Articles about 'Israel'
May 10th, 2013
Debra wrote asking for help with a Yiddish rhyme:
The following has been passed down through the ages (at least 150 years) by my mothers family, though we can only guess what the words mean now or the correct spelling of the words. I am hoping you may recognize it or be able to decipher it...
May 10th, 2013
Jeff wrote asking for help with a Yiddish song. Here’s his email:
Hi,
I grew up reciting a Yiddish rhyme or song where we pinched the skin on the back of each others hands and bobbed them up and down while saying something like (and I’m just writing what it sounded like):
"Sipicle sipicle amadal, kimsimir and kamadal,...
February 20th, 2013
When my son was born, my husband’s grandmother asked if she could tie a red ribbon to the bottom of his crib. This was to ward off the "evil eye" and keep away bad luck.
Some people wear a red string or bracelet on their left hand to ward off the "evil eye" too. The red...
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February 17th, 2012
Open Culture has a page of free language learning links covering 40 languages.
Here are some of the languages you can find links for…
Arabic, English, Chinese, French, Spanish, Bulgarian, Catalan, Danish, Dutch, Esperanto, Finnish, Gaelic, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Lithuanian, Luxembourgish, Maori, Norwegian, Portuguese, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Swahili,...
December 18th, 2011
Jewish children play the dreidel game for Hanukkah. Dreidels are tops with four Hebrew letters on them – one each side of the dreidel. The letters are nun, gimel, hay, and shin.
Legend has it that dreidels originated from a time when the Jewish people were forbidden to practice their religion. The game was invented...
December 7th, 2010
What a great idea to make candy dreidels for Hanukkah! They’re dreidels made out of marshmallows, with candy kisses attached using Nutella as "glue". Then dipped in chocolate with a mini pretzel stick as the handle. Check out the recipe at The Shiksa in the Kitchen Blog.
Many thanks to Corrine Lewack for pointing out...
November 30th, 2010
Latkes (potato pancakes) are the food of choice for Hanukkah. That’s because they’re typically cooked in oil and oil is an important symbol for Hanukkah. The problem is that cooking latkes in all that oil is very unhealthy. It’s also time consuming to deep-fry them individually. This year I was determined to come up...
November 28th, 2010
Hanukkah is coming soon. Here are links to some Hanukkah songs, videos, recipes and gift ideas we’ve posted in the past…
Happy Chanukah!
Mama Lisa
Original Photo: Wikipedia (edited by Mama Lisa)
July 30th, 2010
Librivox just released another bunch of recordings of fairy tales in various languages, including Hungarian, Russian, German, English, Italian and Portuguese (with links to the text of each tale). This is the 3rd collection they’ve posted.
Fairy Tale Collection #1 also includes recordings in Latvian, Danish, Romanian, Yiddish and French. You can also...
March 29th, 2010
Go Down Moses and Dayenu are well-known Passover Songs.
Go Down Moses has its origins in an African American spiritual from the time of slavery. What’s interesting is that the slaves chose the story of Passover to express their situation. Now Jewish people sing it for Passover.
Here’s a Passover version of Go Down Moses…
Dayenu...
December 12th, 2009
Here’s a Hanukkah song called I’m a Little Latke with a YouTube video…
I’m a Little Latke
I’m a little latke, round and brown,
Here is my upside, here is my down.
When I am all ready, take a bite,
And eat me up on Hanukkah night.
Happy Hanukkah!
Mama Lisa
Come see our other posts on Hanukkah Songs…
December 7th, 2009
We celebrate many holidays in our house! That’s why I was just checking when Hanukkah is this year. I found out it’s December 11 to December 19. (You can tell I’m behind with my holiday planning!)
I have tons of sweet potatoes from the CSA we belong to (where we get veggies...
September 19th, 2009
Today is Rosh Hashanah… the Jewish New Year. Much about the holiday centers around the theme of having a sweet year.
One of the greetings for Rosh Hashanah is “Shana tova umetukah”, which is Hebrew for “A good and sweet year”.
Apples and honey are served as a symbol of a sweet year. People dip...
April 15th, 2009
Matzo brei means fried matzo in Yiddish. The traditional way to make it is with a lot of matzo – you generally use equal eggs to matzo. Jewish people eat it around Passover. Savory Matzo Brei is salty. There’s a different recipe for Sweet Matzo Brei.
You can put whatever you like into savory matzo...
April 15th, 2009
I’ll give the recipe here for a matzo omelet. It’s inspired by the dish called Matzo brei. There’s a little story behind this and I’ll tell it in a moment. Matzo brei means fried matzo. The traditional way to make it is with a lot of matzo – you generally use equal eggs to...
April 13th, 2009
Matzo Brei means fried matzo in Yiddish. This is a good dish to make near Passover. That’s when most Jewish people eat it. I’d suggest trying it even if you’re not Jewish. Here’s one good reason: Matzoh is always on sale around Passover and there’s tons of it in the store. How can you...
April 8th, 2009
One Passover tradition that children love is "Hide the Matzoh". An adult hides a piece of matzo that’s wrapped in a cloth napkin or put in a baggie. Then the children try to find it. Whoever finds the matzoh gets a prize. The prize is often chocolate money (gelt) or real money (like a dollar).
“Hide...
February 22nd, 2009
We’d love it if you’d join the Mama Lisa Facebook Group. You can post anything you’d like about your culture. You can post your own musical recordings or YouTube videos… Links to culture and musical sites… Photos of your country… Questions about songs or cultural issues… Anything related to World Culture and...
January 25th, 2009
Martin wrote:
Hello from a sunny but quite COLD New York City!
I am wondering if anyone knows the answer to this. Not being too knowledgeable about the Belarusian language, I’m assuming that this song my maternal grandmother used to sing to me when I was in my single digits was in Russian or...
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