|
At some point last year, this Israeli television show called Srugim started making its way through the Orthodox crowd here in NY. There were screenings, people were downloading, etc., but I didn't pay much attention because the show is in Hebrew (no English subtitles) and my Hebrew was...well, let's just "abysmal" wouldn't be an exaggeration. I knew that the show was about the religious singles scene in the Katamon section of Jerusalem, but that was pretty much it. Over the last year though, I've been taking an online Hebrew class to try to improve my Hebrew and I've been shocked to find it actually getting better. Whatever mental block I had as a kid that prevented me from getting it during my years of schooling seems to have broken down. Not that I'm fluent -- faaaaar from it -- but there's no question that I get a lot more than I used to and also that I've gotten *much* better at recognizing the patterns and styles of words so that even when I don't know it I can tell if it's a noun or verb or passive or active, etc.
For a lark I decided to get my hands on a copy of the first season to see if I could understand any of it. To my shock and delight, the show does have subtitles -- Hebrew ones. As it turns out, I would not be able to understand the show at all by just watching it as Israelis make me look like a slow-talker and also swallow half their words, but with the subtitles I'm able to pause it, read them, see what I know, look up the rest (and add them to my list of words to learn) and continue. This means that it takes roughly two hours to watch a 1/2 hour show, but I've been able to enjoy it anyway.
A lot. Because here's the thing -- I have watched a lot of TV over the years and seen many movies. I have related to characters and situations because there are certain universal experiences that all humans go through. But the truth is that I've never before seen anything even remotely resembling my life depicted in any medium. All these HS shows I've loved...I didn't exactly have jocks and cheerleaders in my all-girls yeshiva, you know? And even "Jewish" life as portrayed on TV never looked like mine. Either it's Chassidim living in the dark because people think they don't use electricity or secular Jews who eat roast pork at the Seder. Occasionally there is a regular Orthodox Jew on Law & Order or something who wears a big white skullcap and pronounces things wrong. And that was always ok, you know? I didn't particularly feel the *need* to see my life on TV. In fact, I thought it was probably better for us regular, non Chassidish, Orthodox Jews to keep flying under the radar.
But Srugim is a show produced and directed by Orthodox Jews. Granted, they are quite modern, and the actors aren't religious, but the lifestyle they're portraying is mine and everything is totally accurate. It's cool, but it's almost *eerie.* Granted, it's not exactly like my life. I obviously don't live in Israel or speak Hebrew, and I don't live in a singles community (I suspect if I lived on the Upper West Side I'd be even more freaked out by this show.) But the little things are there. For instance, the most "holy crap" moment to me in the whole series so far was in the pilot. The episode ends on a Friday night, and the main male characters are back in their apartment, having eaten Shabbos (Shabbat, to Israelis) dinner elsewhere. The lights in their apartment are off, either because they were set to go off already, or because they didn't leave them on since they were going away for the meal. The camera pans around their dark apartment and comes to rest on one of them, sitting on the floor by the bathroom and reading the newspaper by the light from the open bathroom door. Duuude! What observant Jew hasn't done that! We've all done that! Where we're either really into a good book or just aren't tired yet but all the lights in the house are already off and the only light left is in the bathroom. When I was 12 or 13 I actually got so wrapped up in a book that I brought my blanket and pillow in there to read more comfortably and my mother found me sleeping on the floor the next morning. That they would include a detail like that was just incredible. And that's not even getting into the portrayal of the singles scene which is so accurate a lot of people who've experienced the real thing find it too damn painful to watch.
I wish, so badly, that I could show the show to all of you so you could at least see an accurate portrayal of Modern Orthodox life, but obviously that's not possible as the show is in Hebrew. There are apparently DVDs with English subtitles, but it's not clear whether they're even playable on American players. (Also, they're not cheap as they'd have to be ordered from Israel.) For some reason I actually have started writing a recap of the first episode but I'm not sure there'd be any point in posting them as I doubt they'd be at all interesting without also seeing the show and the actors.
|
|
So now that I'm all caught up on Leverage (cut the hair, Christian Kane, cut the hair!) which is fluffy and ridiculous and tons of fun, I've finally started on Mad Men, another show with an Angel alum that I've been meaning to catch up on. So far I'm definitely liking it, which is not a surprise. (Jon Hamm? Waaaooow. He's like the American Jason Isaacs. I want to go to there too, Liz Lemon!) What is a surprise for me is how much the show deals with anti-semitism. I knew the show dealt with sexism and racism, but I didn't realize how much of it also focuses on the kind of anti-semitism that was prevalent in the business world of the '60s. It's quite fascinating, and from the stories my mother tells me (although hers are from the late '60s early '70s), also completely accurate.
Anyway, there's this one episode in the first season where the agency is hired by the Israeli Tourism Industry. The group is trying to figure out how to spin it without bringing religion or "promised land" stuff into it, and I found this bit particularly amusing.
Draper: So. We have a quasi-communist state, where women have guns, and it's filled with Jews. Well, not completely filled. Let's not forget that there are also Arabs.
Paul: They've got oranges.
Salvatore: As far as I can see, the biggest thing this place has going for it? (Holds up a picture of a sexy, busty Israeli woman) The people are good-looking. The Jews there don't look like the Jews here...
Me: Ha ha ha! Too true, too true.
Salvatore: (smirk)...Have you been to the Diamond District?
Me: Ha ha...HEY!
Heh. |
|
I'd been thinking about doing a pronunciation guide for a while, but as Tseeps pointed out, there really isn't anything "poopyheaded" about not knowing how to pronounce the words of another language or culture. (Although I did say that some entries in the series would be merely informative and not involve any actual poopyhead behavior.) However, I was given a good excuse when I heard yet another reporter completely screw up the names of Israel's Prime Minister and President, and journalists really ought to learn how to pronounce them properly if they don't want to be considered poopyheads. If we can all do our best to pronounce "Mahmoud Ahmadinejad" I think we can also manage to say "Shimon Peres" properly.
Rather than struggle through using text to try explain the pronunciations, I've used box.net widgets as a handy dandy tool so you can all hear me actually saying the words (and you can play them right here rather than downloading them.) Annoyingly, the sounds in each group play in a loop until you click the "x" at the top right corner to shut them off.
Onwards.
( Jewish Pronunciation Guide )
|
|
How did I never notice how unintelligible Michael Jackson's lyrics are?
A song of his came up on my shuffle today, and of course this lead to a nostalgic marathon of his music, and for having grown up on it (I can still remember my 5-year old self dancing around the living room to the "mama-say mama-sa ma-macoosa" bit from "Wanna Be Starting Something") I'm amazed at how little I know of the lyrics, even of the songs I thought I knew well.
I should have realized, considering it was David Cook who taught me the words to "Billie Jean" and it wasn't until Anoop sang "Beat It" on AI that I realized Michael wasn't telling us that "No one's wants to feel it, feel it." At least I knew that I was probably wrong about the "Strong is your hockey, strong is your fight" bit, as I do not believe it was a group of ruthless Canadians who were picking a fight with Michael. Although when it comes to Canadians, you just never know.
Similarly, I'm going to guess that the words to "Man in the Mirror" don't go like this:
Osama's disregard
A broken bottled-heart
And a one-man stove
That might be slightly off. I also doubt that in "Thriller," Michael's telling us that we're fighting for our lives inside a "Can of, can of...Greta!" as I'm not sure they sell Gretas in cans. However, I'm pretty sure the "You're a vegetable, they may hate you, you're a vegetable" from "Wanna..." is actually correct, so I suppose it's not *that* crazy. |
|
So many people, even when defending Israel, make the mistake of tying its creation completely to the Holocaust. This is a grave error for a number or reasons, and with Obama himself recently asserting this fallacy in Cairo, it's good to see a member of the Senate getting up and disputing it, and outlining in good, succinct detail most of the basic issues that need to be addressed when discussing Israel, including the hundreds of thousands of Jews who were expelled from Arab and Muslim nations in the wake of its creation, and the fact that Zionism and the Jewish community of Israel existed well before the Holocaust.
Aside from the small Jewish community that existed consistently from Biblical times and all through the Middle Ages, the disciples of the Vilna Gaon and the Baal Shem Tov (the Misnagdim/Perushim and the Chasidim, respectively) started settling in Palestine and building it up in the 1700s. Mishekenot Sha'ananim, the first neighborhood outside the walls of Jerusalem's old city, was established in 1860. The first Aaliyah began in 1881. The first modern agricultural settlement, Petach Tikva, was established in 1878. The first Zionist Congress took place in 1897. Degania, the first Kibbutz, was founded in 1909. So was Tel-Aviv. The Balfour Declaration, stating that the British government (in charge at the time under the mandate) ""view[ed] with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people" was signed in 1917. And so on.
Too many people seem to believe that Israel was created entirely after the Holocaust. That western nations, feeling guilty, sent all the Jews there, threw the Arabs out, and created a western, Jewish state on Arab land. But it is not a state established by the West. It's a Jewish state, founded by Jews, legally bought by Jews, built by Jews, and *fought for* by Jews, based on western principles of democracy, freedom, and equality. Which (some say) the West learned...from the Jews. Is the Holocaust important to Israel? Is it maybe what made the rest of the world see how important it is? Sure. Is it why the Jews are there? Hell no.
As an addendum: It is *amazing* to me that Bibi Netanyahu is considered a "hard-liner" because he dares to demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel (way too much for the Palestinians to take) and says that he doesn't want to govern the Palestinians, but wants them to govern themselves and wants to begin peace negotiations immediately "without preconditions." Meanwhile, Abbas is a "moderate," despite refusing to acknowledge Israel's right to exist, defending terrorist attacks, and stating that he will not take part in any negotiations until Israel agrees to return to it's pre-1967 borders, gives up the Temple Mount, and agrees to grant Palestinians the right of return. Essentially, "Give us everything we want, *then* we'll talk, but we offer nothing in return, not even acknowledging your right to exist." Yes, quite moderate. Clearly a partner for peace. |
|
I know I promised that my next "poopyhead" post would be about the poopyheaded question of "Do you really think G-d cares?" and I also know that I haven't posted in quite a while. That's because my little neck issue? Turned out to be two herniated discs in my neck. I'm still in pain. It has gotten somewhat better over the past week (largely, I believe, from stronger drugs) and I'm starting physical therapy, so hopefully that should speed things along as well. (Alas, the hot hot hot physical therapist, Dmitry, no longer works at the place I go to. Sadness.)
Anyway, I finally have enough energy and enough inspiration to post, but it's not going to be about That Question. The inspiration comes from this post from ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) spectralbovine about rape, and about men's attitude towards it. His post was inspired by cereta's post about the topic. You should read them both.
I'm not going to get into my own perspective on the topic right now. spectralbovine encouraged us to read the comments to the post, and I did my best to do so, but it's hard as I find long discussions in blog entries to be very difficult to follow, what with all the expansions and parent threads and who's replying to whom and so forth. (I've really never gotten used to using blogs for discussion, and will always prefer good old message boards.) I did come across some comments about Orthodox Judaism and how the rules of modesty are largely to prevent rape and isn't that ridiculous why can't men be responsible for their own actions.
So I'm going to address two issues here: The concept of modesty in relation to rape prevention, and the concept of safeguards and nature/morality.
( Hoo boy. )
|
|
Just saw Star Trek.
Hmm.
It is a very strange experience indeed to watch a movie, enjoy the high holy hell out of it, laugh like crazy, cry a little bit, get chills and feel the urge to clap when it's over, yet still feel a sort of sinking feeling of, well...
"The hell did I just see?"
( Spoilers under the cut. )
In other news: Chris Pine is hot. Yowza. |
|
Any of my friends here in New York into NYC trivia? Because I really want to go to this trivia night hosted by the Bowery Boys, a podcast I really enjoy. I couldn't go to the last one because it was on a Jewish holiday, but I've looked at the questions from that one, and just off the top of my head I got about 75% of them correct. With a good partner and a little bit of review, we could totally kick ass. I need at least one teammate (up to three) so if you're into it, or know someone else who would be interested, please let me know. |
|
Well, I had an interesting Pesach to say the least.
First I was woken up by my first migraine in 2-3 years on Saturday night, and had the lingering postdrome through Monday.
Then, probably due to the stress of the migraine (and the fear of another) I was woken up by the most horrific stiff neck I have ever experienced on Monday night. I tried to take it easy, sleep on more supportive pillows, get a short massage etc. and it seemed a bit better on Wednesday. Then yesterday morning when I woke up my head gave a jerk and pain like I have never felt before shot through my neck and has been pretty much non-stop since then. I don't know if it's a pulled muscle, a pinched nerve, or what. It sort of feels like what I always imagined whiplash feels like, though I have never actually had whiplash, and the worst part is that there is pretty much no escape as it hurts no matter how I sit, stand, lay down, etc. There is no comfortable position to be in. I am going to attempt to see a chiropractor (and possibly also a doctor) today, but it's hard to imagine any relief from this right now.
On the other hand, Tseeps sent me this and I can't stop laughing, despite the fact that it hurts.
For those not in the know, this is the lovely and ginger Damian Lewis (of TV's Life), and this is him reading sex-ay poetry. |
|
Oh my gosh. So tired. Intended to wake up early to attend Birkat Hachamah. Ended up waking up an extra hour early and couldn't fall back asleep. Just took a nap. Now a zombie.
Late night seder, here I come!
A happy and healthy Pesach/Passover to all my friends who celebrate.
!חג כשר ושמח |
|
A conversation I had this past weekend reminded me that some months ago (around the time of the release of Bill Maher's movie, Religulous) I had thought about doing a whole series of entries about Judaism (and religion in general) titled, "How Not to be a Poopyhead." I do this all the time — write long, elaborate entries in my head about various topics without ever putting pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard, as the case may be.) Most of the time it's because of laziness; sometimes it's because it's personal. Believe it or not, this lj has been very cathartic for me because I use it to rant and rage in exquisite detail without ever actually having to write any of it. It all goes on the lj in my head. It's an excellent solution because it allows me to sort through my feelings (somewhat) without actually revealing them to others, preventing the annoyance of other people knowing my business. Of course it sometimes becomes too much even for me which is why I will occasionally actually rant here, but I usually regret it afterward.
Anyway, the conversation re-inspired me to open up the topic again. Essentially, "How Not to be a Poopyhead" is going to be about whatever religious topic I'm in the mood to talk about. Some entries will merely be informative (like the one I did about the order of significance of Jewish holidays), some will address the kind of poopyheaded behavior I and my fellow Jews (as well as fellow religion-followers) often encounter in our lives from people who are either ignorant about or antagonistic towards Judaism and religion in general. And yes, of course I know that religious people can be poopyheads too. I may decide to address that at some point, but it's simply not the goal of this series.
That's if I actually do more than one entry. We'll see. No promises.
So, onto our first topic: ( The Question )
|
|
I seem to have just gone on a date with Turtle from Entourage.
Weird.
|
|
Hooray!
Freedom Tower is now 1 World Trade Center.
Thank G-d. Seriously, was there anything cornier than that? Now if they can just build the damn thing we'll be in business. |
|
So my boss is finally out of town; time to finish up writing about the trip. Here we go: the final entry!
( London/Cardiff/Belgium Trip, Day 10, Part 2 — Beer and Britney in Brussels )
|
|
Friday was actually the first day we spent entirely in Brussels. In the morning we headed to the Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts, the Museum of Fine Arts, before heading to the EU area in the afternoon.
( London/Cardiff/Belgium Trip, Day 9 — Art and the EU in Brussels )
|
|
Thursday we took a bus tour to Ghent and Bruges (or Gent and Brugge) in Flanders.
It was mad foggy.
( London/Cardiff/Belgium Trip, Day 8 — Ghent and Bruges )
|
|
So let's say there's this woman, a "singleton" approaching 30 who as of late has been particularly dejected, sad, and cynical about her prospects of ever finding the right guy. She attends a singles event, which turns out not to be the worst she's ever been to, but she doesn't meet anyone she'd be remotely interested in. She leaves a bit early, longing for a quiet, soothing subway ride with her music and hoping to make it home in time to watch the Oscars. While standing on the train platform, one of the guys who was at the event — whom she noticed from across the room, but didn't speak to at all — ends up on the platform too, and strikes up a conversation. ("Were you just at the event at..."?) And he's smart, and cute, and interesting, and as it turns out, is taking the same train she is to the same stop. And so they end up sitting next to each other and talking for the entire hour-long train ride home.
Wouldn't that be adorable?
Replace the words, "smart," "cute," and "interesting," with "strange," "awkward," and "clearly developmentally disabled" and you have what happened to me last night.
|
|
Does anyone know if it's at all possible for someone to hack into another person's cell phone account and download stuff (like games, ringtones, etc.) to their own phone and have it charged to the other person's?
Because something like that appears to have happened to me. I got an e-mail that my phone bill was available, and when I opened it up I nearly had a heart attack when I saw the amount due. Somehow, despite the fact that I have never downloaded anything to my phone *ever,* I was charged $54 for...let's see:
A green magma theme
Resident Evil: Genesis
Mega Man III
Two ringtones from Kanye West, one from Akon, and a bunch more from people I've never even heard of.
And many more!
This is mind-boggling not only because I've never downloaded anything, but because anyone who knows me at all would know that even if I had, it wouldn't be any of *that.* I hate dumbass themes, haven't played video games since I was 13, and I detest hip-hop and R&B. Kanye West? You couldn't pay *me* to listen to that!
So I call T-mobile, and of course they don't know what the hell is going on but eventually they agree to reverse the charges. However, they see that I still have even more charges pending on my next bill, that I apparently have *subscriptions* to download stuff on a regular basis, including something connected to my myspace.
How interesting, considering I DON'T HAVE A MYSPACE.
They agree to reverse those charges as well, but when I ask what to do now all I get is silence, like, "What do you mean?"
Um, hi! Someone is downloading stuff and *I'm* getting charged? Either there is some kind of glitch and the wrong person is getting charged, or someone has somehow hacked into my account and is downloading things onto their phones. Don't you think we should maybe do something about it, especially given that now you're the ones who have to eat those charges?
They don't know where these things are going, and they have no way of stopping it. Ok. So do I need to get a new sim card? Change my number? Get a whole new account? A new phone?
.....
.....
I could almost hear the lady shrugging over the line. Finally she contacts the sidekick people and says that they say I need to get a new sim card. How? Oh, I need to go to a T-mobile store and buy one.
Hi, NO. I'm not paying for that. We get into a bit of an argument so I finally ask to speak to a supervisor. She puts me on hold, and when she comes back says that she's transferring me to the sidekick division and they'll cover the cost of the sim card. Fine. So I get to sidekick tech support and she has no idea what I'm talking about.
*facepalm*
She is able to confirm that none of these downloads were purchased through the sidekick. All of these were third party — through websites and the like. That's good because it means I can't have accidentally pressed something on the phone and caused all this, and I think it also further cements the idea that I didn't do it as there's proof it wasn't actually done with the phone itself.
She says, however, that they have no protocol to send someone a sim card, nor does she think it's going to do much good if someone's downloading stuff to that number. So what should we do?
.....
.....
Apparently, no one seems to think this is anyone's problem but mine. I once again ask to speak to a supervisor, and he goes on for about five minutes about how, as long as no one else is using my card it shouldn't happen again. I explain that they haven't downloaded them to my sim card, as none of this crap is on my sim card, nor has my card ever left my phone. The problem is that it's on someone else's card, but it's being billed to my account.
He says this is impossible. Impossible? IMPOSSIBLE? It's clearly possible as it's already happened, you %$#*&%. He says I'm free to do a sim swap at a store (and claims I won't be charged for it, but I'm not sure I believe him) but that there's no guarantee that it'll end this mess. So what will? What do I need to do? Should I go back to T-mobile support? Do I have to change my whole account?
.....
.....
*shrug* |
|
|
