Pre-Chanukah photo treats

Just a quick post to share some photos of two different events at Ilan’s gan. One was when we planted some plants outside of his classroom and the other one a pre-Chanukah party with some photos with Ariela.

Chanukah is not even here and I have already eaten more than 5 sufganiot or pontchkes (Punch-cakes as Batya calls them in Idish) – i.e Chanukah doughnuts.

Cant wait for our trip to Mexico. In honor to both our trip to Mexico and Chanukah I can’t think of a better song but the following, enjoy:

Sorry about the quality, it was the best I could find online.

Get it? La Bamba? Mexico? Menorah, Chanukah? :)

King David vs. Chinese Warrior

Dear loyal readers,

Your favorite blog was attacked yesterday by a Chinese Warrior. This Chinese Warrior came specifically from San Ch’Ung in the island of Taiwan.

Fellow bloggers, please take note.

The above mentioned warrior is a modern warrior aka Spammer. It all started with a random comment on the blog saying “I'm appreciate your writing skill.Please keep on working hard.^^” (clearly translated by Google) from a person named 非凡 which means “Extraordinary” in Chinese (thanks again Google translate). Some time after that I received in a time period of about 10 minutes more than 50 comments one on each blog post with links in Chinese.

I have already taken measures to go after the San Ch’Ungean warrior (many other Ch words come to my mind in Spanish for this person) it’s my way of defending my modest blog and its visitors. Just think of it as King David with his slingshot against the Su Ching… warrior. Justice will prevail.

How does this affect my loyal readers?

Just disregard messages and links on the comments section in Chinese (I have taken out several of them), and when you post a comment you will need to confirm a word on the space provided.

That’s it for now.

 

Happy Thanksgiving – Thanking Freddie, George and John for their music.

To all my American readers or foreigners living in America I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving. We certainly will miss our dinner with our Canadian friends as we assimilated to the American “turkey with gravy while the ball game is on, but don’t stay up too late since I’m going to Macy’s at 6 am tomorrow” culture.

What are we doing this Thanksgiving?

Well…. I’m blogging for now and will go to sleep soon, that’s it. I guess we never really assimilated to the Thanksgiving holiday, but it’s a good time to stop and thank for all that we have and all that we are.

I don’t typically remember but November 24 commemorates the loss of one of the great rock singers Farrokh Bulsara or as we all know him better: Freddie Mercury from the band Queen. I remembered it because of this great video I came across with.

Hilarious, isn't it? It had 3.5 million views in only 2 days, how about that?

Thank you Freddie for your music. And since we are in that mood too lets thank George Harrison for his music (commemorating his death on November 29) and John Lennon (commemorating his death on December 8) both of which I consider among the top.

Coming soon… I’m doing another guest post but this time it’s not a contest as it was back in “5 Israeli Job Search Tips” (which by the way I got 1st prize thanks to your support), this time I’m giving back. Lets see how it turns out. Don’t worry I will keep you posted. Just make sure you check the blog every once in a while.

Also, very soon, the family clock will be reset, I’m just waiting for confirmation of date and approval to make it public. (No, we are not pregnant).

We are very excited about our visit to Mexico. Can’t wait to see you all!

Shabbat Shalom and Happy Thanksgiving.

And for those with time (and the understanding of Spanish) listen to the following promo that I remembered after craving for a juicy turkey. Un clasico!

From Rompope to Eggnog to Sachlav

As I was sitting down with Liora last night relaxed and drinking a warm Sachlav it occurred to us that we have passed through several drinks similar to this depending on the country we are living. We asked to ourselves, how many people in the world you think know and have tried these three drinks? Very few…

They might all look the same, but they each have their distinguished taste to me.

Rompope: Mexican drink made with eggs, milk and vanilla, with Rum.Rompope to me has the taste of home, family, old friends, my roots, my founding base, my family values.

Eggnog: sweetened dairy-based beverage made with milk, cream, sugar, beaten eggs, and flavored with ground cinnamon and nutmeg. Popular throughout the US, Canada and Luxembourg (go figure). Eggnog to me has the taste of a honeymoon, new beginnings, community building, strong friendships, new family, educational and professional achievements, transition.

Sachlav: A sweet creamy milk, cinnamon, and rose water drink thickened with cornstarch. Warm. I would think it’s middle-eastern and not only Israeli. (ok, lets assume it’s Israeli). Sachlav to me has the taste of my land, my people, our mission, challenge, my children’s future, my spiritual growth. I’ll have the Sachlav thanks.

Now how many of you actually know and have tried the three of them? You should!

Shabbat Shalom.

Captive (and hungry) audience

I have been wanting to blog about this since Acharei Hachagim (after the holidays). It tries to bring in my marketing experience by analyzing something unique and maybe funny in Israel just like it was done with The Sabra Album Take 6 – Marketing Edition (which I highly recommend).

Captive Audience + Opportunistic Marketing = Consumer Need

“A captive audience is a person or a group of people who have gathered in a certain place for a purpose and are provided or exposed to information that are unrelated to their actual purpose of being there.” From Wikianswers® “with nowhere to go” that’s my addition.

“Opportunistic Marketing communication are the messages and other media used to communicate to consumers by taking immediate advantage of the circumstances” I just made up this definition.

Now let me explain. Every Shabbat and holiday a bunch of leaflets are available at the synagogue both in Hebrew and English from different organizations that talk about Parshat Hashavua (the weekly torah reading) or the holidays. For a couple of years I have enjoyed following and studying both on-line as well as hard copies of the TT (torah tidbits) by the OU (They do a great job every single week). The TT for Yom Kippur is one that you spend a lot of time looking at given the many hours you spend at the synagogue. Now here is the back cover to that Yom Kippur’s TT:

From Other

Now you know where I’m going with this…

The ad reads in Hebrew: “Brazilian grilling party at Papagio Jerusalem”

Are you kidding me? I haven’t eaten for 25 hours, I’m hungry as a wolf and I’m sitting at the synagogue with nowhere to go looking at the back cover of my TT. What a perfect recipe. If I were the OU I would charge triple for that back cover. So for now I have a new consumer need to go and eat at Papagaio.

So the equation:

Captive Audience + Opportunistic Marketing = Consumer Need

Can also be represented as:

Synagogue on Kippur + Food ad on Kippur = Go to Papagaio

Makes sense?

I most admit that I’ve had cravings for a churrascaria (Brazilian steakhouse) since I accompanied my co-workers at a Brazilian restaurant in Bentonville AR several years ago. I saw them enjoy one piece of meat after the other while I was munching on my crunchy lettuce (don’t get me wrong, it was a good salad). So now that I have it Kosher… well I haven’t tried it yet, but hopefully soon will.

Note: I did not receive any commission from Papagaio for this post, and I wouldn’t reject a free dinner for two either.

To be continued…. (I hope)

Mr. President and Me

Sorry for the sporadic activity on the blog, it has been busy around here.

Below a picture at a recent event I attended. I know it looks like a balagan (chaos) but if you look closely you can see me (the tall guy behind the lady in red) and you can see our President Mr. Shimon Peres (the only guy with a tie).

The last time I had such close encounter with an Israeli political personality it was with the back then prime minister Menachem Begin in 1981. You can read about my encounter with the prime minister Begin at a previous blog post here.

Continuing on Mashina

Continuing my investigation on the roots of Mashina’s song Night train to Cairo, I found the following rare footage believed to be the origin of the song:

I warned you that this song is addictive and gets stuck in your mind.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about read the previous blog post

A Night at the Party – Mashina Unplugged !