Question of freedom (Re: I Gave My 3 Year Old an iPhone)

January 24, 2010 at 11:33 pm (Critics, Innovation, Life, Media, People, technology, world)
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b”h

What is freedom? First and foremost, a basic question.

A still barely defined one.

The second question following : What does freedom depend on?

The third, then:

Can freedom be dependence and vice versa?

My personal reflection.

—

Why the philosophic introduction? It’s the first things I thought of when reading the article  I Gave My 3 Year Old an iPhone: Have I Created a Monster? and the comments on it. A couple of days ago, after the article appeared the first time on the home page of WordPress, I remember to have clicked on the link immediately, with big eyes, expecting a literally “burning” page on a topic of such blatant controversy. As I suggested, it’s a burning topic with all sorts of responses. At that time, there were over 100 responses, at the present time, surely over 150.

So I dove into the issues of a parent reporting on “his way” of education of his young child, namely, 3 years old.

It’s not a new way of education and no new philosophy. With all due respect, technical revolution hasn’t started last year with the arrival of the almost omnipotent I-phone. First there had been the discussion on TV’s, and perhaps even before on radios. I don’t know what came first. Then the records. CDs. Little “high-tech gods” provided us then with walkmans and the computer came into use. I bet the newspapers and parent magazines of those prehistoric times were filled with articles reminding of the one cited. Media hasn’t prove itself being wrongly invented, so far, in the most cases, when mindful adults took control of it. I am not a pessimist.

Discussion and opinion sharing is everything, for me. After all, we should be living in an open world.

Do we consider it being a free world, though?

Instead of focusing on the variety aspects freedom seems to offer for a discussion, let’s take one out. The free choice of man to decide in favour or against technological development.

(Unfortunately, this development is often equated with civilization. Could one prove me this is a right equation?)

So now, what’s with our I-phone? Is it a new symbol of the free being and the entrance into a “more free” human era?

For this we should have defined first what freedom is. To start off, let’s state what freedom certainly isn’t.

To be free does not mean to be free of all obligations towards family, friends, society, environment. Right? Wrong?

If you feel that you owe no gratitude to your parents, it’s not your job to develop your child’s sould because the child relies on you and you are his source, if you feel that whatever happens to this world is not of your interest, if society collapses because everyone does what he likes doing and fears no law: Is this your dream of how your freedom should look like?

To be free does not mean to be in a relationship of dependency. Right? Wrong?

If you depend one someone borrowing you money, or on a drink to be drunk when you feel unwell, or a bad habit you practise but which actually does not benefit you: Is this your dream of how your freedom should look like?

Why do I ask such questions? To create a fluent connection to the I-phone and its “character”. Complicated but simple. I’ve just found it out after my friend got an I-phone himself. I’m not telling I wasn’t envious at him. I was. And then the self-educational process started in my head; a process which is less recognizable from outside compared to motor scills, yet this “process” made me understand what advanced technology means.

(Yeah perhaps it’s only reconceiling with the fact I can’t afford that toy, you might think. But who said that reconciliation doesn’t lead to straight thoughts?)

Iphones and similiar let me think I am deeply in need of a “my town” application or the last time table of the bus to your neighbourhood. Or the weather forecast for the next months possibly…

Advanced technology gives me the illusion of freedom and creates dependance.

I, personally, do not want to be dependant. I want to use my mind which creates the best apps possible due to memory skills, ability to learn languages, appreciate nature, feelings and thoughts.

This I have to learn and experience first. Only then should I turn to technology in order to reproduce what I’ve understood.

Remember: this I think as a barely grown-up. Would I think the same as a child exposed to the iphone? I don’t say a child using I-phones does not get the appropriate guideance. It’s the question of who dominates his life.  Who should it be dominated by.

Setting of priorities.

—

There was a comment which I suggest represents the wast-spread opinion of many modern-age parents and ones who strive to be such.

Do we need another IT genius?

It goes like that:

My daughter is 1 year 4 months and she already knows how to activate the iPod Touch, slide to unlock and flip through the homescreen. I’m so proud : D

I somehow expected it, you know. I agree, it looks nicely, a toddler staring professionally on a screen of a business man’s device, locking and unlocking it. It’s amusing and fun and I guess the motor skills of the little girl improve, somehow. At least the ones dealing with touch.

Yet I wonder, whether this little baby, being so clever at turning the phone on and off, knows how to talk. How to say thank you and when. Perhaps, if she’s so clever, the proud parent could have taught her the first letters.

Or perhaps it’s not really a question of intelligence. There were studies on adult apes , chimpanzees and the like, to observe their reaction and cognitive process when feeling hunger or when in need of action. The ape had to recognize a button with a banana on it in order to push it and therefore order the banana to come. And even more sophisticated ones, I simply do not remember all details…

Is this now a question of intelligence? In this case, the ape has shown much more.

Or another one.   Now it’s the case of a slightly other generation of ancestry, a person who surely didn’t grow up with technical devices and apps for breakfast. The person was delighted on the functions an I-phone has to offer for her little one. She even wrote how the phone is “dedicated” to the child.

I didn’t quite get the meaning of this.  I responded, but actually, the response goes to us all who we feel tempted by the technical options of today to integrate them to the fullest into our life:

The phone is truly dedicated as it has no choice.
Who else is dedicated to your offspring?
Songs being available are great.
Even greater it has been for me as a child to have a person available to me to sing a song with.
I don’t think a child’s mind has changed so much in the last decade. Do you?
Some say, they can monitor  activity at the phone.
And without… can they? Would they?
Would they try instead of extending the battery rather extending the time of personal dedication and guideance for the son, grandson, niece?
Or will she search for life experience through the apple search function, perhaps?…

Simple questions need oftenly one single word to be  replaced in them and the effect is  tremendous.

—

No, I’m not making it easy for me.

I’m not a parent, I can’t jugde on this behalf.

I basically note down what comes to my conclusion as a youngster having all these devices around me. A youngster who may claim that her intelligence wasn’t damaged at all by the lack of sophisticated technical toys due to limited financial household. That’s my experience and as a child I perfectly survived without television at home and I think, others would do the same. No problem at exposing oneself to technics. The very prove I do this is this entry.

But before, in my opinion, one should first have known how the world is without. The simple world we all live in, minus the toys. Since the sun shine and the wind blows without caring for the weather forecast app.

(Believe it or not, there is a beautiful saying in the Tora which states “Here I put in  front of you life and death, so choose life”. I consider it being the ultimate prove of reasonable free human will. Examine and choose what makes you live.)

“Have I created a monster?”, the author of the entry asks.

No, you haven’t. Every person creates him-/herself.

Nothing against learning letters through guideance of an electronic device.

It’s just, once you dive into it, you can hardly get out. Neither can your child.

Isralike

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Colours of the landscape

January 24, 2010 at 12:44 am (Life, philosophie, philosophy, world)
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b”h

Our realities are made by our own hands.

Every day this is being proved to me in an incredibly powerful way.

I try to hold on. Focus my eyes on an object. Try not to think at all. But just as Rousseau commented, “The man does not love to think. Once started, he can’t stop though”:  I literally feel my thoughts wander nonstop through my body . It’s usual, it’s not something new. What startles me is when I realise it’s not the sort of thoughts which bound me to the present moment. It’s solely internal. I reflect on things said and done, on what they cause, on what I’ve seen today and what I am planning to see; whether it is raining outside and when it will begin to rain; where’s my mum, what is she doing?, and finally, when did I see this place the last time before now.

You see – not a single thought of what I’m doing now. I’ve focused my eyes on something, but I don’t even care. If you could scan my mind from outside, you wouldn’t be able to fix it at a certain point. It wanders from past to future. From empirical impressions to subjective and fictional expectations.

Where is the real world here?…

I leave it be.


When trying to catch my concentration and to force it to stand still instead of wandering around, I experience a feeling of growing emptiness as I don’t know what to think of the present moment. How to relate to the fact that I stand here and look at  a wall or a chair. There can’t a full second be felt in which my mind isn’t trying to develop the idea of presence. No pause from reflection and digestion can be taken on its own.

So I leave it be. G-d is grand…

Reality is man-made. By me  and for my own, even if I come to an agreement with my environment on certain abstract and physical matters so that we can have a sort of a common basis. It sounds to general, but here an example: my mood.

I sit on a chair in the library, just woken up after having fallen asleep a while ago. My window view are tops of roofs, a grey sky and black trees standing still next to the houses. I feel weakly, turn some music on and put my earphones into my ears. Immediately, I’m droven away by the rhythm, the melody and the singer’s voice. I’m no longer perceiving the outside in its silent, neutral way. The song is melancholic and slow, lifts me high spiritually but still leaves space for traces of sadness. So I watch houses and think of those I’ve been in throughout my life; of how I want to change my everyday; of how difficult it is going to be for me to get up from this chair and continue spending my day in hurry and stress instead of watching and learning life silently.

Yet I know and I, in my momentual, intentional despair, hope for the next song to follow so that I can gain strength and optimism and get up from the chair and trust in myself that life will go on. I’m torn between proceeding to the next song or to remain with the quiet and sad one to enjoy my dreams.

Nothing in the world indicates though, that houses may be a reason for melancholy and the grey sky for stress. It’s still the same view from the window.

… And minutes later I’m on my way, hurrying down the roads, planning the next steps on my daily agenda. Forgotten the houses, the trees and the sadness.

So I leave it open, leave it be. There are many waves in the sea.

Too often during the day it’s being offered to us  to detract ourselves from reality. Be those technical devices, books, films, music. At this point here I don’t care whether it’s for the good or for the bad. It’s a noteworthy fact, though: While detracting from the collective world, I automatically begin filling my own one.

- And that’s what I eventually exist for, isn’t it? The Talmud had known this long before me as its Sages stated that “One who saves a human being, saves a whole world”.

I live by the saying that in order to enjoy this world to the fullest, I have to have the desire to understand how it works. The absence of an omnipresent realty is a breathtaking observation I’ve been doing now for a couple of days. It shows me, on the one hand, how short-lived words and images are; it’s the deeds which contribute to our collective world which should have more importance and value.

And still, if we remind ourselves of the magic statement of Antoine de Saint-Éxupery, “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly. What is essential is invisible to the eye” and even take in account scientific remarks on physics, the answer would be all the same:

It’s solely your mind which adds or takes away the colours of a landscape.

Isralike

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Museum and me – Berlinian impressions 2

December 30, 2009 at 1:24 am (Holidays, Judaism, Life, travel)
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b”h

The human being always directs his most attention to things familiar, known and/or dear to him. A connection is the most important thing. No matter where or how. It’s part of his behaviour.

That’s what I’ve learned the last days.

As for museum (museums - hardly an acceptable plural), in Berlin I used the opportunity to enter one or two – after a long time of observing solely “wild life”.

The first day I’ve spent at the Jewish Museum, the whole daytime until dawn. (Not a very smart decision because afterwards I had to discover the “rest” during twilight and cold darkness.) The Jewish Museum, I must acknowledge, is full of everything. It’s really crowded with objects worthy of seeing them. It’s full of photos, items and – description plates. Perhaps the second most important thing in a museum.

On my feelings I had during my Jewish Museum visit – and afterwards while visiting other galeries – I understood what characterizes my behaviour at “cultural sights” the most:

I basically go to a museum or an exhibition to look for things I know or have seen, things I’ve already liked most. You understand? I believe most people visit these places in order to find something new, to see things they’d never find anywhere else. Or if to a concert, then to hear music one would not normally come across.

But me, I get most delighted when stumbling upon something good, old, familiar. I cannot go visit museum or listen to musicians playing something I’ve never heard of. A slight conservatism of a strange direction. I’m not sure whether this is the purpose of a concert or an exhibition. Yet in cases of pleasure of this sort, I don’t like taking risks. Because I don’t like the feeling of being disappointed, of having wasted my time.

It’s as if I was meeting old friends instead of trying to find new ones.

So now, back to the keyword -  what does a Jew look for in a Jewish Museum?

I believe, he would look for items he’d be able to feel connected to.  To be honest, more or less I went through and learned about Ashkenazi Jewish history already years ago. If then I get to a museum of exactly this culture, I don’t know how to react.

And so I was wandering around and what caused my real interest?

When I found stories telling of Jewish youth of today and how they maintain their lives. When I saw posters and photos from the beginnings of Jewish resettlement in the HolyLand.

But here comes the real highlight of the visit:

In the special exhibition on Kosher food and food rituals in other cultures (amusing and really entertaining topic, very well presented!!) I ran into a recording of Jewish food blessings.

By a Yemenite rabbi!!

Nothing could erase my smile afterwards.

(For people who don’t know my Yemenite story, just take it for granted that anything Yemenite wams my heart 24 hours a day.)

And then as the top of the whole adventure, I got to see a episode of one of the funniest TV series ever. “Avoda Aravit”, Arab Labour.

Israeli series in Hebrew. In the museum.

What does one want more?!

Except for, well, reading from an old Torah scroll in another exhibition in another museum.

You see, my guideline sounds something like

“To go out in order to go in” or “to leave in order to return”.

Funny thing. My mother educated me culturally since year 1 and before.

And I go there in order to return to my own “kitchen and sewing box”.

But at least, I have fun!

Sometimes there’s no need at all to bite the bullet. :)

Isralike

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In my Capital – Berlinian impressions 1

December 30, 2009 at 12:40 am (Beauty, Holidays, Life, travel)
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b”h

Making myself familiar with Berlin. Berlin…

So here I am – and very soon the time will have arrived for me to leave – in my capital city. In Berlin, in the North-Eastern part of Germany.

Far away from Cologne.

And my thoughts wander and I’m glad to experience this new corner of the world.

Berlin! A superlative in all its respects. Wide streets, endless boulevards, high, old-fashioned houses. As I haven’t seen so many big European cities so far, for me Berlin represents the ultimate fusion of Old World and attempts of Modern Age. As I said, I haven’t seen too many metropolises. Yet there are certain ones I can compare Berlin with.  I like them all. So I must admit, Berlin didn’t fascinate people for nothing.

It’s Germany’s heart, for sure a Northern one yet still the source of energy for this country. In its own way.

Somehow I perceive Berlin in another way as it happens to me with Cologne. The elements and remains of the previous generations of which this town and its inhabitants are undoubtly proud of – or at least content with  – it’s astonishing. Highly admirable for me. Cologne, the town I’ve spent most of my life in, never seemed to me striving to preserve nor make use of the prudence of previous generations, it didn’t really care for its own spirit or atmosphere . Now that I have Berlin around me, I realise that Cologne’s way of life – if I only knew why! – has too often been to look forward and never “backward”, as if to feel free of the former burdens such as old-fashioned houses and worn-out looking streets. So-called modernity, either because of the present multiculturalism in Cologne, or because nothing  of the older kind remained after the war – this is present Cologne’s direction, goal and god.

And it seems to me so artificial.

Not the like in Berlin. And this makes me, personally, feel good here. Somehow it’s a town which is not ashamed of its own. Not ashamed to maintain a certain image and not to change it year after year. It is respectable and loves details.  Berlin does not need any Roman ruins to gain historical importance. Almost like in Jerusalem, you may feel in Berlin the history of countries, states and lives clouded around you. Sometimes it seems overweighted, at certain places. I recomment to avoid them from time to time.

I’ve been longing a lot in Cologne for buildings, equipment and everyday life which would allow you to feel connected also to the past and not only to the future which never seems futuristical enough. To some, high stone buildings in beige, brown and grey with sometimes only one window side might seem depressing. I  enjoy them. It’s only reasonable that Berlin and sorroundings are considered a federal state on its own. There’s indeed no lack in space in this town.

The Wall, the Brandenburg Gate  -and I’ve even visited the Reichstag with the last visitors’ group at night – lovely places actually. I had been eager to see the East  -and discovered that there isn’t nowadays so much difference between the two. Now, after 20 years of unification.

I wonder whether the people here who lived in West or East before 1989 can understand the Jerusalemites and what the War of 1967 meant to them. I wonder whether a person who had felt his heart torn apart when the wall separated him from his beloved ones between ‘61 and ‘89 now thinks with compassion of Palestinians whose land was used to build the security fence in Betlehem and West Bank.  There are many walls on the earth. But not all cause hearts to melt, hate and danger to disappear and people to unite, once they fall.

My aim here for these 3 days was to understand a bit the spirit of this city. For this, I made use of busses (2 floors like in London! I am impressed!), trams, city trains and underground rail. My daily ticket covered all areas I had the time to visit. Walking and eating and phoning at the least comfortable places belongs to this “hunt for Berlin spirit” just like entering backyards of houses and visiting a “Room of Silence” and the like. And sometimes I just had to stop and breath through.

And it has been only 20% of the town area I’ve run through, or even less!!

Today afternoon (30/12) I’m gonna leave.

But I hope very much to come back when nature’s returned to the town. Means in summer. There are various lakes in and around Berlin. I haven’t seen even one. It’s winter time.

So, what?

I love Berlin.

No.

I feel good in Berlin.

I’ve bought a coffee cup there.

Meanwhile a visitor. Isralike

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Ofra, the 21st, 5 years – skipped?

December 21, 2009 at 7:49 pm (Life, Music, ofra haza)
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b”h

Ofra Haza 97...

Dear Ofra,

on our special day, today the 21st of December, this year, 2009 it would have been 5 years since 2004. The time and day I discovered you the first time. The time and date my world changed completely anew. And me, this time I forgot to plan something so in the end I didn’t do anything at all. Now it’s late, I can’t even go for a walk, I have spent my time on other people and I feel very ashamed and lethargic even. 5 years – and nothing happened. As if I went to stagnation on your topic. No computer, nothing. Can’t even make a video clip.

Sorry, it’s a not a sign of strength nor continuation.

Love you.

AyCh
ofrahaza.de

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Israel’s Unsung

December 16, 2009 at 7:54 pm (Ethik, Israel, Judaism, Life, Politics, Zionism, ideologie)
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b”h

Very often I claim my life to be quite interesting, full of happenings which do not allow me falling into depression, stagnation or simple boredom.

Now I look around and see that the current situation in Israel doesn’t allow one to fall asleep either. For sure, Israeli turbulences do not affect (nor afflict?) an extremely high percentage of the world population. Yet if looking closely on the topics and matters the trouble is about, one will not deny its significance.

Ideological, ethical, spiritual, social and national battles take place there every day anew. Israel is a country which never rests – even the Holy Day of Rest, the Shabbat, cannot be seen as a period of cease-fire, on the contrary, it’s the day where the ones throw stones, others add fuel to the fire (ironically, lightening fire is forbidden by the Torah!) by their statements, decrees, acts.

Let’s tell of one example.

Last Thursday, I guess – now it’s almost a week ago – radical Jewish settlers went out on rampage of special kind. Protesting the anyways weak settlement freeze imposed by the Israeli government on the Westbank area, they entered a mosque in a location called Yasuf and set fire in the room where holy scriptures were stored, obviously in the library. They left the site of crime signing their “act of sweet revenge” with Hebrew sprayings. (Domestic reports on it can be found at Jerusalem Post, Haaretz.com and others.)

There can be for sure variuous ways of how to judge upon this. My point is clear: it’s an act of ignorance, blind hate and planned revenge on the ones in replacement of the others. I was distraught. Pure barbarism and nothing more. Niveauless struggle for everyone-has- already-forgot-what. If one intended to harm Israel’s internal and external image in a never-seen-before way and additionally to provide the accusants with as powerful evidences as possible, then I’d say he couldn’t have done it better to succeed on the largest scale.

At least within the country. I’m not sure whether the outer sphere noticed.

Yet, anyways, the issue was in the headlines for two or three days and then moved down.

And then something very significant happened.

The Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of Israel, Yona Metzger, moved down (or up) to Yasuf for a solidarity visit  – with the mosque. Or with the village.

Or with the shaken Jewish values in that region.

Because this is not how Jews behave. This is not the Jewish law, the Jewish tradition, the Jewish ideal. Neither does this crime have anything to do with Jewishness or Israeliness. And one has to call it by its regular name – the mosque attack has been a crime. And the act is to be considered an act of terrorism. Just as a month ago a Jewish terrorist, the term I’d never thought it would be used once, was (finally!?) caught,  (be his name deleted), a serial murderer and ideological terrorist for several years. He has been convicted. The nation was shocked.

And then the Yasuf affair. Though the Torah forbids attacks or any harassment against inhabitants of the country, be they Jews or non-Jews, be their status strangers or citizens.

I was relieved by Rabbi Yonah Metzger’s statement. Even more than by the fierce condemnation the President Shimon Peres offered following the attack. I mean, he surely thought the same way as I did, yet it is is obligation, you understand. It has a completely different value than that of a Rabbi’s statement, a Rabbi who more or less is the Chief “Representative” of present Judaism (it’s a vague term, I know.).

As I mentioned before, I haven’t heard of many occasions when the Head of the Jewish religious institution made it to the Palestinian Muslims of the Westbank to consolate them over the loss of their mosque.

And another miracle of coexistance was a group of settlers, obviously more rational than radical ones. Forgive me that I don’t recall the name of the association. These Jews came and replaced the burnt remains of Qoranic scriptures with new ones. Just as the Halacha, the Jewish law, requires. The law of compensation of damaged good.

Have you heard about those unsung personalities of the last week? Weren’t this said in the news?And why not?

Don’t ask. Don’t say in return how many desecrations had been made by others on our holy places, throughout history. Don’t defend crime acts, don’t approve villains and barbars.If you don’t know how to respond, take it as a fact.

I don’t care how many thugs other nations have to deal with. May the whole world sink in chaos around, may murder and immorality become a necessary part of each civilized country’s constitution.

In our Torah, the teaching straight from G-d, it is said: “Run after justice with justice.” Tzedek, tzedek tirdof.

We have to stay pure and holy. It’s a condition and an aim.

Know that I won’t have rest until I know that morality is restored within our rows, that we do not desecrate G-d’s name in favour of our personal or politically-directed interests.  I know that my soul has its highest rejoice when I hear of unsung like the the ones mentioned above.

Wouldn’t you then agree with me that this is the real national, patriotic love? If not this, so what?

–

Isralike

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Chanukkah and more….

December 14, 2009 at 2:48 pm (Holidays, Judaism, philosophie)
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b”h

<<Zur Mishelo – Eshet Chayil  – soundddddddd…>>>

It’s Chanukkah time and Chanukkah reminds me again of the fact that Jewish holidays will soon return to us.. in a couple of months after this 8-day-long festivity…

Yemenite Chanukkah

So what’s so special about holidays?

Well, I thought yesterday, the special thing is mainly that the meaning of this or other holiday  is discovered at its very end and not, as one might think,at its start… This so far as my observation is concerned. I doubt I’d “feel” any holiday

date approaching if I’d not

think about it and what this means to me. The same is with any date, symbol, place, event or word. Just as things becom

e within reach and memorizable only after you know their name or at least have any idea of them in mind -  same

with meaning. Same with holiness.

Things become meaningful, valuable, holy if you grant them such attributes. To realize why something is meaningful, valuable, holy you have to enter the perspective of the one who gave them these attributes. ….

Well, anyways, back from philosophy to Chanukkah,

my Chanukkah feeling will probably be only fully developed at the time when I light the last candles and sing the last songs. Is it something to complain about?

Don’t think so. I suggest holidays are made to teach you certain things, to make you think of them & their impact on you (if you allow it to be unfolded). Some holidays, if you le

arn enough about them, might even change some character traces or sometimes even your view on life. Those should then be called the “grand holidays“. Perhaps that’s why the Jewish New Year and the Day of Atonement are called “Yamim Noraim” (more or less to be translated as the Days of Awe).

I suppose this happens because during the special days, one becomes familiar with them while celebrating. And I think this might very much be the real purpose of each holiday. As one of my friends and teachers once said, it’s not the dates we celebrate, we celebrate dates because of the thing

s happened and their significance for us.

Whatever.

Wish you an enlightened, joyful and warm Chanukkah!

Isralike


<<<Shir la’ma’alot – Eshet Chayil – sounddddddddddd…>>>

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Open Letter

December 6, 2009 at 8:01 pm (Life, People)
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b”h

Dear addressee.

These lines are directed to you.

The intention of these lines, too.

They do not oblige you to read them, but they oblige you to know of their existence.

They oblige you to be aware of the fact that certain thoughts are spent on your behalf, and certain questions are asked.

– Because I do not understand.

Again you made a cut. A cut which slightly reminds me of this holiday from life of yours, several years ago. The first cut. The difference between them is that your first decision to depart was filled with something vibrant. I could feel it. Even though having a little of a desperately resolute aura. You remember perhaps how I struggled to accept it and what various ways I had to misinterprete your decision.

And now. You didn’t come back from your holiday untouched. Rather disordered. This could be felt in any sense. You broke your sabbatical several times and still haven’t achieved any inner peace. I don’t know in how far you have tried it.

And here we are. And the difference between then and now is that this cut through our peculiar bonds was made in a very lethargic way. It seems so to me.

– And I don’t know how to understand.

You know. We spoke a lot about what friendship should be like. For you. For me. I thought it was a dialog.

You know, no one has ever taught me how to make and uphold friendships and how to take care of friends.

I had to realise on my own what friendships mean. And to feel on my own how certain people take away my heart and fill it and become a part of it. I had to figure out whether this was the real friendship, or something beyond, or something below. Mating of souls or just pure attraction.

During the years, we both knew that we became a part of each other. I doubt I could imagine the last years without you. I doubt you could do the same, for an instance.

– And I don’t manage to understand.

There is a country which unites our thoughts. By your name, and by your deeds, you made me take it for granted that you were this country, and it was  you. For an instance. People form imaginations, form images, form ideas. I’ve never set a foot on the land which from time to time seems to be so close to me, but it has become very vivid within me, through the assistance of your magic hand. Or message. Or voice.

– And I try but don’t understand.

You’ve read numerous things. And I’ve read much, too.

When dreams are shared, a whole new world is opened. Even if one deprives you of your last possession, you will have your dreams to rebuild the missing, I once read.

You had the word. The word which is the beginning and the bauplan of all.

You’ve had the word and I’ve got to catch it, too. You’ve known of the might and I opened the eyes and saw. And then we both had it.

Did we let it go?

– And I admit that I refuse to understand.

I have a brother. He walked away from me on silent shoes and became invisible. By becoming invisible, his presence became  indetectable. Yet he didn’t ? cosider it that the lack of his presence could be felt more than his presence would have been.

– And I admit that I fail to refuse and fail to understand.

Once this brother will come back ( and he certainly will for there is no sense in staying away), I doubt anyone will dare asking him why he did so.

Relationships, this I learned the last days, often stagnate when expectations of the involved become too bound on habits and offer no free space for suprises. For renewals or simply for other directions.

– I know I should feel the need to understand.

If you want me to let you go, you’ve already went. “Off you go…”

In any case, we both go on living one within the other. That’s the case with long-time friends. It’s pretty normal so.

All in all, I hope you will keep in mind the following lines:

– I may understand or pretend to do or not to do at all.

I wish you luck.

– Yet I refuse to say farewell.

–

Isralike

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Ofra, a never-fading flower

December 6, 2009 at 1:41 am (Beauty, Music, ofra haza)
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b”h

No matter you read or you just miss it…

- I’m back again at re-discovering the wonderful world of Ofra Haza.

Just put my old and quite advanced collection for my kitchen couch in order and went to the computer to check Youtube for any new uploads. This I do once in a month perhaps, with always an excitement and mixed feelings towards the results to be found. Each new and rare or never seen before upload is a new chance and new miracle – and a new threat to my popularity because the uploader himself then becomes a concurrency in my eyes.

But nevertheless. Sometimes it occures that despite being a bit jealous at the lucky person who has just shared with us his new video which I’ve never seen before…

…I become so moved. So wonderfully moved. So full of sweet sadness and at the same time with delight, and joy, and almost heavenly pleasure and can’t get rid of the smile on my face which shines from it even hours after. On videos such as this one, “hand in hand”, picturing a lovely Ofra singing together with happy Israeli children on TV and fulfilling them perhaps the dream of their life.

It makes me feel so warm inside. So blessed that Ihave the access to see it. And so sad when remembering that she and her miraculous world and all the blessings in it are gone forever…

But each new piece of the rare old material makes my soul recover a little more.

If only our children would still be growing up on this!

:)

Isralike

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Pro-Palestinian

November 22, 2009 at 12:36 am (Antisemitism, Critics, Israel, Middle East, People, world)
Tags: , , , , , , ,

b”h

A nice advice by Khaled Abu-Toameh:

What Does “Pro-Palestinian” Really Mean?

In recent years there has been a significant rise in the number of non-Palestinians who describe themselves as “pro-Palestinian” activists. These people can be found mostly on university campuses in North America and Europe.

What is striking is that many of these “pro-Palestinian” activists have never been to the Middle East, let alone the West Bank or the Gaza Strip. In most cases, they are not even Arabs or Muslims.

What makes them “pro-Palestinian”? …more

 

 

 

Isralike

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