Chinese Try Israeli Food for the First Time

Jews are known to have an affinity for Chinese food, but how do the Chinese feel about Israeli food?

On the occasion of 25 years of diplomatic relations between Israel and China, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs was curious to know what the Chinese think about Israeli food, so they asked some Chinese people in a restaurant in the port of Jaffa to sample and comment on Israeli foods.

Watch to find out what they had to say:
 
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Welcoming Shabbat with Nava Tehila Singing Lecha Dodi at Jacob's Ladder Festival in Jerusalem

Nava Tehila is a Jerusalem-based prayer community that gathers for a big musical Kabbalat Shabbat once a month in Jerusalem's Baka neighborhood. They create musical and engaging prayer spaces where people feel comfortable to come as they are. All are welcomed. 

Their prayer service is innovative, egalitarian and accompanied by acoustic instruments. It flows between ecstatic chanting and dancing and contemplative, and is uses mostly their own beautiful original melodies written by their members. 

Nava Tehila’s musical spiritual leaders generate new prayer modalities, compose new music for prayer, and train Jewish leaders, including rabbis, cantors and students, in the art of musical and innovative prayer leading.

The Nava Tehila leaders travel to Reform, Conservative and other communities in Israel, the US and Europe to share the ideas that have proven so successful in drawing in not only nonaffiliated Jews, but also speaking to long term members of these communities.

They have produced two albums of music for Shabbat and High Holiday prayers, and run a resource website that offers prayer leaders free access to sheet music and recordings of their material.

Today we welcome Shabbat with Nava Tehila's own version of Lecha Dodi. 

Enjoy and Shabbat shalom!

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Throwback Thursday Comedy Special: Buddy Hackett on The Johnny Carson Tonight Show in 1973

We thought that we had run out of Buddy Hackett videos and were pleasantly surprised to find a mother lode of Buddy's appearances on the Johnny Carson Tonight Show. It's rare to find a Hackett video these days, especially one that's clean. 

So go back with us 44 years to 1973 when Buddy made one of his visits to Carson's late night show.

In this episode, Buddy tells of his scouting days when he raised rabbits for a merit badge in animal husbandry, how his father converted a would-be robber into an upholsterer, his antics as a cook in the army, and how he met his wife Sherrine duBois, daughter of Esther Cohen, at the Concord Hotel.

Enjoy!

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Key Tov Orchestra Celebrates Yom Yerushalayim with Jerusalem Song Mashup

Elliot Dvorin and the Key Tov Orchestra are at it again.

We have featured the Chicago-based wedding band before, performing a flash mob version of Hashem Melech and and a mashup of Passover songs in downtown Chicago, with the Kol Ish a cappella singers in a bluegrass version of Yigdal, in an Israeli salsa number in Miami, and in a Chicago mashup of Chanukah songs old and new.

In March they released a new music video that was filmed in some of the most iconic locations in Tel Aviv. Now they're back just in time for Yom Yerushalayim (Jerusalem Day) wiith a talented team of dancers performing stunning choreography to a variety of musical styles in familiar sites around Jerusalem.

Enjoy!

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The songs included in the mashup are:

Yerushalayim Shel Zahav - Naomi Shemer
Im Eshkachech Yerushalayim - Yaakov Shwekey
Jerusalem, If I Forget You - Matisyahu
Al Chomotayich Yerushalayim
Sisu Et Yerushalayim - Akiva Nof
Lach Yerushalayim - A. Rubinstein & Amos Etinger
Yerushalayim Oro Shel Olam - Avraham Fried
L'Shana Habah B'Yerushalayim - Reb Shlomo Carlebach

משאפ שירי ירושלים:

ירושלים של זהב - נעמי שמר
אים אשכחך ירושלים - יעקב שוואקי
מתיסיהו - Jerusalem, If I Forget You
על חומותיך ירושלים
שישו את ירושלים - עקיבא נוף
לך ירושלים - א. רובינשטיין & עמוס אטינגר
ירושלים אורו של עולם - אברהם פריד
לשנה הבאה בירושלים - ר׳ שלמה קרליבך

Israel Celebrates the 50th Anniversary of Jerusalem's Unification

Jerusalem couldn't wait to celebrate the 50th anniversary of its unification. The week-long Jerusalem Day celebrations  started three days early on Sunday night with a fantastic light and sound show projected against the old city walls outside of the Jaffa Gate. 

The evening, which was attended by tens of thousands, including President Reuven Rivlin and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, told the story of the history of Jerusalem. Beginning with the binding of Isaac on Mount Moriah and continuing through Jacob's dream, the history of the city played out including King David, the Temple of Solomon, the Babylonian exile, the return to Zion and rebuilding of the Holy Temple, the Maccabees and the refurbished Temple of Herod and its destruction in the year 70 CE by the Romans.

The story resumed in the 16th century as entire Jewish communities began to resettle inside Jerusalem's walls, to the first Jewish settlements outside the walls, the division of the city during Israel's 1948 War of Independence, and climaxed with the liberation and reunification of Jerusalem during the 1967 Six Day War.

The presentation included the voice of Mota Gur, who commanded the Israeli paratroopers who stormed the Temple Mount, taken directly from the two-way radio with which he was commanding his troops.

Jerusalem's old city was liberated on the 28th day of the Hebrew month of Iyar, (tomorrow), which was on June 7, 1967. Israel will be celebrating 50 years since the liberation of Jerusalem throughout the entire week.

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A Joke to Start the Week - "The Rabbi's Hawaiian Vacation"

It's another Monday. Time to get back to work, time for another Joke to Start the Week and time to start the day with a laugh. Today Joyce Fama is joining us again with a joke about a synagogue's gift to their rabbi.  

When she's not telling jokes, Joyce is an award winning Connecticut sculptor. Her medium is fired clay  that is inished with custom patinas.

Here's the setup for today's joke: The rabbi of a Reform congregation is so appreciated by his congregation that they pay for an all expense paid trip for him to Hawaii. And then...

Enjoy!

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David Kilimnick (Jerusalem's Comedian) Reflects on Life as a Comedian in Israel

David Kilimnick, known as Jerusalem's comedian and dubbed Israel's father of Anglo comedy by the Jerusalem Post, has been telling his jokes and stories about the joys and perils of making aliyah since moving from Rochester, New York to Israel in 2003.

David owns and operates the Off the Wall Comedy Basement at the intersection of King George and Ben Yehuda Streets in the center of Jerusalem.

He was recently the subject of With the Help of Laughter, a five-minute video feature in which he reflects on his life as a stand-up comic in Israel. It includes excerpts from his comedy nights in English and in Hebrew.

Enjoy!

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Welcoming Shabbat with a Beatles Version of V'Shamru at Beit T'shuvah in Los Angeles

Beit T'shuvah is a Los Angeles based synagogue community with a mission to guide individuals and families towards a path of living well, so that wrestling souls can recover from addiction and learn how to properly heal.

They also have a band, and in 2015 they recorded a Beatles Shabbat service with all the familiar songs in the Friday night liturgy sung to some of the most popular Beatles songs.

We previously posted their version of Lecha Dodi set to Let it Be. Here's another excerpt from the service with the shul band welcoming Shabbat with V'Shamru set to Hey Jude.
   
Beit T'shuvah is led by Rabbi Mark Borovitz, described on the synagogue website as "spiritual leader, author, Senior Rabbi, ex-con, recovering alcoholic, and overall anomaly."

Officially ordained in 2000 at the University of Judaism with a Master's in Rabbinic Literature, Rabbi Borovitz combined his knowledge of Torah and street smarts to shape his calling: helping recovering addicts find their way in the world. 

After being released from prison in 1988 he began his work at Beit T'Shuvah. Over the past twenty-eight years, he has co-created one of the most exceptional approaches to addiction treatment and criminal rehabilitation and reintegration in the world.

The lead singer in this video is Cantor Shira Fox, the daughter of two Los Angeles cantors -- Herschel Fox, the Yiddish stand-up comedian we profiled in 2011 and his wife Judy, the cantor in the Synagogue for the Performing Arts in Los Angeles (where Joseph Telushkin is the rabbi),
 
Enjoy and Shabbat shalom!
 
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Throwback Thursday Comedy Special: Henny Youngman in a One-Liner Performance in 1955

It's been awhile since we've posted a collection of Henny Youngman jokes, so we think Throwback Thursday is a good opportunity to share another bunch with you. 

Youngman, a British-American Jewish comedian and violinist, was very popular in the 1950s and 1960s, with many appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show and on Laugh-in.

His stand-up comedy stood out from that of his fellow comedians in that he only told simple one-liner jokes, a format that was picked up years later by Rodney Dangerfield.

Henny explained the origin of his classic line "Take my wife, please" as a misinterpretation: in the mid-1930s he took his wife to a show and asked the usher to escort his wife to a seat. But his request was taken as a joke, and Youngman used the line countless times ever after.

This video clip goes back 62 years to 1955. The jokes come so fast that it's easy to miss some of the punch lines. We had trouble understanding his opening joke about losing two dollars betting on a horse named Nashua to place until we did some research and found this explanation: The day before Nashua lost a match race to the equally great Native Dancer. Obviously there can't be a place bet when there only two horses racing. 

Enjoy!

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#Throwback Thursday, #TBT

Bob Mankoff, New Yorker Cartoon Editor, Picks His Favorite Jewish Cartoons

Last week JTA profiled Bob Mankoff, retiring cartoon editor at The New Yorker, and asked him to pick his favorite Jewish-themed cartoons from over the years, and he was happy to oblige.

As Gabe Friedman wrote for JTA,

Bob Mankoff has been the cartoon editor at The New Yorker for 20 years. But he’s been a Jew for 72.

The celebrated cartoonist, who is stepping down from his prestigious perch in May, has therefore had a long time to formulate his thoughts on Judaism and Jewish humor. For example, he once wrote an essay about how Jews have become the “People of the Joke,” as opposed to the “People of the Book.”

“The Jews of the Bible aren’t funny,” he told JTA. “[Judaism] is a decent first draft of how to behave. It’s a really good try for 4,000 years ago.”

In this video clip from a Moment magazine symposium, Mankoff shares his observations on Jewish humor. His seven favorite Jewish cartoons appear below the video.

Enjoy!

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