Random Israel Tidbits

I just feel like there's a lot I need to get off my chest. Not that I need to justify my post. It's my blog. But don't expect any theme to this.

My mother in law and stepfather in law arrived on Friday. (Thus no time to go through pictures and and figure out what we did on our trips; Budapest, Vienna, and Spain coming soon.) I really intended to take pictures of our apartment after we cleaned but before she came, but, alas, I did not. Now there are four people living here, which will probably not make it cleaner.

My mother in law brought Scott and I lots of things, for which we are very grateful. There are the things we needed, like medication and ziplock bags. Then there are the things that we needed not so much, like shoes (me) and Clif bars (Scott). So, my mother in law shlepped my beautiful new suede shoes across the world with her, and I wear them right away. And what happens? I step in dog poop. At least it wasn't severe and didn't reach the suede.

On an unrelated note, today was the yarzheit (anniversary of death) of Rachel, as in Rachel from the bible. It's a popular time to visit and pray at her tomb. So our school took us there (my second time). Unfortunately, it's in an area not fully controlled by Jews, so this is the road to get there (excuse my friends' heads):

Inside, it was a little bit (or a lot) like bumper cars, but with people. Of course, where I stood became the main thoroughfare to the better seats in the building. I guess everyone could just sense that I enjoy large groups of people, especially when they bump into me.

Later that day, I made beer battered onion rings. Yum.

I can't remember where I found it. Recipe:

2 large white onions

1 cup beer

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 1/4 cup flour

1 tbsp oil

1 beaten egg

Garlic powder (my addition)

Directions:

1. Slice onions into ¼ inch slices.

2. Separate into rings.

3. In a large bowl combine flour, baking powder, salt, egg, beer and oil.

4. Blend until smooth.

5. Dip onion rings into batter to coat well, fry in hot oil at 375 degrees until golden brown.

6. Drain on paper towels, serve hot.

I also made a delicious batch of baklava:

Syrup:

2 cups sugar and 1 cup honey

1 1/2 cups water

2 tablespoons lemon juice

(though as a warning mine was drowning in syrup; I had to strain it)

Filling:

4 cups ground walnuts

1/4 cup sugar

1 to 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 pound (about 24 sheets) phyllo dough

About 1 cup vegetable oil

1. To make the syrup: Stir the sugar, water, lemon juice, and if using, the corn syrup, cinnamon sticks, and/or cloves over low heat until the sugar dissolves, about 5 minutes. Stop stirring, increase the heat to medium, and cook until the mixture is slightly syrupy. Let cool.

2. To make the filling: Combine all the filling ingredients.

3. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 12-by-9-inch or 13-by-9-inch baking pan.

4. Place a sheet of phyllo in the prepared pan and lightly brush with oil. Repeat with 7 more sheets. Spread with half of the filling. Top with 8 more sheets, brushing each with oil. Put the rest of the filling on, and then another 8 sheets. You get the idea.

5. Use a sharp knife to cut length and width wise, and then diagonally for a diamond shape.

6. Just before baking, lightly sprinkle the top of the pastry with cold water. This inhibits the pastry from curling. Bake for 20 minutes. Reduce the heat to 300 degrees and bake until golden brown, about 15 additional minutes.

7. Drizzle the cooled syrup slowly over the hot baklava and let cool/put in fridge. Cover and store at room temperature for up to 1 week.

Also, if you ever come to Israel and buy avocados, wait until they look a little bit black and rotten on the outside, and then they're ripe.

New feature, Hebrew word of the post: matana = gift

Sorry if there are typos herein. It's 11:23 and I'm too tired to proofread.

Prague

Here is a preliminary summary of our trip:

1: time an Asian tourist wanted to take a picture with us (probably because we're Jewish?)
2: number of shows (one opera, one ballet)
3: cities (Prague, Budapest, Vienna), all with fantastic transportation
4: pairs of shoes I wore
5: palaces we toured
6: kosher restaurants
7: times Scott got mad at me for taking too many pictures (approximately)

8: days

9: nights
10+: times I tripped over nothing

If I split up the cities, this job seems much more manageable. We visited Prague first.

So, Prague. We arrived in Prague around 10am.. to rain. We took a bus to a train to our hotel. We had a great location, a little bit outside the Old Town, one of the main areas of the city, and the location of the Jewish Quarter. I'm pretty sure we had the biggest room, and definitely the only one with a balcony.

Prague is a cute, colorful city. It has a bit of a medieval feel with the architecture of the buildings and the cobblestone streets. We planned to start in the Castle Quarter across the river, but on the way, we passed some nice streets (first below) and Old Town Square (next three). Scott kept wanting it to be called Prague Square, but... it's not.

By this time, Scott had already become annoyed that I was stopping to take so many pictures. Which was really counterproductive, because then he just walked into my picture and I had to take it a second time. Ironically, the reason he was getting annoyed was the same as the reason I felt obligated to take so many pictures. We only had until 6pm or so to do our activities before yom tov (holiday) started and we had to be back at the hotel. In addition to being in a rush, we planned only to spend three days in Prague, the next two of which were yom tov, meaning I couldn't take pictures after that first day.

On the way to the Castle Quarter, we also stumbled upon the Parliament building. Unfortunately they didn't think to pave the pathways.

On the way up to the castle we saw some more cute streets and saw a beautiful view of the city:

Finally arrived at the castle, winded of course. The first picture shows part of the complex. The second picture is an awesome ceiling inside, where coronations were held in the 15th century. We weren't supposed to take pictures, thus the lack of artistry. I failed to capture its beauty.

On the way down from the castle, some more nice views:

We had a couple of hours before yom tov, so we took a river cruise:

Looks like another passenger took the picture for us right? Oh wait.. there were no other passengers.

Above is the castle, from the bottom of the hill.

After the cruise, we were in a rush, per usual erev (afternoon before) shabbat or yom tov. We had to go check into the restaurant at which we would be eating our holiday meals, as well as the synagogue where we would be davening (praying). First, we went to the wrong restaurant. Then, we realized the restaurant wasn't labeled. We stood outside, thinking about how to get in, when out of nowhere, a young Israeli, clearly a plain clothes security guard, showed up. He started to tell us this is not Israel, you can't just show up somewhere on a Sunday and get in. We explained that we had contacted the restaurant beforehand and made reservations (for which the restaurant required references). After some questioning, he let us in.

The restaurant was next door to the shul, and luckily involved the same security. So, thank G-d, everything worked out.

Praying at that shul was special. It dates back to 1270, and as such is the oldest continuously used synagogue in the world. It's also a major tourist attraction, closed on shabbat and yom tov. Except to some random tourists security let in as we prayed. Surely with plenty of questioning. In addition to the shul's security, there were constantly a couple of state policemen with machine guns hanging around outside the shul and next door community center (that held the restaurant). As we later saw, this is common in central Europe.

Over yom tov, we walked. A lot. We walked around the Jewish quarter, all around New Town, across the famous Charles bridge, back up the hill next to the Castle Quarter, and around the castle to the other side. Sadly, no pictures to document.

When yom tov ended at sundown on the third day, we had a few hours left in Prague before our night train to Budapest. Here are some pictures of Old Town Square (aka Prague Square, to Scott) at night:

First, we went to the Communist Museum, which was above a McDonald's and shared an entrance with a casino. But the museum was very informative. And finally, Scott found a great, really old (400 years?) beer hall (U Medvidku). It makes this beer called X-33, which, I have to admit, was good. And, as you all know, I don't like beer.

That pretty much sums up Prague.

Dancing through the streets

The idea of going through the 600+ pictures I took on our trip to Europe intimidated me. So I'm starting starting from the most recent, and easier to handle, event and going backwards.

The other day, Shapell's, the school where Scott learns, got a new Sefer Torah (aka Torah scroll). It's a special event, and one that I never thought about until it happened. Basically the Torah (first five books of the Bible) is over 300,000 letters. And they're all neatly handwritten in order to produce a kosher scroll. They cost around $40,000. (Blogging is great.. I look up all sorts of things that I didn't know before in order to share them.)

In this case, the scroll was donated by the family of a Shapell's alum. They finished writing the scroll at the former student's house and danced it to Shapell's (for normal people a 5 minute walk; for a large group of people celebrating with a Torah, a 20 minute walk). There was fire, a chuppah, and music. Not to mention a fancing dinner after. It was quite the experience.

Only in Israel (Part I)

Unfortunately, we leave for Europe early tomorrow and I didn't find any time to post about our last Europe excursion. Life is rough. Posting is first on my agenda when we return. Promise.

And by early tomorrow, I mean early. Our flight is at 6 am, thus we have to get up at 2:30 am. So you don't have to do any complicated math, it's 10:30pm now (=4 hours sleep). But I wanted to make sure to post something, at least something quick, before we leave so you know I didn't already forget about my blog. Don't worry, I'm doing what any sensible person would do to save time and mental function in the morning--sleeping in my clothes.

Israel is a special place in a lot of ways. There is so much history here for so many different groups of people. But it's also special in other ways. Lots of things happen here that wouldn't happen anywhere else. I've decide to start a list, and will add on when I see or think of more.

1. Men and women walking around in regular clothes with machine guns.
2. Cars routinely parked on the sidewalk.
3. When something is wrong with a product at the grocery store, the checker asks the customer to go get another.
4. Cars honking at a police car because the police car doesn't move quickly enough on a green light. All 5 or 6 cars behind the police car.
5. The necessity of looking in dumpsters for stray cats before throwing anything in.

Bed time.

Hello Blog

I've been talking about this for awhile, this whole starting a blog thing. I faced a few setbacks. First, I couldn't decide on a title. Luckily I finally came up with something super creative. Second, there was the time issue. Taking a break from life has been busy, between being in class from 9-6 (some break..), getting the apartment together, cooking for holidays and Shabbat, and so on. But what better activity is there when you wake up at 5am to throw up and then can't fall back asleep? What can I say, it's my new favorite thing to do (meaning this was the second time; not pregnant, just Israel). Finally, I was a little bit wary of starting a blog because it seems like I'd have to talk about myself a lot. Aside from that being far from my favorite thing to do, who cares?  I'll try to talk about Scott instead.

A few other things gave me the final push to do this. First, it's a good way for me to remember what happened. Second, it prevents me from having to email everyone everything separately. No offense, but I need some of my spare time to work on my story so I can get rich. Oh, and to spend time with my new husband. Thirdly, Scott and I (see, some of this is about Scott) went to Madrid a month and a half ago, and we leave for Vienna/Prague/Budapest in a week. If not now, it will be way too overwhelming. 

Here are the topics to expect (or at least what I expect): life in Israel, travels, and maybe some successful recipes. A lot of lists, apparently (see above). Comments in parentheses (again, see above). Brutal honesty. Oh, and sarcasm. Lots of sarcasm.

So, here goes.