Here it is again, the holiday that can’t be spelled in English! Chanuka, Channuka, Hanuka or Hannuka – I just checked and people are searching Google in all four variations, so I had to use them all in the post 
Not planning on many other words in this post either – this is mostly pictures.
We spent the first eve of Hanuka with my brother-in-law and his family at the Kibbutz. We participated in thecandle lighting in the communal dining room. Each table had its own menorah – Hannukia in Hebrew – and our Ron lit the one we had:
Dan moved on to performing some scientific experiments on the candles:
They have a tradition in this kibbutz: on the first candle of Hannuka, the Bnei Mitvah class/group (that means the 12-13 old ones) announces their new group name. In honor of the event, the kids made special desserts for everyone and gave packs of sweets to the younger kids. Here’s our Ron munching away on his bag of sweets:
The day before, the kids had a Hannuka party in their school. We missed the candle lighting but arrived on time for the workshops. The kids (first and second graders) could go to any workshop they wanted to. The first one was about candles, and they could play around with creating artwork using dripping candles:
In the next classroom, kids were recycling old CD’s into fancy metal dreidels (use the word Sevivon in Hebrew – no one here would know what a dreidel is).
The so called pottery workshop was about making basic menorahs out of clay and decorating them with beads and stuff.
Finally, the only workshop my boys attended: making cardboard swords and shields for the brave Maccabi warriors!
And can’t end the holiday post without the Sufganiyot! Basically, these are round donuts with no hole in the middle. I was happy to see the school only got the classic ones – just some sugar powder on top, with or without strawberry jam filling. The shops are full of yuppie donuts, with the weirdest toppings and fillings nowadays – inspired by the American variety. I refuse to as much as try them – our sufganiyot are the plain good old ones – just some red gooey jam injected into the middle, and lots of white sugar powder on top.
Happy Hannuka everyone!
on Dec 14th, 2009 at 4:02 am
happy chanukkahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Thia is how I spell it
on Dec 14th, 2009 at 6:18 am
Chag Chanukah Sameach! Sufganiot = Donuts without the hole but with jelly filling. This description makes me always smile. Like them but not just. Did you know that we have Sufganiot in Germany, maybe a little bigger than in Israel but plainly the same. We call them Pfannkuchen (pancakes) here in Berlin but the rest of the nation calls them Berliner. So when Kennedy proclaimed: Ich bin ein Berliner! upon his visit to Berlin, he really said I am a sufganiot! Slight grammar mistake – we would always say ‘Ich bin Berliner’ without the article ‘ein’ = a – huge message to the world: he was not only a donut but an Israeli donut eaten for Chanukah.
on Dec 14th, 2009 at 7:49 am
Many shops here in the States call some donuts Berliners as well. And my mother used to call a fluffy scrambled egg a “finekuchen” in her fractured Yiddish.
Chag Chanukah/Hanukkah/Hanuka sameach!
on Dec 14th, 2009 at 10:39 am
Happy hannukker! Your boys are consistent, I’ll say that! None of that candle stuff for a mighty warrior! But donuts – how dare you speak badly of jelly donuts! Police in the US actually live off of them.
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on Dec 15th, 2009 at 3:07 pm
I would like to mix all the words.. ChanUkYa..
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