shanah tova

we celebrated rosh hashana last friday, the jewish new year. literally it translates "head of the year", and therefore it's custom to eat a head of some sort, as a part of the seder (the evening meal). my mother in law serves a fish head, but it's actually only her husband who will take a bite. the rest of us pass on that opportunity.

shabbath and holidays in israel are still counted as in the old days. meaning, that the holiday begins by sunset and ends the following evening, traditionally it would end when you could see three stars on the sky, but today the exact hours of shabbath and holidays are posted in the newspapers.

so, a holiday would then traditionally begin with a visit to the synagogue as the sun sets, just like when the shabbat is greeted on a friday evening. if you observe shabbath you obviously don't cook, so the women prepare the meal before sunset, the shabbath candles are burning and the table set. she can then either join her husband in the synagoge or take a moment to relax until the men arrive back from the prayer.

don't get me wrong here. we don't do this, as we live a secular life. my parents in law are traditional and observes shabbath in a modified version, and will follow the traditional course of a holiday seder (what to eat and when to eat it fdring the holiday meal, together with the reading of the holiday scriptures). i am just giving you the traditional way of shabbath and the seder. among secular jews, some will do parts of the seder, some will serve some of the traditional dishes, but many will just have a family dinner, based on the rosh hashana and holiday meal traditions.

as you may know, a traditional shabbath dinner will always include the breaking of the bread. often they will begin with a short prayer, over the wine, then there will be some light dishes, followed by the breaking of the bread and the prayer that goes with it. the host will then take little pieces of the bread, dip them in salt and pass out to everyone participating in the shabbath dinner. that's the beginning of the real meal.

on rosh hashana the salt is replaced with sugar. the sugar is what makes rosh hashana seder meals special. the sweet ingredients are like a wish for a sweet new year.

besides the sugar instead of salt, the seder prayer involves eating certain sweet dishes, while reading aloud. like dates, sweet pumpkin and pomme granate. and most importantly, apples dipped in honey. this specific snack is everywhere around rosh hashana, it's the snack for this holiday, closely followed by the pomme granates.

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sunday evening yom kippur, the holiday of fast and atonement, will begin at sunset. for now we're headed at the beach, where we'll be camping with friends. it means, barbecuing, swimming, sand and salt in the hair, and lots of sun and wind. we'll be tired and ready for a day of complete yom kippur silence and quiet when we return home.

shanah tova! wishing you a sweet and healthy new year!

flying high

do you remember this? when dad or an uncle could throw you all the way up, right into the blue sky? how you would jump excitedly on the ground while waiting your turn? the happiness, the thrill, the laughter when flying through the air?

sometimes i wish i could be like that again, that i could fly like that again. feel so light again.

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sorry, i missed corner view this week. i actually took the photos, but didn't have the time to sort through, you know, the life-got-in-the-way sort of thing. that would also be the reason why i didn't visit any of your corner views yet. but i will.

friends, family and food

more from denmark. we visited good friends, had lovely food, cold glasses of white wine, home made fruit drinks, new potatoes and lovely moments in beautiful homes and gardens. i know it's beginning to be a while back, that denmark trip, but i still have some photos to share. and i love to look at them, so this is my excuse to sort through them again and again.

we have had a few days with rain here, it's still really hot and more like tropical rain, really heavy for a short while and then nothing. but it has cleared the air a bit, made it fresher. and the smell... there's nothing like the smell after summer rain, is there?

yellow

i meant to do the yellow post this week, but i'm running late. blame it on september and all the holidays. and on top of all the family gatherings, beach days and barbeques, i have a very dear friend visiting from denmark. alas, i'm prioritizing hard core these days. it's good, but it means not much posting and not much blog reading. i will be back soon, though.

check out kristina's post for more yellow.

wishing you a lovely week :)

corner view september

september is usually the last hot and humid month around here. not as hot as july and august, but still pretty much summer.

it's the month of the jewish holidays of rosh hashana, the new year; sukkot, the feast of booths (where you are to eat your meals outside under palmtree leaves); simchat torah, the reading of the torah starts over again in the synagoge; and yom kippur, the day of atonement and probably the most important of all jewish holidays.

we'll have a lot of family dinners and events around here. and i am planning to show and tell as it happens. today i am showing you a few glimpse from around the village, taken on yesterday's walk to the place of the fire.

evidence of september: orange dates fruits on the palm trees, texas sage blooming in the front yard (which i brought home for a bit of pretty in the house), a few white clouds on the clear blue sky, and then the green that is still here, all though most green plants and grass is by now dried out and more yellow than green. summer sun is hard and shows no mercy to little plants.

for more information about corner view, visit jane from spain daily.

for a little boy

i made this blanket just before we went to denmark. a gift to a very special little boy, born on the other side of the world back in july. i hope it'll serve him good. and i wish we will one day again live closer to him and his sweet family.

after the fire

i went to look at the place of the fire i mentioned in my previous post. it was a wasteland with a beauty of it's own. such a contrast to the neighboring green orange trees.

i'm kind of intrigued to see how nature will take back this land in the coming months, how the dust will slowly disappear and the blackness will fade.