Follow the sun

Couple more days like that, and I will think I am in paradise. Another great day has past having great time with my wife, my daughter my sister and my parents. Great to be in my home town again.


Saturday, January 29, 2011 – Woke up to a beautiful sunny day. My daughter and her boyfriend slept in, as Patti and I went through our emails and handled urgent issues with work, while having some instant coffee (They don’t have “American” coffee here).
When the royal young couple finally woke up (this would be my daughter and her boyfriend) we dropped them at one of the hotels where Amit boyfriend’s parents are staying (they are here for their anniversary). Patti and I continued to visit my parents, and met briefly my brother who stopped by to say hi. We will probably meet him again tomorrow, with his wife and new born son.

Time went by and our stomach told us it is lunch time. Amit and Raz already called us to pick them up, They were hungry too. Patti wanted to taste an Israeli Shakshuka made by a professional cook in a restaurant, so we found a restaurant that specializes in Shakshuka, but they were closing. Most establishments are closed for the weekend in Israel, as they serve Kosher food, and in order to be Kosher, food could not be prepared on Shabbat (Saturday). And speaking about weekends – in Israel weekend is Friday Saturday and not Saturday Sunday. We were all hungry so we decided to go the the city, where all the hotels and tourist restaurants are. Those are usually open all the time. We chose a Yemenite restaurant in one of the hotels, and sure enough it was open. They started by serving a series of small salads as an appetizer. This custom is very common in Israel – no personal salads but free sampler of Mediterranean style salads with Pita bread for all. Patti found her Shakshuka, and I ordered a Yemenite variation of  Sambuca.
From there, my parents drove back home, they got tired and needed some rest. They are older and having hard time walking long distances. The four of us, that is my daughter Amit with her boyfriend Raz, Patti and myself, decided to take a walk on the beach. It was  pretty warm outside (82) so Amit and I went to the boardwalk, bought swimming trunks, and jumped into the water for a swim. I missed swimming in the red sea, The saltiness of the water, that has a unique taste to it different from any other sea or ocean, brought again many sweet childhood memories of so many days of fun I spent here on this beach in this water.

At around 4:00pm we drove back home. We are invited tonight to my sister for Friday night dinner. My sister is observant Jew, and have a full Shabbat dinner with all the ceremony of preparing and accepting the holy day. As a young couple they had a very relaxed atmosphere singing the Shabbat songs and blessing the day and the food. Speaking of food – man, there was so much of it, She prepared fish and chicken and oven grilled potatoes and stuffed Mangold leaves (don’t ask me what it is), and meat casserole, and, and, and… wow!
We were still somewhat full from the late lunch and could not eat so much. I think she has now leftovers for the whole week! We had great dinner followed by some great time of just sitting and talking about so many different things – our childhood, the city, the friends memories – we could have continued on and on, but it became very late and everybody got tired. I think it wasn’t before 1:00am that we left.
Oh – no pictures from the dinner. You are not supposed to take pictures on Shabbat :)
Came back to the apartment and fell into a sweet sleep after a great day.