath. My partner lets go and I hold on firmly, lowering the china plate to the floor. “You have to let go,” she says gently. “Let’s try again.” I take another deep… Continue reading Letting Go
‘After the chagim’ is the Jewish form of ‘mañana.’ When we are busied with the holidays – Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot and Simchat Torah – not much else gets done. Business meetings? After the chagim. Looking for a handyman? After the chagim? Need something at the health food store? Wait till it opens after… Continue reading After the Chagim
Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire. Plutarch I just read an article about the cost of giving a child a Jewish education. I read over the chart listing the tuition of Jewish day schools and then multiplied these enormous sums by the number of children born to families… Continue reading Lighting a Fire
Life in Israel 