Fish Tank Friday

Welcome to the inaugural edition of “Fish Tank Friday”*.

Now, before you start picturing elaborate aquariums with expensive filtration systems and exotic sea life, I should hasten to dissuade you of that notion.

In fact, it’s not exactly an actual tank, per se.

Indeed, I daresay that most people would refer to it as “a cheap plastic container with jagged holes in the lid and a common goldfish inside.”

But I’ll let you be the judge:

His name is Fish.

This somewhat prosaic yet highly descriptive name was chosen by his owner – a Shiputzim daughter, who acquired her watery pet about a year and a half ago. Ever since then, remembering to feed Fish daily and change his water every week or so has become the bane of the Shiputzim family’s existence Fish has become a dear and treasured member of the family.

Meanwhile, in keeping with today’s theme, here’s one of the many things the Shiputzim children have been doing since their day camps ended:

 “Aquatic Diorama” by ENG

 “Under the Sea” by TSG

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* Of course, today’s post could have easily been divided into two parts: a “Fauna Friday” post and also a “Fine Arts Friday” post. But as you may have figured out by now, I’ve never found a fake-themed Friday which I haven’t favored. For instance, would you fancy a future post entitled, “Faux Themes Friday”? I could focus on all the forced yet fascinating Friday themes which have been featured on this forum…

!שבת שלום ומבורך

Translation time

Here in TRLEOOB*, we’ve been playing around with translation software.

For instance, as you may recall, in my day camp challah post, I wrote:

“Well done, young bakers!”

Most – if not all – human English-to-Hebrew translators would translate this as:

“!כל הכבוד, אופים צעירים”

However, according to Microsoft, the correct translation is:

“!אופים שבוצעה היטב, צעיר” (Literally, “Bakers that was [sic] done well, young!”)

Meanwhile, Babylon came somewhat closer with:

“!טוב עשה, אופים צעירים” (Literally, “Good did [sic], young bakers!”)

And then there’s Google, which, in its infinite wisdom, chose to adopt a multilingual approach:

“!bakers ,כל הכבוד צעיר”

Now, admittedly, the literal meaning of this odd phrase is, in fact, “Well done, young bakers.”

Nevertheless, I must confess that I have a few, ahem, minor quibbles. Namely:

• The word “bakers” isn’t exactly Hebrew.
• In Hebrew, the adjective should follow the noun, but here the order is reversed.
• Although “bakers” is obviously plural, “צעיר” is singular.

But to paraphrase one of my earlier posts, if the erudite Rav Google rules that this is the proper translation, who am I, a lowly and humble J-blogger, to argue?

Which translation did YOU like best?

On a related note, I was asked by the Hebrew-to-English translator who did this letter about the IDF chaplains to inform my readers that she’s available for translation work. For more information, please contact me at the email address in the sidebar to the above right, and I’ll gladly forward all inquiries to her.

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*TRLEOOB=the real life equivalent of our blog

‘Tis the season (Mwahahaha…)

To the dismay of children everywhere (but to their parents’ secret delight), the call of the school bell grows ever louder.

Thus, last week, the Resident Ulpanistit graciously took stock of our textbook and school supplies inventory and compiled a list of the things which we were still missing.

The next step was to buy a number of second-hand books, and then we placed an order for the rest this morning. (Here in Israel, most schools don’t provide the books.)

And here are our purchases from a recent sale at a local stationery store:

 As always, click on the picture for a closer look. 

For comparison’s sake, here’s a link to the First Annual Our Shiputzim School Supplies Post: A notebook on the floor is worth two in the knapsack (or something like that).

Have you done your school supplies shopping yet?

HH and Only in Israel: Drinks edition

We experienced a heartwarmingly beautiful only-in-Israel story over Shabbat. But first:

The last edition of Haveil Havalim is available here. Special thanks to Baila for including my post on the one-year Israel programs - then and now and also my post on packing for the machaneh.

And now this:

On Friday night, just after we had finished our meal, we received word that our neighborhood’s water supply had apparently been contaminated.

B”H, we had enough bottled water on hand to make it through Shabbat, and we served only juice and soda during Shabbat lunch and at seudah shlishit.

Here’s the only-in-Israel part:

On Shabbat morning in shul, they announced that the owner of one of the local grocery stores (i.e. makolet for the Hebraically-oriented among you) – who also happens to live in the affected area – had thoughtfully placed cases of drink in front of his store.

Everyone was invited to help themselves to as much as they needed. The necessary financial arrangements would wait until after Shabbat.

!מי כעמך ישראל

“Who is like Your nation Israel…”

(Divrei HaYamim I 17:21)

Freshly Baked Goods Friday: Cinnamon Swirls Edition

Attention all Our Shiputzim fans!

If you happen to be near TRLEOOB* over Shabbat, please feel free to stop by.

After all, look what we’re having for dessert:

 

Aren’t they cute?

And they taste good, too!

Special thanks to the Resident Ulpanistit (aka the Baker-in-Chief), her sous chef ESG, and her entire team of talented assistants.

The recipe comes from the Israel-Food list, with a few minor changes.

Cinnamon Swirl Cookies

Ingredients

• 3 eggs
• 1 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup canola oil
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 4 cups flour
• 2 heaping tsp baking powder (i.e. one envelope, for our Israeli readers)
• Mixture of cinnamon and sugar

Directions

Beat eggs, sugar, oil, and vanilla. Add flour and baking powder. Roll dough into long, skinny “snakes”. Dip each “snake” into cinnamon and sugar mixture, and then form into spirals. Place cookies on parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for 11 minutes.

Yield: About 65-70 cookies

Note: These cookies can be frozen.

!שבת שלום ומבורך

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*TRLEOOB=the real life equivalent of our blog

A sartorial scenario

Here’s an interesting dilemma:

Read and discuss.

Disclaimer: The following scenario is based on recent events here in TRLEOOB** a work of complete fiction. Any resemblance to a member of the Shiputzim family is purely intentional coincidental.

Picture this:

You’re a typical Israeli teenager about to head out on your machaneh (מחנה - literally, “camp” – refers to 2-7 days of sleeping outside in the mud*).

On one hand, you want to look good. Given your age, this means that you can only wear clothes which are “normal”. (Ed. note - If you have to ask what “normal” means, you’re clearly too old to understand.)

On the other hand, your Anglo mother insists that you only take clothes which are “suitable” for sleeping outside in relatively primitive conditions. According to your mother’s definition, “suitable” means she won’t mind if they get ruined.

If your clothes were to be represented by a Venn diagram (after all, your parents DID study new math – much to your grandparents’ consternation), the intersection of Set A (your “normal” clothes) and Set B (your “suitable” clothes) would be fairly small.

As it so happens, this year, you’ll IY”H be away for seven days – including a three-day gichah (גיחה – literally, excursion or sortie) without access to a shower. (Ed. note – Eww!)

In other words, you need to supplement the aforementioned intersection of Set A and Set B with clothes from either Set A or Set B.

What do you do?

Please leave your answers in the comment section.

Don’t forget to show your work...

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*Here’s what I wrote last year when a certain Shiputzim child returned from her machaneh. (BTW, that post also includes a great idea for a one-day tiyul.)

**TRLEOOB=the real life equivalent of our blog

Nitkatnu hadorot

An unscientific survey of my peers has revealed that many believe that life in the one-year Israeli yeshivot/seminaries is much easier now than it was back in our day.

First of all, no one could ever get in touch with us, because we had neither cell phones nor email accounts

But our communication issues were only part of the problem.

The main difference between now and then is that – as a whole – our generation seemed to have far fewer places to go for Shabbat.

I mean, sure, we all had a handful of obscure third-cousins-five-times-removed or a few so-called “old friends” of our parents, whom we had never even heard of before.

Ever-so-slightly exaggerated version of actual quote:

“You don’t know the X’s?! But Abba went to high school with Mr. X! And we got together with them once, oh, it must have been about 15 years ago. Remember? You were about two years old, and you played with their daughter? We’ve known them FOREVER! You really MUST call them. I’m sure they’ll LOVE to have to you for Shabbat!”

To this day, I still shudder when I recall a certain phone call to some elderly relatives (a”h) living in Haifa. The assimonim were dropping; the girls around me were motioning that I should get off the phone already; and I was literally shouting into the phone. I had to repeat everything about ten times, because the elderly relatives couldn’t hear me.

Ah, good times, good times…

But today - thanks to NBN, and also due to the fact that much of our generation spent those years in Israel and, as a result, was determined to make aliyah ourselves - rare is the American student who doesn’t have an assortment of aunts, uncles, grandparents, or very close family friends (whom the student actually knows…) living here in Israel.

Oh, and did I mention that when WE were here for the year, we had to trudge ten miles in the snow every single day?

As my kids would say, staaaam….

HH 228 and pizza for supper

Two newsworthy items from around the J-Blogosphere:

1) The latest edition of Haveil Havalim is available here. Special thanks to Heshy for including my presidential post.

2) Here in TRLEOOB*, we recently ordered pizza for supper, and hijinks ensued. Toby has the story.

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*TRLEOOB = the real life equivalent of our blog