rekafot

Purim:
went to an ulpan party with Aurora on Tuesday and befriended Ruth, dressed extravagantly as a peacock. Lots of costumed small children roaming the streets, haredi children smoking their first cigarette, drunken yeshiva boys and mishloach manot, gifts of wine and snacks. Too many oznay haman/hamantaschen. Hard to find the ones with the poppy seeds--halva, chocolate and dates much more popular. (Why? Poppy seeds are the proper way to do it.) Two-year-old Anat with red hair dressed as a queen.
Playing with the first graders at the school I work at, singing the morning song, having six-year-old Renana (high functioning Asperger's) tell me that in a few year's time she would become a cat. Really speaking Hebrew. A lot of it.
Went to Haifa to stay with the Nirs. Visited a kibbutz where the wildflowers grow. My favorite flower in Haifa: the one native to the Carmel, it's lavender and blooms on trees. Homemade wine and labbaneh. Driving through Daliyat, the Druze village; the roadside stands with olive oil and Druze pita for sale. Rummy and bridge. Turkish coffee. (The caffeine addiction cannot be cured, especially not here.) People who used to live in Palo Alto, where the Israeli exodus descends.
Soon: Greece with its temples and the poet who makes leather sandals in the agora, and Egypt, with pillaged pyramids, mezze and merrymaking.