Shopping for Shabbat in Machaneh Yehudah

A second helping of the feast that is Jerusalem:

Yes, we went, accompanied by jet lag (apparently suffering jet lag is, ahem, inversely proportional to one's age), and survived the Shabbes-shopping crowd for almost forty minutes, after which we retreated back to the apartment and I went to the local supermarket to shop for the many things we didn't get in Machaneh Yehudah. The overwhelming sensory experience is almost too much for anyone accustomed to the formalism of North American supermarkets, restaurants, fast-food establishments and vending machines. In Machaneh Yehudah everything is so personal and so entwined with the lives, sounds, and presence of the people who sell, stock the shelves, and pull customers from the "street".  It personalizes the exchange between the hungry and those who sell the food, makes the experience an intimate exchange. But it is really overwhelming with its noise, its crowds, and its scents.

Needless to say, the area surrounding the market is now remarkably more urban than it was on my first visit forty years ago. The signage  for the return of the Messiah (courtesy of our friends in Lubavitch) is everywhere, and there are tzedakah collections taking place everywhere (how can you start Shabbat without performing the mitzvah of tzedakah?), including at least three clusters of high school students whose accompanied singing is a sweet invitation to help them collect for their high school's class visit to the US next fall.

I asked one when they would be in New York City -- and the dates overlapped the Post-Bar Mitzvah class trip that is tentatively scheduled for late October or early November.  I doubt we actually will meet in the balcony of B'nai Jeshurun for Kabbalat Shabbat services, but wouldn't that be an amazing shidduch (match) made for the class.

My solo venture to the supermarket in the height of the afternoon heat --- before everything shuts down for Shabbat -- is quick, and the purchases modest. I haul three shopping bags uphill on the return trip, kicking myself for not bringing that bottle of water that Laurelle urged me to carry. At the peak of the hill in the park, I sit down and watch the urban cats and birds play at surviving each other.  The scent of the city is here, and its silence (though there is a man yelling at his child for an unmentioned act of shtuyot -- and the child's escalating response, "Ani mitzta'er m'od. M'od.  Mitzta'er m'od m'od." "I'm very sorry. Very.  Very very sorry."

I say a little prayer for the relief of both parent and child to permit them both to enter Shabbat. Then I resume the return to the apartment, having secretly facilitated a moment of reconciliation. Maybe it will be a more peaceful Sabbath for them both.

So now we're readying for Shabbat -- sunshine pouring through the windows, the air conditioning making like Winnipeg, and Laurelle and Keithen sleeping away the afternoon.

I wish you all a beautiful Shabbat!

Rabbi Larry Pinsker