By David Verveer
During these heart aching days, with those terrible videos of showing the corpses of the earthquake victims in Haiti, explaining about the hopelessness future of the survivors, the time consuming efforts to save lives of those who have managed to stay alive under the debris of the quake, with the understanding that those who were saved by the rescuers have in reality, no future ahead of them, to overcome this horrendous disaster and no possibility in building up a livable future in this world, which continues, and already went to the next item of the newscast of the television.
Yes, this disaster is already fading away from our mind, the new scandal with our prime minister’s wife, not paying her domestic help, and the person that was kicked out the big brother show, seem to be on the same level as the reports about Haiti, because we are, thank God, rather passive participants in those dramas, our daily live goes on, and in reality, we really can not help much, donating 10 Euros, with the knowledge that this money wont reach the victims and will be scoped up by the various middlemen on the way, as a sort of payment to tranquilize our conscience, and continue to enjoy our existence, unaffected and far away. We do feel a little bit ashamed when we see on the screen the terrible plight of the people there, and are proud that our country, clearly because propaganda purposes has send an enormous team of rescuers and medical staff to Haiti, without taking into account the sacrifice that was made, was by the poor and suffering people in our region, for whom no money can be found to treat their illnesses, to house them and / or to repay their sacrifices of the past.
Illogical and somehow cruel is the fact that our nation (of course, in defense, and without alternative options) killed last year 1400 people, with the most modern weapons, based on a primitive concept of: an eye for eye and tooth for tooth reasoning, by arguing that they (the enemy) were asking for this punishment, and realistically, looking at the facts and figures, this was true, but still, why can we gallantly save Haitians and kill Palestinians, something must be wrong with our logic, not to speak about the traffic accidents which only yesterday killed more than 10 people and wounded more than 30. Why do we rescue Haitians, when we do not prevent murder on the road?
But my question is somehow different, as good citizen of this world, with a clean conscience, am I allowed in these dark days, to enjoy myself, obvious I can not solve any problems personally, and donations, as we discussed before, do not help the people in Haiti, taking into account that life is relatively short, and every day wasted on crying about the cruel fate of people far away, is a total loss without any benefits for anyone, but laughter and enjoyment is somehow blaspheming, certainly when we demand from other people to remember our sufferings during the holocaust, (which was of course man made, while the earth quake was a natural disaster, a defenseless argument, as buildings and infrastructure built according earth quake codes, are still standing in Haiti, and the World could have come to help and prevented most of the damage, but these are unrealistic reflections which have no real answer).
I see, I need to summarize my remarks, in order to explain my message (which, in any case, is rather vague), but let me try.
I feel terrible sorry for the Haitians, but I can not affectively help them, and don’t want to waste valuable time of my life being sad. Further more, I question the purpose of this all, why do we not prevent, why do we play the hero for propaganda purposes, and why are we such a hypocrites?
Monday, January 18, 2010
Friday, January 1, 2010
The Sylvester dilemma for the Israeli Jew
The Sylvester dilemma for the Israeli Jew
By David Verveer
I know I hear you say it, what a bloody nonsense; doesn’t he have other problems than discussing the Sylvester celebration? Indeed, I agree, my problem is less critical done guessing which person will make it the person of the year, and will get her or his picture on the cover of the Time magazine. I know you could not care that lost people, like myself, sit on new years eve, and stare at the television, seeing other people jumping around, shouting HAPPY NEW YEAR. My wife went to sleep around 10 o’clock, our television did not have a special new year program, as this celebration is not considered kosher, and we Israelis don’t do like the gentiles, we don’t celebrate the birthday of this unknown saint Sylvester figure, who was so lucky to die precisely between old and new. But some gentile friends tell me that Sylvester is only an excuse for celebration, the reason is an heathen pre Christian celebration in honor of mother earth, who managed to do what it does best, for another year.
But, we Jews are not allowed to celebrate the Gentile holydays, and somebody who has a real wonderful party, acts against all principles of Judaism, his actions deny the suffering of he Jewish people, throughout the ages, if you are really a Jew you should evade all this nonsense of celebration at the same time and because the same reasons as your neighbors.
I love to see the fireworks which start on 12 o’clock, mid night, after the count down, I remember when living in England, I visited on New Years eve, a local pub, and at mid night, people (strangers) stood in a circle and sang an old English song called “All acquaintances been forgotten” and hugged everyone in the pub, and even though, it was a heather celebration, I thoroughly enjoyed it and understood it, it was not religious, not patriotic and simply humanistic.
As children, living in the after the war period in Holland, my mother always invited our surviving cousins, to celebrate together with us the new years celebration. We at special food (such as huzaren sla, I have no idea how that is named in English, olie bollen (I think donuts) and appel flappen (donuts with slices of apple inside).
It was one of the most loved celebrations of the year, and has a special place in my memory bank. At mid night we would open the windows to look at the commotion outside, with the burning of Christmas trees, fireworks and people dancing in the street, until the police and fire brigade came to extinguish the burning asphalt, stop the fights of the street gangs who had gathered and stolen the entire week between Christmas and new year, trees from the neighboring gangs, fraught gang wars, and made terrible noises, my brother once participated in such a gang warfare, but received after five minutes of participation a blow on the head, and decided that this is really not a war for Jewish boys, returned home, in order never to try it again.
And now, I sit alone, look at the TV, see people shout and dance in far away countries, wait until midnight, listen to the news, hear about a missile attack in the south, no damage and nobody was hurt, and go to bed, with an empty feeling of the lost excitement of Sylvester celebration, why do we not enjoy simple enjoyments, why is it wrong to be happy together with the gentiles, why do we have to carry the Burdon of the religious Jews, life is short, let us have fun, and I know, it is not done, but I wish you a very happy, healthy new year 2010.
By David Verveer
I know I hear you say it, what a bloody nonsense; doesn’t he have other problems than discussing the Sylvester celebration? Indeed, I agree, my problem is less critical done guessing which person will make it the person of the year, and will get her or his picture on the cover of the Time magazine. I know you could not care that lost people, like myself, sit on new years eve, and stare at the television, seeing other people jumping around, shouting HAPPY NEW YEAR. My wife went to sleep around 10 o’clock, our television did not have a special new year program, as this celebration is not considered kosher, and we Israelis don’t do like the gentiles, we don’t celebrate the birthday of this unknown saint Sylvester figure, who was so lucky to die precisely between old and new. But some gentile friends tell me that Sylvester is only an excuse for celebration, the reason is an heathen pre Christian celebration in honor of mother earth, who managed to do what it does best, for another year.
But, we Jews are not allowed to celebrate the Gentile holydays, and somebody who has a real wonderful party, acts against all principles of Judaism, his actions deny the suffering of he Jewish people, throughout the ages, if you are really a Jew you should evade all this nonsense of celebration at the same time and because the same reasons as your neighbors.
I love to see the fireworks which start on 12 o’clock, mid night, after the count down, I remember when living in England, I visited on New Years eve, a local pub, and at mid night, people (strangers) stood in a circle and sang an old English song called “All acquaintances been forgotten” and hugged everyone in the pub, and even though, it was a heather celebration, I thoroughly enjoyed it and understood it, it was not religious, not patriotic and simply humanistic.
As children, living in the after the war period in Holland, my mother always invited our surviving cousins, to celebrate together with us the new years celebration. We at special food (such as huzaren sla, I have no idea how that is named in English, olie bollen (I think donuts) and appel flappen (donuts with slices of apple inside).
It was one of the most loved celebrations of the year, and has a special place in my memory bank. At mid night we would open the windows to look at the commotion outside, with the burning of Christmas trees, fireworks and people dancing in the street, until the police and fire brigade came to extinguish the burning asphalt, stop the fights of the street gangs who had gathered and stolen the entire week between Christmas and new year, trees from the neighboring gangs, fraught gang wars, and made terrible noises, my brother once participated in such a gang warfare, but received after five minutes of participation a blow on the head, and decided that this is really not a war for Jewish boys, returned home, in order never to try it again.
And now, I sit alone, look at the TV, see people shout and dance in far away countries, wait until midnight, listen to the news, hear about a missile attack in the south, no damage and nobody was hurt, and go to bed, with an empty feeling of the lost excitement of Sylvester celebration, why do we not enjoy simple enjoyments, why is it wrong to be happy together with the gentiles, why do we have to carry the Burdon of the religious Jews, life is short, let us have fun, and I know, it is not done, but I wish you a very happy, healthy new year 2010.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)