Shafner Kids as food critics...

Since we are beginning this more than 2 weeks after arriving, we will start with our highlights to date:

Best Burger – Burger Bar wins hands down – Hava and Yonah both give it a 10 (out of 10)

Best snack food – Cheetos - it is amazing to eat American Treif, Kosher in Israel

Best Gum – Hubba Bubba – every time we go into a store Ben, Yonah and Hava have to try a different flavor or brand of gum. (not to mention all the other fun candy that is kosher)

Best Israeli Food – Everyone’s favorite is Falafel from the schuk and Schwarma from Schwarma Doron on Emek Refeim.

Best Pizza – American Pie, of course that is the only pizza we have had. For kids that only eat Simon Kohn’s pizza – watching them experience pizza is great.

Best Barekas - Ema's Barekas fresh out of the oven and right down the street

Best Sufgianot - Marziapans as recommended. We learned one of our first hebrew words there - Rabat Chalav(butterscotch) yum.

Best novelty - kosher candy everywhere including large kiosks at the mall - especially all those gummy worm and ring candys that aren't kosher in america. (not to mention seeing open spices and dried fruit in open bins in the middle of the mall)

More updates to come....

Yonah and Hava Shafner (with some input from Mom and Ben)

The second in a series of video Devray Torah from Jerusalem

Mount Morayah: Fulcrum of Exile and Redemption, Sacrifice and Reprieve

My little Moroccan hole in the wall and Jewish unity -by Hyim

I have been davening at a small hole in the wall French-Moroccan shul at which I was today number 10 and yesterday number 8 with no one to follow. I like praying with people with whom there is no expectation to speak. Who are so culturally different from myself. Today into this small room of 6:30am schacharit praying sefardim dressed in jeans and small kippot came a Chasid from a very different neighborhood both here and in the old country dressed in black and while with long payot collecting money. With no questions asked everyone gave there few shekels. In some strange way I think the Orthodox Jews of Israel are actually more unified than those of the exile.

Schools and British Jerusalem -by Hyim

Today we dropped Hava off for her first day at Israeli school. Evelina DeRothchild a religious school named for the first Jewish woman to sit in the British Parliament. There is something quaint about the hidden English underpinnings (site names, places formally exotic consulate locations, crumbling railroad depots, etc.) of Jerusalem left from the British days. In my private fantasy a hidden genteel side to the sand of the desert, the ever present security, the cold stone walls and floors, and the Middle East culture and language so far from our English speaking life.

Evelina has been a pleasure to experience. The principal a man who, though thoroughly Israeli, was the principal of a day school in Palo Alto, his secretary who's daughter lives in Riverdale, and Hava's Michanechet (teacher/educational overseer) Chagit, who possesses the constant smile of the religious Israeli female educator, and who engenders within me the feeling she desires nothing more so than educating my child well. I am excited for Hava, and the ease that I think such transition will be for a person so young.

For Ben and Yonah, we are still negotiating and searching. A stressful task to convince schools that they will be able to handle 6 months in Israeli school and that though no one seems to have room, they should admit us. I'm sure it will all be resolved soon.