Catching up...

Here are some updates on the past week.  Videos and comments...

First, Dena had a great work-meeting at Yad Vashem today.  And I went with Chayim Tzvi to checkout a potential office space in Jerusalem.  It was nice - minus the lack of A/C and Internet.  The question is whether I can manage without... one or both of them!

After our meetings, we stopped in Bayit V'gan to see an old friend...



[BTW - You know you're becoming an Israeli when you take for granted the following toppings always on hand at the pizza place; corn and olives (black AND/OR green!)]




Yesterday we went to a petting zoo.  Where else but Israel can you go to a petting zoo and find a... camel!!!  The zoo was located in Moshav Yish'i just outside Ramat Beit Shemesh.  Entering the moshav you get a rustic rural feel.  Lovely pace of life with a shul at the center and everyone going around doing their business.
Two girls hosted the peeting zoo - located adjacent to their home.  Aged ~15 and 20, they beamed with simchas hachayim - pure happiness.  And the kicker was when they offered us figs handpicked from their tree.  I asked, have you taken trumot and maasrot (agricultural tithes)?  And they reminded me of the halachic exemption of  about fruits eaten in the field!  Only in Israel.






Two days ago, I took the kids to Hertzeliya Park.  50 minutes from Ramat Bet Shemesh (RBS). If you have kids below the age of 11, it can be a half-day adventure for the family!  Walking, biking, climbing, swinging and sliding.
But the best part was driving through Tel Aviv onto the Ayalon Expressway.  That's right.  Passing Bnei Brak and exits for streets like Rechov Kibbutz Galiyot, seeing streets named Betzalel, Akiva, haAri, and Shivtei Yisrael.  The yiddishkeit is in the air, in the blood, in every breat of everyday life..






On erev shabbos last week, I picked-up Dov Betzalel from school.  He continues to be all smiles as he wakes early to make his own sandwich for aruchat eser (10 am sandwich time in every school in Israel) and he is fixated on biking to and from school!






We also made a trip to Gush Etzion to get Lara and Mark's car from the mechanic.  Miraculously, they did NO repair work, but the car seems to be fixed.  AMAZING!
Also a great glimpse of the real symbiosis of Jews and Arabs living side by side - peacefully and mutually beneficially.  The Jewish mechanic closed early for shabbat at 11am.  So he left me the car keys with the Arab gas station attendants...  I got my keys from them and bought another bottle of radiator fluid... just in case.






Lots more to share, but the hour is REALLY late.  Got to be up to learn, daven, take DB to school, some professional meetings, more unpacking and settling the home and preparing office for more clients tomorrow evening...  Nap today was helpful - between driving to/from Jerusalem, buying fill for the kids' sandbox and potting flowers with the kids to decorate our smaller mirpeset...!

If you know your Hebrew, you'll appreciate the following!  In one final special moment - we go to nursery to buy flowers and soil.  The man's name is Zerach.  And he refers us to another place to buy certain gravel.  That shop is called "Yifrach."