I am so excited about my friend Naomi. She just got engaged. Oh, my! Naomi & I have been friends for a year but I feel like I've known her forever. She's such helpful and loyal friend. I am so happy for her. She is smart, beautiful, funny and very outgoing, it is always interesting to be with her. We have spent lots of Shabbats together and I am so thankful to her for she helped me a lot.
Well, I do not need much reason to be happy and smily, but this news of Naomi's engagement really took my breath away. I mean it. Isn't it amazing that three girls of our MaBaT got engaged during these last 2 months? Oh!!! I can't wait to see Naomi and then, G-d willing, to dance at her wedding till I drop.
I haven't posted here for ages I guess. I have times when I just can't think in English & vica-verca, I post so much that forget my Georgian blog (which happens almost never :lol: )
Today's Tu Bishvat - Jewish New Year of trees. Last year I went to Georgian Hillel to celebrate this day, but this year Tu Bishvat comes to the same day as Shabbat so there won't be any parties I guess. Everyone will celebrate it at home.
Aw. And I miss midrasha. My life is empty without it. I miss all the girls, families I used to visit on Shabbat, shiurs of my beloved teachers, rabbis and all. I just miss that kind of life. Hope to go back soon, with G-d's help.
Our girl school had an outing on the Golan Hights. That way The Israeli Ministry of Education had decided to make "Russian" children over into one hundred percent Israelis. Me and my wife travelled together with the school. Well experienced tour guides were called into action, complete with university degrees and broad smiles. Specially fitted tour programme that included motion pictures was meant to spark off some patriotic sentiment. So the trip was over, what was told there safely forgotten, but one story remains in my memory. It haunts me no less than the account of Metzudah defenders. Because I have returned to Israel, not just came here.
War crashes into our lives and homes in an unnoticeable kind of way and always at a wrong time. All of a sudden it turns out that someone didn't have the time to write up a letter to his mother. That a bride expects over her groom in a six hours time as he hopes finally to get a long awaited "yes".
Soldiers were asleep, as young men could be following excruciating military exercises. Yom Kippur, The Day of Atonement got in, a festival of fasting that brings together almost all of the Jews. There's even a sad joke, "Yom Kippur Jews". Anyways, the boys were fast asleep. Because their commanders kept saying to them that if the enemy dares to...we'll... And that the border is well guarded. And that "The Gardian of Israel doesn't sleep, nor does He drowse". Strong and reliable is battle-tried Israeli military.
The war tore up the quietude of the festival. Syrian tanks rolled into The Valley of Tears. The most advanced at the time T-55 tanks, complete with night vision gear. The latest of Soviet military hardware was always tested in real combat conditions. So the volley was set ablaze.
Khani really meant to say yes to her Beni. It's just that she wanted to lead him on a little more. She'd hate herself for that for many years to come. But in vain.
The fighting over the volley has been on for 2 days now. Less and less tanks respond to the vehicle in command. Communications with the head quarters are out. However, one thing is for sure, the reinforcement is coming. It can't be otherwise. The squad commander, Yig'al Baum receives the same response all over again to all his check-ins: "No ammunition. We're pulling back, back, back".
How difficult it is to take responsibility for someone else's life. The boys haven't lived it up yet. Some don't even know the taste of the first kiss. But what's there to do? The Syrians can't be let past - whatever the price. There comes through a unique order in the history of warfare: "All tanks follow me. The enemy doesn't realise we're disarmed".
But war is no game. You can't just bluff - lives are at stake. Ten tanks started slowly going uphill. Without firing, simply burning away the remaining fuel.
Unrestrained valour sometimes frightens more than the most heavy shelling there is. The Syrians suddenly began to retreat. By the time they figured out that the unfiring tanks aren't some kind of secret Israeli military ploy, the reinforcement moved in.
There are a lot of flowers in the Golan Hights. The flowers grown in the Volley of Tears will never wither. For the memory of the fallen soldiers cannot disappear. So forever will blossom the flowers on the ground drenched with our blood and tears.
Know that everything is according to the reckoning. And let not your evil inclination promise you that the grave will be an escape for you - for against your will you were created; against your will you were born; against your will you live; against your will you die, and against your will you are destined to give an account before the King Who rules over kings, the Holy One, Blessed is He.
(Rabbi Elazar HaKappar. Pirkei Avot 4:29)
"Pirkei Avot" is the book that I read on Shabbat. I read when I feel good and bad. I read when I have nowhere to escape and you cannot escape from yourself, you know. Today I found this quote and could not wait to share it with you.
Free will has always been an issue that bothered me since I have begun to understand life, world and G-d. My mother kept saying, you just do it, what you have to do, and the result will be from above. Sometimes I was doing what I had to do and sometimes - not. Especially if you read something like this and think: if everything is destined and happens without my will, what should I act for? If I have no power to change my life, why should I go on?
One of my friends told me that it is not a right way to think. We, humans, are free to choose the way we go, even though it was destined for us to see it. One still has to decide where to go, what to be, what to wear, what to eat...
And still, can we??? Can we really decide what our life should be like? I do not know and this is the question no-one could answer me so far :| Because nobody really knows. There are controversial facts, speeches and all, so one says what he/she believes or according to its life experiences, childhood and etc.
That is why I adore "Pirkei Avot", you can always find something deep in it and have thinking for rest of your life. By the way, was it destined for me to love "Pirkei Avot" anyway???
Sometimes we think that we did not deserve all the hard things we got into. We think we are much better than G-d can see us we are. That is how we become stressed, empty and lonely.
Today I miss my friends so much. I even wrote an e-mail to Tea and Chili. Skyped Dina and listened to her Israel trip story. And missed them even more.
I've been missing my dear people for all my life, really. Most of them have been living far from me and we just grow up without seeing each other; things happen - we cry, we laugh, we love, we do not love, we feel solitude, we have fun... and all this goes being far apart.
I wrote to Tea that we hardly and seldom understand life. We call it life and it's just G-d's movie where we play our very roles - some good and some bad, but the end is always depended on director's will.
I've been fond of Drew Barrymore since I remember myself. I've been watching her movies all my life, collecting her photos and admiring her character really. She has been through so much - hard adolescence, conflict with parents, crazy boyfriends and husbands, David Letterman shows and etc.
Baby Drew in famous Spielberg movie "E.T."
Bad girl in "Poison Ivy"
Despite everything Drew has become one of the successful actresses, producers, and even directors in Hollywood. There may be lots of starlets playing in romantic comedies, but Drew has something that absolutely distinguishes her from other beautiful Hollywood women. She is crazy, funny, risky and is never afraid to get embarrassed as she once has said.
As Charlie's angel
It was time for her to get an award. And here it is. Drew got the golden globe for performing little Edie Bouvier in "Grey gardens". I saw this movie some weeks ago and got really surprised by Drew. She seemed to have taken this role very seriously and it was nothing like she had played before. I admire her more after seeing her in the movie about Bouvier mother and daughter.
Directing "Whip it"
As Little Edie in "Grey Gardens"
Well-deserved Golden Globe - January 2010
Drew is 10 years senior than me. Some people say I look like her. Thank G-d I did not have life like hers, but mine hasn't been easier though. I hope that in 10 years I'll have got my own golden globe.
