Shabbat

Last night I had Shabbat dinner with Tammy's family. Her Hungarian grandmother and uncle were here from New York, and they cooked up a little Eastern European feast--culminating in chestnut paste (strangely reminiscent of egg nog) and whipped cream for dessert. I suppose this was my first real Shabbat dinner, complete with candle lighting, challah, and a few rather light-hearted prayers from the secular head of the house, probably thrown in for my sake. I loved it.

After dinner, Tammy, her boyfriend Yoni, his best friend Gabi and I went out, and after a few stops and starts finally ended up on the beach in Herzlelyyia with a bottle of whiskey. We started out perfectly respectably, but somehow ended up rolling around in the sand and singing "Starry Starry Night" -- rather well I must say, considering we only knew the first three words. By the end of the night we were back at Tammy's house, discussing religion. I'm pretty sure I remember the discussion being wonderfully intelligent and stimulating. Yes. I'm pretty sure about that.