One Week in September

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BBC, Fox News, France24, Intel, Iraq. Afghanistan, Israel, Kenya, paranoia, SkyNews, suicide bombers, Syria, terrorism, Twin Towers attack, Westgate Shopping Mall

I happen to be one of those people who wake up early in the morning full of vim and vigour and ready to tackle anything. Getting up at around six a.m. is no big deal for me and sometimes I wake up even before that and have no option but to get up and start my day.

I have made it part of my morning routine, after having a cup of coffee and scanning the newspaper, to go down into my basement, which contains exercise equipment and a television set. And so, I walk for about half an hour on the treadmill (just under two kilometers), and then have a set routine of exercises, some upright, some on a floormat, some with leg weights, others with hand weights, for another half an hour. I acquired the routines over the course of the last twenty or thirty years, first in the late Uri Michael’s fitness studio in Jerusalem, and subsequently in the fitness centre at my place of employment.

Of course, exercising in a group is very different from exercising alone, but by now my routine has become so fixed that I hardly have to think about it any more, and the exercises seem to follow on naturally from one another. I enjoy exercising on my own. I also enjoyed exercising in a group in the past, but nowadays, as I no longer go in to work, I’m less inclined to drive into town to engage in group activities.

In order not to be bored while exercising I watch the various TV news channels, switching between Sky, BBC, France24 and Fox News. This way I get an overview of what’s happening in the world, and feel that I’m not completely cut off from what’s going on.

But this week I found myself getting more and more depressed and upset with what I was seeing and hearing as terrorist attacks featured almost constantly on the television screen. Terror attacks in Afghanistan. One hundred people killed by suicide bombers in a church in Pakistan. About the same number massacred in a shopping mall in Kenya. I wept real tears as the heartrending stories of brutality and bravery emerged.

The ongoing attacks with innumerable casualties in Iraq and scenes of devastation, terror and grieving people. Mass shootings by disturbed individuals in the US and the dire situation in Syria, with thousands of people being killed or made destitute on a daily bases, have become a matter of routine by now. What is the world coming to?

We Israelis have had more than our fair share of terrorist attacks in the past. Incidents in which crowded buses were destroyed by suicide bombers had become almost commonplace here ten years ago, ending only when stringent security measures were put in place and a wall was built to prevent potential terrorists from reaching their target – the civilian population. And of course, the attack on New York’s Twin Towers has led to the introduction of extensive security checks at airports all over the world. In the course of the last ten years, Israel’s security forces have foiled countless attempts by terrorists to sow murder and mayhem in Israel over the years.

Security personnel check ladies’ handbags and the trunks of cars at the entrances to shopping malls, cinemas, theatres and supermarkets in Israel. Our government is accused of over-reacting, and even paranoia, but these measures seem to be required. And although really determined terrorists will overcome such obstacles, we are well advised to adopt the motto of the microprocessor giant, Intel: ‘only the paranoid survive.’ In addition, anyone who has lived in Israel as long as I have has no option but to be an optimist.

There is no getting away from the fact that the events of the past week have shown that while not all Muslims are terrorists, all terrorists are Muslims. The Prime Minister of Kenya has said that terrorism is an act of cowardice, and England’s Prime Minister claims that those who engage in terror are not acting in the name of religion. Fine phrases that achieve little except, perhaps, to soothe the consciences of those who allow religious extremism to flourish.

I look out of the window and see the sun shining and flowers blooming. The week of the Jewish High Holydays has brought friends and family together. Peace has returned to my soul, but it looks as if it’s time for the whole world to adopt Intel’s motto.

Forty Years On

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Day of Atonement, Kennedy assassination, Sha'arei Tzedek Hospital, Yom Kippur War

Just as Americans remember where they were when Jack Kennedy was assassinated, Israelis remember where they were when the sirens went at 2 p.m. on Saturday, 6th October, 1973. Anyone who is now under forty or had not yet immigrated to Israel and wasn’t there at that crucial time may not be aware of the extent to which that event changed the life of every Israeli and of the State in general.

Two days previously I had given birth to my third child. This means that he is just about to turn forty (according to the Gregorian calendar, and has already turned forty according to the Hebrew one). And so I was in the maternity ward of Sha’arei Tzedek Hospital in Jerusalem, sharing a room with two other women. As it happened, these two ladies were extremely orthodox Jews.

Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, which fell on a Saturday that year, is traditionally marked by fasting and prayer in the case of observant (and also some secular) Jews, as well as by radio silence and a complete absence of traffic on the roads. This gives children of all ages a golden opportunity to turn out on their bicycles, tricycles, skateboards, roller skates, scooters, and whatever wheels they possess and proudly show off their prowess on the otherwise deserted roads. One could say that fasting on Yom Kippur has become a national sport, as it were, accompanied by a relaxed atmosphere on the streets on the first evening, when many people enjoy a stroll in the unpolluted air.

But forty years ago I was stuck in hospital, far away from my family, who were unable to come and visit me because of the inability to travel by car on that day. The hospital’s policy was to provide food for patients who were unable to fast on medical grounds, and this was especially the case with regard to women who had just given birth.

Apparently, the rabbis whom my room-mates took as their authority in matters religious had declared that women in our position were permitted to eat a small portion of food ‘as much as an olive’ every hour. Their devoted husbands had provided them with scales, and so throughout the day the two ladies were busy weighing and eating, weighing and eating, and occasionally feeding their babies.

I partook of the lunch provided by the hospital, and continued to read whatever book I had brought along with me. But once the siren sounded everything changed. In an instant doctors and nurses were rushing from one room to the next, placing each mother’s baby in her arms, and instructing us all to be ready to go down to the air-raid shelter.

I apologized to my room-mates and told them that I felt impelled, under these unusual circumstances, to turn on my little portable radio. Sure enough, announcements were being made, soldiers and reservists were being called up to their military units and the general impression was that something terrible was happening. This was, after all, the holiest day of the year, and one that was usually marked by nothing more dramatic than children falling off their bicycles or fasting teenagers fainting. No one had envisaged that a war would break out.

My frantic efforts to contact my home (mobile phones had not yet been invented) were fruitless. There was no answer. I was just wondering what to do, when my husband appeared at the door like a guardian angel ready to take me to safety. There was no time or need for questions or explanations as he had left our two small children waiting outside the maternity ward.

We quickly gathered my things together, dealt with the accelerated discharge bureaucracy, collected our children and walked as quickly as my condition would allow to the waiting car. Once home, our minds were focused on protecting our family to the best of our very limited ability. Our flat was on the second floor, and the building had no shelter. We moved the baby’s cot and the children’s beds away from the windows, then turned the TV on to see what was happening. Of course, we got no information from the one channel that Israel provided in those days.

All that day, and for many subsequent days, we were left in the dark as to what was happening. We barely knew in which areas fighting was taking place. Many of the events of that dreadful time are only now being brought to light. Mistakes were made by those at the top, there were some unbelievable acts of heroism by men in the field and the end-result was that almost three thousand soldiers lost their lives.

Although the war ended in a way that can be regarded as a victory, it constituted a blow from which Israel took a long time to recover and has coloured its political landscape to this day. It gave rise directly to the peace treaty with Egypt and indirectly to that with Jordan. It cast a shadow over the entire country for many years, and still does on every anniversary of that war. Israel lost a great deal of its buoyancy and sense of self-confidence, but also took steps to ensure that nothing like that could ever happen again.

Let’s hope that those steps do indeed have the desired effect.

Cookery Books

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French cuisine, Len Deighton, Nina Rimon Davis, Nora Ephron

Reading Nora Ephron’s book ‘I Feel Bad About my Neck’ (recommended by my friend and fellow-translator, Nina Rimon-Davis) I came to the piece about her involvement with cookery books. That, of course, set me off thinking about my own experience with them. Naturally, I’ve seen the movie she directed, ‘Julie and Julia,’ and loved it.
I did not, however, entirely identify with the heroine, Julie, who attempted to cook her way through ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking’ by Beck, Bertholle and Child. In my view, anyone who attempts to do so is seriously in need of psychological help.

My story is slightly different. When our first child was born in 1967 my husband arrived at the hospital with gifts. What were they? I hear you cry. No, there were no diamond rings, gold bracelets or precious trinkets of the kind that other new fathers are apt to bestow on their wives. What Yigal brought me was: 1. a pink floppy hat, 2. a small chocolate cake, and 3. the Beck, Bertolle, Child cookery book (paperback edition). How original and imaginative!

What I did not know at the time was that if there is anything my husband hates it’s French cuisine. Neither he nor I know why he bought the book. I suppose he thought it was a good idea at the time. Perhaps he didn’t realize that no self-respecting French cook produces anything that does not contain wine, cream, cheese or milk – all items that Yigal abhors in their cooked form.
On returning home from the hospital, once baby Dana had settled into a comfortable routine of a feed every four hours and I had got over the exhaustion that producing a baby engenders, I embarked on trying to produce some of the dishes in that fat tome. Its grease-spattered pages are a testament to my valiant efforts to produce a perfect roast chicken, to blanch vegetables before proceeding to cook them, or to concoct a dessert that does not consist solely of fresh melon or watermelon cut into chunks.

None of my efforts were appreciated by the audience of one for which they were intended, and as time went by I eventually abandoned all pretence of aspiring to haute cuisine and settled down to a diet of chicken soup, boiled chicken, plain rice and salad. As our other children came along and grew up I ventured into more adventurous realms, and even managed occasionally to produce beef rissoles, chicken roasted with honey and mustard, and similar ‘exotic’ fare, at which Yigal turned pale and made a beeline for the boiled chicken and rice from which, it seems, he was never weaned.

But fortunately Beck, Bertholle, Child (the names are seared into my memory) was not my first cookery book. Even before our wedding, probably because she realized that I was a complete novice in the kitchen, my sister sent me Len Deighton’s ‘Action Cookbook.’ Now, that was a cookbook after my own heart, even though Deighton’s novels are not really my cup of tea.
The ‘Action Cookbook’ gives clear and simple instructions, mainly in comic-strip form, for dishes that are pretty basic. Apparently, these ‘cook-strips,’ as he calls them, first appeared in the serious UK weekly, ‘The Observer,’ and in 1965 were published in book form. I tried a few of the recipes and even managed to slip some past the ever-watchful food censor. But even without preparing the food, it is just great fun to look at the pictures and read the – often humorous – text. Len Deighton undoubtedly has a way with words, and since no illustrator is acknowledged in the book, he presumably is good at drawing, too.

Since those first heady days I have acquired quite a library of cookery books, as well as a card index of tried and tested recipes culled from newspapers, magazines, friends and relations. Together with my sisters I have even produced one containing our mother’s recipes. But most of those have remained in their pristine condition, and have not been subjected to the wear and tear of those first two milestones in my culinary career.

Goodbye to Gorgeous Garments

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Bank of Israel, Bond Street, Marble Arch, Oxford Street

On my return home after spending several weeks in France and one in London, the last with two grandchildren, I found several new items of clothing in my suitcase. Of course, a trip down Oxford Street with a very grown-up twelve-year-old granddaughter inevitably entailed some retail therapy, and I suppose that both she and I went a tiny bit berserk as we visited every single store between Marble Arch and Bond Street underground stations.

Thus it was that when I came to put my new acquisitions away in my closet I found to my horror that there was no room at the inn! It seems that over the years I have accumulated an inordinate amount of clothing. Drastic measures were required.

It is now almost eight years since I retired from my job at the Bank of Israel. Admittedly, it was not a high-powered managerial position, but as translator and editor-in-chief of its English publications I felt that I had to present an image of efficiency and competence (whether my performance was either of those is not for me to say).

Oh, how I loved ‘going in to the office’ in my efficient-looking trouser suits of various pastel colours, with shoes that were not too frivolous, but not too old-fashioned either (I hope). That lasted for about fifteen years, up until my retirement at the ripe old age of 62, as the law permitted me to do at the time.

My career at Israel’s central bank came after I had worked as a free-lance translator/editor/writer for many years. Free-lancers can wear what they want, work how and when they choose, and only on rare occasions do they need to present a respectable front to the world. Having experienced both work situations, I found that I enjoyed each one equally, and have no regrets about either. In both cases I came into contact with interesting people and more-or-less interesting material.

But I now have to face the fact that those days are past. That I will never again wear those cute little trouser-suits, and so, since they are superfluous to needs, as the saying goes, they will have to go to make room for my new acquisitions which, though charming, no longer need to project any image about my ability to do the job.

Thus it was with a heavy heart that I weeded out an inordinate number of those dear little suits (how and why did I acquire so many?), packed them into bags and took them to the clothing recycling containers that the local authority has kindly placed at strategic points throughout our neighbourhood.

The clothes from these containers will be distributed to needy folk, of whom Israel has no shortage. I’m just wondering what kind of needy folk will end up wearing those clothes and on which occasions. Furthermore, they will have to be rather petite to get into them.

I wish both the people and the clothes the best of luck as they embark on their new career.