Weekend etc

[liv]

I didn't make it to pseudomonas' party for Pseudojonathan's birthday aka the Jewish new year for trees. This is because I was invited to a New Year party months ago, and the party had to be postponed until this weekend due to the host's ill health. I hadn't realized until I arrived that she hadn't just picked an arbitrary date a month after NYE, but instead had intentionally moved the party to the new year for trees.

So we had a tu bishevat seder, which originally was a mystical tradition where you do passover-ish things on the new year for trees. The liturgy we used came from something the local youth movement had put together a few years ago, so rather than mystical symbolism we had a lot of Zionism and environmentalism. We didn't take ourselves too seriously though, and I think we did manage the requisite 15 varieties of fruit. Let's see: figs, dates, scorfs, pineapple, redcurrants, raisins, nuts, pears, kiwis, passion fruit, bananas, apricots, phrysalis, mango, and ok, we may have counted chocolate as the fifteenth fruit, in the form of some extremely decadent chocolate tortes.

B's friends are a really fascinating crowd, ranging over several decades in age and an impressive number of nationalities. As well as eating tasty food and running through the ceremony in a delightfully discursive way, we did a lot of singing. B played the violin, a couple of her guests took turns at the piano, and there was a guitar player who is also a very skilled singer. I was already getting sentimental over Naomi Shemer songs, so I was a lost cause when they put on a CD of the setting of verses from Song of Songs that I used to be utterly in love with, and which I now associate with several different kinds of loss and grief. I was invited to suggest some "English" songs, but was doubly disadvantaged by the fact that English people don't get together and sing folk songs, and the fact that I'm hopelessly unmusical. Anyway it was a great evening, and my Swedish is coming on quite nicely.

As you might expect, at this lattitude it isn't really the weather for a spring festival. It has been warmer this week, at least; it's an odd sensation to go out and notice that the air feels positively soft, with the thermometer reading +5 instead of -5. And the birds seem to be singing as if the fact that it was cold and now it's not so cold means that it must be spring. The downside is that the snow is melting, but it isn't melting very fast so there's a lot of ice around. I knew intellectually that ice is more dangerous than snow, but now I know it in my body, in the scrapes and bruises from falling over all the time, in my muscles aching from having to pay conscious attention to locomotion instead of using the gait which has been automatic for a quarter of a century. It was definitely a bad sign when a woman older than my grandmother offered to give me her arm because I looked so unsteady...

Comments

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

I think we did manage the requisite 15 varieties of fruit. Let's see: figs, dates, scorfs, pineapple, redcurrants, raisins, nuts, pears, kiwis, passion fruit, bananas, apricots, phrysalis, mango, and ok, we may have counted chocolate as the fifteenth fruit, in the form of some extremely decadent chocolate tortes.

Hate to tell you, but pineapple is בורא פרי האדמה.

I managed fifteen fruit, though some in sub-כזית quantities, such as jam and marmalade. Despite attending a Tu Bishvat Seder at Yakar, I only got up to nine fruit, which I furthered to eleven at the mini Tu Bishvat Seder in shul the next day. I was despairing of getting over fourteen when I realised the answer was right in front of me, in the form of the lemon juice I'd put on various dishes.

And then spoiled it by having a danish with glacé cherries in, bringing the total up to sixteen.

[snjstar.livejournal.com]

Well you both did better then me I had date, almond, raspberry jam, a strawberry jam filled biscuit, lemon juice, tomato (although don't know what blessing that is). So that was 6 or 7.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

Also:

I was invited to suggest some "English" songs, but was doubly disadvantaged by the fact that English people don't get together and sing folk songs,

*ahem* Might I cite the last time we met up in this country, at j4 and addedentry's place, as a counterexample? ;^b

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

I was at the Seder with Yakar, too. They had not much fruit. They chocolate with almonds in it. I did not like olives. They had not many option. I ate the first time Carob. I did not really like it. You can use it as a rattle.
The Seder with Masorti in the Rabbi's house was much better. They had a lot more fruit and different options of juices and grape juice. Masorti people are not meshuge frum and don't see anything wrong with Vegetarian Grapejuice from Tesco. Whoever is married with a Jewish partner is still married to the same person and whoever was single did not change their minds to marry out. It is all just superstitious. Anyway, I did not bother so much about the 15 fruits.