How not to make ANZAC cookies on Yom Hashoah

I decided if there was one thing that I was going to achieve this week, it was to bake ANZAC Cookies. It's nearly 11pm on ANZAC day and I still haven't managed to acheive that aim. A symptom of how I totally underestimate the number of hours that are in a day. I'm still going to justify how this is somehow not my fault.
I think it started yesterday when my boss asked me to work today as well. So the allotted time of baking grew less. Last night I was still missing some of the essential ingredients. My mum kindly sent me the recipe, which calls for Golden Syrup. So instead of making them last night, I settled down to watch the ceremony at Yad Vashem for Yom Hashoah which this year falls on the same day as Anzac day.

I listened to the speeches, Miri Mesika singing, the stories of the 6 survivors who lit the flames of rememberance. Suddenly the news of a terrorist attack in Dahab came on TV, as it was all in Hebrew, and it was annoying to concentrate because I had already spent the day concentrating at work without my glasses again, I fell asleep.

So today I was on a mission to get Golden syrup. first I had to go to work. At 10am A Siren sounded and everything stopped. Everyone told me that everything stopped, I was about to treat a patient, in a cubicle so I know I stopped, but apparently the rest of the country did as well. After work, I looked in 3 different super markets and could not find this item. I was wondering what I could substitute that has a similar consistency. I thought maybe date honey because it looks very similar, then I found Molasses in a health shop, I think that is the same thing, so after staring at 4 different brands for about a half an hour unable to make a decision between that and Date Honey. I bought a bottle.

I got home, but then I put off making the cookies as Susie came over. We had full intentions of making the cookies together, but instead we discussed how to get from Vienna to Kracowice to Barcelona. Then I went shopping for my sisters impending arrival, to make sure her fridge will be stocked. It was around 5pm and I didn't realise that they stop delivery from the supermarket this far into the day. I had already piled the shopping trolley full of stuff...so I decided to just push the trolley up the hill to her place...of course I bumped into Becca who laughed at me, because I looked like a total idiot, but then she helped me and it all worked out.

I briefly visited Shira on the way home, who had just returned from America, chatted a bit. Then I felt it had become time to bake the cookies. I was hungry though, so I had dinner and tried watching a video that I had rented from the night before. it didn't work on my computer, my flat mate's or his play station. Frustrated I just wanted to relax for a few minutes so I did some writing, but then I got a call to go back to my sisters apartment because a friend of hers was going to drop by some things for when she arrives. Fine. I went and took the DVD with me, so I could try it on her machine. It worked. I watched half the movie and then got bored, and I needed to return it anyway.

I walked back to the video store. On the way I bumped into a French friend of mine, Sandy, I really like her, I think it's hilarious how we try to converse in broken Hebrew, French and English. We do have one common language though, boys, so as we shared anecdotes I introduced her to 'The Third Ear' the most awesome video store in Jeru.

Now I am back at home and I want to make the cookies, but I thought I would write a blog instead. Another friend of mine just got back from NY and is coming over to give me a present, I told him my tale of woe regarding the cookies and he said he'd help me make them. All the ingredients are eyeing me with contempt. Why have I left it to 11pm?

I think about the Siren, the ceremony and the biscuits. Maybe it's all about stopping for a moment, setting some special time aside, to commemorate, to take a deep breath in and look at the larger picture, place it all in context and the re-start. Maybe I will have time to do that tomorrow.

Anniversary

Well it has been a year since I made Aliyah...granted I spent some of the past year in Australia, I still feel it is a cause for celebration that one year on I can still be find on the streets of Jerusalem.

A few things that I have noticed since I have arrived:
-I'm a little bit wiser (I don't bother reading Jeru Guru anymore)
- I'm not entirely Israeli yet (I can't bring myself to by plastic sandals i.e. crocs)
-Sundays are becoming my Mondays due to the fact that I now work on them and typical Monday Morningitis has started to occur, but on Sundays(last week I was 10m away from the entrance to work when a car came by and drove through a huge puddle splashing me head to toe, this week I forgot my reading glasses..you get the picture)
- I still answer to Olah Chadashah (new immigrant) I wonder how much longer I can pull that off for...
- I get pissed off when people think that I am American (I literally screamed at the taxi driver last night when he said it...poor guy...but not the first guy to be on the receiving end of my wrath)
- I have met interesting people and made heaps of new friends, some of whom have really helped me settle in...I am very indebted to Neil, Aliza, Susie, Carmi, Danny, Dave, Shira, Ilana and Becca...for Shabbat Dinners, a place to crash and solving general life issues...
- I am living and contributing positively to a society that I care about (I got to vote in the election)

My aim for next year is to provide visuo-spatial training to all of Israeli society so they will not walk into me everytime I am on a sidewalk, bus, supermarket whatever, I do not want to be bumped into by random people all the time, there is no need, look where you are going and do not hit me!

Welcome...

I'd like to welcome my friend Aliza to the Blogosphere....A personal favourite is the post entitled "Come on Baby light my fire"...Read it and you will figure out why we are friends...