Lost in Translation

The other day when Simon and I were walking home from school, I was asking him about what he did that day. He told me that they didn't use siddurim when they did tefillah. I asked him how they all knew what to say and he said "we all know it..." and then he was obviously thinking what to say and then he said "we know it with our mouths." In Hebrew, "b'al peh" is how you say "by heart" but it translates literally to "by mouth."

This week was fun and included a trip up north to the Golan for the bris of Mic and Ayla's new baby, Afik. We let the kids skip school and we left around 8:30 am to get there in time for the 11am bris. We met up with Karen and Judah at a random rest stop where we saw a Suburban with California license plates and a bunch of SUV's with diplomat plates and security guards wearing bullet proof vests and one gray-haired English speaking guy who David thinks is a senator but we have no idea who. We made it to the bris just in time (or a little late because Mic called Judah to find out where we all were and said they were waiting for us, but luckily we were just turning into Natur at that point!). Simon immediatly ran off with Shalem. The bris was in the shul and they went back to Shalem's house, which is about a 5 minute walk away. At some point, I sent David to check on them because I thought Simon might be scared of their dog. David actually bumped into Simon on his way back to the shul because he had to go to the bathroom! I was impressed that he knew his way back. I asked him if he had been scared of the dog and he said yes. I asked if he cried and he said yes. I asked what Shalem did when Simon was crying and he said Shalem took the dog outside and told him not to cry. He's a good friend!

We went to see the land where their house will be built and marveled about their view of Syria which is closer than I care to think about!

We made it back home in time to drop Simon off at Playball and go to Eli's end of year party at Gan. Pictures of that party will follow...not that Eli participated even for a minute!

**update**The rest of the Golan pictures will also come later because Blogger is being annoying right now and keeps freezing when I try to post more pictures!