Werd to the Wise.

CHECK ME OUT.

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 22:23:00 -0400

Hey Tumblr Friendz,

Check out my new website! And You Shall Tell is an online archive of interviews and portraits exploring the Jewish, New Yorkish world.

DO IT, and then, of course, pass it on to someone else who might DO IT.

Best,
Rachel

Oh hiiiiiiiiiii. masaisraelcommunity: By Rachel Smith, Tikkun...

Wed, 12 Jun 2013 22:10:38 -0400

Oh hiiiiiiiiiii.

masaisraelcommunity:

By Rachel Smith, Tikkun Olam in Tel Aviv-Jaffa

After graduating and feeling like I’d overdosed on anthropological theory but was lacking in real world experiences, I knew I wanted to travel. I moved to Abu Dhabi to work for a year as a Teaching Assistant at NYU Abu Dhabi, where I was also involved in building Jewish community and the NYUAD Writing Center.

This experience brought my Jewish identity to the fore. To explore it further, I moved to Jaffa, Israel for a study and volunteer fellowship. While spending a year on the Masa program, Tikkun Olam in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, I taught English and volunteered in education reform with HILA for Equality in Education. During this time, I lived with Jews from Colombia, Mexico, France, Hungary, and Israel, and realized that being Jewish meant something different to each of us.

When I came back to New York, I saw this magnified within the scale of a single city, inspiring me to apply for a PresenTense fellowship. My venture, And You Shall Tell, brings together interviews and portrait photography to document Jewish diversity in the city, and gives users the tools to record and share their own stories. Over the past few months, PresenTense has taught me how ideas are grown and how to grow ideas. They’ve helped me launch this venture, which combines my academic training in anthropology, my passion for Jewish diversity, and my love of New York. While New York is an ideal starting point, my goal is for the website to eventually expand to include other Jewish communities from across the country, and ideally from all over the world.

Originally from Philadelphia, Rachel moved to New York when she began studying Anthropology at NYU. After five years of studies, a year workingat NYU in Abu Dhabi, and a year in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, she’s now back in New York and putting her degree to good use. Her new venture, And You Shall Tell, is an online archive of interviews and portraits exploring the Jewish, New Yorkish world.

On How I Started Thinking Babies Might Not Be Awful

Sat, 25 May 2013 08:34:14 -0400

Tonight my brother became a father. At 9:25 PM, Facebook alerted me to a new status update that I was now an aunt. There she was, with hair, wrapped up in a blanket. The hair, my grandma told me, was very good. Apparently, “bald babies are harder to work with.” I agreed, although I couldn’t remember ever looking at any babies and remembering if they had hair or not, which was pretty indicative of my thoughts on babies.

I’ve always tread the middle ground with them, feeling simultaneously repulsed and amazed by it all. I get grossed out thinking about giving birth and placenta and dilation. When I found out a few years ago about the existence of afterbirth, I nearly choked. Somewhere deep down, I know the process is pretty amazing, but it gets covered up by the mess of fluids and post-birth diapers. And babies themselves. They spit and poop everywhere. They’re pretty needy. They’re not great conversation partners. Though for seeming so stupid, I’m amazed by how smart they are. They can discern more sounds than you or I can, and they have an intuitive moral compass that many adults seem to lack. Even though I know this, I never got fully onboard with the whole miracle of life thing. I don’t feel warm and fuzzy looking at pictures of babies. Especially newborns, which have always looked to me like oversized, fleshy, pink raisins. I’d never even held a baby until I was 20 years-old and volunteering in an orphanage in Ghana. And I haven’t held one since. I guess I’d say that I don’t not like babies.

But as I spent the afternoon thinking about my sister-in-law in the hospital about to pop one out, I couldn’t help but feel excited. I’ve known for months that she was pregnant, but I only really thought about it for the first time this afternoon. I thought about how the baby’s eyes would open for the first time. I thought about how little her fingernails would be. How we had all been waiting for her, and how loved she was before she was even born. I sat on a bench in City Hall park during my lunch break, ate my Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich, thought about babies, and cried.

For the first time in my life, I decided that babies might just be OK. One day, a person will come out of me. And I will feel it kicking me, and it will be attached by its belly button. And then it will exit my body through my vagina and into the wonderful world. Babies may be covered in regurgitated peas and spend their days sitting in their own shit, but they’re still miracles. Fleshy, pink miracles.

Ideal lists of ideas for idealists.

Sun, 10 Mar 2013 10:56:42 -0400

The idealist.org offices located in an anonymous building in midtown, Manhattan are home to one of the most well-known websites today. If you haven’t heard of idealist, you’ve probably never worked with or for a non-profit. Idealist is the nexus of non-profit resources for employment and networking. Their site includes job, intern, and volunteer postings; upcoming programs and events; and profiles on people and organizations.

Idealist was born in the early 1990s, during a time before the internet was what it is today. It was a time when very few people had actually heard of the internet, let alone used it. “It was like trying to sell TV guide to people without televisions,” Ami Dar, founder of idealist says. The site, which is essentially a network of linked sites, was founded before search engines were designed. “You couldn’t search anything online. We had to just click on links until we found the sites we were looking for.” Almost twenty years later, the site has developed into the online hub of non-profit opportunities.

But it wasn’t always this way. Dar says that up until he was 25, he had “accomplished nothing.” He floated through the typical Israeli trajectory of completing his army service and traveling. When he took a job working for a friend in the early 1990s, he discovered the wonders of the internet. He saw in it powerful potential to answer a question he had wrestled with throughout his life: how to move people from intention to action.

Dar says that if you ask people what keeps them from making a difference, they all say the same 50 or 60 things, whether they’re thinking of potholes in the street or civil conflict in Syria. He finds that all excuses fall into the categories of time, money, power, fear of failure, feeling helpless or hopeless.

While idealist is one means of working to solve this, Dar sees a much more complicated picture, with three main issues coming to the fore.

First, how do we find real connection in life? “We are overnetworked and underfriended. We think we’re connected, but we’re not. We don’t even know our own neighbors.” Once a year, idealist invites everyone in the building to lunch in their offices. “If you don’t smoke, you may never see these people. And we all work all day together in the same building.”

Second, how do ideas travel? “Before the internet, things were completely different.” Voices had to be louder, actions more drastic. He points to the case of Ted Kaczynski who threatened terrorism unless the New York Times published his ideas. “Today, the unibomber would just be a blogger.” How do we spread ideas today? How can we harness the internet to spread the word about building a global network to connect how to connect intention with action, people with people, and spread ideas?

But perhaps the most resounding question is how to move people from online to offline. “How do you inspire people to stand up and get out there? How can we help move people to act on the issues they care about?”

Dar leans back in his chair and sighs. “With the internet, everyone knows everything. You just have to go and do it.”

What Does It Remember Like?

Sun, 06 Jan 2013 11:03:04 -0500

“Jews have six senses: touch, taste, sight, smell, hearing … memory. While Gentiles experience and process the world through the traditional senses, and use memory only as a second-order means of interpreting events, for Jews memory is no less primary than the prick of a pin, or its silver glimmer, or the taste of the blood it pulls from the finger. The Jew is pricked by a pin and remembers other pins. It is only by tracing the pinprick back to other pinpricks – when his mother tried to fix his sleeve while his arm was still in it, when his grandfather’s fingers fell asleep from stroking his great-grandfather’s damp forehead, when Abraham tested the knife point to be sure Isaac would feel no pain – that the Jew is able to know why it hurts. When a Jew encounters a pin, he asks: What does it remember like?”

-JSF

How Good It Is

Thu, 22 Nov 2012 10:30:00 -0500

It’s easy to forget how lucky we are sometimes, to get upset and angry about things that won’t actually matter next week, next month, next year. Time for a step back to think about what does matter this Thanksgiving.

I’m so thankful for my parents. Saying that they are “the shit” would be a vast understatement. They support, they encourage, they inspire. I think I’m slowly becoming more like them the older I get, and I think that I might be ok with that.

I’m thankful for the opportunities I’ve had by virtue of my skin color and socioeconomic class, being born where I was, when I was, to whom I was. I am so thankful for the luxuries of going to school where I want, to study what I want, to travel where I want, and work in what I want.

I’m thankful for my schvestie-bestie. There’s something pretty amazing about having family you’re close to and there’s something pretty fabulous about great friends and when those forces combine, you’re just left with a whole lot of amazing fabulosity.

I’m thankful for this ceasefire that will hopefully end this conflict that has unfolded in Gaza and the internets, pitting us against each other in a nausea-inducing “for us or against us” mentality, and lead the way to a more productive solution.

I’m thankful for food, that we can eat enough food tonight that will leave us all in comas on the living room couch, and not think twice about it. I’m thankful that I’ve never needed to think twice about it.

I am thankful for my Tribe, who have taught me who I am and where I’m from. Among other things, I am thankful for their help in leaving Egypt, their teachings and words of wisdom, and their scholarships to live in Israel.

I’m thankful for trees and other green things. I always forget how much I like them until I flee New York for greener pastures. Sometimes I need the the reminder that we weren’t here first. Oh, and for the oxygen they give us. Maybe that’s why people in New York are so crazy.

I’m thankful for the revival of the MTA post-Sandy. I’ve never loved the JMZ train more (though more accurately, I had never loved it at all). I’m thankful for those professionals behind it all who got our city running again, and the everyday people who gave their hearts, time and energy when it was needed most. But let’s not relegate Sandy to our two-week timeframe of caring and forget that volunteers are still needed.

I’m thankful for finding those who cross the lines we draw between friends, family, mentors, colleagues. I’m thankful for colleagues who are friends, friends who are mentors, and mentors who are family. They keep me sane, grounded, and growing, and for that, I am forever thankful.

Wishing everyone a happy Thanksgiving.

"Drawing a Crooked Line Between Right and Wrong"

Wed, 31 Oct 2012 14:04:16 -0400

"Drawing a Crooked Line Between Right and Wrong":

From my brilliant friend Salama—taking a look at some of the deeper effects of NYU in Abu Dhabi.

Dear New York,

Mon, 29 Oct 2012 15:14:00 -0400

New York, I’ve missed you. I’ve missed the corner bodegas and music in the streets, the all night traffic, the seasons. I missed you more than I ever thought I would. I guess that’s why I’m back.

I wasn’t sure I’d be back. I thought I’d had enough of my world here. I’d grown out of the village. So I found a new world.

Brooklyn, I do believe I love you. You are everything I needed you to be. You’re different, grittier, harder. Now, let’s see what you can do.

Sukkah on the go.

Mon, 15 Oct 2012 16:46:25 -0400

Sukkah on the go.

Back in Brooklyn and feeling fine.

Tue, 02 Oct 2012 13:42:29 -0400

Back in Brooklyn and feeling fine.

Tikva Levi, Remembered

Mon, 06 Aug 2012 20:58:36 -0400

This past week, I learned of the passing of Tikva Levi, the director of the NGO Hila for Equality in Education, an organization where I volunteered throughout my year in Tel Aviv. I was so fortunate to have met her and become involved in her work. It soon became clear to me how important her work was, how great a need there was for it, how many peoples lives she had affected. Tikva was fierce. She stood up for what she believed in and she fought for it. Throughout her life, she struggled for herself and later for others. Here is an interview I did with her in the spring. We listen, we record, we remember.

An interview with Tikva Levi, Director of Hila

I’ve been the director of Hila for 25 years, since finishing my degree in Hebrew literature. When I was a student, I was active in social justice issues and looked for work in the field. Hila had just started and I began to work there and really felt like I had found my place. I had grown up in a neighborhood of activists in Ashkelon and there I really saw that only four or five students from my grade in elementary school finished high school with their bagrut (matriculation exams) and from what I know, I was the only one who made it to university. This situation did not seem logical or just. There is no reason why others exactly like me did not receive the same opportunity to obtain higher education and advance in life.

The main thing that I liked about Hila was their work with parents. We don’t make changes in the system as an organization versus the system. We empower parents so that the change will also come from them, in two ways: First, change in the home. The parents will create a good learning environment and do simple things like sign up for a library card to encourage their children. The second type of change will come from giving parents the information, tools, and strength to make changes themselves in their communities and schools. I know that this is longer and exhausting but I don’t believe in “instant revolutions.” You must go step by step, house by house, and community by community. That is the most important thing that Hila does. We try to give people the strength to change and give them the tools to make that change. We don’t see ourselves as people making change for the parents because the moment we leave, we don’t want things to go back to how they were so we must put tools for change in the hands of the parents.

Hila is open to opportunities. In the beginning, we did courses for parents, later we developed private consultation. Hila became one of the most well-known organizations because of our parent struggles against unfair and unsubstantiated referrals to special education. There were times when at the start of every school year, 50-60 parents would be up in arms and wouldn’t send their children to schools because they were forced into special education classes. Some kept their children at home for over a year. There were many struggles and Supreme Court cases and as a result the Ministry of Education released new regulations that emphasized parent rights in the allocation to special education. For example, up until 1996 parents were not allowed to access written material, i.e. psychological tests and school assessments on their children, in the placement committees,. So we took it to the courts! We argued that this just cannot be; it is like a person being held in jail without knowing his sentence!

This was one of the prominent achievements in the 1990s, in addition to cutting in half the number of children in special education from over 60,000 to 32,000. Today we’re coping with the same issues we’ve been dealing with in the past but now with other, additional things. We are fighting battles that we did not have in the past like the conversion of public schools to private schools. It is a big struggle but we are fighting this battle with teachers and so we often succeed. In Maale Iron, for example, a number of Arab villages in the north succeeded in keeping their school from privatizing. In other places, we work with parents who must pay increasing school fees, which is another part of increasing privatization. The whole idea of free education is a joke because parents are now paying hundreds of shekels to schools, especially in religious schools. Today we are also dealing with increasingly problematic selection processes. Before, when students lagged behind in class they could do the same year again but now children are divided into tracks in kindergarten already according to psychological examinations and teacher reports. And the bagrut (matriculation diploma) are more confusing. Which topics and how many points in each topic and which track will it qualify for. Students themselves need much more information and tools because a good bagrut is needed to qualify for university. These are not equal opportunities at all.

The future? I’m not sure, because from the perspective of the government policy, it does not look like things are advancing and not just in education but in all aspects. Things are getting worse. There are schools for the poor and schools for the rich and this cycle will just continue and worsen. But I hope that we at Hila and other organizations also working in social justice will succeed in getting more people engaged, people who are not content with this situation. People who will say stop! This is what I hope.

Like Leave It To Beaver, Only Drunk

Mon, 06 Aug 2012 20:53:50 -0400

People are sometimes shocked when I tell them I’ve lived in some comparatively bizarre places like Accra, the capitol of Ghana and Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. They give me a blank stare tinged with confusion as if to say, “but why?” After this summer, I can now say that Princeton, New Jersey feels no less bizarre.

When I first moved to Princeton, I felt like I was living on the movie set for Pleasantville or Leave It To Beaver. The hedges are trimmed, the lawns manicured, the flowers in bloom, the birds chirping. Children play in front yards and there are ice cream stores on every block. People smile as they drive by, call out greetings to their neighbors. They even stop for you when you’re walking.

It was a hard transition from Jaffa to Princeton. I hated it at first. I missed the noise of Jaffa, the music of Jaffa, the people of Jaffa. I missed the pounding subwoofers and the call to prayer, the people yelling from their windows, the nightly fireworks, the horses interspersed with cars. I missed hearing tangles of Hebrew and Arabic and English. Princeton could not have felt further away. Everything is clean and quiet and controlled, and everyone is whiter than White-Out.

But once I started to settle in, I began to really see Princeton. It’s pretty. I forgot how pretty trees are. It’s nice to bike around without someone almost running you over at every corner. And the people are real. The ice cream stores are only outnumbered by liquor stores. I heard a neighbor threatening to call the police over her next-door neighbor’s dog continually shitting on her front stoop. That’s real life and I like that.

I won’t miss living in Princeton but do appreciate the reminder of the value in a deeper look. Onto Philly and then next stop, Brooklyn. Stay tuned.

تاةانا our jaffa.

Sun, 08 Jul 2012 17:15:00 -0400

تاةانا

our jaffa.

From Jaffa to Princeton

Sat, 07 Jul 2012 21:43:16 -0400

I miss it. I didn’t think I would miss it this much but I do.

I miss the diversity even if no one got along. Everyone here is white. I mean white. Waspo Americana White.

I miss the trashcats. Squirrels now look emaciated to me.

I miss the burekas and the beach and the sand that got everywhere.

I miss the jingle at supershuk. Now I get lost in massive grocery stores with aisles only for ice cream. I miss the variety of barely distinguishable dairy products, that dairy and fruits and vegetables actually tasted like something, that the pitas filled the bags with condensation.

I miss that everyone’s all up in each other’s business because that’s what they do. I don’t like that everyone here ignores each other, that houses are so far apart.

I miss the shouts of NAHAGGGG to open the back door, the tachless and the dugri and the davka, telling it like it is.

I miss the Call to Prayer. It is so quiet here. Way too quiet.

I miss hearing Hebrew. A lot. I miss the linguistic jumping jacks flipping between languages. I hate that I get excited when I see it now because it’s no longer part of my everyday life.

I miss that my toothpaste said “Happy and Kosher Passover,” that they served blintzes in the hospital and have a menorah in the airport.

I miss it. Romanticizing a bit? Of course.

Onto the next chapter. Ok, Princeton. Let’s see what you can do.

Reflection on GIRLS:

Wed, 13 Jun 2012 16:48:34 -0400

Spanish philosopher Jose Ortega y Gasset noted how “youth, because it is not yet anything determinate and irrevocable, is everything potentially. Herein lies its charm and its insolence. Feeling that it is everything potentially, it supposes that it is everything actually.”

Just another day at Jaffa beach

Wed, 13 Jun 2012 15:56:00 -0400

wine tasting in the Judean hills at the hidden gems of Agur,...

Wed, 13 Jun 2012 15:09:00 -0400

vineyards at Tzuba.

wine press from 500 BCE.

by the barrel, please.

notes of oak, apricot, and bouge.

living the good life.

wine tasting in the Judean hills at the hidden gems of Agur , Tzora, and Tzuba wineries. getting more bougie by the day.

“I don’t grow grapes. I grow wines. It is a prospective process. I don’t know what the temperature will be, what the microbes will do. We can never know. You can manipulate wine but like with your hands tied” -Shuki, Agur Winery.

I'M FAMOUS OH.EM.GEE!

Tue, 12 Jun 2012 17:15:22 -0400

From Humans of Tel Aviv, one of my favorite blog series, “Humans of…”

Disclaimer: this was for TLV Pride

Humans of Tel Aviv:

Rachel is from New York, and has been living in Israel for the past year. For her, the big difference between Tel Aviv and New York is the amazing beach. she love Israeli guys with a brown tan, Sabich, and she volunteers in a school in Jaffa teaching English to little kids.

p.s.

I spotted Rachel (frankly how can’t you?) on the Zebra cross miles away. When I approached her I started to explain that i have a page on Facebook called: “Humans of…” but I couldn’t even finish the sentence… Rachel gave me a big hug: “I know you - Humans of Tel Aviv..”— at Tel Aviv Allenby Street.”

Tel Aviv Pride: A Gay Ol’ Time

Sun, 10 Jun 2012 14:22:50 -0400

Tel Aviv Pride: A Gay Ol’ Time

STAR RADIO Sale and advanced repair service for radios, stereos,...

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 06:28:50 -0400

STAR RADIO

Sale and advanced repair service for radios, stereos, and color televisions.

Electronic parts and accessories.

91 King George, Tel Aviv.