40 Days and 40 Nights

My kids and I like to read Torah together. The other day we were reading Genesis again, and the story of Noah and his ark came up in our reading.

When we got to the part where it was raining ofr 40 days and 40 nights, Matthew asked, "What on earth were they doing for 40 days and nights in that ark?"

Justing, ever the practical one replied, "What, they were cleaning up after all the animals and they were trying to keep the lion from eating everyone else."

Of course as we went on with the story, Craig started to wonder how they managed to store enough provisions for not only the humans but the animals, why on earth they took mosquitoes with them, and how Noah stored all the fish as the rain must have diluted the salt content of the oceans to unbearable level to sea creatures, yet at first the infusion of salt water to the sweetwater bodies must have killed all the sweet water creatures. Good thing we are not Bible literalists, because I simply don't have the asnwers to those questions. Of course some answers are available from midrashim, rabbinic writings, but then some of them cannot.

While Noah might have been busy 24x7 caring for the animals, my kids are not really buying it. Spending a year with only his close family they must have read and prayed together and probably played together. Matthew thinks they played cards and charades. And 20 questions. Definitely 20 questions. Craig thinks it was more like 2000 questions, given the time frame.

How would YOU spend 40 days and nights in an ark with your immediate family?

A happy and a sad thing

I watch the rainbow of children: my nieces and nephews and their friends as they play together. They come in every colour possible: the pale white freckled redheads, the typically Mid-Eastern / Mediterranean look, the Hong Kong adoptees, The Kochin Jews with their Indian look, and the Ethiopean Jews with their beautiful dark skin and curly hair, running, laughing, playing in the sprikler in unity and peace.

Kol Yisrael Chaverim.

These kids feel that. They see no difference between each other: they are all the same in each other's eyes. Isn't that so lovely?

And now the sad thing. This morning I was reading index.hu for my daily news dose and I read that Hungarian singer Tamás Cseh passed away. He had lung cancer.

Tamás Cseh was something different. He was a visual artist: he had a degree in art, he started out as an art teacher, and his songs were always visual. He didn't have a very great voice, his songs pretty much always stayed within one octave or less. They didn't have complicated melodies, but they were always very real. Tamás Cseh was a 20th century minstrel, singing songs of post WWII Hungary.

Rest in Peace.

My boys are home and life is now crazy!

My boys got home on Monday, several hours after they were supposed to land, with tons of stuff they brought from the States. They pretty much left with 3 pairs of underwear and 3 tee shirts each. Now they are back with 70 lbs of stuff EACH. Seriously, I don't think I'll ever have to buy crayons again! Or stickers. Or notebooks (note to self: these notebooks won't work in Israel!). The kids have enough crocs in various sizes to last till they go in the IDF (and I only slightly exaggerate there) and more American patriotic shirts than I'll ever let them wear.

We have a lot of new books in English, worksheets, workbooks, novels, kid books etc. So so lovely.

Of course there were all the essentials: Reese's, rootbeer, clam chowder (yes, not kosher, of course), Oreos and what not. Things that little kids love. And the not so little ones as well.

Today was the first time I hhad time to sort through the kids and Janice's luggage. Good thing we had a new loft put in, because otherwise I have no idea where I'd put it all.

Some of tehs tuff they brought we are going to use at cousin camp. For the duration of the camp we have my sister's four kids staying with us, so now we have 5 boys and 2 girls between the ages of 6 and 16 in the house. Tomorrow we have Crazy Christian Neighbour's kids over as well, also overnight as Crazy Christian Neighbour, Not-At-All-Crazy Wife, Christian Downstairs Neighbour and the Odd American are going to some retreat sans kids, so that will make 11 kids in the house. That shall be interesting. Especially as it's Torah day at cousin camp tomorrow...