MY BRAIN HURTS

Now that I am ensconced in solitary (almost- spouse is here with me) glory in Shoreham, the family weekender, I actually have a few minutes to think and write. It's been nuts with work, looking after grandchildren, and still no washing machine. 2 weeks now. Been taking it to my sister inlaw's place. 

As an aside, may I give you a word of advice? If you are looking for appliance repair, and you google, and you find a nice, easy to use website with email contact, BUT the only phone number is a cell phone - don't go there. This guy is probably a one man operator who calls in his mates as needed and has no inventory of parts and thus any part will take forever. So Mr Washing Machine, you stooged me. You sound nice on the phone but you really got me good. I paid $126 ( Cash! Because you are having some temporary banking issues and so cannot take a credit card; more bullshit!) for your 'technicians' - 2 Lebanese wogboys, all struts and attitude,  to walk in the door the day after my SOS and look at the machine for 20 seconds; your assurance that I won't have to pay for the visit when they return to affix the part, trapped me. I even offered to courier or FedEx the part from wherever, but no.  So it will be another week. 3 weeks or more! Without a washing machine and 3 little kids in the house. Folks, here's an anti-endorsement: do NOT use Mr Washing Machine. So there. 

I just did 2 loads of laundry here in Shoreham and I actually enjoyed it. 

Enough about domestic shit. 

My brain is split into 3 compartments. One has got all the house stuff stuffed into it, family and all that too. One thinks about Israel, Jewish stuff, world politics, anti Semitism, the Jihadist threat to the world and stuff like that. And the other is relevant to my work: Breastfeeding, birth, mothers and babies. There's been so damn much going on in all three compartments that I haven't had a chance to think, but now... Oh crap, it's nearly Shabbos. 

To be continued. 

A Soul in Transit

There's an apocryphal story about a Westerner who attended a Chinese wedding with a friend of the young couple. During the celebrations there were speeches, and the first speech was made by an elderly relative. The wizened old man stood up, slowly walked to the microphone and beamed a huge smile at the young couple. The crowd maintained a respectful silence. The elder made a short speech in Mandarin, smiled, bowed to the bride and groom and returned to his seat among enthusiastic applause. 

'What did he say?' asked the Westerner. 

'He gave the bride and groom a wonderful blessing. He said, 'Grandparents die, parents die, children die.''

 The Westerner was taken aback. 'What kind of blessing is that? He just said that everyone in the family should die!'

'No, no, listen carefully to the order,' said the friend. 'Of course, eventually everyone will die. But the blessing is that old people will die first, then their children will die in the right time, in their old age, and then the children of the children. Because the greatest sorrow is for children to die before their parents. The greatest blessing is to die in the correct order.'

There is no greater heartbreak than the death of a child. In spite of all the medical advances, in spite of cutting edge medical procedures and medications and all the hope and prayers, in spite of the Tehillim and the community prayer vigils and group challah baking, in spite of the love and support of family and friends who are all good people who give tzedaka and help their fellows, in spite of everything, a child dies. 

We all weep together at this time of communal loss. We are speechless and impotent. We pray for an end to these tragedies which we cannot fathom. We ask 'Why? Why this child, this family, this community?' There are no answers. We try to comfort the bereaved knowing that there is no comfort and no reasons. 

Grandparents. Parents. Children. At least give us this, death in the right order at the right time. 

In memory of HaTinok Boaz ben Ilana veBinyomin.  

May his parents, grandparents, great-grandparents be spared any further heartbreak. May his pure neshoma be a shining light in Gan Eden, may he be a 'gitteh better', an intercessor on behalf of us all. May G-d have mercy on us all and send Moshiach, immediately. 

Amen. 

TRADIE HELL

I may have mentioned that I live a privileged life in a lovely large house in a leafy suburb in Melbourne, one of the world's 'Most Liveable Cities'. I work largely form home, so I spend a lot of time in this lovely home, and although I have a daily housekeeper, I don't have a house manager or butler or whatever; I alone am responsible for the maintenance of the house. And believe me, the house needs a lot- A LOT- of maintenance.
It was built pre WW1 and has been renovated and extended and rewired and replumbed and you name it. It has high ceilings, polished floors, (some carpet though- this will become relevant) and lovely gardens back and front. And I have a pool. And everything needs maintenance and attention from tradesmen. When I say that not a day goes by when I don't have tradies in the house, I am not exaggerating. NOT. A. DAY.
Sometimes all the stars come into alignment and everything comes up at once. Yesterday was one of those days.
At 7.30 am the guys working on the security system turned up, third day running; replacing defective sensors etc etc and since there is also a 'smart house' interface (and what an oxymoron is that expression, 'smart house') called a Crestron, and everything has to be programmed through the Crestron, there was also the guy with the laptop as well as the 2 guys in overalls. Who were fiddling (third day!) with the alarm system, going beep-beep-beep-beep and setting it off from time to time. Did I mention that I work from home?
At 7.45 the aircon-heating maintenance guys came, 2 of them in boots and shorts, climbing up ladders, removing and cleaning filters, searching for missing controls, prowling and lurking around every corner, all day.
Then the pool guy came and did his thing, but he doesn't get in the way much. I still had to talk to him about a problem with the pumps. He was only there an hour.
Meanwhile, the lawn guy was adding to the symphony with his mower and whipper snipper. This guy is a legend. He comes every 2 weeks in spring-summer-autumn and every 3 weeks in winter, come rain or shine, come drought or flood. When the lawn was little more than a dirt patch during the recent 10 year drought, he would still come. I had to beg him to only come once a month. He is a robot. But he was done in an hour too.
Then the carpet cleaning guy came. He was supposed to come 3 weeks ago but didn't due to some dental problems. He didn't call, of course I had to chase him. Then he was supposed to come Monday. So he came Wednesday, in the middle of all of this. He sprinkles this powder which get on everything, and then has this machine which adds to the ambient sound mix. I think the powder dust has affected his brain after all these years because he's always cheerful and always loves to chat no matter how late he must be for his other jobs. (He should have come an extra day late to clean the carpet after the aircon guys in boots tromped all over it.)
What are we up to? 3 cable guys, 2 aircon guys, one pool guy, one carpet guy, one lawn guy, and a hassled housekeeper.
AND THEN. The washing machine broke down. So I had to call a repairman, and I got some info off the net and picked up the phone to call- DEAD. The phone wasn't working.

Actually it had stopped working the night before, so I assumed that the cable dudes had screwed something up; so I called their boss an told on them. But it turns out that the problem lay outside, in the street; the whole area was out because some workmen who were out there slowing traffic and looking very serious while being hoisted up in scissor lifts and cherry pickers to look at power lines and junction boxes, were cutting back trees etc, and it looks like they cut more than trees.

Today, day 3 of no phone, or fax, it occurred to me that I should call Telstra and find out how long this lack of phone will last. (I might add that we had Optus for the internet connection so at least I had THAT, or else I would have topped myself.) And a recorded voice told me that there was a damaged cable and would I like to speak to someone? Well, yes, why not. And a very nice young Indian (of course!) fellow came on the line, confirmed the damaged cable, said it should be fixed by the evening and THEN suggested diverting my home/work phone on to my mobile! For free. Immediately. And he told me how to undivert it once the cable is fixed. I was very impressed by the service, and my inner cynical pessimist was almost silenced. We will see how young Sanjay's advice turns out. (I don't know if his name was Sanjay; if I asked him he would probably say he was Kevin from North Balwyn, not Bangalore. I just like the name Sanjay.)

And yes! The washing machine guys came and told me after 20 seconds that I need a part which they didn't have but they will order. And it turns out that it will take 7-8 working days to get the part. But there will be no service fee when the return to actually fix the machine. Well, $138 well spent! What the hell am I going to do with all the dirty laundry? Shavuot next week, too. I might visit my mother-in-law's washing machine.

And then my housekeeper mentioned that the polished floors were looking a bit ordinary and maybe we need to call the floor guy. Also the marble tiles in the en-suite had some weird blotchy marks, so we should get the stone guys out (again).

So after the cleaners and the gardener leave, I'm leaving my house to go to the mall, to look at a fridge for my newlyweds. I need some peace and quiet.

FOREVER YOUNG?

I am a huge fan of Peter Alexander pyjamas. Yes, I know they are overpriced, but they are so CUTE. And I have grandchildren. And little kids always need PJ's. PLUS it's so easy to shop on-line; it's the friendliest website ever. And because I am a good customer, I also get a printed catalogue which has immensely high production values and is bright and cheery and full of pretty girls and boys modelling their jammies and trackies and bootees, as if anyone actually looks like that when slopping around in these clothes, in bed or out.
So, as Mothers' Day (please note placement of apostrophe; it is MOTHERS' not Mother's. I always feel a surge of rage and despair at poor apostrophic placement. I am not alone. There is a world of punctuation nerds out there. But I digress.) is around the corner, the catalogue featured stuff for Mum too, modelled by the famous 'femme d'un age certain', (older lady- in this case VERY older lady) Carmen Dell'Orefice who is 82. Yes, you read that right- 82.

http://www.peteralexander.com.au/shop/en/peteralexander/catalogue

Now, the thing about Carmen is that she does not resemble in any way, any 82-year-old woman I have ever seen. There is no way that she has not had 'work' done, no matter what G-d gave her. And G-d did bestow upon her height, slenderness and great cheekbones. But you don't get that smoothness of complexion without a fair bit of nip and tuck. The catalogue states that there was no photoshopping used on the images so one can only assume that she herself has been - well, photoshopped for real.
So when it says 'Beauty is Ageless', I can only agree; but in the end, it's a pretty limited view of what beauty is.

http://www.peteralexander.com.au/shop/en/peteralexander/catalogue?utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=PA1305WK3D&utm_source=Shop+Catalogue+Footer&cm_mmc=Email-_-PA1305WK3D-_-Shop+Catalogue+Footer-_-NA&link#look12

Because it's still all the same 'beauty' isn't it?! She is trying, pretty successfully, to hang onto the chimera of youth, right? Smooth skin, tall and straight and slender. Ageless. With some help.

She has been modelling since age 15 and has had an interesting (read 'difficult') life, so good on her for her long and successful career, even though now it's not the catwalk or Vogue, it's Peter Alexander and his PJ's;  but you can see the humour and the elegance.

But beauty has to come in more diverse packages than youth, or faux-youth. It has to.

What is WRONG with us?

Last night I watched the first episode of Arrow. I had been anticipating this rather keenly, in fact, I had even seen the first 2 episodes on a plane a few weeks ago and I actually wanted to see it again. I don't do this new-fangled internet thing, I don't have cable, I just watch free-to-air from time to time. I can barely work the TV remote, since I never get to hold the thing, being female and all.
Anyway, I do love a bit of the comic-book hero rehash, and DC's JLA (Justice League of America) was a personal favorite back in the day, PLUS, I admit I like a bit of eye candy and a good fight, so Arrow it was. This is the Green Arrow like nobody ever would have thought of in the JLA of the 1960's. As with many of these re-imaginings, the hero is a dark vigilante with a Secret yada yada, but mmm-mmm does he look good. And the parkour (free running or what have you) is amazing. And the fights are great. And he gets the baddies etc. So that was good.

Then I made the mistake of continuing to watch the next program, The Following. Now, this has been acclaimed as a great drama with great performance from the main character, played by Kevin Bacon, who is a damaged ex-FBI agent who hunted down and brought to justice a nefarious serial murderer who keeps escaping and killing more people. The hook on this one is that the baddie (sorry, I missed his name) is a sort of cross between Hannibal Lecter (genius, charismatic, evil killer) and Charles Manson (the same, but minus the genius, plus he actually does exist) and has A Following of people whom he has in thrall and who will do anything for him, literally kill and die for him. He was some sort of professor and he managed to turn many students to the Dark Side.
So Kevin Bacon is the one who knows most about him and thus has been brought back from his alcoholic depressed retirement to get him. Look, there's all sorts of plot happening, and it's really well acted and very tight and chilling; but it is appalling.

The act of killing is so eroticized it is sickening. This is more than the stylised violence that we have become used to, guns and biffo and roundhouse kicks and what-have-you. In this one episode I saw, not even from beginning to end, we saw the Master whatever his name is, teach a student how to kill a bound and gagged terrified woman, with a knife, almost as a caress, with ecstatic eye-closing etc; a shocking fight between a captured cop and one of the followers, egged on by other followers, involving metal pipes and knives with the cop being stabbed and rescued in the nick of time by Kevin Bacon who comes in guns blazing (well, at least nobody was gettin' it on, apart from the bloodlust, that is); a scene where one of the followers offers his life to the Master as a gift and as punishment for himself because he didn't succeed in his duty, and the Master taking him up on the offer and stabbing him in the most erotic, even homo-erotic, way, all embraces and sighing and gasps and murmurs, while standing on a plastic sheet which had been thoughtfully placed on the carpet by another disciple to avoid bloodstains; one of the male followers beating up on and almost strangling one of the female followers, as some sort of foreplay to violent consensual sex; and there was more, but these were the standouts. Knives and knives and knives; the parallels with sexual penetration were not lost on me. Duh.

We've had vampires all sexed up and neatly packaged for teen consumption; and we've had Hannibal 'the cannibal' Lecter, all Mr Exquisite Sensibility, tucking into a victim's liver, while listening to Glenn Gould's Goldberg Variations; and we've had sado-masochism gone mumsy mainstream in good old Fifty Shades; and every time I put on the TV there's more crime and police procedurals and Criminal Minds etc etc ad nauseam. But this is on free-to-air TV, 9.30 on a weeknight. And never have I seen such a juxtaposition of sex and violence and cold-blooded murder, such a blurring of Eros-Thanatos, life wish-death wish stuff, it would have Papa Freud spinning in his grave so fast he would drill his way to China.

What the hell is the matter with us? Why do we want to watch this? Why are these programs being made? Do we really want more and more graphic and disturbing violence? We sure have come a long way from Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot on the Orient Express. People getting sliced and diced, so easily abducted and murdered, and hohoho hahaha creepy Dexter only kills the bad guys, except sometimes he accidentally kills innocent people, whoops! That's entertainment, folks, 2013 style.

I am definitely sticking to comic-book heroes. Definitely the buff dude doing the ascending muscle-ups and the parkour chases to get the baddies has it all over this sick stuff. Is it just me?

Who is to blame?

On March 25, 1911, in New York City, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire claimed the lives of 146 garment workers, all young women, aged 14 to 43. Most of the victims were recent Jewish and Italian immigrants. The fire started in a scrap bin toward the end of the long working day, and quickly spread. Probably a match or cigarette butt started it, the bin was full of months' worth of accumulated fabric scraps, and the fire spread rapidly. There were no alarms. The fire exits had been sealed to prevent unauthorized breaks and theft; this was a common practice at the time. The workers died of smoke inhalation or in the flames, and many tried to leap from the 8th, 9th and 10th floors of the building, where the factory/sweatshop was located. Most died, of course. Others who did manage to find an unlocked fire exit were killed when a poorly-constructed fire escape broke away and dumped them 100ft onto concrete.
The tragedy was the second deadliest disaster in NYC until the destruction of the World Trade Centre in 2001.
As a result of this horror, significant workplace reform took place. Legislation led to improved factory safety standards. The Ladies' Garment Workers Union was formed to fight for better conditions for sweatshop workers.

Whose fault was this fire? It was certainly not the fault of the consumers of the ladies' blouses that the factory produced.

The recent collapse of the Bangladeshi factory has so far killed 380 garment workers. It is unlikely that any more survivors will be pulled from the rubble, 5 days after the event. The 8 story building was illegally constructed and cracks in the building had been noted; the workers were not supposed to have been there on the day the collapse occurred, but they were ordered to come to work by their bosses, so they came. They needed the job. Many children were killed because there was a creche on the premises; a part of me thought that having childcare at work is actually a pretty good thing for working mothers, but who knows what that sort of childcare means? Playing with a ball of yarn under your mother's machine, until you are old enough to thread a needle?

So now I am reading opinions in the blogosphere about how it's all our fault in the West; it's the fault of the global economy and it's the fault of the consumers who want inexpensive clothing. It's the fault of Benneton and whoever else was having their product made in Bangladesh. It's the fault of Wal-Mart for keeping prices low for their customers. And how we in the West should care about where our clothes come from, just as we care where our eggs and coffee come from, and we should have clothing labelled to show if it was made in an acceptable factory, and we should not buy from countries where sweatshop workers are exploited etc.

http://www.dailylife.com.au/news-and-views/dl-opinion/the-role-we-all-played-in-the-bangladesh-tragedy-20130428-2in4s.html#comments

I think that this is just middle-class white guilt. The fault does not lie with the customer who wants nice clothes for a low price; the fault lies with corrupt and incompetent governance. It lies with the building inspector who is bribed to turn a blind eye to shoddy and illegal practices. It lies with the government department who only employs 18 building inspectors for the whole of Bangladesh, as if there is a shortage of people there. It lies with the owner who built an extra 3 storeys onto a 5 story building and got away with it. Until it collapsed.
Corruption and to a lesser degree, incompetence, are the 2 major contributors to bad governance in the Third World.

We in the West can beat our collective breast over our rampant consumerism, but we did not kill those poor women. There is nothing inherently wrong with being paid a low wage as a semi-skilled worker. These women want the work and need the work; the garment industry in Bangladesh is the third largest in the world, after China and Italy. It is worth 20 billion dollars annually.

But there is everything wrong with being killed at work.

We cannot 'fix' Bangladesh and other such countries. Certainly boycotting these garments would be impossible, absurd and, in the end, harmful to the economy and the workers.
Change must come from within, as it did after the Triangle fire.

YOM HAZIKARON 2013

Last night I attended the local Yom HaZikaron commemoration at Robert Blackwood Hall in Monash Uni Clayton.

I wrote about my brother Yehuda who fell in the Yom Kippur War, October 1973, last year, and I really have nothing more to say about him. Although, there is good news; my daughter named her baby boy after him 5 months ago. Little Yehuda Raphael is the first to be named after him, may he always be a source of nachas to his parents.

So I won’t write about my brother. I want to write about the actual ceremony.

Some 20+ years ago when Yom HaZikaron started being commemorated in Melbourne, it was a small, short affair. It went from 8pm to 9pm, pretty much sharp, and it was all in Ivrit and attended mainly by Israelis. About 300 would come and the venues wandered around from Beit Weizman to school halls and town halls, eventually coming to rest at the Robert Blackwood Hall, one week after the Yom HaShoa commemoration. It got bigger and bigger, it drew more diverse participants and, along the way, it changed from a tight, rather military-style evening with a very Israeli flavour, to a rather long, bilingual affair, with pre-recorded segments from Israel being screened as well as lots of speeches from local dignitaries and heads of Zionist organizations. This is all OK up to a point. But the interesting thing is that, while Yom HaShoa, which attracts slightly larger crowds and involves children’s choirs and a lot more people coming and going on stage, as well as survivor testimony and candle lighting by elderly folk and their families, has become tighter and more streamlined, starting at 8 and ending at 9.30, the Yom HaZikaron evening seems to get longer and longer; last night went from 7.30 to 9.30, and then there was a singalong for the Israelis, at which point we left.

In fact, I understand why this evening has spread out in this way. Early on, there were 7 candles lit, each in remembrance of the wars fought: 1948, Independence war; 1956 Suez war; 1967 Six Day War; 1967-70 War of Attrition; 1973 Yom Kippur War; 1982 First Lebanon War; and a candle for the victims of terror. And lives lost in training accidents.

Well, unfortunately, you can see the problem here. There have been more wars. Second Lebanon. Gaza, Cast Lead and Pillar of Defence. First and second intifadas, although that was more about terror attacks. 

It’s not as ‘neat’ as Yom HaShoah and the 6 candles for the 6 million. It keeps growing. But you can’t just keep adding candles. So now there are still 7 candles lit but it’s all over the place. With each candle we hear the story of an individual who lost his or her life in defence of Israel, usually in combat but sometimes in training, or as a result of terror. 7 people come and light them, family or friends of the dead. And there are stories and stories and stories.

23,085 people have lost their lives since the State was established. Every family in Israel has been bereaved.

Last night, the hall was pretty full; but it should be overflowing. Yom HaZikaron is a reminder that, however you feel about it, as a Jew you have a link with Israel, the only Jewish state in the world. This little piece of land which has been fought over for millennia, is our land, and it’s all we’ve ever had and it’s all we’ll ever get. We’ve been kicked out of it and stomped on numerous times, but we’re still here, and it’s still ours. Whether you are religious or not, Zionist or not, left or right in politics, when push comes to shove, Israel with its politically blurry borders and its hostile neighbours, is all we Jews have. If we had had Israel, or any sort of foothold in Palestine during the time of the British Mandate, the horrors of the Holocaust would not have been. Jews had nowhere to go, in the main, and history showed that nobody wanted them, and they were murdered. We were murdered; one third of the 18 million Jews at the time, the flower of European civilization, were murdered. Triated, not decimated; decimation is the killing of one in 10. One in three of us perished at the hands of Nazism and world apathy. If we had had a Jewish state, even only a little piece of the ancient Jewish homeland which the British at first ‘gave’ us with the Balfour Declaration and then prevented us from entering during the Mandate, maybe we would have ‘only’ been decimated. We might ‘only’ be mourning 1.5 million martyrs instead of 1.5 million children. But millions would have been saved.

It is not good enough to say that Yom HaZikaron doesn’t interest you or is not meaningful to you or you have something better to do on the night. Israel is our birthright, as Jews. If we don’t show ourselves, our children, the world, that it is important to us, then it looks like we don’t care. And if a Jew doesn’t care about the Jewish state, then who the hell will?

In memory of the fallen, the heroes in battle, the victims of terror;  those who have survived with injuries, physical and psychological and spiritual; and the wounded families, whose lives have been changed forever. 

Lest we forget.

Am Yisrael Chai.