Laughing Our Way To Becoming Israelis

With all the terrorism, nuclear Iran and the seemingly eternal mid-East peace process doom and gloom coming out of the news in Israel, it’s natural to think that Israelis walk around in sackcloth and ashes, with dark clouds hanging low in the sky above us all the time. Two new books, both completely absent a single word of political or theological polemic, were written to capture the real experience of living in Israel. Both authors use humor to carry their readers past the dark news headlines and introduce them to the juicy bits of real life in Israel, as seen through their generous and loving eyes.

 

Welcome Home: My First Six Months of Living in Israel by Akiva Teddy MacLeod opens on August 6, 2013 when the MacLeod family arrived in Israel as new olim (immigrants). The book ends when MacLeod received the results of his ulpan (intensive Hebrew language classes) exam. [Spoiler alert: … nah, on second thought, I’m not going to tell you whether he passes or not]. Welcome Home began as a series of Facebook posts that MacLeod wrote to keep his family and friends back in Canada connected to how the MacLeod family was progressing in Israel.

 

Welcome Home covers ground that’s familiar to anyone who has ever made aliyah – the bewildering differences in culture and language, the disorientation of shopping for groceries in an Israeli supermarket, the cast of comical characters in ulpan, the hunt for Chinese food in Israel, the difficulty getting used to the fact that winter is strawberry season and the genuine pleasure of finding an American grocery item or discovering an excellent falafel. A congenial tour guide through the early days of aliyah, with a particular emphasis on food in the Holy Land, MacLeod made me laugh out loud and read funny passages about the bathrobe lady and the way he tortures his children when he sees cats on along his way, to my husband in the next room. Besides food, MacLeod’s favorite themes include his young children, swimming in the Mediterranean and swimming in the Mediterranean with his young children.

 

Welcome Home is a 200-page confection that makes you want to become friends with MacLeod on Facebook just so you can keep up with his observations. It’s worth noting that, since it was based on Facebook posts, the book contains lots of photographs that don’t render properly in the Kindle edition. [UPDATE: The problem with the photos has been fixed.]

 

By contrast, Herb Keinon, an American-born journalist for the Jerusalem Post, has lived in Israel over 30 years. His new book French Fries in Pita, is a collection of columns Keinon published in the Jerusalem Post about life in Israel. Sharing MacLeod’s amusing, slightly self-deprecating voice and featuring his family members equally prominently, Keinon’s columns are vignettes of daily life in Israel, without the dark contentiousness of the Jerusalem Post’s front page news stories.

 

Although Keinon is a vatik (a veteran immigrant), he never shakes the immigrant perspective. In fact, much of the humor in French Fries in Pita is based on the contrast between Keinon and his American-born wife (who he famously refers to as “The Wife”) and their four very Israeli children who are ever-so-slightly embarrassed by their immigrant parents. Keinon virtually basks in his identity as an immigrant. Even though he’s been in Israel for decades, Keinon returns again and again to the differences between himself and “real Israelis”, such as Itzik who solves a knotty bureaucratic problem with the mere mention of the first name of someone he knows in a relevant government office.

 

Whether you’ve already made aliyah, have friends and family living in Israel or are just curious about how ordinary Israelis survive the drama of life in the Middle East, Welcome Home and French Fries in Pita offer true-to-life windows. They are the kinds of books you’d read over a single, quiet Shabbat, closing the back covers and smiling from the sense of how completely compelling life in this effervescent, slightly crazy country can be.