Summer trips: We just took a one night beach camping trip to Palmachim Beach near Rishon LeTziyon. As you may have heard, it has been hot, even for the Middle East, round these parts. I am not a fan of sweltering weather which is one reason we chose Neve Daniel in the first place. At 1000 meters above sea level, most of the year it's pleasant and breezy. Not this week. Weather reports said that the beach was 10 degrees cooler and we have been meaning to check it out anyway, so away we went. Here's something I learned about myself yesterday: If I am going to like beach camping, it cannot be on the sandy part of the beach. Being able to listen to the waves was lovely and having the kids in the water before 8:00 am will never happen in our family unless we sleep there, so there were definitely upsides. However, we are newbies at camping in Israel and I was kind of expecting California State Park amenities. You know, water spigots at each site, a path to the restrooms, enforced quiet hours between 11:00 and 7:00. That sort of thing. We are planning another one night camping trip next week in Ashkelon, so I now have to make sure that there are spots that are far from sand, etc. We will get this right!
It was interesting to see beach life here, a cross section of Israeli society I do not usually see, living here in our Gush Etzion bubble. On the very crowded swimming side of the beach I counted three hookah circles and on our camping side, one poike pot and an unfortunate amount of litter. I had never heard of poike pots before we got here, but they are quite popular. They look like they could serve as props for the opening scene of Macbeth and people put their potatoes, onions, etc. in them and sit them in the fire. Then as the fire dies down, you pull them out and eat your now-cooked food.
Last week we went "glamping" with Rozens, Farkas' and Greenbaums at Ella Valley Farm near Bet Shemesh. They provide tents (these big teepee looking structures with a light bulb and outlet in each one), mattresses, sheets and blankets. Rabbi Rozen was the BBQ master and the kids had a great time. We had one escaped goat wander down to the picnic table area but Adami escorted him back to his pen. The kids enjoyed the little above ground pool and the animals (chickens, goats, rabbits). Only problem was that the roosters whose coop was right near our tents woke up at 1:00 and crowed to each other for the remainder of the night and morning. I am generally a gentle person but I had some violent ideas about those birds at around 4:30 am... Since we were getting home on Friday we set Shabbos up in advance and split lunch with the Farkas'. We had Josh Zak with us for Shabbos which was a great treat :)
School for next year: Tiferet has been officially moved back to her original grade after a meeting and several emails and phone calls. The girls in 6th grade last year were truly lovely and welcoming but she just never felt that she fit in and had been friendly with the girls from the current seventh grade from our summer visits here. After lots of uncertainty about what the school would support and which class she would be placed in, she is now set to be in the grade and class that she wanted and is spending lots of time on Khan Academy catching up on the 7th grade math and science curricula.
Hillel starts Gan on Sept 1st and though I am nervous about leaving him and his being upset about those morning transitions (I hate making him sad...), I think it is the best program for him and super convenient as it is right across the street and up about 4 houses. They're having a parent meeting this Sunday night, and I hope to be able to organize some playdates for him with future classmates (other than Ariel Farkas whom he already knows) to help ease the newness of it all. He's still not talking much, though he is very engaging and skilled at communicating, so I hope that he'll be okay.
More summer activities: Aharon Akiva spent about a week in a computer programming "camp" and enjoyed that (he has been teaching himself programming through Khan Academy too. Love that site!). Shoshana finished her camp and is now enjoying down time, having sleepovers with friends and making slushies in the blender. We also got a second hand treadmill and she likes using that while watching her favorite shows on YouTube :) Hodayah also finished her camp and has little on her to-do list but was hired by a local camp (same guy who taught the programming camp) to assist in reading word problems and help kids with their math. It's a good fit for her and, I think, a good experience to see what it's like to go to work even when you don't always feel like it!
Shoshana learned how to make colorful challah at her camp. Now the food coloring comes out every Friday when I bake, which I just recently started doing again.
House: I called and called and left oodles of messages for Mustafa, out regular contractor (he also built my SIL's house) and he must be very busy or having phone trouble or something because I haven't heard back from him for weeks. So I called someone else, a roofer named Judah who was recommended by my friend down the street and they started work this week. It looks really great and I am really pleased that this project is moving along. More and larger windows placed more sensibly and soundly on the third floor, bigger dormers that give the rooms more space, and we're putting in the insulation and tar paper that was supposed to be put in originally when the house was built but wasn't, so we'll be better protected against moisture and weather. I know there are many opportunities for unpleasant surprises when doing construction, so I am holding my breath a little bit, but it seems to be going well. Our guard, a chatty Ethiopian man from Kiryat Arba who says he has experience with construction, says that they're doing a very careful job and that this is a good improvement for the house. He also has ideas about how I could help get the kids to help organize their stuff better, but that's just Israelis having helpful opinions about everything :)
Misc: We had a mourning dove lay eggs in our bedroom windowsill and it was exciting for the kids to be here when they hatched and watch the baby birds grow. They have now flown off and left what I knew would be a mess (I had pigeons lay eggs in my window box when I was in middle school) but it was worth it.
I went to a prayer gathering/ rally at the big intersection down the road earlier this week for the Dawabshe family and, as always, felt a mixture of despair, hope and frustration. Despair because there were not more people there (though there were an estimated 300) and because, for reasons I really do understand, there were almost no Palestinians aside from the speakers. And because I know that we were a small group and not the ones who were ever committing acts of violence or incitement. Frustration because I know that, aside from the above-mentioned sadness, nobody in the rest of the world seems to care about these kinds of events, they just like writing and talking about the folks who do the bad stuff and then paint the rest of the country as the same, or at least condoning it by silence. Not true! There are such fierce debates and protests and rallies and conversations and I find most people I interact with to be very engaged in thinking about the problems that we face (and the critics don't, by the way. I'd love to see them go through this as a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book and see how well they do.) One person commented on a particularly virulent and absurd NYT Op-Ed that he doesn't know if he should attribute the writing to malice or tremendous ignorance. Sigh. I ran into another former JCHS student there, Nathan Wexler, who was here on a program through UC Berkeley and staying in Bethlehem for the week. It was great to see him and I hope he sends me anything he ends up writing about his trip!
Aharon Akiva got his orthodontic appliance and has gotten used to wearing it and Shoshana got her braces, so we are finally on our way through the orthodontia journey! I waited because I knew that, as Shiri Twito said, "What it costs here (in the US) in dollars, it costs there in shekels." Yep -- treatment plans are a fraction of the cost and we have a great orthodontist from England who is skilled and funny and looks like Patrick Stewart. Tiferet starts later this month (she was on a class trip when we had our initial appointments so she's on a delayed schedule...
Shoshana braces selfie :)
I am sure I will remember more later but need to get back to preparing for Shabbos.
