Chabad chic?

"Fashion" and "frum" are words that don't usually go together, especially when you are talking about a traditional Orthodox man's wardrobe. The ensemble is pretty consistent: black pants, black jacket, black hat, white shirt.

But there is a hint of the slightest crack in that conservative clothing code. And it comes from, of all places, Chabad.

According to JTA, a few young, male Chabad emissaries, scattered from London's Savile Row to New York's Soho, are injecting notable elements of style into their daily garb - a splash of color here, a bow tie there, and overall outfits that are landing one or two on fashionista "best dressed" lists. Some even are designing tailored, colorfully lined versions of the classic kapota - long, black coat - worn by Hasidic men.

While some may believe these efforts fly in the face of modesty and tradition, a few of the young mavericks point to a surprising mentor: The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, of blessed memory.

"When he was young," one designer said, "he was a very well-groomed man. The style he wore in the '50s in France is the style many Chabadniks are now adopting." The Rebbe's biographer noted that, in his younger years, "he dressed in a much more cosmopolitan fashion, sometimes wearing a beret."

Bittersweet chocolat

Speaking of France, the French are celebrating the 500^th anniversary of their vaunted gourmet chocolate industry, and they are, at long last, giving due credit to the masters who created it - Portugal's Jews.

According to the Times of Israel, some of the Jews forced to flee the Inquisition took up residence in the region around Bayonne, France. They brought with them their recipes and chocolate-making expertise, laying the foundation for what would become the world-famed pain au chocolat.

A few decades down the road, however, after the locals had mastered the art themselves, they followed in the footsteps of the Portuguese and exiled the Jews.

Flash forward a few centuries. Preparing to mark the quincentenary, Bayonne's chocolatiers decided it was time to acknowledge the roots of their success and the Sephardi Jews who made it all possible.

As the Times of Israel story reported, "Since we are the inheritors of the Jews' savoir faire, it was our duty to thank them, but also to restore a historical truth: after they introduced chocolate in France, Bayonne Jewry was gradually evicted from the chocolate industry in the 17th century by the very people who had learned everything from them," says Jean-Michel Barate, head of the Chocolate Academy and CEO of the Bayonne-based chocolate brand Daranatz.

My Son, The Folksinger

In the 1960s, the brightest star in the long line of Jewish song parodists was a pudgy, bespectacled comedian named Allan Sherman. As is too often the case, however, funny onstage does not always translate to funny off.

In just over a decade, Sherman went from anonymity to having three hit albums, a #2 song on the Billboard charts, and a regular spot on the talk show circuit, and then saw his career nosedive before he died of a heart attack in 1973 at age 48.

During those early years, however, he carved a memorable niche in comedy history, and an indelible mark upon a generation of summer campers, virtually every one of whom can to this day still sing the refrain from Sherman's "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah! (A Letter From Camp)."

Sherman is once again being recalled with the release of Mark Cohen's comprehensive biography, "Overweight Sensation: The Life and Comedy of Allan Sherman." Tablet Magazine comedy columnist Josh Lambert calls the book "exhaustively definitive," providing an incredible level of detail about the life that shaped Sherman and his career.

Lambert says Cohen cannily emphasizes "that what differentiated Sherman's first albums … was that most of his humor rested not on descriptions of Jews as they had been in some imagined immigrant or old country past, but as what they were becoming in America: model suburbanites." In songs ranging from "Sarah Jackman" to "Harvey and Sheila," Cohen claims that Sherman comedically portrayed Jews not in terms of where they had come from, but as what they had become in contemporary American society, anticipating the ethnic style of Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Minority literature?

Who says it sounds better in Yiddish?

There are 400 Yiddish-language students at Bar-Ilan University, 25 percent of whom are … Arab. 

"My dream is to read Shalom Alechem's Tevya and his Daughters (of Fiddler on the Roof fame) in the original, says Yusuf Alakili from Kfar Kasem, currently earning a Master's in Hebrew literature.

Another enrollee, Salam Bashara, who just finished his undergraduate degree in Arabic literature, says Yiddish tales of loss and tribulation have universal appeal; the 22 year-old student from the township Tira revealed he hopes to devote his master's thesis in comparative literature to parallels between Arabic and Yiddish literature.

But a female Arab student who fell in love with Yiddish confided to the program head that there are red lines to this odd love affair: Like Tevya - devastated when one of his daughters married a non-Jew - she revealed "her father would also 'sit shiva' for her…if she fell in love with a Jew…"

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

Ancient story. Modern telling.

OK. It's only a few days since you sat through the retelling of the Passover story. But, as much as it pains me to say this, the printed word can, at times, be somewhat limiting. That's probably why folks keep coming up with new ways to relate the tale.

Take, for example, the Maccabeats, the all-male a capella group that had a huge online hit a couple of years ago with their version of Candlelight. Apparently, in the course of their studies at Yeshiva University, they discovered that the entire score of Les Miserablés actually is nothing more than the Haggadah set to music. Who knew? If you have any doubts, check it out yourself.

(Shameless plug alert: The Maccabeats, as well as the King David Drummers and headliner Matisyahu, will perform at this year's Israel Solidarity Day celebration, Sunday afternoon, April 28, at Ravinia Festival in Highland Park. Details here.)

Then there were the students at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, who were looking for a more kinetic form of expression. So, according to Israel 21C, they recreated the parting of the Red Sea, the pyramids and the BGU logo (I still don't remember that one in the original) - in dominoes. 50,000 dominoes. It took three days to set up. And seven minutes to fall down.

Of course, seders take up a relatively small part of the holiday's eight days. The rest of the time, when they're not in synagogue, Orthodox families face the challenge of finding things to do. Things appropriate for young children. That don't involve food that isn't kosher for Passover. And that respect the norms of their community.

How about the circus? Not just any circus. The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. The Greatest Show on Earth. Oh sure, there are a few potential issues, like the hot dogs and popcorn and scantily clad women. But all of that can be worked out, can't it?

Absolutely. At the request of an Orthodox school in Brooklyn, and after lots of discussion, Tablet magazine reported, the circus agreed to adapt an entire performance - complete with cast and costume alterations, music modifications, and a bring-your-own kosher for Passover food policy. Ringling Bros. even agreed to share billing with the Yeshiva Boys Choir and kid-favorite Uncle Moishy.

The result was a smashing success. 20,000 people showed up for what they called the Ringling and Yeshiva circus. 

Ain't that a kick?

Didja know there's a martial art called Thai boxing? It's a modern-day version of a 16^th century close-combat technique that often involves jabbing punches, flying elbows, windmill kicks, selectively placed knees, head-butts and more.

If you haven't heard of it, then you certainly wouldn't know that the sport's new world champion isn't from its native Thailand, or anywhere else in southeast Asia. He's Ilya Grad, from Israel.

It's actually his second "world championship" in the past year. According to one online ranking, Grad also tops the list of "the 50 most talented, intelligent, funny, and gorgeous Jewish men in the world." (Hey, in the Internet age, you can make up pretty much any kind of list you want.)

The "gorgeous" part probably explains why he also does some fashion modeling.

Not bad for a former street tough who, at age 16, decided it was time to leave the drinking and brawling behind and find a better outlet for his adolescent restlessness.

In Israel21C, Abigail Klein Leichman tells the tale of how the teenage Grad, a Russian émigré, was taken under the wing of the president of Israel's Thai Boxing Federation and, nearly a decade later, emerged as world champ.

Now Grad lives in Bangkok. But he hopes one day to return to Israel, perhaps "to open a school for young kids like myself who see sports as something that can change your character and your life."

Outsized success

Chicagoland Jewish High School in Deerfield had an amazing March.

Getting most of the publicity was the varsity basketball squad, which made it to the sectional finals in the Illinois state basketball tournament - further than any private school before.

But another CJHS team also had a fantastic run. At the national Model UN competition in New York, facing off against schools 10 times its size, CJHS tied for second among the more than 300 teams competing. And they did it the hard way. The all-Jewish, heavily Israel-centric squad had to represent the Saudi Arabian delegation.

The power of a smile

According to a saying in Hebrew, one should bless people on their birthdays by saying - ad me'ah ve-esrim:  You should live to be 120.  But how exactly should one bless Miriam Am'ash from the Arab township-on-the-Med Jisr az-Zarqa, just north of north of Caesarea?

The birthday girl didn't know her exact birthday, but her identity card put her birth date as 00.00.1888; Am'ash recently died at the ripe-old-age of 124, still clear of mind, leaving a legacy of 600 children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great grandchildren.

Asked about the secret of her longevity, the deceased said: drink olive oil in the morning and, most importantly … smile a lot.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

 Adolf Hitler is alive!

And he's running for office in India.

Even in a region peculiarly known for namesakes ranging from the famous to the infamous—think Kennedy, Carter, Billy the Kid or Frankenstein—Adolf Lu Hitler's moniker stands out. But it hasn't kept him from winning at least three elections to the state assembly.

"I am aware at one point of time Adolf Hitler was the most hated person on Earth for the genocide of the Jews. But my father added 'Lu' in between, naming me Adolf Lu Hitler, and that's why I am different," Hitler told The Associated Press.

Israel Hayom reported that the tiny northeast Indian state of Meghalaya that Hitler is from "has a special fascination for interesting, and sometimes controversial names." The ballot for recent state elections includes more than half a dozen that would be readily recognizable to Westerners.

They weren't eligible for Birthright

It took more than 50 years, but Barbie and Ken have made their first visit to Israel. And their vacation photos have gone viral.

The trip was sponsored by an Italian couple, Enrico Pescantini and Maria Giovanna Callea, who brought the iconic Miss B and her beau along on their own vacation and then took pictures of the plastic duo wherever they went. So, according to a column in The Algemeiner, there are photos "of Barbie and Ken floating in the Dead Sea, riding on a jeep ride in Ein Gedi, catching the waves in Tel Aviv, and posing in Jerusalem with the Dome of the Rock in the background."

All the pix have been collected into an exhibit called "Barbie Loves Israel," currently on display at a bar in Milan, which is home base for Pescantini and Callea. And the story of their journey has been noted in the likes of Italian Vanity Fair, Vogue and this very blog.

Israel's pioneers of poochdom

Take one of Israelis' top passions—their dogs—and combine it with one of the others—innovation—and you've got the makings of an entrepreneurial wonderland.

That's certainly in evidence if you look at the array of pooch-focused products, projects and programs Israelis have created. Israel21C, a newsletter that highlights all manner of technological wonder born in the Holy Land, has conveniently compiled a list of its 10 favorite canine-centric breakthroughs, at least one of which has been featured previously here in Askew.

Israel's Knesset decided to open a joint Frequent Flyer account. Currently, members are forbidden from cashing-in their world perk miles, which are considered a kind of 'kickback' forbidden by law. The points earned will be used to fly sick children abroad for medical treatment and allow homesick "lone soldiers"* a bit of well-earned home leave, overseas. 

*hiyal boded, in Hebrew, most of them new immigrant soldiers from the former Soviet Union and North America whose families remained in the Diaspora.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

Period piece-by-piece

Taking a cue from the dismantling of the Berlin Wall, the Haifa Municipality found a dirt cheap way to break down an old wall at the southern environs of the city* to expand Haifa's seaside promenade.  A boardwalk with benches, and a bike path are planned in its stead.

Instead of engaging a contractor to take down the mustard yellow wall in Bat Galim*, city elders are staging a mass do-it-yourself happening, inviting Haifa residents armed with hammers and chisels to come take down the wall in unison … to the tune of Pink Floyd's hit "The Wall" (Just Another Brick in the Wall). 

Alas the organizers didn't say if participants would be expected to cart off the rubble as souvenirs, or whether the municipality would rent dump trucks to dispose of the debris.

* that walled off a naval training base, blocking access to the beach.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

Remember the part where …

Oscar Night is just weeks away, but alas, Les Miserables won't be in contention.

At least, not the 1995 version from France. The one with Jean-Paul Belmondo. Playing a truck driver in 1930s Paris. Helping a Jewish family elude the Nazis.

As Jewniverse.com reports, that may not be exactly true to Victor Hugo's novel, which was set a century or so earlier. But it did manage to add a Jewish twist to the tale.

In addition to some key storyline, the French film also didn't have Anne Hathaway. But, like Hathaway, it did win a Golden Globe Award (for best foreign language film.)

Not a single mention of lox

When Time Out Chicago checked out the latest in the world of round bread with a hole in the middle, they aptly titled the article "Not your bubbe's bagels."

That's putting it mildly.

TOC's Julia Kramer highlighted Reno's wood-fired bagels, made with saffron-infused water and topped with treats such as pumpkin seeds and olives. And then there's the "Grumpy Goat," offered by world-class chef Stephanie Izard's Little Goat Bread bakery. It's a New York-style bagel with fennel seed and golden raisins, sprinkled with Wisconsin goat cheese.

Of course, any respectable bagel must be topped. So, per Kramer's report, Izard offers a selection that includes green-bean-cashew-shallot-fish-sauce cream cheese, and Reno's Katie Wyer "creates seasonal 'schmears' (e.g., sweet potato) and jams (such as sweet pickled apricot)."

Don't look down

It's largely an underground phenomena, but the No Pants Subway Ride has been around for a dozen years and has spread around the globe.

The annual event is exactly what its name implies. Groups of passengers wearing no pants board subways or trams (or the L, in Chicago) in cities around the world, joining more attired riders for a stop or two. They never acknowledge their fellow participants (or is it "partici-pantlesses"?) and act as if everything were completely routine. All must wear underwear. Nudity is strictly prohibited.

Well, a few weeks ago, the event made its debut in Jerusalem, a city that Tablet magazine notes "prizes modesty." Not sure of what to expect, Tablet contributor Daniel Estrin rode along and recorded a podcast of the experience. (Note: This link to the Tablet story and podcast does include photos.)

Bottom line (Spoiler alert!): The prank went pretty much as it does elsewhere. Most riders avoided eye contact. A few stole glances. Once in a while there was stifled laughter. There was, however, one only-in-Jerusalem dimension to this ride - the sight of pantless men with tzitzit hanging down.

Animal Airlines

Visiting Israel is a joy, but there's no question that getting there is a lot of work. Picking out flights. Checking fares. Arranging transfers. Getting all the required shots. Filling out agricultural forms. Implanting a microchip.

Granted, human visitors don't have to go through all of that. But pets do. And wherever the marketplace spots a need, you can be sure some sharp entrepreneur will arise to meet it. Thus, let me introduce you to Terminal4Pets, which bills itself as the Israeli Pet Travel Agency.

Whether you are just going for a vacation or making aliyah, the company promises to help you navigate the paperwork maze, arrange necessary veterinary services, select proper shipping arrangements, and coordinate flights for both human and animal travelers "with the best, most pet friendly airlines." They'll even have a car waiting for all of you at the airport.

Now, I'm not endorsing this firm, because neither I nor my family's guinea pigs have ever used its services. And there could be other companies doing the same thing. But it's nice to know that, absent a Birthright trip for dogs, there's someone in Israel ready to lend a paw when your furry pal is ready for its trip of a lifetime.

No cop-out

When Israeli patrolman David Cohen was sent to investigate why someone had unlawfully locked an apartment building's storage room for cooking gas canisters - a public hazard forbidden by law - the cop found the culprit was the head of a destitute family of four that lived in the building.

The gas company had threatened to cut off their gas supply due to $125 in unpaid gas bills. When a company rep explained to the cop that his hands were tied, as the family had already received several extensions, patrolman Cohen whipped out his wallet and, going beyond the call of duty, paid the bill on the spot.

Escorting the culprit back to the storage room to remove the lock, the good-hearted police officer turned down the resident's request that the money be a temporary loan.

Case closed.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

Perfume sales rocket in Gaza

To move the merchandise, you gotta have a gimmick.

How about this one? Create an inexpensive perfume and  name it after a terrorist rocket.

That's what a Gaza manufacturer did last month. And the idea worked.

The orange/lemon/herbal perfume, which comes in both men's and women's versions, is labeled "M-75" - after the missiles Hamas launched at Tel Aviv and Jerusalem last month. Those rockets travelled further, and reached larger population centers, than any previously fired from Gaza, and the perfume has successfully piggybacked on their popularity among Gazans.

The scent sells for about $13 for a 2 ounce bottle, and the director of the firm that markets it says "sales have gone through the roof." 

Speaking of rockets....

Say you live in one of the most technologically advanced nations on the planet, but the neighbors keep shooting missiles at you.

Well, there's an app for that. Actually, several.

Even before last month's rocket attacks reached their peak, innovative software developers were designing smartphone apps to help Israelis duck for cover. While the most targeted regions of Israel's south have the "Code Red" alert system -- which gives a 15-30 second warning, depending upon how close you are to Gaza -- it can't always be heard. (Think: In a car with the radio on. While wearing headphones. In a rural area far from a town. In the shower. OK, maybe you wouldn't have your phone with you in the shower. But you get the idea.) And even if you do hear it, you might not know where to go to get out of harm's way.

Enter the apps.

Several sound their own alarm any time Code Red sounds in a pre-designated area. You also can use it to track alerts in an area you aren't in, but want to know about.

Another app tells you where the nearest safe spot or shelter is, based on your GPS location. The operative word here is "nearest." Remember, you've only got seconds to get to it.

Things to do while a loved one is on Birthright

OK. We've all heard about the amazing things that can happen on a Birthright trip. Some of them can be absolutely life-changing - in the best of ways.

But did you ever stop to wonder what was going on back home with the folks who weren't on the trip?

Sometimes, they can find some pretty creative ways to use the time. And to express themselves. In ways that can be absolutely life-changing. In the best of ways.

I could tell you more, but that would spoil the surprise. You should just  check it out on YouTube  for yourself.

Just following orders

In a rather indecorous game of Jewish geography, a German company called Fotopuzzle that makes posters- and puzzles-to-order from a database of 55,000 aerial photographs of Germany, decided to add Dachau and Buchenwald concentration camps to its collection of picturesque photos that can be made into a 60 x 40 cm poster to hang in the living room, or a 1,000-piece puzzle for hours of family entertainment.

Following the intervention of Germany's CSU (Christian Social Union) party head Gerda Hasselfeldt, in whose constituency Dachau is situated, the puzzles have been withdrawn from sale.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

Foreplay

When Robi Gluden and Izolda Abraham decided to get married, instead of hiring a wedding hall and a band, the two aspiring actors wrote a 90-minute-long romantic comedy about how they met and fell in love, then set out to find a venue that would agree to stage their drama.

After a series of performing arts centers delicately declined to cater to the star-struck couple's fantasies, the 449-seat Nesher Cultural Center outside Haifa agreed to host the play. Invitations were designed like theatre tickets and a reception was held in the foyer. Acts ran from a scene recalling their first date to re-staging their first lover's quarrel, climaxing in the last act - how could it be otherwise - with a staged, but apparently binding, marriage ceremony.  

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

 Bikes from boxes

Don't throw out that cardboard box the delivery guy just dropped off. You might want to turn it into a bicycle.

An Israeli inventor didn't think that idea is as ridiculous as it may sound. So after a lot of trial and error, he's done just that. And he believes his cardboard bicycle just might change the world.

Izhar Gafni spent years trying to develop cardboard strong enough and durable enough to be turned into a bike, Reuters reports —a bike with absolutely no metal parts and tires that can't puncture. But achieving that technological breakthrough, he and his business partner, Nimrod Elmish, say, is just the start.

The resulting 9-pound bicycle is assembled in a way they claim will make local manufacturing—and employment—more economical than using distant factories in cheap-labor locales. The resulting bikes will sell for no more than $20, and even that price is just so dealers can make some money. In fact, many of the bikes could be given away for free in poor areas, because government grants and recycling incentives should entirely offset the cost of production. Manufacturers would make their money by selling advertising on the bikes.

"This is a real game-changer," Elmish says.

Production will begin in Israel in a few months, Reuters reports, and the bicycles should go on sale within a year.

 Sperm quality takes a dive

Israeli sperm banks report a troubling trend: The quality of deposits being offered just ain't what it used to be.

While declining sperm quality is an international phenomenon, a Los Angeles Times report says the drop-off in Israel is occurring twice as fast. Two decades ago, one sperm bank there rejected a third of its potential donors. Today, if the same standards were used (they have since been changed), that number would be 80 percent. Another facility offers a "premium" line of the highest quality. Originally, one in 10 samples met the standard. Today, one in 100.

There's plenty of speculation, but no one really knows why. Some suspect cellphones tucked in front pockets. Others suggest depleted uranium. Scientists are looking at estrogen in the milk and water supplies.

In a nation obsessed with demographics, and the balance between Jews and Arabs, there is real concern, the article reports. So far, there's no sign of a declining birthrate. That's actually up, as it is elsewhere. But a significantly higher percentage of infertility in couples is being blamed on the male partner.

And, one scientist notes, since sperm bank donors tend to be younger and healthier than the rest of the population, the potential problem could be worse than suspected.

 Iranians and Israelis agree!

If you think there's not much a typical Iranian loves about Israel (or at least admits to loving), you obviously don't know Rita.

Rita Jahanforuz is a major singing star in Israel. But the release of her latest album, "All My Joys," suddenly turned her into an underground sensation in her native Iran, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Rita's family moved to Israel more than 40 years ago, when she was a child. Since the '80s, she has performed in Hebrew and English. But the current album, featuring updated versions of old-time Persian songs she calls the "soundtrack of my childhood," is entirely in Persian. Despite that, it went gold in Israel within three weeks.

Then it was discovered in Iran. According to the Journal, fans use special software to bypass government filters to download her songs, and DJs play bootleg CDs at secret underground parties. They have bombarded her with emails and online messages, and Iranians around the world flooded a Tel Aviv internet radio station with calls when she was interviewed.

Along with her music, Rita delivers a message decrying war and a hope that her songs can break through the tension.

Her popularity has not gone unnoticed in official Iran. The Journal says that Fars, the official news agency, has called Rita "Israel's 'latest plot in a soft war' to gain access to the hearts and minds of Iranians."

 Ash Wednesday

With divestment from Israel a popular "calling" among Israel's adversaries, the late Chilean ambassador Joaquin Montes Larraín's last diplomatic mission and parting gift to his host country was a moving gesture of friendship that gives a poignant touch to the immortal words of medieval poet Yehuda Halevi, who wrote "my heart is in the East, and I am at the ends of the West."

The 61 year-old diplomat, who died in an Israeli hospital in a last-ditch battle to beat a rare form of leukemia, requested days before his death that his body be cremated and half his ashes scattered in Jerusalem, half in his native Chile as a symbol of his deep personal attachment to Israel.

On a Wednesday, after a Mass was said for Larraín in a Jaffa church and a farewell ceremony was held at Ben-Gurion airport, all that remained was to fulfill the second half of the Chilean diplomat's last request.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

It's green, it's mean, and we think it might be edible

The first hint was the smell.

The pungent odor emanating from an area in Haifa's central post office immediately aroused suspicion, Israel Hayom reported. An elite drug and money laundering unit was called in and focused full attention on seven containers shipped from Thailand. And in those containers, members of the unit discovered …

Frogs. Dried frogs, to be precise. And toads. And giant cockroaches. And dung beetles.

All of them, the investigators concluded, apparently intended for human consumption, as prized delicacies. Illegal to import. But otherwise, not particularly nefarious.

Unless, of course, your tastes don't lean that way.

Wi-fi hits the trail

Israel is one of the world's great technological meccas, if I may mix some metaphors. A veritable oasis of innovation. But its latest technological triumph—an apparently first-of-its-kind mobile wi-fi hotspot—comes not from the local HQs of Intel or Microsoft, nor from the folks who invented instant messaging, but rather from the manager of a tourist attraction in Galilee.

As the Algemeiner reports, Kfar Kedem offers a journey back in time, re-creating life in ancient Galilee as visitors travel the historic landscape on donkeys. Manager Menachem Goldberg, however, realized that to keep visitors engaged—and perhaps get a few of their friends to join the experience—they needed a way to share their experiences and photos via email and Facebook.

Not an easy task when you're riding a donkey through ancient history.

Unless you attach wireless routers to the donkeys.

So far, Goldberg says, five of the 30 donkeys have gone wi-fi. If they get enough "likes," there could be more.

A life-changing discovery … perhaps

Csanad Szegedi was a rising star in Hungary's right-wing Jobbik Party, the Associated Press reports, known for his frequent rantings against things Jewish, or even smacking of "Jewishness."

Then, one day, he acknowledged what had been rumored for weeks: He is, indeed, a Jew.

He doesn't practice the religion. He was raised Presbyterian. But apparently unbeknownst to him until recently, his grandparents on his mother's side—one survived Auschwitz, the other forced labor camps—were Orthodox Jews. Which makes him Jewish.

Now, AP reports, his political career is in shambles. His party, which ousted him from leadership, wants him to give up his seat in the European Parliament, allegedly for offering an informant a bribe to keep the information quiet. And his business partner, Jobbik's executive director, has pulled out of their internet firm.

Szegedi is fighting to keep the Parliament seat. But he also has met with a Chabad rabbi, "apologized for any statements which may have offended the Jewish community, and vowed to visit Auschwitz to pay his respects."

Spitting image

Is the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement losing momentum? There's room for optimism: Israel has just been accepted with open arms as a member of the IFOPS—the International Federation of Pit Spitting.

Other member states include Bulgaria, Italy and China. Actually, pit spitting competitions are ancient and can be traced all the way back to the cavemen, a pastime found illustrated in prehistoric cave drawings in Spain.

The best score by one of the chief contenders for the Israeli championship was 13.9 meters—but Israel still has a long way to go: Spain holds the world record for olive pits - 21.32 meters, while the world record for cherry pits is 56 (yes, fifty-six) meters.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

Invitation to a wedding

D. and M. wanted to get married, but didn't have a penny to their name. Turns out that all they needed was a little help from their friends… who opened a Facebook group called "Organizing a Wedding Together," which asked surfers to help put together a wedding for the pair, ad hoc.

Within minutes someone offered to drive them to the wedding; a makeup artist offered to prepare the bride; a band volunteered to provide music; a photographer said he'd take the wedding pictures gratis; and a graphic artist offered to prepare a hand-written marriage contract. Another business offered to provide waiters at the reception and donations flowed in to pay for a hall and a caterer.

The couple—who knew nothing of their friends' campaign—not only got a memorable wedding held in a Bat Yam hall, but their friends—encouraged by the response—had asked Israelis who didn't even know the couple to donate furniture and appliances to give the newlyweds a good start.

Courtesy www.chelm-on-the-med.com

And from the sports desk …

Olympic Gold Medal gymnast Gabby Douglas, who we don't think is Jewish (as opposed to teammate Aly Raisman, who we know for sure is) told Us Weekly that her favorite meal is matzo ball soup. Interestingly, it just happened to be Number 13 on her list of "25 Things You Don't Know About Me."